The recall of ground beef at Whole Foods Market has shed a new spotlight on Nebraska Beef of Omaha, one of the country’s largest meatpackers. Seven people in Massachusetts, from ages 3 to 60, were sickened by E. coli from beef bought at Whole Foods stores. The same strain has sickened 31 people in 12 states, the District of Columbia, and Canada.

The Whole Foods ground beef was among 1.2 million pounds of Nebraska Beef recalled on Friday. The processor also recalled 5 million pounds produced in May and June after its beef was blamed for another E. coli outbreak in seven states.

Sanitation violations over the past six years at Nebraska Beef, include:

• The USDA shut down the plant three times in 2002 and 2003 for problems such as feces on carcasses and water dripping off pipes onto meat
• In 2004 and early 2005, Nebraska Beef was written up at least five times for not removing brains or spinal cords from the food supply, as required
• U.S. inspectors in August 2006 threatened to suspend Nebraska Beef operations for not following requirements for controlling E. coli
• Also in 2006, Minnesota health officials blamed Nebraska Beef for sickening 17 people who ate meatballs at a church potluck; several victims filed lawsuits against Nebraska Beef, including the family of a woman who died

Whole Foods claims that it did not know that their supplier, Meyer Natural Angus, had switched processing plants to the Nebraska Beef facility. Whole Foods has long audited the slaughterhouse facilities from which it is supplied.

Antiquated thinking posits that you shouldn’t mix work and play. But the truth is, your personal interests have a lot to do with your success, particularly if you’re in an idea-centric field — which means just about every job that has problems which require creative thinking.

It’s no coincidence some of the most profound and popular scientists are also musicians: Albert Einstein played the violin. Numerous bios of Steve Jobs cite his schooling in calligraphy as a driving factor for why the early Mac computers were so far ahead in terms of graphics. Think about what skills you have that aren’t officially job responsibilities, but get applied nonetheless.

Do this fun exercise:

1. On the left-hand side of a piece of paper, write a list of your favorite career moments
2. Beside it on the right, write a list of your hobbies and activities off the job
3. Draw circles around something in the left column that happened because of something on the right, and join them with a line

The connections are now much clearer. By recognizing how various parts of you falsely appear miles apart but are actually adjacent in their applicability, you stand a much higher chance of succeeding at what’s important.

Every person who takes up running has been confronted by a “helpful” critic who is more than happy to reel off the reasons running will ruin your life. Here’s a look at three questionable claims about running and health:

1. Running will give you a heart attack or other heart problems. It is true that exercise temporarily raises the odds of a heart attack while you’re mid-workout, but doing it consistently reduces that risk over the long haul, leading to a net benefit. Going for a run most days of the week is doing far more good than bad for your heart.

2. Running will ruin your bones and joints. A study in the American Journal of Preventive Medicine found no evidence of accelerated rates of osteoarthritis among long-distance runners. Weight-bearing exercise like running helps stave off osteoporosis by maintaining bone mineral density.

3. Running will kill you before your time. According to a study in the Archives of Internal Medicine, running and other vigorous exercise in middle age is associated with a longer life. Not only that, it will make your later years more pleasant by reducing disability.

The human brain went through two enormous evolutionary changes — one in size, followed by an even more important one in cognitive ability. Your brain consumes huge amounts of calories and exhibits incredible prowess. In fact, your brain’s roaring metabolism, possibly stimulated by early man’s invention of cooking, may be the main factor behind our most critical cognitive leap, new research suggests.

About 2 million years ago, the human brain rapidly increased its mass until it was double the size of other primate brains. Some believe this is because humans started to eat better food. But then, about 150,000 years ago, a different type of spurt happened — those big brains suddenly got smart. Humans started innovating, invented many new tools, and started creating art and perhaps religion.

Research suggests that increased access to calories spurred these cognitive advances. The extra calories may have come from the first hearths. Cooking, by breaking down fibers and making nutrients more readily available, is a way of processing food outside the body. Eating cooked meals would have lessened the energy needs of the human digestion system, thereby freeing up calories for the brain.

Nearly half of cancer patients in England are being forced to cut back on food or heating in order to pay for their prescriptions drugs. Almost two-thirds miss out on simple leisure activities, like family days out, to cope with their medication costs.

A survey of nearly 500 cancer patients in England found that 44 percent were struggling to cope with drug costs.

Prescription charges were eliminated in Wales in 2007, and will be phased out in Scotland by 2011. Northern Ireland has frozen its charges while it considers whether to abolish them entirely. In England, however, the government has ruled out any move towards free prescriptions.