Rose Hips vs Blueberries – Which is Healthier?

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Our Verdict

When comparing rose hips to blueberries, we picked the rose hips.

Why?

Both of these fruits are abundant sources of antioxidants and other polyphenols, but one of them stands out for overall nutritional density:

In terms of macros, rose hips have about 2x the carbohydrates, and/but about 10x the fiber. That’s an easy calculation and a clear win for rose hips.

When it comes to vitamins, rose hips have a lot more of vitamins A, B2, B3, B5, B6, C, E, K, and choline. On the other hand, blueberries boast more of vitamins B1 and B9. That’s a 9:2 lead for rose hips, even before we consider rose hips’ much greater margins of difference (kicking off with 80x the vitamin A, for instance, and many multiples of many of the others).

In the category of minerals, rose hips have a lot more calcium, copper, iron, magnesium, manganese, phosphorus, potassium, and zinc. Meanwhile, blueberries are not higher in any minerals.

In short: as ever, enjoy both, but if you’re looking for nutritional density, there’s a clear winner here and it’s rose hips.

Want to learn more?

You might like to read:

It’s In The Hips: Rosehip’s Benefits, Inside & Out

Take care!

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  • Oats vs Pearl Barley – Which is Healthier?

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    Our Verdict

    When comparing oats to pearl barley, we picked the oats.

    Why?

    In terms of macronutrients first, pearl barley has about three times the carbs for only the same amount of protein and fiber—if it had been regular barley rather than pearl parley, it’d have about twice the fiber, but pearl barley has had the fibrous husk removed.

    Vitamins really set the two part, though: oats have a lot more (60x more) vitamin A, and notably more of vitamins B1, B2, B3, B5, B6, and B9, as well as 6x more vitamin E. In contrast, pearl barley has a little more vitamin K and choline. An easy win for oats in this section.

    In the category of minerals, oats have over 6x more calcium, 3x more iron, and a little more magnesium, manganese, and phosphorus. Meanwhile, pearl barley boats a little more copper, potassium, selenium, and zinc. So, a more moderate win for oats in this category.

    They are both very good for the gut, unless you have a gluten intolerance/allergy, in which case, oats are the only answer here since pearl barley, as per barley in general, has gluten as its main protein (oats, meanwhile, do not contain gluten, unless by cross-contamination).

    Adding up all the sections, this one’s a clear win for oats.

    Want to learn more?

    You might like to read:

    Take care!

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  • Osteoporosis & Exercises: Which To Do (And Which To Avoid)

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    It’s Q&A Day at 10almonds!

    Have a question or a request? You can always hit “reply” to any of our emails, or use the feedback widget at the bottom!

    In cases where we’ve already covered something, we might link to what we wrote before, but will always be happy to revisit any of our topics again in the future too—there’s always more to say!

    As ever: if the question/request can be answered briefly, we’ll do it here in our Q&A Thursday edition. If not, we’ll make a main feature of it shortly afterwards!

    So, no question/request too big or small

    ❝Any idea about the latest research on the most effective exercises for osteoporosis?❞

    While there isn’t much new of late in this regard, there is plenty of research!

    First, what you might want to avoid:

    • Sit-ups, and other exercises with a lot of repeated spinal flexion
    • Running, and other high-impact exercises
    • Skiing, horse-riding, and other activities with a high risk of falling
    • Golf and tennis (both disproportionately likely to result in injuries to wrists, elbows, and knees)

    Next, what you might want to bear in mind:

    While in principle resistance training is good for building strong bones, good form becomes all the more important if you have osteoporosis, so consider working with a trainer if you’re not 100% certain you know what you’re doing:

    Strong, steady and straight: UK consensus statement on physical activity and exercise for osteoporosis

    Some of the best exercises for osteoporosis are isometric exercises:

    5 Isometric Exercises for Osteoporosis (with textual explanations and illustrative GIFs)

    You might also like this bone-strengthening exercise routine from corrective exercise specialist Kendra Fitzgerald:

    Enjoy!

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  • Ready… Set… Flow!

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    Time to make your new year plans? Or maybe you’ve already made a list, and you’re checking it twice. If so, now’s the time to make sure that your new year’s plans will flow:

    “Flow”, as you may be aware, is the psychological state generally defined as “a state in which we feel good about what we’re doing, and just keep doing it, at a peak performance level”; the term was coined by psychologist Mihaly Csikszentmihalyi and has risen to popularity since.

