Sorry about
the news delay, folks. Due to our extreme attention focus on building a chicken coop and
totally enclosed chicken run (no foxes, no hawks), we have been too busy to write a main
article for this issue (or even answer many personal e-mails). Perhaps when the rush to
get the little peepers into their new digs is over, we’ll get back on track. In the
meantime, here’s a whole lot of short highlights you might wish to check out. Miscellaneous BS 1. This year’s flu season draws to
a close as one of the mildest in recent years, partly because the vaccine was a good match
for this winter’s most common virus. Overall flu and pneumonia
deaths were below those of a typical flu season, and health officials say fewer than two
dozen children’s deaths were reported. Full story
at: http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/12519608/ Personally, I find this report to be a condemnation
of flu vaccines. Why? Because, for those of you who remember, this was the year of the
major screw up in vaccines and there just wasn’t enough to go around. Perhaps they
are hoping you forgot that when they wrote this story, but hundreds of thousands who would
have gotten a shot this past flu season did not get one. Could that be why fewer
people died? Sorry, but did they say ONLY “fewer
than two dozen” children died of the regular flu? I would guess that means 22
or 23 children died. Can you imagine the headlines if only ONE or TWO children died of the
bird flu? I don’t know about you, but I’d say, given the hoopla about the
bird flu, this past flu season was a pandemic, wouldn’t you? (Tongue firmly in
cheek!) 2. An antibiotic plagued by serious
blood-sugar complications is coming off the market. Bristol-Myers Squibb confirmed
Monday that it plans to stop making and selling Tequin. …stocks currently available
are not being recalled. He urged people using Tequin not to discontinue it…
…there have been 388 patients with blood-sugar irregularities associated with the
drug including 20 deaths and 159 hospitalizations since Jan. 1, 2000. http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/12580698/ I recommend you not only stop using
this immediately, but stay away from any long-term antibiotic use. Think about this –
a blood sugar problem… antibiotics are mycotoxins. They should, then, promote an
environment friendly to fungi. Fungi feed on sugars and multiply (one billion fungi per
equivalent teaspoon). The fungi count should then cause the body’s sugar levels to be
depleted accordingly and when they have nothing to feed on, they will make you crave
sugars so you’ll continue feeding them. You will either have low blood sugars or,
depending on your reaction to the cravings, you’ll create a high sugar level. This
should go up and down with any long-term antibiotic use. And, of course, when your
allopathic doctor does a blood test, you likely will be declared diabetic. 3. Middle-aged, white Americans are much
sicker than their counterparts in England, startling new research shows, despite U.S. health care spending per person that’s more
than double what England spends. A higher rate of Americans tested positive for diabetes
and heart disease than the English. Americans also self-reported more diabetes, heart
attacks, strokes, lung disease and cancer. The gap between the countries holds true for
educated and uneducated, rich and poor. Smoking rates are about the same on both sides of
the pond. The English have a higher rate of heavy drinking, but a higher percentage of
Americans are obese. “It’s something of a mystery,” said Richard Suzman of
the U.S. National Institutes of Health,
which helped fund the study. Full story at: http://www.breitbart.com/news/2006/05/02/D8HBP9F00.html They postulate numerous causes for this
in their article and I can give them a simple answer, but they wouldn’t believe me.
