Arsenic. Mercury. Pesticides. Dioxin. Toxic gases. Your typical hazardous waste dump, right? Wrong. These materials can be found in the home. Every day, people work, live, and play amid potentially harmful toxins-things they might not even know are there. They are exposed to these toxic substances in their homes, neighborhoods, schools, workplaces, foods, and consumer products.

Now, two toxics experts with decades of experience in public health have created a book that separates the risks from the myths of everyday toxins. Comprehensive and easy-to-use, this guide provides scenarios and...

In the developed world, obesity is a serious risk factor for many chronic diseases. Besides its morbidity and mortality burden, Obesity generates a huge cost burden on countries health services. This study aims to assist policymakers in their efforts to prioritize interventions to prevent and treat obesity by calculating cost-utility ratios of the treatment modes of dietary counseling, pharmaceutical interventions and bariatric surgery.Generally, the majority of interventions were found to be either cost-saving or very cost-effective in an Israeli setting. Differences in cost-effectiveness...

Smoking is an extremely serious, but reversible, risk factor for many chronic diseases. Multiple effective tobacco control interventions exist. No one single intervention can totally reduce the considerable smoking related burden of disease in terms of treatment costs, morbidity and mortality (around 6,000,000 deaths worldwide in 2010). Therefore, a multi-faceted approach is required, combining public health interventions such as smoke-free legislation, counter-advertising, and increased taxation with a variety of clinical and community-level prevention and cessation interventions. Public...

Physical inactivity (sedentariness) is a serious risk factor for many chronic diseases. Primary preventive interventions based on exercise prescriptions, patient counseling, pedometer use and mass media campaigns, supplied additional quality-adjusted life years (QALYs) at no additional net cost, and thus were cost-saving in an Israeli health care setting. Internet-based campaigns, community programs to increase pedometer use and joint mass-media/community activity campaigns were also cost-saving. Transport programs to encourage walking, paid media advertisements, public relations events with...