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If you feel a fainting fit coming on … cross your legs and you’ll feel better! According to Dutch researchers, this simple little trick could help to avoid sudden, transitory loss of consciousness, which, we must agree, can be very annoying in everyday life. Blackouts are due to cardio respiratory arrest which can be a sign of a serious heart problem. It’s common among people whose heart beats too slowly and among individuals who suffer from arterial hypotension – in other words an abnormally low drop in blood pressure.

But clasping your hands together with your fingers interlocked or clutching a ball tight in one hand appears to increase heart rate and thus produces a rise in blood pressure. Crossing your legs also appears to help the flow of blood back to the heart.

This is all perfectly serious! These measures have been tested on more than 200 patients who suffer from fainting fits and the results show that they really are effective. At least a lot more effective than the traditional recommendations such as lying down, drinking water or increasing salt intake. Obviously, these new measures need to be taken at a very precise moment – as soon as you feel the first symptoms coming on: tingling in your lower limbs, dizziness, sudden nausea, problems with your sight. Whatever the case, there’s no harm in giving them a try.

“No violence against children can be justified". These are the opening words of a report on violence perpetrated against children across the world, and published last year by the General Secretariat of the United Nations. The facts and figures it gives are frightening. And today is a good opportunity to remind ourselves of them. Monday, 19 November will in fact mark World Day for the Prevention of Child Abuse. And the following day, 20 November, will be the 18th anniversary of the Convention on the Rights of the Child. Isn’t this reason enough to recall these statistics? This report is the first document really to offer an overview of (...)

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