Weird thing of the day 2 February 2005/23 Shevat 5765 (Groundhog Day/Frozen Food Day/No Soda Day)

Greetings.

1) On January 9 (National Static Electricity Day), I reported on a boy, David Dingman-Grover, who was being treated for a very inconveniently placed tumor. Today he is scheduled to have a biopsy to make sure the tumor is dead. (It has been treated with radiation and chemotherapy and has dramatically shrunken, thank God.) Prayers for a full recovery would be appropriate. You can find his Web-site at http://www.brytr.com/.

2) The groundhogs are predicting six more weeks of winter. I wouldn’t mind, but winter isn’t much fun without snow, which we get very little of here in Charleston. Meanwhile, a town in North Carolina has decided to use a pig on “Groundhawg’s Day” to predict the weather. Go figure.

3) If you've checked Lesser Known Holidays, which is where I get a lot of my weird holiday information, you won’t find No Soda Day. That’s because No Soda Day is a holiday only here at the Medical University of South Carolina, where they sent us some E-mail on it:

DRINK SODA?? THINK AGAIN...



Sodas and other sweetened beverages are associated with:



*Higher Caloric Intake, *Greater Weight Gain, **Displacement of milk from 

Children’s Diets, and **Increased Risk of Type 2 Diabetes in Women 

CELEBRATE NO SODA DAY!  Wednesday, February 2nd



Stop by the Horseshoe and get a free non-soda beverage between noon and 1pm.



Affirm that you take a stand against a cause of obesity by being a role model –

You will not imbibe liquid candy for a day!



Goals of No Soda Day:

• Make people aware of the health problems associated with soda consumption

• Encourage health professions students to think about their own habits and setting

an example for their patients



Sponsored by PHIG (Public Health Interest Group) and AMSA (American Medical Student 

Association)



*J Pediatr. 2003 Jun;142(6): 604-10.  **JAMA. 2004 Aug 25; 292(8): 927-34.

Considering how bad soda really is, decreasing soda consumption is something worth thinking about.

Aaron