    We wrote about it a little before, here:

    Morning Routines That Just Flow

    The above article details how to start the perfect day, but how to start the perfect year? Firstly, it’s good to get the jump on the new year a little; see:

    The Science Of New Year’s Pre-Resolutions

    …and we also agree with Dr. Faye Bate, who preaches taking the path of least resistance when it comes to healthy habits:

    How To Actually Start A Healthy Lifestyle In The New Year

    Because…

    Getting into the flow

    The most hydrating drink is the one that [contains adequate water and] you will actually drink. The best exercise is the one you’ll do. The best sleep is the sleep you can actually get. And so on.

    We see this—or rather its evil counterpoint—a lot in diet culture. People frame their willpower against the temptations of donuts and whatever, and make Faustian bargains whereby they will eat food they find boring in the hopes it will bring them good health. And it won’t. Because, they’ll give up quickly.

    Instead, each part of our healthy life has to be engaged with with a sense of flow. Again, that’s: “a state in which we feel good about what we’re doing, and just keep doing it, at a peak performance level”

    So we need to find healthy recipes we like (check out our recipe section!), we need to find exercise that we like, we need to find an approach to sleep that the Geneva Convention wouldn’t consider a kind a torture, and so forth. And, ideally, not just “like” in the sense of “this is tolerable” but “like” in the sense of “I am truly passionate about this thing”.

    And that’s going to look different for each of us.

    Running is a great example of something that some people truly love, whereas others will do almost anything to avoid.

    And food? We’ve written before about the usefulness of a “to don’t” list; it’s like a “to do” list, but it’s things we’re not going to even try to do. For example, a person with two addictions is usually advised to quit one at a time, so quitting the other would go on a “to don’t” list for now. The same goes for food; you need to enjoy what you’re eating or you won’t “feel good about what we’re doing, and just keep doing it”, per flow. So, do not deprive yourself; it won’t work anyway; just pick one healthy change to make, and then queue up any other changes for once the first one has started feeling natural to you.

    For more on “to don’t” lists and other such tricks, see: How To Keep On Keeping On… Long Term!

    Staying in the flow

    …is not usually a problem, you would think, because “…and just keep doing it, at peak performance level” but the fact is, sometimes we get kicked out of our flow by something external. We covered some of that in the above-linked “How To Keep On Keeping On” article, such as figuring out showstoppers in advance (for example, “if I get an injury, I will rest until it is healed”) and ideally, back-up plans.

    For example, let’s say you have your dietary plan all worked out, then you are invited to someone’s birthday celebration a couple of weeks in, and you don’t want to rain on their parade, so you figure out for yourself in advance how you are going to mitigate any harm to your plans, e.g. “I will simply choose the healthiest option available, and not worry if it doesn’t meet my usual standards” or “I will simply fast” if that’s an appropriate thing for you (for some it might be, for some it might not be).

    For more on this, see:

    How To Avoid Slipping Into (Bad) Old Habits

    Take care!

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  • Peas vs Green Beans – Which is Healthier?
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    10almonds is reader-supported. We may, at no cost to you, receive a portion of sales if you purchase a product through a link in this article.

    Q&A with 10almonds Subscribers!

    Q: Any tips, other than supplements, for improving memory?

    A: So many tips! Certainly enough to do a main feature on, so again maybe we’ll do that in another issue soon. Meanwhile, here are the absolute most critical things for you to know, understand, and apply:

    • Memory is a muscle. Not literally, but in the sense that it will grow stronger if exercised and will atrophy if neglected.
    • Counterpart of the above: your memory is not a finite vessel. You can’t “fill it up with useless things”, so no need to fear doing so.
    • Your memory is the product of countless connections in your brain. The more connections lead to a given memory, the more memorable it will be. What use is this knowledge to you? It means that if you want to remember something, try to make as many connections to it as possible, so:
      • Involve as many senses as possible.
      • When you learn things, try to learn them in context. Then when your mind has reason to think about the context, it’ll be more likely to remember the thing itself too.
    • Rehearsal matters. A lot. This means repeatedly going over something in your head. This brings about the neural equivalent of “muscle memory”.
    • Enjoy yourself if you can. The more fun something is, the more you will mentally rehearse it, and the more mental connections you’ll make to it.

    Have a question you’d like to see answered here? Hit reply to this email, or use the feedback widget at the bottom! We always love to hear from you

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  • The Truth About Vaccines

    10almonds is reader-supported. We may, at no cost to you, receive a portion of sales if you purchase a product through a link in this article.

    The Truth About Vaccines

    Yesterday we asked your views on vaccines, and we got an interesting spread of answers. Of those who responded to the poll, most were in favour of vaccines. We got quite a lot of comments this time too; we can’t feature them all, but we’ll include extracts from a few in our article today, as they raised interesting points!

    Vaccines contain dangerous ingredients that will harm us more than the disease would: True or False?

    False, contextually.

    Many people are very understandably wary of things they know full well to be toxic, being injected into them.

