Since the beginning of the COVID-19 pandemic and lockdown, many people started to eat more than they were used to. The general chaos stirred by the pandemic stressed people out and changed some of their daily routines for the worse-including food choices. Dr Prabhjot Gill would be able to provide right information about this.

Before the implementation of lockdown, we were warned about the tendency to get fat if we don’t move enough and eat mindlessly. However, many people didn’t take into consideration the recommendations and satisfied their culinary cravings more than ever before. A careless attitude emerged with the implementation of lockdown and uncertainty about the virus: I am prohibited to go out and the world is falling apart, so why should I care if I destroy my body with food? 

Obesity was already a major issue in many countries across the world. COVID-19 multiplied the victims in this field, as well.

At a closer look, there are many ways in which these 2 issues, obesity and COVID-19, go hand in hand and influence each other.

The impact of COVID-19 on Obesity

As mentioned before, people freaked out when the pandemic began. A virus that silently makes victims, implementations of safety measures that modified everybody’s routine, the economy collapsing, the inability to put things in perspective and see the light at the end of the tunnel, can harm your mental health and your attitude. Feeling hopeless or useless, having mixed feelings, worrying- these are common feelings that people experienced since COVID-19. Many found comfort in food. Staying at home, being bored or restless, uncertain about work and health, made many people overeat. Sweets are known to be an instant mood booster, so it’s no surprise that pastry, alongside junk food and mindlessly consuming food, boosted the obesity rate.

How Obesity is an additional risk in COVID-19

Obesity means diabetes, health problems, poor functioning of the lungs, getting tired faster, low immunity, catching colds more easily and the list could continue. 

The uncertainty about which category of people is at the highest risk to get infected has amplified the panic. The virus mostly affected those who were already suffering from other health problems. Coronavirus affects the lungs, and people with lower immunity who catch the virus could experience the symptoms more intense than others. Unfortunately, obese people are at a higher risk for any cold and disease than people who take care of their diet and stay active.

What should be done

Indeed, food is tasty. That’s why it becomes a dangerous addiction and causes obesity, which in turn leads to major health problems or even death. When people start associating food with pleasure rather than a fuel to function and live a healthy life, it becomes hard to stop. It’s a thing to try junk food once and then stick to a balanced diet, and it’s a completely different story to eat mindlessly unhealthy foods, every single day until you can’t function anymore like a normal human being. 

The only thing that could help in breaking this harmful cycle of overeating is to force yourself to stop, seek support, and simply stop buying unhealthy food. Junk food production is unlikely to stop too soon, as the profit is enormous. So, it’s the will power of every individual that must take the wheels. Until people who suffer from obesity understand why they eat and start making significant changes in their lifestyle, no recommendation will help.

Conclusion 

Although it might be hard to stay optimistic and make the right choices without having any certainty about the future, especially when a global pandemic is going on, people shouldn’t stop taking care of themselves and fighting obesity or other harmful addictions. The continuous development of Medicine will certainly cure COVID-19 at a certain point, but people must keep their calm and continue their lives as normally and as healthy as possible. This way, not only will they live longer, but also help in fighting this pandemic.

  “Dr Prabhjot Gill MBBS MRCGP(2016)”

Newborn photography offers a unique opportunity to capture the very first moments of a baby’s life. Infants are highly flexible since their bones consist mainly of cartilage. They can bend into poses that adults or even older children cannot even try. Take advantage of this stage to obtain interesting newborn poses for your album. Whether you have a girl, boy, or even twins, we have easy newborn photography poses that you can try. You can use simple DIY props to assist with the baby poses. Include the siblings in the baby posing as well. Remember how delicate a newborn baby is. Even as you scout for the best shots, remember that safety in posing newborns comes first. 

