Consuming foods with added sugars – such as soft drinks, ice-cream and cakes – may increase the risk of developing kidney stones, according to scientists. Researchers have found that those in the US with the highest intake of added sugars had nearly 40% greater odds of developing kidney stones. They said this association was more prevalent among Asians as well as Native Americans. But the researchers pointed out that their study, published in the journal Frontiers, does not show how exactly added sugars increases the risk of kidney stones. Lead author Dr Shan Yin, a researcher at the Affiliated Hospital of North Sichuan Medical College, Nanchong, China, said: “Ours is the first study to report an association between added sugar consumption and kidney stones. “It suggests that limiting added sugar intake may help to prevent the formation of kidney stones.” One in 11 people will get stone symptoms during their lifetime, according to The British Association of Urological Surgeons. Ours is the first study to report an association between added sugar consumption and kidney stones. Dr Shan Yin Known risk factors include obesity, inflammatory bowel disease, diabetes, and being an adult male. For the study, the Dr Yin and colleagues analysed data from more than 28,000 people who were part of the US National Health and Nutrition Examination Survey (NHANES) survey. Each person’s daily intake of added sugars was estimated from their self reported food and drink consumption. They also received a healthy eating index score (HEI-2015), based on the food they ate, whether it was beneficial foods such as fruits, vegetables, and whole grains, or less healthy options such as refined grains or saturated fat. The researchers adjusted for factors such as gender, age, race or ethnicity, income, body mass index, HEI-2015 score, smoking status, and whether the people taking part in the study had a history of diabetes. The researchers said people who received more than 25% of their total energy from added sugars had a 88% greater odds than those who had less than 5% of their total energy from added sugars. Results also showed people below poverty levels had greater odds of developing kidney stones when exposed to more added sugars than those at or slightly above poverty levels. Dr Yin said: “Further studies are needed to explore the association between added sugar and various diseases or pathological conditions in detail. “For example, what types of kidney stones are most associated with added sugar intake? “How much should we reduce our consumption of added sugars to lower the risk of kidney stone formation? “Nevertheless, our findings already offer valuable insights for decision-makers.” Read More Charity boss speaks out over ‘traumatic’ encounter with royal aide Ukraine war’s heaviest fight rages in east - follow live Why TikTok is going wild for lip oil 5 late summer blooms to plant now Why have the birds disappeared from my garden?

It looks like the U.S. canned seafood industry is moving well beyond tuna sandwiches thanks to a culinary trends that emerged from the coronavirus pandemic

A fishery vessel will attempt to use the high tide to pull free a Bahamas-flagged Norwegian cruise ship carrying 206 people that has run aground in northwestern Greenland

“Aussies know a road warrior when they see one,” Ukraine’s Defense Department said earlier this month in a

Western styles are becoming the protagonists of 2023 fashion. From the emergence of the “Coastal Cowgirl” trend on TikTok to the many cowboy references found in the spring and fall 2023 runway collections, it’s clear that fashion is ready to giddy up. But, while it may seem like it’s suddenly everywhere, it’s never really gone out of style.

I was the little girl who daydreamed about her wedding day. But when the imaginary faceless man waiting for me at the end of the aisle became a beautiful woman, I realized that I had a lot to rethink. Weddings are tied to a long history of tradition, steeped in an extremely heteronormative binary. And as a queer person who has heard time and time again (and oftentimes not with the kindest of intentions) that my lifestyle is “alternative” (aka, explicitly not traditional), wading into the waters of wedding planning can be an emotionally loaded and complicated process. That’s because literally every moment of a wedding is entrenched in these binaries, which can feel uncomfortable for a queer person that doesn’t feel like they fit into them. If you’re in a queer couple that doesn’t adhere to these preconceived roles, reimagining your wedding from the ground up is a lot to take on.