    One subscriber who voted for “Vaccines are poison, and/or are some manner of conspiracy ” wrote:

    ❝I think vaccines from 50–60 years ago are true vaccines and were safer than vaccines today. I have not had a vaccine for many, many years, and I never plan to have any kind of vaccine/shot again.❞

    They didn’t say why they personally felt this way, but the notion that “things were simpler back in the day” is a common (and often correct!) observation regards health, especially when it comes to unwanted additives and ultraprocessing of food.

    Things like aluminum or mercury in vaccines are much like sodium and chlorine in table salt. Sodium and chlorine are indeed both toxic to us. But in the form of sodium chloride, it’s a normal part of our diet, provided we don’t overdo it.

    Additionally, the amount of unwanted metals (e.g. aluminum, mercury) in vaccines is orders of magnitude smaller than the amount in dietary sources—even if you’re a baby and your “dietary sources” are breast milk and/or formula milk.

    In the case of formaldehyde (an inactivating agent), it’s also the dose that makes the poison (and the quantity in vaccines is truly miniscule).

    This academic paper alone cites more sources than we could here without making today’s newsletter longer than it already is:

    Vaccine Safety: Myths and Misinformation

    I have a perfectly good immune system, it can handle the disease: True or False?

    True! Contingently.

    In fact, our immune system is so good at defending against disease, that the best thing we can do to protect ourselves is show our immune system a dead or deactivated version of a pathogen, so that when the real pathogen comes along, our immune system knows exactly what it is and what to do about it.

    In other words, a vaccine.

    One subscriber who voted for “Vaccines are important but in some cases the side effects can be worse ” wrote:

    ❝In some ways I’m vacd out. I got COVid a few months ago and had no symptoms except a cough. I have asthma and it didn’t trigger a lot of congestion. No issues. I am fully vaccinated but not sure I’ll get one in fall.❞

    We’re glad this subscriber didn’t get too ill! A testimony to their robust immune system doing what it’s supposed to, after being shown a recent-ish edition of the pathogen, in deactivated form.

    It’s very reasonable to start wondering: “surely I’m vaccinated enough by now”

    And, hopefully, you are! But, as any given pathogen mutates over time, we eventually need to show our immune system what the new version looks like, or else it won’t recognize it.

    See also: Why Experts Think You’ll Need a COVID-19 Booster Shot in the Future

    So why don’t we need booster shots for everything? Often, it’s because a pathogen has stopped mutating at any meaningful rate. Polio is an example of this—no booster is needed for most people in most places.

    Others, like flu, require annual boosters to keep up with the pathogens.

    Herd immunity will keep us safe: True or False?

    True! Ish.

    But it doesn’t mean what a lot of people think it means. For example, in the UK, “herd immunity” was the strategy promoted by Prime Minister of the hour, Boris Johnson. But he misunderstood what it meant:

    • What he thought it meant: everyone gets the disease, then everyone who doesn’t die is now immune
    • What it actually means: if most people are immune to the disease (for example: due to having been vaccinated), it can’t easily get to the people who aren’t immune

    One subscriber who voted for “Vaccines are critical for our health; vax to the max! ” wrote:

    ❝I had a chiropractor a few years ago, who explained to me that if the general public took vaccines, then she would not have to vaccinate her children and take a risk of having side effects❞

    Obviously, we can’t speak for this subscriber’s chiropractor’s children, but this raises a good example: some people can’t safely have a given vaccine, due to underlying medical conditions—or perhaps it is not available to them, for example if they are under a certain age.

    In such cases, herd immunity—other people around having been vaccinated and thus not passing on the disease—is what will keep them safe.

    Here’s a useful guide from the US Dept of Health and Human Services:

    How does community immunity (a.k.a. herd immunity) work?

    And, for those who are more visually inclined, here’s a graphical representation of a mathematical model of how herd immunity works (you can run a simulation)!

    Stay safe!

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  • Climate Change Threatens the Mental Well-Being of Youths. Here’s How To Help Them Cope.

    10almonds is reader-supported. We may, at no cost to you, receive a portion of sales if you purchase a product through a link in this article.

    We’ve all read the stories and seen the images: The life-threatening heat waves. The wildfires of unprecedented ferocity. The record-breaking storms washing away entire neighborhoods. The melting glaciers, the rising sea levels, the coastal flooding.

    As California wildfires stretch into the colder months and hurricane survivors sort through the ruins left by floodwaters, let’s talk about an underreported victim of climate change: the emotional well-being of young people.

    A nascent but growing body of research shows that a large proportion of adolescents and young adults, in the United States and abroad, feel anxious and worried about the impact of an unstable climate in their lives today and in the future.