Basic Newborn Photography Poses

Newborn photography is one of the most tasking yet fulfilling facets of photography. With an infant, it is up to you to select and arrange the poses. Don’t rush it. Baby photo posing takes time. Posing a baby is not easy, but with some patience, you can come up with the most creative shots. Whether you’re dealing with the basic newborn girl or newborn boy photos, or the rarer twins, here are simple newborn poses that you can try: 

1. Chin on Hands

Here the baby wears only a diaper, and the lower torso is covered with loose fabric. Some newborn poses have the baby posing without a diaper, but that increases the chances of soiling the set. A boy could even spray you with pee in the process. And yes, it does happen; it’s all part of the job. Handling a girl is safer in this particular baby posing. Here you let the newborn’s hands pose on a small pillow when lying on the belly. The chin is then placed on the hands. From there, you can shoot from different angles. 

2. Swaddled

This simple newborn pose reminds the baby of the womb position. Swaddling is pretty easy: wrap the baby into a bundle with a soft blanket. The specific swaddling method may differ slightly. For instance, some swaddle the baby with arms across the chest while others prefer them down to the sides. Let the parents help you swaddle their baby as they deem fit. The newborn baby poses comfortably as you snap away. 

3. Little Frog

Baby photography is simply incomplete without this classic newborn pose. The baby literally poses like a frog. Place the baby’s belly down. Fold the hands at the elbow with the palms cupping the chin. Fold the legs forwards at the sides, with the feet peeking just behind the elbows. Such flexibility can only be achieved by a newborn. This pose highlights the baby’s facial features. For a girl, you can include a cute flower crown. And you don’t have to buy one - an easy DIY option will do just fine. 

4. Fallen Froggy Pose

Here’s a nugget to add to your newborn photoshoot tips. Try to achieve different positions with one newborn picture pose. The fallen froggy pose is just one step away from the little frog pose. Here you lay the baby’s head on the side as opposed to supporting it with the hands. The rest of the posture remains the same.

5. Tucked-in Pose

Here you tuck the infant in a bed face-up. Place a small prop under the head. The hands should be slightly visible. You can also have the baby hold something like a flower. This pose, along with the ‘frog’ poses above, is great for newborn portraiture as the focus is on the baby’s facial features.

6. Tushy Up

Here’s another form of sleeping babies photography. Cross the baby’s feet and tuck the knees under the belly, leaving the bum in the air. Fold the arms at the elbow with the hands resting under the chin. With his or her face down and behind poking into the air, this is an adorable and silly way to make loved ones smile with your pictures.

7. Taco Pose

This is one of the newborn poses for pictures that attempt to replicate the womb pose. The baby is practically folded into two, just like a taco. The hands and feet are folded under the upper torso. The pose focuses on the face, fingers, and toes.

8. Laying and Curling

This is one of those easy newborn poses. Simply place the baby on the side, preferably the right side, and tuck the hands under the chin. You can add a hat for a boy or a flower band for a girl for an extra highlight.

9. Back Pose

Natural baby photo posing does not come better than this. Lay the infant on the back with the hands and feet folded above the upper torso. You can use a reflector for extra lighting. Just avoid shining the light directly into the baby’s sensitive eyes. With the back pose, you can achieve amazing newborn portraits highlighting the face. Consider using a diaper for a boy to avoid a pee-spray incident.

10. Tummy Pose

Here you have the newborn laying on his/her tummy. From there, you can achieve different variations of this pose. You can shoot from different angles to highlight various features. Remember to be extra careful when adjusting the head. Make sure to always provide the baby’s neck with proper support. The neck muscles should turn freely. If there’s any tension, give the baby a moment to relax and try again. 

- Top-Down

Here you can use a newborn posing basket. Place the baby on the tummy with the bum raised. Adjust the hands underneath the chin. You can then shoot from the top, side, and any other angle that gives an interesting newborn baby portrait.

- Front Side Portrait Tummy Pose

Here you place the camera overhead for a top-down shot of the baby’s body. The image captures the flowing body shape plus the newborn photography basket. For this perspective, you’ll have to remove the reflector as you’ll have to stand over the baby.

