These are amazing statistics and should be suppressed. The
world already has too many people and we have a duty to move on , to
make room for the billions waiting to be born.

guardian.co.uk
Meditation 'leads to longer life'
    Being a loner could be bad for your heart

James Meikle, health correspondent
Monday May 2, 2005
The Guardian



The transcendental meditation group had 30% fewer deaths from heart
disease and 49% fewer from cancer.
David Adam, science correspondent
Monday May 2, 2005
The Guardian

The Beatles were right: researchers have found that hanging out with
the Maharishi may make you live longer.
A new study shows that transcendental meditation, a relaxation
technique developed by the Indian guru and made famous when the fab
four dabbled with it in the late 60s, can reduce death rates by nearly
a quarter.

Robert Schneider, who led the research, said: "The study found that in
older people with mild high blood pressure, those practising
transcendental meditation had a 23% lower risk of death from all
causes."

The study was funded by the US government and the results appear in
the American Journal of Cardiology. The study pooled the findings of
two previous trials that followed 202 elderly people in the US over 18
years. Some practised transcendental meditation, while others tried
different techniques, such as progressive muscle relaxation.
The transcendental meditation group had 30% fewer deaths from heart
disease and 49% fewer from cancer.

"Although the sample [size] was relatively modest, these preliminary
results suggest that an effective stress reducing intervention may
decrease mortality," researchers said.

Previous research has found that transcendental meditation can lower
stress hormone levels and blood pressure. "This study builds on that
and shows the final outcome of these physiological and psychological
changes is a longer life span," said Dr Schneider, who heads the
centre of natural medicine and prevention at the Maharishi University
of Management in Iowa.

Being a loner could be bad for your heart - if you are a man, at
least.
Men with few social connections have the highest levels of a blood
marker for inflammation that has been linked to atherosclerosis, the
blocking of the arteries.

Eric Loucks, of the Harvard School of Public Health in Boston,
Massachusetts, said: "It seems to be good for health to have close
friends and family, to be connected to community or religious
organisations, and to have a close partner."His team studied 3,267
people as part of a 50-year monitoring of the population of
Framingham, Massachusetts, which has yielded more than 1,000
scientific papers on heart and other diseases.
The average age of the participants was 62, and they had physical
examinations between 1998 and 2001. Their blood was measured for
concentrations of four markers, including one called interleukin-6, or
IL-6. People gave their marital status, numbers of relatives and close
friends in whom they could confide, as well as information about
involvement in religious meetings or clubs.

Men with the least social involvement had the highest levels of IL-6,
although there was no such link for women, Dr Loucks told the American
Heart Association's conference in Washington. There were no links
between the other blood markers and social involvement. (And further
research was necessary, such as studies on the quality rather than
just number of relationships.)

Researchers have suggested that social isolation may influence "health
behaviour", such as smoking, which in turn affects IL-6 levels, or
that isolated people are often depressed and stressed. Stress can
raise IL-6 levels.