Our pace of life here dictates a larger consumption of junk foods. Their failure to make
this connection is because allopathic doctors (most anyway) still do not believe there is
a strong connection between diet and diseases. Socrates knew this a few thousand years
ago. 4. Common
Soap Antiseptic Found in U.S. Crop Fields
— A chemical widely used to
make soap “antiseptic” survives sewage treatment and is being spread onto
farmland and released into water, with unknown effects, researchers reported
Tuesday. They said the compound, called triclocarban, is not broken down by
conventional sewage treatment. Researchers estimated that more than 70% of the triclocarban used by
consumers is released to the environment when treated sludge is put on land used,
in part, for food production. There it has the potential to accumulate in crops…
“When it degrades, it forms
an animal carcinogen,” Halden said in a telephone interview. Full story at: http://www.enn.com/today.html?id=10385 5. Lying with Statistics: Which drug would you rather take? One that reduces your risk of cancer by 50%, or another drug that only eliminates cancer in one out of 100 people? Most people would choose the drug that reduces their risk of cancer by 50 percent, but the fact is, both of these numbers refer to the same drug. They’re just two different ways of looking at the same statistic. One way is called relative risk; the other way is absolute risk. Here’s how it works: Let’s say that in a trial involving 100 people, two people would normally get breast cancer during the trial duration, but when all 100 people are put on the drug, only one person gets breast cancer, meaning the reduction of breast cancer is one person out of 100. Yet the pharmaceutical industry will exclaim that the relative risk reduction is 50% because one is 50% of two. In other words, the risk is cut in half from a relative point of view. The headlines promoting this drug, therefore, will always talk about the relative risk -- “A whopping 50 % reduction in risk!” -- and these headlines will be parroted by the mainstream press, medical journals, the FDA, doctors and drug marketing reps, who are always pushing and exaggerating the supposed benefits of their drugs while minimizing their risks. Because, you see, even though this drug may help one out of 100 people, its side effects create increased risks to all 100 people. Everyone suffers some harm from the potential side effects of the drug, even if that harm is not immediately evident. Yet only one out of 100 people was actually helped by the drug. More at: http://www.newstarget.com/019368.html 6. The FDA’s requirement of a
standard vocabulary for electronic prescription drug labels is expected to help prevent
medical errors. Nice electronic format, but the biggest
problem is that doctors seldom look at patient history before prescribing yet another
drug. Full story at: http://ct.enews.eweek.com/rd/cts?d=186-3613-31-89-143870-424563-0-0-0-1 7.
The debate rages on…PARMA, Italy, -- The
European Food Safety Authority announced Friday a review of evidence on aspartame use
found no increased cancer risks. http://www.sciencedaily.com/upi/index.php?feed=Science&article=UPI-1-20060505-19360500-bc-europe-aspartame.xml So basically, they said, there will be
no more freakin’ studies done about this, so just shut up and eat your aspartame.
However, at the same time, from the same country, we get this: Yes,
Aspartame is a Carcinogen. BOLOGNA
(Tierramérica) - The Italian scientist Morando Soffritti has revived the debate
about the safety of aspartame, an artificial sweetener used in many popular products,
including diet soft drinks made by Coca-Cola and Pepsi Co. … The sale of aspartame, with only four calories per gram and 200 times
sweeter than sugar, is sold under the trademarks NutraSweet and Equal,
bringing in 570 million dollars a year. It is estimated that some 350 million people
around the world, many in hopes of losing weight, consume aspartame daily through 6,000 kinds of foods and beverages.
Get
the full story at: http://www.ipsnews.net/news.asp?idnews=32904
Six thousand? Read those labels! You know, it has never been the threat of cancer that
keeps me away from this poison. As we have
mentioned before, aspartame has aspartic
acid{1} in it, which is a well-documented excitotoxin. Single
amino acids like this can cause your brain cells to become excessively excited and
die. Excitotoxins can also
cause a loss of brain synapses and their connecting fibers (which is why we refer
to aspartame generally as a neurotoxin). Then the ester bond connecting aspartic acid to phenylalanine
in aspartame is broken down to formaldehyde and methanol, which have their own toxicities.
Get off this stuff if you value your life. Note 1: Not that this applies to this particular article, but I just
found this same ingredient in a non-refrigerated probiotic that is currently being sold by
one of Know the Cause’s sponsors. I don’t want aspartic acid in anything I eat
or drink, especially in something that is supposed to be for my health. 8. What is the fourth-biggest seller in the Novartis medicine
cabinet? No lifesaver. It’s Lamisil, a pill for -- horrors! -- toenail fungus. The main effect of the fungus is that it turns the
toenail yellow; it can hurt, but no one has died of this inconvenience. But a few people
may have died taking Lamisil. Federal
regulators have linked the drug to 16 cases of liver failure, including 11 deaths.
