Religion in General is irrelevant to human health. Moreover it prevents and actually harmful to health. How many people were hoping for a prayer and as a result launched the disease and lost his life.

Are you sure?  The Muslim driver in Berlin was definitely not well because of his religion.

I recommend going through some of my prior posts in this thread. I have highlighted numerous studies that examine various aspects of the relationship between religion and human health.

The data available clearly shows that religion is both highly relevant and highly beneficial to human health.

I really "enjoyed" (more correct term may be 'riveted by') this movie Finding Home last night:

http://www.imdb.com/title/tt3319398/videoplayer/vi2310911513?ref_=tt_ov_vi  (there is a trailer video)
http://www.findinghomefilm.com/about/film/
http://corneredglobe.com/finding-home-cambodias-prostitution-epidemic/

It is available on Netflix.

It was interesting on many levels, most of which is just the emotional connection to the girls and their sadness, hardships, and triumphs. But it was also interesting the negative role that religion played in their debacle.

Afaics, you are moralizing and judging... Please read Jesus's wisdom in Matthew 7.

 ... But it does have the the downside that they alienate the goyim and there has been at least one purge already because the Jews are seen as outsiders or parasites. I am not saying I agree with the Nazis but it is a risk one takes when choosing to be a Jew. So if you can judge me and say that my problems in life are due to my choices in life including my choice of value system, then I can also turn that mirror back on the Jews and say they reaped what they sowed in Nazi Germany. I am not that judgmental so as to blame their deaths on their choice of religion, but if you are going to really want to look at the speck of dust in my eye, perhaps you may want to check if there is plank of wood in your own...

As an applied mathematician, you know that correlation does not prove causality. One correlation wouldn't mean the Bible is an effective dietary guide book for every climate, culture and situation.

Also processed meat is not the same as pig. Processed meat is more unhealthy due to the nitrate chemicals added. Also meat in general is more unhealthy when it is overly cooked, stored for too long, etc..

Also after Noah's ark, the Bible permits us to eat pig.

Generally I think having self-discipline and avoiding activities that religion typically disallows is probably more healthy especially for the offspring. But taking it down to the level of diet is a bit ridiculous. Except I would agree that many youth especially have horrendous diets these days, so if a strict religion could stop them from building bad habits that would be more healthy.

No one mentioned Peter's revelation!  So when Christ died, Peter was the senior apostle and most religions believe that he was therefore the President of the New Testament church.  Catholics call him the first Pope; evangelicals may prefer Paul's zeal, but still defer to Peter in authority (as did Paul).  So by definition Jesus "fulfilled" the Mosaic law, but there were still debates as to what that meant.  To this day there are religions who throw out the whole Old Testament, and others who still keep a Saturday sabbath.  Peter erred on the side of caution and until revelation was received otherwise insisted everyone stay kosher, and for a short time even mandated circumcision.  Until...

So Jesus ascended into Heaven in Acts 1.  Shortly afterwards--nine chapters later--in Acts 10:11 (http://lds.org/scriptures/nt/act...), Peter had a vision of a great feast prepared with both kosher and "unclean" food.  God commanded him to eat it; Peter refused; God told him "what God has now cleansed thou shalt not call unclean." (http://www.blueletterbible.org/B...).  Most Christians believe that this experience proves that Kosher was one of the elements of the Mosaic law that was completed by the atonement of Jesus Christ.

Are you sure?  Read it again.

https://bt.irlbtc.com/view/1367154.0

You guys are funny.  Taking your dietary recommendations from bronze age book.

What is next? Are you going to perform some old fashioned blood letting on your kids when they will get a common cold?

Bronze age Jews knew very little so stop this nonsense.

The Healthy Jew traces the culturally revealing story of how Moses, the rabbis, and other Jewish thinkers came to be understood as medical authorities in the nineteenth and twentieth centuries. Such a radically different interpretation, by scholars and popular writers alike, resulted in new, widespread views on the salubrious effects of, for example, circumcision, Jewish sexual purity laws, and kosher foods. The Healthy Jew explores this interpretative tradition in the light of a number of broader debates over 'civilization' and 'culture,'

The American Academy of Pediatrics announced its first major shift on circumcision in more than a decade, concluding that the health benefits of the procedure clearly outweigh any risks.

"There is clear evidence that supports the health benefits of circumcision," said Susan Blank, who led the 14-member task force that formulated the new policy being published in the journal Pediatrics.

