Health news blog

There is nothing outstanding in the proportion of heterosexual offenders vs. children who had homosexual activity after puberty: 42 per cent had homosexual experience outside of prison and an additional few confined their activity to periods when they were incarcerated, bringing the total with homosexual experience to 46 per cent. This is a moderate percentage, relative to other sex offenders, but exceeding that of the control group (34 per cent). A moderate proportion, 24 per cent, also had more than incidental homosexual experience. This we have arbitrarily defined as overt homosexual contact on 21 or more occasions or homosexual activity with six or more different males.

The offenders vs. children are also intermediate insofar as comparisons with other sex offenders are concerned with respect to other measurements of homosexual activity. The percentage with experience by a given age remains within moderate bounds, rising from 25 per cent by age fourteen to 42 per cent by age twenty-six. The average (median) age for the first homosexual contact was 15.6 years. The percentage of single males who reported homosexual behavior within a given five-year age-period is often markedly larger than that of the control-group males, but is still more accurately called intermediate than high. One fifth had such experience between puberty and age fifteen, slightly over one quarter between sixteen and twenty, nearly one fifth between twenty-one and twenty-five; thereafter the percentage decreased to only 11 per cent between the ages of thirty-one and thirty-five. Among married offenders vs. children the incidence is much less, dropping from 13 per cent between the ages of sixteen and twenty to 4 to 8 per cent thereafter until age forty-one, when homosexual activity ceased. Prior to age forty-one these percentages may be termed generally intermediate with regard to other groups, though always greater than those of the control group.

The frequency of homosexual physical contacts has been calculated as the number of contacts outside of prison divided by the number of years outside of prison. The rate for the offenders vs. children was 2.6 per year, a low-intermediate figure in comparison with other groups and less than that of the control group (3.4 contacts). Single males found only a moderate proportion of their total sexual outlet in homosexual activity, generally less than the control group. Nor is there anything unusual in the frequencies of their contacts at various ages. There were too few married men who had homosexual activity to permit a meaningful calculation of frequencies.

The median offender vs. children with homosexual experience had contact with five males; again this is a moderate number though one and one-half times that of the control group. Since they themselves were aged eighteen or more, i.e., physically adult, 16 per cent had had homosexual contact with boys under twelve, and boys aged twelve to fifteen were the youngest partners for an additional 12 per cent. The percentage for boys under twelve is the third largest we recorded, but the figure for minors is neither large nor small compared to other sex offenders, although much larger than the figures shown by the prison and control groups. Five per cent, a relatively moderate number, had as their youngest partners males aged sixteen to seventeen. The fact that the number who had contact with very young boys exceeds the number who had contact with sixteen- and seventeen-year-olds hints at a pedophilic tendency.

About half of all the offenders vs. children disapproved of male homosexuality and about 13 per cent approved—a ratio similar to that of many of our comparative groups. In brief, there is nothing unusual about their attitude.

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The reasons for taking some form of exercise are obvious. Not only do you look better and feel better, but you enjoy better health as the exercise strengthens the heart, lungs, circulation and muscles.

If you are already playing sport or working out regularly the recommendation to take exercise is unnecessary and only confirms what you already know from experience: being fit pays off. But for others this recommendation is worth heeding. What it does not mean in this context, however, is training the body until it is rippling with muscles and high definition although that sort of body is still within reach if you are dedicated enough to train seriously and go to a qualified instructor at a gymnasium with equipment like Nautilus. But at this age what you should have is a good-looking body with trim physique, upright posture and an appearance of being many years younger. This is the kind of body that performs well in everyday life. And sexually.

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Many men today have their hair lightly permed to give it extra texture and many with nondescript hair have it coloured or streaked. To get this kind of treatment right it must be carried out professionally and not at home with the do-it-yourself kits available from stores’ counters. If you are worried about going grey have it coloured professionally and avoid using hair colour restorers. The colour these give is flat and unreal and under artificial light the hair often looks spinach green or aubergine. On most men greying hair looks distinguished and adds to, rather than detracts from, appearance. Many people are prematurely grey; the days when grey hair was a sign of age are long passed.

How many times you should wash your hair depends on lifestyle and where you live. In a city where pollution is a problem you will have to wash your hair more often than if you live in clean-air countryside. And if you play sport you should wash your hair after each game in order to keep it clean, glossy and healthy. Oily hair usually needs three washes a week; dry hair about every five days.

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Although this may sound like a carte blanche solution to life for some of us, changing emotionally means expanding your interests, not discarding a wife or lover like an old shirt while you give chase to another — even if you are bored and have grown apart with personalities maturing and changing direction. To change emotionally you must alter your life in such a way as to be able to move on to a richer plateau with fresh interests and commitments. Do not give up a life you are enjoying but accept that with time your tastes have changed slowly. You are beginning to ask and expect different things from life and for the future. Even if you could remember the priorities you had in your twenties or thirties they are not likely to be the same as those you have now. Involve yourself more in additional interests that will broaden your lifestyle and stimulate you either mentally or physically, or both.

Expand your interest and give yourself new goals. Find activities that relax you and add an emotional sense of contentment. This is not a sign that you are getting old, but of progression. To get the most from life you need the pleasure of indulging in some form of relaxation. It can come through sport, listening to opera or taking country walks with the dog. Emotionally expanding the mind can come through selective reading, studying a language ready for travel, joining a club.