    Abby Rafeek, 14, is disquieted by the ravages of climate change, both near her home and far away. “It’s definitely affecting my life, because it’s causing stress thinking about the future and how, if we’re not addressing the problem now as a society, our planet is going to get worse,” says Abby, a high school student who lives in Gardena, California, a city of 58,000 about 15 miles south of downtown Los Angeles.

    She says wildfires are a particular worry for her. “That’s closer to where I live, so it’s a bigger problem for me personally, and it also causes a lot of damage to the surrounding areas,” she says. “And also, the air gets messed up.”

    In April, Abby took a survey on climate change for kids ages 12-17 during a visit to the emergency room at Children’s Hospital of Orange County.

    Rammy Assaf, a pediatric emergency physician at the hospital, adapted the survey from one developed five years ago for adults. He administered his version last year to over 800 kids ages 12-17 and their caregivers. He says initial results show climate change is a serious cause of concern for the emotional security and well-being of young people.

    Assaf has followed up with the kids to ask more open-ended questions, including whether they believe climate change will be solved in their lifetimes; how they feel when they read about extreme climate events; what they think about the future of the planet; and with whom they are able to discuss their concerns.

    “When asked about their outlook for the future, the first words they will use are helpless, powerless, hopeless,” Assaf says. “These are very strong emotions.”

    Assaf says he would like to see questions about climate change included in mental health screenings at pediatricians’ offices and in other settings where children get medical care. The American Academy of Pediatrics recommends that counseling on climate change be incorporated into the clinical practice of pediatricians and into medical school curriculums, but not with specific regard to mental health screening.

    Assaf says anxiety about climate change intersects with the broader mental health crisis among youth, which has been marked by a rise in depression, loneliness, and suicide over the past decade, though there are recent signs it may be improving slightly.

    A 2022 Harris Poll of 1,500 U.S. teenagers found that 89% of them regularly think about the environment, “with the majority feeling more worried than hopeful.” In addition, 69% said they feared they and their families would be affected by climate change in the near future. And 82% said they expected to have to make key life decisions — including where to live and whether to have children — based on the state of the environment.

    And the impact is clearly not limited to the U.S. A 2021 survey of 10,000 16- to 25-year-olds across 10 countries found “59% were very or extremely worried and 84% were at least moderately worried” about climate change.

    Susan Clayton, chair of the psychology department at the College of Wooster in Ohio, says climate change anxiety may be more pronounced among younger people than adults. “Older adults didn’t grow up being as aware of climate change or thinking about it very much, so there’s still a barrier to get over to accept it’s a real thing,” says Clayton, who co-created the adult climate change survey that Assaf adapted for younger people.

    By contrast, “adolescents grew up with it as a real thing,” Clayton says. “Knowing you have the bulk of your life ahead of you gives you a very different view of what your life will be like.” She adds that younger people in particular feel betrayed by their government, which they don’t think is taking the problem seriously enough, and “this feeling of betrayal is associated with greater anxiety about the climate.”

    Abby believes climate change is not being addressed with sufficient resolve. “I think if we figure out how to live on Mars and explore the deep sea, we could definitely figure out how to live here in a healthy environment,” she says.

    If you are a parent whose children show signs of climate anxiety, you can help.

    Louise Chawla, professor emerita in the environmental design program at the University of Colorado-Boulder, says the most important thing is to listen in an open-ended way. “Let there be space for kids to express their emotions. Just listen to them and let them know it’s safe to express these emotions,” says Chawla, who co-founded the nonprofit Growing Up Boulder, which works with the city’s schools to encourage kids to engage civically, including to help shape their local environment.

    Chawla and others recommend family activities that reinforce a commitment to the environment. They can be as simple as walking or biking and participating in cleanup or recycling efforts. Also, encourage your children to join activities and advocacy efforts sponsored by environmental, civic, or religious organizations.

    Working with others can help alleviate stress and feelings of powerlessness by reassuring kids they are not alone and that they can be proactive.

    Worries about climate change should be seen as a learning opportunity that might even lead some kids to their life’s path, says Vickie Mays, professor of psychology and health policy at UCLA, who teaches a class on climate change and mental health — one of eight similar courses offered recently at UC campuses.

    “We should get out of this habit of ‘everything’s a mental health problem,’” Mays says, “and understand that often a challenge, a stress, a worry can be turned into advocacy, activism, or a reach for new knowledge to change the situation.”

    This article was produced by KFF Health News, which publishes California Healthline, an editorially independent service of the California Health Care Foundation. 

    KFF Health News is a national newsroom that produces in-depth journalism about health issues and is one of the core operating programs at KFF—an independent source of health policy research, polling, and journalism. Learn more about KFF.

    Subscribe to KFF Health News’ free Morning Briefing.

    This article first appeared on KFF Health News and is republished here under a Creative Commons license.

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