Family Photos with Newborns

Family photos with newborns are even more fun with everyone involved. We have creative newborn photography with parents, siblings, brothers, sisters, and even grandparents. The more the participants, the more newborn family poses you can come up with. 

1. Facing Each Other

This pose comes naturally in newborn photography with parents. The parents are gazing lovingly at their little bundle of joy, who is either asleep or looking back at them.

2. Looking at the Camera

This is another classic for family portraits with newborns. Everybody faces the camera, and you take a conventional portrait. The parents hold their boy or girl upright facing you. Turns out even better if the baby is awake. You can check online for more newborn poses ideas and interesting props for this particular pose. 

3. The Cradle Hold

Parents love to cradle their newborns, making this one of the favorite newborn baby picture poses. The parent cradles the baby at the chest, either facing the camera or looking towards the baby. You can take different shots where parents touch the baby’s hair, hold fingers, or gently kiss the forehead or the nose.

4. Keep Heads Close

You can do the cradle hold with both parents with their heads close together. They could face the camera or look admiringly at the baby.

5. With Siblings

For this one, an elder brother or sister (or both) poses with the baby. In most cases, the elder sibling is a child as well, so you have to be cautious when handing them the baby. Let the sibling sit comfortably, then give them a swaddled baby to hold.

6. Lifestyle Newborn Poses

Here you aim to capture the whole family spending time together. They could be posed or not. Either way, you should end up with a lovely family portrait.

Are you ready to try these newborn poses on your young one? Remember, newborn shoots can be unpredictable. The baby might not respond as you expected. Either way, go with the flow. You may not always achieve the pose you were aiming for. That’s okay. You can also end up with a different but equally beautiful one. Finally, remember to keep researching on newborn photo poses ideas so that you can bring a unique aspect to every shoot.

Credits: https://101photography.net/

While everyone can decide to host an online conference, only a few people can succeed in hosting the best online conference. This is usually because of the various challenges that come with hosting an excellent online conference. Well, don’t get worked up over your desire for a great conference. Continue reading this article to learn how you can host the best online conference possible.

Have a concrete plan

Before you start telling people about your online conference, you need to have an all-encompassing plan for what you need to do on the day.

Your plan should consider:

• The theme of the conference – it must be something your target audience will love to hear about
• The guest speakers at the conference
• The benefit of the conference to the attendees
• Duration of the conference

Find the right tools

As expected, you cannot host any online conference without the help of some state-of-the-art tools. So, get started by looking for the tools that will make your conference successful.

A few of the tools you should look for are:

• Webinar software such as Zoom, Zoho Meeting, Livestream, EasyWebinar, and Google Meet
• An email service provider
• Online conferencing plugins

Select the right time

Irrespective of the benefits, size, or promotion of your event, people will only join if they have the opportunity to do so. Therefore, if your online conference is scheduled to hold on a popular holiday, festival, or event, people may not attend. Also, hosting an online conference during the busy period of the day may have a negative impact on attendance.

To avoid this problem, do your research or look at the analytics of events during different periods. Alternatively, use public polls to decide the best time. Whatever you do, ensure you are choosing the right time that encourages attendance.

Promote your conference

Having chosen the right time, you should start looking for ways to reach out to your target audience. Look for the key selling points of the conference and use them to market it to the potential attendees. The selling points could be the benefits of the event, the popularity or experience of the speaker, the available networking opportunities, and lots more.

Regardless of the platforms that you want to use, don’t forget social media marketing. Social media platforms like Twitter, Facebook, and LinkedIn can come in handy to help you get in touch with your target audience.

Be fully prepared for tech problems

Tech problems can happen anytime in any event, and online conferences are no exception. Therefore, you should prepare for any possible tech troubles.

In view of this, you should have backups of presentation files, visuals, and other resources. Don’t shy away from advising your speakers to do the same thing. If you are not tech-savvy, have a tech-savvy person around you.