Christian Horner has suggested that there are “lessons to learn” from Formula 1’s return to Las Vegas after describing the Sin City schedule as “brutal”. Red Bull enjoyed a successful weekend in Nevada, with Max Verstappen fighting back to secure a thrilling 18th win of the season. A glamorous occasion marked F1’s first race in Las Vegas in more than three decades as the sport sought to capitalise on a popularity boom in the United States with a third date on the calendar. But not all ran smoothly - second practice was delayed into the very early hours of Friday morning after a loose manhole cover forced the cancellation of the first session on the street circuit, while a race start time of 10pm local time also proved unpopular. And while recognising a need to satisfy global audiences with suitable start times, Horner believes that the schedule should be reconsidered ahead of next season’s grand prix. “There are going to be many lessons to learn,” the Red Bull team principal explained. “One of the things to look at is the running schedule because it has been brutal for the team and all the men and women behind the scenes. “Everybody is leaving Vegas slightly f*****! One way or another it has been a brutal weekend for everyone behind the scenes, and I think we need to look at how we can improve that for the future. “I think run it a little earlier in the evening because you are never going to keep every television audience totally happy. This is an American race. If you run it 8pm in the evening or something like that it would just be a bit more comfortable for the men and women working behind the scenes.” Verstappen’s victory was one of his best of a season that the Dutchman has dominated. The Red Bull driver beat Ferrari’s Charles Leclerc and teammate Sergio Perez in a captivating three-way fight for first as a much-anticipated event delivered thrills on and off the track. F1 and Las Vegas have signed a ten-year deal in the hope of establishing the city as a perpetual location for the motorsport, but Frederic Vasseur, Leclerc’s team principal at Ferrari, agrees with Horner that the timings require a rethink. “If we have to improve, it’s perhaps the timing,” Vasseur told Motorsport.com. ““It’s not an easy one to find, if you want to have a decent timing for Asia, Europe, East Coast, West Coast. “In the past, we had no issue because F1 was just for the European people, and we had to stick to the European timing, and it was okay. “Now it’s a worldwide project, and it’s much more difficult to find something fitting with the expectations of the 24-hour zone. But we will adjust it.” The Formula 1 season concludes in Abu Dhabi this weekend. Read More ‘It happens’: F1 fail to apologise or issue refunds to Las Vegas fans F1 2023 official calendar: All 23 Grand Prix this year Carlos Sainz handed ‘ridiculous’ penalty after drain cover crash at Las Vegas GP Five times a manhole cover stopped F1 in its tracks Las Vegas Sphere wears giant F1 helmet ahead of inaugural grand prix F1 clothing craze sweeps retailers ahead of Las Vegas Grand Prix

Out of all the messed-up things the Roys and their offsiders have said to one

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Sick leave in the UK has hit its highest rate in 15 years and is well above pre-pandemic levels...

