A new study in the "Journal of Clinical Oncology" reinforces existing evidence showing that women with breast cancer can greatly reduce their risk of recurrence by eating a healthy plant-based diet rich in fruits and vegetables and making other healthy lifestyle choices, according to nutrition experts with The Cancer Project.

"Women coping with breast cancer deserve to know that plant-based diets and regular exercise can spell the difference between life and death," says Jennifer Reilly, R.D., senior nutritionist with The Cancer Project. "In the battle against breast cancer, fruits, vegetables, and other low-fat vegetarian foods may be our most powerful weapons. Doctors must let women know that diet changes and exercise can help them beat this terrible disease."

crew of Brazilian fishermen was captured on video killing 83 dolphins and joking about their illegal haul, Brazil's Ibama environmental protection agency said Tuesday. The video obtained by an Ibama researcher and broadcast by Globo TV showed the fishermen netting the dolphins, which suffocated because they could not surface to breathe. The dead dolphins were then hauled from the sea and piled on the boat's deck. Fishermen on board are seen laughing after someone said, "Everyone's going to jail after this filming!" Fishermen who illegally snag dolphins usually sell the meat to other boats to use as bait to catch sharks, Globo TV said.

The images came as a surprise to groups working to protect dolphins around the world. "Brazil has strict laws to protect whales and dolphins in their waters, and they are very clearly being abused," said Claire Bass, program manager for marine mammals with the London-based World Society for the Protection of Animals. "Using nets to kill these extremely sociable and intelligent animals by drowning them is completely diabolical." River dolphins are sometimes harpooned in the Amazon and used as bait, Bass said. Fishermen who kill the river dolphins try to wound them so they can be tied to trees while still alive. "Then they come and kill them for the bait as and when they need it," Bass said.

Sharks could face extinction within a generation from overfishing for their fins, a conservation group said on [July 18], calling on the Chinese government to lead the way in their protection. More than 90 percent of shark fin is consumed in China and demand is growing rapidly as the economy develops leading to more sharks being caught, many illegally in areas that are supposed to be protected, according to the group WildAid. "These animals have been here for 400 million years and they may disappear in one generation, not to provide people with basic food, but for a solely luxury item," executive director Peter Knights told a news conference to launch a new report.

A recent article in The Buffalo News cited a reader who said she's a vegetarian, except for chickens, because chickens are the "least intelligent" animals of the meat choices available to her. I would like to challenge this view with evidence of the intelligence of chickens. Summarizing what we now know, avian specialist Lesley Rogers wrote in "The Development of Brain and Behaviour in the Chicken" that "It is now clear that birds have cognitive capacities equivalent to those of mammals, even primates."

One reason is that chickens have excellent memories. They can recognize more than 100 other chickens and remember them. In addition, chickens are able to wait for rewards, demonstrating that they can anticipate the future and exercise self-control. In laboratory studies, chickens have learned not to peck at buttons that yield only a small number of grains in favor of waiting longer to peck at buttons that produce a large amount of food. Hens fed grains that made them ill not only avoid such grains in the future; they push their chicks away from the bad grains (which they distinguish by color coding) and lead them to the good ones. Laboratory findings show that lame chickens, given a choice between food bowls laced with pain reliever and bowls having none, choose the medicated food.

Animal rights activists accused the largest producer of foie gras in Canada, with links to a French group, of cruelty to ducks. The Global Action Network unveiled images of live ducks being decapitated, beaten, thrown against walls and floors, and ducklings left to suffocate in plastic bags purportedly at Elevages Perigord's poultry farm and food processing plant south of Montreal.

"This industry has no place in civilized society and we are asking the Canadian government to outlaw the production of foie gras immediately," Andrew Plumbly, director of the animal protection group, said in a statement, noting it has been banned in 14 countries. The birds are force-fed several times a day, he alleged, causing bruising, lacerations, sores, organ rupture, and even death. It also creates the grossly oversized and diseased "fatty liver" for which foie gras is named. The birds, meanwhile, are left gasping, vomiting and struggling to move, he alleged. Canada started making foie gras in large quantities about 10 years ago. About 30 percent of it is exported to the United States.