Make your conference engaging

The last way to host the best online conference possible is to make your conference engaging. You have to actively create opportunities for your audience to take part in the event. This will not only make them have fun, but it will also keep them interested in the conference. A few of the ways you can use include letting your audience submit their questions and giving shout-outs to people that attend the event. Also, let them provide feedback at the end of the conference.

With the strategies above, you can host the best online conference possible without much hassle.

Mood swings refer to the rapid and drastic changes in moods, hence ‘swinging’ between moods. Whilst it is natural for us to sometimes go from one feeling to another due to people around us, or some circumstances, it’s not okay to be feeling this way all the time. Having episodes of shifting mood is not a normal state of the body and might just be a symptom of a disease.

However, it is important to realize not every mood shift is alarming. Women, for example, experience mood swings prior to their periods. But it is not normal to change moods that disrupt your entire life and are unpredictable in frequency and pattern.

Serious signs of Mood Swings:

Danger bells should ring when the shift in moods is drastic and disruptive. If you are experiencing a rollercoaster of emotions; happy one minute and depressed the other without any obvious reason, if you feel like you might harm yourself, if you are not able to carry out on your daily activities, it’s time to get help.

The signs above are not your ordinary mood swings. They may just be indicators of some health condition. Visit a facility like Quaid-e-Azam Hospital that has good doctors who are able to find the reason for these shifts. Not treating the fundamental cause of mood swings can severely impact life, as the conditions causing them are not to be taken lightly. Some such conditions are as follows: 

One of the most alarming causes of mood swings are the underlying mental issues. One such condition is Bipolar Disorder where the person experiences a range of emotions; one moment they are feeling depressed and the next they get over-excited. This is why it was called manic depression as well.

Borderline Personality Disorder too results in severe mood changes. It causes erratic moods and personality. The instability it breeds impacts all aspects of the patient’s life and prevents them from having a wholesome life.

Moreover, people suffering from depression also experience mood-fluctuations. Depressed people have episodes where their mood shifts towards sadness and melancholy. They get irritated and sad very quickly i.e. have a volatile temper. They also experience lethargy and don’t therefore have an active life, social or otherwise.

Attention Deficit Hyperactivity Disorder, more commonly known as ADHD may also be responsible for mood-shifts. Such people have a very small attention span and thus get distracted easily. It also makes them more easily irritable.

Human body does not react well to changes in hormone levels. One such reaction are the mood shifts. Since women experience more of these fluctuations, they are more prone to suffer from the mood-swings. PMS or Premenstrual Syndrome is a well-known condition characterized by getting teary or angry very quickly. Episodes of binge-eating and sleeping are also not uncommon. Usually these symptoms occur 1-2 week before getting periods.

Apparently, spike in estrogen is responsible for this escalation in mood-spike. Pregnant women too are prone to some severe mood-swings. Women undergoing menopause get their fair share of mood-episodes as well. Moreover, puberty also causes a person to become temperamental.

Physical health too can take a toll on mental wellbeing. At times, physical illnesses can lead to shifting mood as well. More commonly, diseases like those of the cardiovascular system, lungs and thyroid are known to cause mood swings. Mood swings are also symptoms of different ailments; for example, initial symptoms of Huntington’s Disease includes mood swing along with depression.

Furthermore, brain injuries also lead to instability in moods. Trauma to the brain affects the mechanism of the regulation of emotions which then manifests in the form of erratic behavior.

The importance of getting proper sleep cannot be stressed enough. Not getting the requisite sleep, or not getting uninterrupted shuteye can lead to mood swings. Such people have prickly predispositions that tend to get better through the day.

Chronic sleep deprivation, or insomnia also causes mood swings. Such people tend to get anxious and depressed. This not only affects their mental health, but their physical health is also compromised. Insomnia increases the susceptibility of getting chronic diseases.

Taking too much stress too can result in mood-shifts. It is not entirely possible to live without stress, its part and parcel of life. Problem occurs when the stress levels are high all the time and start impacting all facets of life. High levels of stress can impact the hormones that regulate the mood of the person, leading to fluctuations that cause shifts in mood. Perpetually high levels of stress are extremely bad for the body as it lowers immunity and increases the risk of developing conditions like heart diseases.