ALBUQUERQUE, N.M.--(BUSINESS WIRE)--May 8, 2023--

When Abby Misbin received an Etsy order for one of her handmade cowboy hats from someone claiming to be Beyoncé’s stylist, she thought it was a prank. Setting her reservations aside, in June 2022, Misbin sent off a one-of-a-kind Stetson adorned with more than 5,000 mirror discs, in the hopes that the order was genuine. Then there was silence. Eight months later, Beyoncé announced her Renaissance World Tour on Instagram. In the official poster, the “Break My Soul” superstar is seen mounted on Reneigh, her disco horse, wearing a glorious diamanté leotard, cascading blingy jewellery and… Misbin’s hat. Three hours later – after Misbin asked a mob of her friends to tag her business account, TrendingByAbby, in the comments – she was inundated with orders. “I was under the impression that I hadn’t seen the hat being worn because Beyoncé didn’t like it!” recalls Misbin down the line from Pennsylvania, six weeks on from the tour’s final concert in Kansas City. “I just imagined her saying, ‘I’m not wearing this.’” But Beyoncé did like the hat. And so did millions of fans who were desperate to emulate their idol’s style. Misbin’s sales soared from approximately two hats a week to 30. At the height of the tour, she would be working 12-to-15-hour days just to keep up with demand. Each night, she’d find tiny shards of glass in her hands after glueing thousands of individual mirror discs to dozens of hats. Misbin is just one of many Etsy sellers who earned small fortunes making unofficial merchandise for the Renaissance shows. Many of these small business owners spent the six-month duration of that tour at the singer’s whim – their day-to-day lives consumed by the various hues of silver that dominated the tour’s colour pallette – a nod to Beyoncé’s disco-themed album. But it’s been six weeks since the concerts came to an end and Beyoncé rode off into the darkness on Reneigh. The silver bubble has popped, leaving Misbin and her peers wondering: what now? Erin Fritts, the owner of North Carolina’s Everwind Creations whose holographic hand-fans also became a staple among the concert crowd, says she was at the “mercy of Beyoncé” during the tour. Between May and October, the singer would make specific demands of her fans – ones that Fritts, Misbin and other Etsy sellers had to be savvy about. For her birthday in September, for example, Beyoncé implored her devotees to dress like “shimmering human disco balls” – and so Fritts got to work. Firstly, she did research into what keywords were being searched on Etsy the most: “Renaissance”; “silver”; “hand-fan”. It made sense. After all, it was peak summertime and an arena full of boisterous fans was bound to get sweaty. Fritts also noticed that the main prop Beyoncé used in the tour routine for her hit song “Heated” was a sprawling hand-fan. The stars had aligned. During the course of the tour, Fritts saw orders for her fans shoot up from two a day to more than 30. At £26 each, there was a time when the fans were generating over £800 daily. “My Etsy sales just skyrocketed out of nowhere,” she says over the phone. In those peak months, Fritts pivoted from her day job in digital marketing to focus on her Etsy full-time. “I was working long hours, and sometimes my mum would help out.” She laughs, “I was at the mercy of Beyoncé. I had to listen to whatever dress codes she put on the internet because who knows what she’s going to tell her fans to wear next?” When the music stopped on 1 October, though, these Etsy sellers faced an unwelcome inevitable. “I was really worried about demand dropping off,” Fritts tells me. “I was like ‘No! Please add more tour days!’ I was definitely mourning the end of the tour. I miss just chatting with the Bey Hive.” Her orders fell back to three per day– five on a good day. “I often wonder… if she does go on that tour again – will she use hand-fans in songs and make it her thing again? It’s up in the air.” Anna Ferguson, the owner of the OneLoveOneAnna Etsy shop based in Atlanta, Georgia, has noticed a similar lull in the sales of her disco ball earrings in the aftermath of both the Renaissance tour and Taylor Swift’s similarly colossal Eras tour, which is currently on hiatus. In addition to online sales, Ferguson would regularly loiter in hotel lobbies near arenas to peddle her handmade jewellery to fans staying there. “In Atlanta, I walked around the hotel with a bag of my earrings and a sign and in five minutes I had made hundreds of dollars,” she says. The next weekend, Ferguson followed the tour to Nashville, where she made $2,000 in 24 hours. “The tours were really a game-changer for me in terms of sales. And I have just ridden on the crazy world tour coattails all of the way.” Now, Ferguson is trying to adapt to a post-tour world. “Sales trickle in, but it’s nothing like what I was seeing,” she says. “This weekend, I’m trading at a Tay-Gate party [unofficial concert parties run for Taylor Swift fans].” She is also holding out for the Renaissance tour movie, which releases on 1 December, as she hopes there will be another spike in Beyoncé-related purchases, like her disco ball earrings with Queen Bey’s face printed on them. “During the tour, I managed to accommodate everyone with their accessory emergencies – I just hope that happens again.” Misbin says that the tour’s end is bittersweet. “Business is not what it was,” she sighs. “I don’t have as many opportunities like that anymore, but I do feel really lucky to have had it in the first place.” At her peak, she was selling 30 hats a week. Now, if she sells 10, she considers it a success. The milliner has also noticed hundreds of dupes of her hat surfacing online with a cheaper price tag. “I’m lucky to still be working full-time but I’m noticing companies recreating it with varying quality,” she says. Misbin herself had been advised to start outsourcing to a factory when she was at her busiest, but she never wanted to compromise on the quality. “I wouldn’t feel right paying someone pennies to make what I make,” she tells me. ‘I can’t imagine someone getting paid less than me.” When Beyoncé’s Renaissance tour ended, ticket seller Live Nation said it made more than half a billion dollars ($579m) from 56 concerts performed to approximately 2.7 million fans. Some fans will have searched Amazon or fast-fashion sites to get their quick fix of silver, disco-inspired outfits, but many, hearteningly, turned to independent sellers. For now, Misbin says she is keeping her “finger on the pulse” for the next big thing. She hopes that with Christmas around the corner and the forthcoming Renaissance tour movie, her sales will soar again before the new year. “I don’t want to miss another thing. If I had closed down my store two years ago, then this would have never happened,” she says. “I’m not going to necessarily shut down if sales are slow – they’re pretty good now. I’m just trying to ride it out.” Read More Beyonce’s mom says her daughter is ‘really mean’ Met Gala officially announces its 2024 theme What does the 2024 Met Gala theme ‘Sleeping Beauties’ actually mean? Met Gala officially announces its 2024 theme What does the 2024 Met Gala theme ‘Sleeping Beauties’ actually mean? Why do people think Met Gala 2024 theme could be a dig at Kim Kardashian?