At around this age it is easy to get into a rut and let your life slowly stagnate. Without firm action while the opportunities exist and without an emotional re-charge, the future could be dull or worse, boring.

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At thirty a healthy heart will pump about 3.4 litres of blood a minute and during exercise the beat will rise from seventy a minute to about 180 to 200.

At forty the same heart will pump about 3.25 litres a minute and during exercise the beat will rise only to 160 to 180 beats a minute.

By the time he is sixty both these figures will have further declined. The heart will pump only 2.75 litres and when there is exertion or exercise the beat will be in the region of 140 to 150 beats a minute.

To arrest this steady decline exercise is invaluable, swimming in particular. However for anyone out of condition whose idea of sport has until now been confined to watching it on television, you must take care before embarking on a strenuous fitness regime. Start gently, do not over-tax the body initially. If during or after a workout you feel dizzy see a doctor for a check-up. It is also advisable to stop smoking. A smoker is twice as likely to suffer a heart attack in his forties as a non-smoker.

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‘I need God. I never did before but now I need to know someone is there, someone I can talk to and lean on who will take care of me. I need help.’

Writer, forty-two, London.

Looking for comfort and solace, many men turn to religion. If they come from families already steeped in religion or have had childhoods where the family attended Sunday service they may return to practising their own faith becoming what is currently termed born-again-Christians. But many in experiment and seeking deeper involvement and spiritual experience turn to Catholicism seeing it as a spiritually demanding faith, or to the lesser known mystical religions like Sufism, prepared to attend class and study the new faith as they embrace it.

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In the past five years research has taken place in Australia, Britain, and the U.S.A. to resolve this problem. During the same period new drugs have been developed which have fewer side-effects. The consensus which is beginning to appear is that the majority of people under the age of 70 whose blood pressure lies in the grey area will benefit by taking anti-hypertensive drugs, although it is just as important for them to change their life-style so that they help control their own blood pressure and reduce their dependence on the drugs.

There are a number of simple measures which a man should adopt to avoid the problems of high blood pressure.

- If you are overweight, get your weight down. If you do, you may find that your blood pressure comes down too.

- Cut down the quantity of salt you have in your food, or add to your food, so that you take no more than 2 g (one-third of a level teaspoonful) a day. You can do this by avoiding salty foods, such as bacon and salted peanuts, and by not adding salt to the food on your plate.

- You should stop smoking! Smoking increases the tone of the branches of small arteries so that they become narrow. This change aggravates high blood pressure and increases the risk of a stroke.

Homosexual and heterosexual behaviours compared

Homosexuals are not more likely than heterosexuals to

-commit violent, especially sexual, crimes

-be sadistic

-molest children

-suffer from severe mental illness

-be neurotic

-become alcoholic

-relate less adequately to another person

Why do between 3 and 5 per cent of the population become exclusively homosexual when they reach an age to make a choice of sexual preference? Is homosexuality due to a genetic or a hormonal defect?

In a society which shows hostility and contempt towards like to believe that homosexuality is inherited, due to defective genes. Some heterosexuals who fear homosexuality would like this as evidence of a defect which leads to a perversion or makes a deviant. Some homosexuals, who are frightened by society’s hostility to them, would like to believe that they are homosexual through no fault of their own. However, only one study has suggested an inherited origin of homosexuality. It lacked objectivity and was based on a selected group, most of whom were ‘criminals or severely abnormal’. There is no reason to believe that homosexuality occurs because of the inheritance of defective genes.

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Only when the trial has been completed is the key broken and it is disclosed which patients have been given the drug and which the placebo. The purpose of a double blind trial of a drug is to reduce the bias from psychological influences, and to try objectively to evaluate the value of a drug. Psychological influences are so significant that they must be excluded. An example of their influence is shown by the experience of a group of women who were all taking the pill. A number complained of side-effects of such magnitude that they wished to change the brand of pill they were taking. They were granted their wish and given a brand of pill which was beautifully packaged. Immediately most of the unpleasant side-effects disappeared. It was obvious to the women that the new pill was better than the old one. Unfortunately, there was a flaw in their feeling. The new pill was identical in chemical composition with the old one – only the name and the package were different.

Few investigations using a double blind trial have been made in treating impotence by using male hormones, and of those which have, most have shown no significant improvement’ among impotent men given testosterone, unless the impotence was due to disease.

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Premature ejaculation is probably the most common form of sexual dysfunction in men. It is difficult to determine the number of men who have this type of sexual problem because many are unaware that there is a problem in their sexual relations or, in the case of other couples, the condition is accepted as normal.

A difficulty in discussing premature ejaculation is that it is poorly defined. About twenty years ago it was said that a premature ejaculator either reached orgasm and ejaculated before his penis entered his partner’s vagina, or within 30 seconds of vaginal intromission. This ‘stop-watch’ definition was not really accurate and led to a variety of ‘home treatments’ involving the man only. These home treatments included mental exercises during intercourse, such as multiplying complex numbers, to take the man’s mind off coming; masturbation just before intercourse; the use of thick condoms or anaesthetic ointments on the penis to dull its response to touch; alcohol or sedatives; and methods of causing self-inflicted pain (like lip-biting or nail-digging) during sexual intercourse. None of them was very successful.

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