There is good news for smokers; a cigarette is apparently no more harmful for us than a chicken wing.

Or it's bad news for those Paleo diet people - they might as well be smoking cigarettes.

Or if you have seen scare journalism and miracle vegetable claims based on population statistics for more than a few years, you just take the whole thing with a grain of salt (but not too much salt!) and keep doing what you are doing.

NEW YORK (March 4, 2014) -- Terminal cancer patients who receive chemotherapy in the last months of their lives are less likely to die where they want and are more likely to undergo invasive medical procedures than those who do not receive chemotherapy, according to research in this week's BMJ. The findings underscore a disconnect between the type of care many cancer patients say they want and the kind they receive, and highlight the need for clearer and more balanced discussion of the harms and benefits of palliative chemotherapy at the end of life by doctors, patients and families, the study authors say.

This news release is available in German.

They hitchhike with us under the soles of our shoes and muddy car tires. Harsh and cold climates do not seem to stop alien plants from establishing themselves in high altitudes, where they now successfully penetrate the alpine vegetation, according to a study at Umeå University in Sweden and the University of Antwerp, Netherlands.

"Alien plants often gain advantages in their new environment because they lack natural enemies, and in this case the lack of strong competitors amongst alpine plants may be the key to success for generalist native species," says ecologist Ann Milbau, assistant professor at the research station Climate Impacts Research Centre in Abisko, Sweden.

It may seem like social media is a great way to engage people, but outside creating a flash mob of dancers or overthrowing an African dictatorship and replacing it with another one, armchair activists aren't accomplishing much.

'Talk is cheap', the saying goes, and retweets and likes are even cheaper. 

Sardines have been a hot news topic in recent weeks. Environmental groups and others have claimed that the sardine population is collapsing like it did in the mid-1940s. 

The environmental group Oceana has been arguing this point loudly in order to shut down the sardine fishery. That’s why they filed suit in federal court, which is now under appeal, challenging the current sardine management.

A number of people are concerned about BPA in plastics but that is far less warranted than concern about plastics themselves. 

In 1967's "The Graduate", the following conversation took place between an older man and the young protagonist:

McGuire: I just want to say one word to you. Just one word. 
Benjamin: Yes, sir. 
McGuire: Are you listening? 
Benjamin: Yes, I am. 
McGuire: Plastics.

Lower incomes are associated with higher obesity, though lower income in America is very much a relative term. Poor and minority kids lead the country in bedroom television ownership, so being poor in the US is not the same as in other countries.

With over one-third of American children overweight, the search is on to figure out why. Happy Meals get blamed, as do sodas, trans fats and just about everything else.

A new study even blames television - not necessarily how much time is spent watching it, but having it in the bedroom. The paper in JAMA associated a bedroom television with weight gain in children and adolescents, and say it is unrelated to the time they spend watching.