Holidays benefit our health!

Tara Wilkins
We all love a good holiday, whether that be lying on a warm beach for a week or hiking up a mountain. Getting away from everyday normality, forgetting about work and the stresses in our lives for a much needed break always leaves us feeling refreshed.

Facebook us mums - government

Women are increasingly chatting and sharing information with friends and strangers about their pregnancies on social media, surveys suggest.

Now the British  government says it backs women using sites such as Facebook to share their questions and experience - but wants them to link to its advice site.

Elixir of mental stability

Stacey Collins    
There always seem to be new studies telling us women what we should and shouldn’t eat in order gain blemish free skin or to avoid gaining cellulite - but the most recent study offers an ingredient that could provide us with an elixir of life/ mental stability.

Time to deal with New Year irresolution

Stacey Collins 
I’m going to play a guessing game with you. I bet that I can guess your New Year’s resolutions for the year 2012, and also for the last twenty years of your life. Resolution number one was to start eating healthier, resolution number two was to start doing more exercise, resolution three was to do all you can to try and find your true love and resolution four was to move out of your parent’s house. Do I win a prize?

Brits gets 'nul points' for their top ranking on Europe's obese list

Stacey Collins

Just a couple of weeks ago I wrote an article about how Debenhams had analysed their underwear and nightwear sales and concluded that it was Birmingham that boasted the best bodies. However, a recent report has stated that the women of the United Kingdom are the ‘fattest’ in Europe.

Good news about teen vaccine

Laura Johnson
Well it's been rumbling away in the background. If you were wondering whether to let your daughter have the new HPV vaccine you might not have known about it.

This was the question of whether the vaccine used in the UK was the best one.

The campaign to vaccinate against cervical cancer has been radical - and even a little controversial.

Birth choice questions

Laura Johnson
It was to have been a drive to reduce Britain's growing rate of caesarean operations - but it's now achieved the opposite.

Whatever the guidelines say, the headlines say that women can now "opt" for a caesarean. Already one in five births are by this route - and it has led to allegations that some celebs are "too posh to push".

Time to get a jab?

 Laura Johnson
British health services are still struggling to get pregnant women to have the flu jab, it seems.

Senior doctors lined up yesterday to plead with women to agree to the flu vaccine - but it looks as though we are keener to give it to children than ourselves.

An excuse to eat chocolate

#BAD11  Stacey Collins

The internet is encumbered with negative articles about the way chocolate will ravage your body and when combined with Kate Moss’ ‘Nothing tastes as good as skinny feels’ saying, many feel that chocolate should be a once a year Easter treat. So, when once in a blue moon an article arises that promotes the effects chocolate has on your mind, body and soul, it is the perfect excuse for a visit to the nearest corner shop for that Twirl you’ve had your eye on for the past week (or in my case, past few hours).

Women have the X-factor

Stacey Collins

Here’s a question that will cause some controversy in the household: who has the higher pain threshold? Men or women? Go…

The gender debate has been discussed, disputed and deliberated in its many form for centuries. In fact you could even link it back to Adam and Eve several thousand years ago.

Blame the parents?

Stacey Collins

I remember watching a weight programme which featured a woman who was convinced that she was born to be overweight and that despite any amount of dieting or training at the gym, she could not lose the extra pounds that surrounded her stomach and thighs. She told the cameras that she had a bowl of fruit for breakfast and a healthy lunch and meal for tea and yet was still classed as clinically obese.

Don't want Maggie's diet no more?

Stacey Collins

Amazon have sparked outrage before by selling the e-book entitled ‘The Pedophile’s Guide to Love and Pleasure: a Child-lover’s Code of Conduct’ in 2010 by Phillip R. Greaves and now they’re facing more trouble after unveiling the child’s book ‘Maggie goes on a diet’ which is up for pre-orders on their website.

New Year, New Resolutions

Stacey Collins
Hands up if you started this year with every intention of 2011 being the year that you actually stuck to your New Year’s resolutions, yet somehow, yet again, that chocolate HobNob just managed to attach itself

Pregnant? Get a jab - urgently!

Laura Johnson
If you're pregnant you should get the flu vaccine.

That was the powerful message yesterday after it emerged that swine flu is rampaging through Britain again.

So far as many as four pregnant women have needed intensive care after contracting flu this autumn, experts said.

Sexual assault aid pledge

Jayne Howarth and Laura Johnson
The UK government yesterday signalled a commitment to improve services for thousands of women who endure the misery of rape.

Across the country, a woman suffers a serious sexual assault on average once every ten minutes, according to Department of Health figures.

Mums reject home-birth

Laura Johnson
The number of women in England and Wales giving birth at home is falling - in spite of efforts to encourage "choice", according to new figures released yesterday.

The latest figures dismayed midwife leaders, who have campaigned for more support for home births. But they may reflect controversy about the risks of home birth - including some

Jade effect fades

Laura Johnson
The “Jade Goody” effect on cervical cancer testing has faded in England, with fewer women having tests last year compared with the previous 12 months, according to new figures revealed yesterday.

The fall in numbers alarmed campaigners - as it is thought to be too early for the HPV vaccination programme to be having an impact on older women.

FLU JAB "LIFE-SAVER"

Staff Writer
All pregnant women are to be offered flu vaccination this winter in a bid to spread immunity against swine flu, it was announced today.

Government advisers say they remained concerned that a re-emergence of swine flu could put expectant women at risk.

ANTE-NATAL BOOSTER CALL

Staff Writer
Expectant mothers who face difficult social circumstances are endangering their own and their babies’ health because they are not accessing antenatal care, campaigners warn today.

NHS guidelines published today by the National Institute for Health and Clinical Excellence (NICE) and the Social Care Institute for Excellence (SCIE), are calling on antenatal services to become flexible and supportive to women’s needs.

NOT JUST A CELEB C-CRET

Staff Writer

Pamela Anderson, ageing rocker Keith Richards and a member of the Red Hot Chilli Peppers.

Not to mention the late Anita Roddick, founder of the BodyShop. What could they possibly have had in common?