Mood swings are not to be taken lightly. It is not natural for the body to persistently shift from one mood to another without a stimulus. Therefore, if this condition has been occurring for some time without any external trigger, you should consult good doctors, like those at Ittefaq Hospital, immediately. The causes of mood swings include serious mental and physical diseases thereby making it necessary to have a qualified diagnosis. It is always better to be safe than sorry.

Introduction

There are labels everywhere you look; on the products, you buy or produce, your spice bottles in the house or even hung on an office door. They all serve a single important purpose, to convey a message through written words or symbolic signs that are commonly understood. The purpose of the label is highly related to the material used in its making.

Some products may be exposed to moisture or be used outdoors. They even may be used on a product that requires flexibility and not create any breakage in the label if it is bent; Otherwise, a broken label is not easily readable. However, some labels need to convey the class of a product along with its message. These labels seem to have a golden or silver shimmer that is eye catchy and gives that premium look to merchandise. These classy looking labels are usually called foiled brand tags and stickers. Depending on the type of products such as being hot, sensitive or not, and design preference of the label. 

Uses

Foiled labels are used to get the attention of customers while giving them a perception of quality. They can include any information and can cover all the surfaces of the product or only a specific area. To cover the whole area with these labels, they use a heat vacuum technique and there are no adhesives involved. Although smaller labels may use adhesives. Alcoholic beverages, cosmetics, expensive food items such as caviar and jewellery producing companies use these products to indicate the high-value content of their packaged goods. 

Some brands may use these types of labels as a technique to stand out between other similar products in the market isles. 

Printability

Foiled brand labels are eye catching and this is their primary purpose. There are two different categories of foiled labels based on their printability aspect; Hot and cold foiled label application method.

• Hot application

These labels are printed using heat. Therefore, it is important to be used on materials that are not heat sensitive. The ink itself is nothing like the traditional liquid ink; it is dry and metallic instead. Hot method of label printing uses a press technique with hot engraved plates that are pushed to the labels’ surface. The result is an astonishing glow of metal colours that indicate nothing but high-end products.

They are used for creating many materials such as branding plates, candles and heat resistance cosmetic packaging, glass wine and alcoholic beverage bottles, specialised hotel cards, and many more. The particular features that this printing method offers are:

• They come in a variety of colours.
• It gives a metallic feel to the touch.
• Lasting lustrous shine and superior look.
• Most useful for the branded palette.
• It could incorporate various metals or alloys.

• Cold application 

This method is used as an alternative to hot foil printing. This label printing incorporates cold plates to apply ink. The label itself is made of a very thin layer of foil. UV lamps are used to bind to the foiled surfaces. The best part of this print is when a product is heat sensitive and can be damaged if exposed to higher temperatures.

Many products use this kind of printing; plastic bottles and containers that can be reformed by heating, household merchandise, and fine food products.

• They could be used to print stickers with pressure sensibility.
• The cold foiled brand tags can provide these features:
• Using it to make spot colour on the label
• Having access to a variety of dyes
• Unique designs
• Budget versatility for all requirements.

Where to print foiled labels

Unlike paper labels, these papers are not printable with simple printers. They require specific printing machines that are heavy and usually are very costly. Placing an order with printing companies that offer foiled labels is the solution for small production lines or limited prints. These labels are usually attachable through the adhesive layer. Bigger companies and continuous production lines prefer to buy their own foil printers for cost-cutting on mass production printing, being able to customise the labels easily, and cost-cutting both on printing services and transportability of labels to a place of production as an all in one solution.

Conclusion

Choosing the right label requires experience; There is a full range of choices, colours, and designs according to the material. This is especially true when it comes down to foiled printing. This printing material is more complex and requires more attention. You could take the advice of an expert to find out the best match for your products. Making extensive research about a printing company before placing an order is helpful for faster delivery time and quality assurance.