The statement, and accompanying technical report, marks the first revision of the organization's position since 1999, when the academy backed away from circumcision. At that time, the group, which represents about 60,000 pediatricians nationwide, concluded that there was no clear evidence for or against circumcising newborns. The group affirmed that position in 2005.

Since then, the popularity of circumcision in the United States has declined. Only about 56 percent of newborn males are circumcised.

The academy's task force spent seven years combing through the latest research, analyzing more than a thousand studies. Their conclusion?

For starters, Blank says, circumcision helps baby boys pretty much immediately.

"The health benefits of male circumcision include a drop in the risk of urinary tract infection in the first year of life by up to 90 percent," she says.

But there's a much bigger reason to do it, Blank said. Circumcised males are far less likely to get infected with a long list of sexually transmitted diseases.

"It drops the risk of heterosexual HIV acquisition by about 60 percent. It drops the risk of human papillomavirus [HPV], herpes virus and other infectious genital ulcers," she says.

It also reduces the chances that men will spread HPV to their wives and girlfriends, protecting them from getting cervical cancer.

"We've reviewed the data and, you know, we have gone through them with a fine-tooth comb, and the data are pretty convincing," she says.

Critics, however, were not convinced. They liken the procedure to female genital mutilation.

"We have no right as parents or as physicians or adults to strap them down and chop off a normal part of their body. To do that is a human rights violation and an ethical travesty," says Georgeanne Chapin of the anti-circumcision group Intact America.

Chapin and other critics argue that the scientific evidence is questionable. For one thing, the studies about HIV have only been done in Africa, where AIDS is much more common among heterosexuals.

"They're cherry-picking their evidence," she says. "They act as though there's this huge body of literature. It's all the same couple of studies that have been regurgitated and reprogrammed. Over the past 150 years, all kinds of medical benefits have been proposed as resulting from cutting off the foreskin, and they have all been disproven."

Critics also question the safety of the procedure, saying too many boys are damaged for life by botched circumcisions.

But many experts say the academy is making the right call. They dismiss any comparison to female genital mutilation as grossly misleading and say male circumcision is about as safe as any procedure could be.

Some think the academy's position is long overdue, and that the group should have gone even further and more forcefully recommended circumcision.

"I think that all healthy newborn babies should be circumcised," says Edgar Schoen, a professor emeritus at the University of California, San Francisco. "I feel about newborn circumcision the way I do about immunization: It's a potent preventive health procedure that gives you a health advantage."

For its part, the pediatricians group hopes the new recommendations will encourage more parents to circumcise their sons — and more insurance plans to pay for it. As Shots reported last week, a lot of state Medicaid programs have stopped covering circumcision.

"Those families who choose circumcision should have access to circumcision. Cost should not be a barrier," Blank says.

The federal Centers for Disease Control and Prevention has been promising for years now to issue the government's first guidelines about circumcision. But the CDC keeps delaying it and still has not said when that will happen.

Oh really, CoinCube?

Does the Bible ever say that circumcision has health benefits?

No. The Bible never makes such a claim. Jewish authorities hesitate to circumcise a baby if two previous sons had died from circumcision. Even today, circumcisions lead to haemorrhages, infections and sometimes even death.

There is NO "proven" link between circumcision and better health. In fact, cutting a baby boy's genitals creates immediate health risks.

Jesus contrasted circumcision (cutting off foreskins) with his own healing, which made a man 'whole and complete.' Jesus' conclusion, not to judge by appearances, also hit the mark, for his critics rejected those who were not circumcised.

http://www.cirp.org/pages/cultural/glass2/

Another reason for the 8th day deals with blood clotting. Blood clotting is dependent on 3 factors: platelets, prothrombin, and vitamin K (which is responsible for prothrombin production and is produced by bacteria in the intestinal tract). Holt and McIntosh, in their classic work, Holt Pediatrics, observed that a newborn infant has “peculiar susceptibility to bleeding between the second and fifth days of life. … Hemorrhages at this time, though often inconsequential, are sometimes extensive; they may produce serious damage to internal organs, especially to the brain, and cause death from shock and exsanguination” (1953, pp. 125-126).

It has been shown that it is on the fifth through the seventh days of the newborn male’s life that vitamin K is present in adequate quantities for blood clotting.

On the eighth day, the amount of prothrombin present is above one-hundred percent of normal (the only day in the male’s life in which this will be normally be the case). Therefore, the 8th day is the perfect day to do the circumcision … when the Vitamin K and prothrombin levels are at their peak.