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New York (CBS) -- OBAMA'S TRIP OVERSEAS AND THE MEDIA GLARE
On Barack Obama's multi-nation overseas trip, this is the day he sees Iraq with his own eyes for the first time since January of 2006, before the surge. He's been talking about it, though. In Afghanistan over the weekend, he told Lara Logan of CBS News:
"It's time for us to withdraw some of our combat troops out of Iraq, deploy them here in Afghanistan. And I think we have to seize that opportunity --- now's the time for us to do it," said Illinois Senator Barack Obama to Lara Logan of CBS News.
Obama's trip is getting a lot of media coverage. But he's had more than his share of that since he effectively clinched the Democratic presidential nomination in early June. According to the Tom Rosenstiel's Project for Excellence in Journalism, out of 300 political stories they surveyed in newspapers, magazines and TV ... Obama's been featured in 77% of them, McCain in 51% of them.
"That's an edge. That is a big enough difference that it is an uneven playing field, probably, for McCain," said Tom Rosenstiel, Project for Excellence in Journalism.
With Obama's trip getting most of the attention over the weekend, even John McCain finds himself talking about it.
"Senator Obama announced his strategy for Afghanistan and Iraq before departing on a fact-finding mission that will include visits to both those countries. Apparently, he's confident enough that he won't find any facts that might change his opinion or alter his strategy," said Senator John McCain, Republican of Arizona.
Obama's strategy right now is to call for a beefing up of troops in Afghanistan --- not when he's elected, but right away.
"If we wait until the next Administration, it could be a year before we get those additional troops on the ground here in Afghanistan. And I think that would be a mistake," said Obama.
"International travel is not usually a way for candidates to win the White House. That says something about Obama's needs as a candidate and what the issues are," said Rosenstiel.
TARGETING A PERFORMANCE-ENHANCING DRUG AHEAD OF THE OLYMPICS
In the Tour de France --- the world's most famous and most grueling bicycle race --- three of the cyclists tested positive last week for a new strain of performance-enhancing drug erythropoietin --- "epo" for short --- which gives the user a definite competitive advantage.
"The edge is huge. It makes you better and faster," said Don Catlin, member of the Olympic Medical Commission.
And is notoriously difficult to detect --- or has been, anyway.
"It had the biggest benefit, the lowest risk of actually getting caught," Adam Bergman, former pro-cyclist.
But the investigators are obviously getting better at it, just in time for the upcoming Olympics in Beijing.
Don Catlin, a veteran member of the Olympic Medical Commission, says epo can thicken the blood, increasing the risk of a heart attack --- but also increases an athlete's power by raising the red blood cell count, and bringing more oxygen to the muscles.
"These events are won and lost by a few seconds, or microseconds, between first and second place," said Catlin.
The U.S. Anti-Doping Agency is doing surprise snap testing athletes out of competition. But critics say just because you pass doesn't mean you haven't been using epo. Dr. Michael Joyner of the Mayo Clinic.
"You could even find an athlete, subject the athlete to a random unannounced test, and they could have used epo in the last day or two, and they might still be negative if they used low-dose epo," said Dr. Michael Joyner with Mayo Clinic.
Former professional cyclist Adam Bergman thought it was worth the risk.
"I was 23, and I was getting top ten results in some of the biggest races in the U.S.," said Bergman.
But Bergman knows better now. He was caught in a surprise test at his house.
"They put a big stamp on my forehead that said 'Doper' --- and it's really hard to get hired now," said Bergman.
He was suspended for two years.
"The suspension doesn't end with two years. It's something that will haunt you for the rest of your life. And no Olympics is worth that," said Bergman.
WHY WE ITCH AND WHY WE SCRATCH
Science marches on, including medicine, of course.
And every day with great medical journals as the source,
The news reports developments of one kind or another,
affecting everything and everybody and his brother.
Some are major breakthroughs, but most are rather small
Some unimportant and hardly worth mentioning at all.
Yet science grows in increments, and sometimes worth relating
Simply because people find them simply fascinating.
Today, it's not about some awful illness you might catch,
But why it is for you and me that when we itch, we scratch.
There's a reason why we want to want to scratch, a simple reason which is
That we are programmed in our brains to scratch when something itches.
At Wake Forest in Winston Salem.
Dr. Gil Yusopovich and his colleagues, we hail 'em.
They scratched 13 healthy people with a soft brush on the leg
at 30 second intervals to find a way to peg
Which parts of the brain the nerves messages are catching
To create the urge when something itches for us to begin scratching.
They used functional magnetic resonance to determine which
units of the brain feel pain and which determine itch.
It turns out that the anterior and posterior cingulated cortexes
are the parts that trigger this response in both human sexes.
Scratching increased activity in the secondary pain centers
And in the prefrontal cortex where compulsion often enters.
Since the people were not scratching to an actual itch
This soft brush stroke there is annoyance part of which
People tended to continue after this was gone.
Yes, we learn something every day as science marches on...
PROGRESS IN THE FIGHT AGAINST HEART DISEASE
Despite the flaws in our health care system in this country, death rates here from heart disease and stroke have fallen by about 25% since 1999.
"This is the fastest we've seen death rates fall for coronary heart disease and stroke since the epidemic began in the 1950s,” said Dr. Daniel Jones, American Heart Association.
How were we able to reduce the death rate from strokes and heart attacks in such a short time? CBS News Medical Correspondent Dr. Jon LaPook.
"The rate of heart attack and stroke death has gone down about 25 percent since 1999 when compared to 2005. That equates to about 160-thousand lives saved in 2005, compared to 1999," said LaPook.
All quite new, says Dr. Todd Rosengart of Stony Brook University Hospital.
"This is all a product of new technology, new devices, new drugs that literally were not available 10 or 15 years ago," said Rosengart.
But --- you knew there'd be some "buts" --- the future is clouded, says Dr. Lori Mosca of New York Presbyterian Hospital.
"We're seeing increasing rates of diabetes and obesity, especially among our youth --- which doesn't bode well for the future trend of cardiovascular disease," said Mosca.
And, as we mentioned, our health care system here is flawed. And not all of us get to benefit from the encouraging medical achievements. Dr. LaPook...
"One of the things that's discouraging is that there's still nearly 50 million Americans who don't have adequate health care insurance. And they're certainly not seeing any improvements from all these wonderful advances. And the other really discouraging part of this is the huge racial disparity. If you are a middle-aged African-American and you have a stroke, your odds of dying from that stroke are about three to four times what it would be if you were white."
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