New shingles vaccine highly effective

Did you know that for folks with heart conditions, getting the flu vaccine means, in any given year, that they have a 50 percent decrease in risk of death during flu season? But you don’t get the benefit unless you step up to the plate (or the pharmacist) and get the inoculation.

Speaking of vaccines, do you know which one just hit it out of the park? The herpes zoster subunit vaccine, or shingles vaccine. According to researchers in Australia, the new shingles vaccine, Shingrix, is more than 90 percent effective.

The vaccine is delivered in two doses, two months apart. The investigators said it offers protection for up to four years, but they believe it could last much longer. They also said no other vaccines perform nearly so well for people in their 70s and 80s.

This is a grand slam because without the vaccine, 50 percent of you will develop shingles by age 85. Check with your doc, and put it on your vaccination schedule (you do have one, don’t you?).

Anxiety and your waistline

Emotions and eating are joined at the hip (or the waist), according to a new study published in the journal Menopause. It seems researchers found that women who are generally anxious also have larger waistlines.

Scientists enrolled 5,580 middle-aged women and used an accepted anxiety-depression scale to evaluate their level of anxiety and measured their waist-toheight ratios. The researchers then divided the women into three waistline groups based on their waist-toheight ratio. Lo and behold, 55 percent of those with the smallest waistline were anxiety-prone, 59.7 percent of those in the middle group had anxiety, and a whopping 68.4 percent of women with the largest waistlines contended with anxiety and physical symptoms.

Which came first, the chicken (waistline) or the egg (anxiety), we don’t know. But we bet excess visceral fat around the waistline stokes up inflammation and possibly neuro-emotional responses such as anxiety. And there’s mounting evidence that excess fat correlates to a disrupted gut biome, where gut feelings, like anxiety, are a real result.

The good news? By eliminating inflammatory, gut-biome-disrupting processed foods, added sugars and red meat, then exercising 150 or more minutes weekly, you can shrink your waistline and inflammation, help rebalance your gut biome and have a calmer outlook on life.

Email questions for Mehmet Oz and Mike Roizen to youdocsdaily@sharecare. com.