Novartis says most of the patients had pre-existing illnesses or were also on other drugs.
Yet 10 million Americans have taken Lamisil, which costs $850 for a
three-month treatment. They have been lured by a grotesque cartoon creature called
Digger the Dermatophyte, a squat, yellow fellow with a dumb-guy New York accent. In TV ads
he lifts a toenail as if it were the hood of a car, then creeps beneath it to declare,
“I’m not leavin’!” TNS Media Intelligence calculates that
Novartis has spent $236 million on
Lamisil ads in three years (Novartis says it has spent only $100 million). The
first run, which featured Digger being crushed by a giant Lamisil tablet, so overstated the drug’s benefit
that regulators objected and the company had to pull the spots; the drug fully cures the
problem in only 38% of patients. But the ad blitz undeniably was effective: Lamisil
sales jumped 19% to $1.2 billion worldwide in 2004 and held steady last year. Lamisil’s
rise points up what is wrong with the drug industry today: the triumph of salesmanship over
science. The industry spends a fortune to create and sell a raft of me-too remedies
aimed at quelling sometimes trivial maladies, even as research pipelines run dry, patents
on old drugs expire and critical areas of medicine go underserved. More at: http://wired.com/news/technology/medtech/0,70760-0.html?tw=wn_index_7 In other words, there is more money available
in promising cures to stupid people than in actually making real cures. They know more
about psychology than medicine. The really sad part about this is that Lamisil
is really the only prescription drug that is a fungcide (meaning it actually kills
fungus), and not a fungistat (meaning it just doesn’t let new fungus grow). If
you have toenail fungus, then you have a whopper of a systemic fungal problem. If you took
Lamisil for a long enough time, it would get rid of your systemic fungus (providing you
didn’t make it worse by eating the wrong foods), but the time it would take to
completely eradicate the fungus would be more time than it takes for the drug to
completely eradicate your liver. My advice to anyone with toenail fungus is to get off
sugar and grains immediately, and start taking a potent natural fungicide such as olive
leaf or oil of oregano. Neither of those have any side effects (they’re foods)
and they will kill fungus just as well (I think better) than any prescription drug. 9. A waterproofing boot spray has sickened nearly 200 people and more than two dozen pets in the Midwest since early last year, health officials said Thursday. No one died, but people in five states reported coughing and breathing problems, and more than 80 went to hospitals. A 69-year-old Michigan man was put on a ventilator and hospitalized for 19 days, said Susan Smolinske of the regional poison control center at Children’s Hospital of Michigan in Detroit. Three housecats died after exposure to the aerosol products, Smolinske said. Most of the cases were linked to two Canadian products — Jobsite Heavy Duty Bootmate and Rocky Boot Weather and Stain Protector. Both are manufactured by Assured Packaging of Mississauga, Ontario. The U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention detailed the investigation this week in its Morbidity and Mortality Weekly Report. “We’re absolutely sure it’s the products that caused these illnesses,” said Smolinske, lead author of the MMWR article. The rest of this can be seen at: http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/12632838/ 10. For Science’s Gatekeepers, a
Credibility Gap: Recent disclosures of fraudulent or flawed studies in medical and
scientific journals have called into question as never before the merits of their
peer-review system. The system is based on journals inviting independent experts to
critique submitted manuscripts. The stated aim is to weed out sloppy and bad research,
ensuring the integrity of what it has published. Because findings published in
peer-reviewed journals affect patient care, public policy and the authors’ academic
promotions, journal editors contend that new scientific information should be published in
a peer-reviewed journal before it is presented to doctors and the public. That message,
however, has created a widespread misimpression that passing peer review is the scientific
equivalent of the Good Housekeeping seal of approval. Virtually every major scientific and
medical journal has been humbled recently by publishing findings that are later
discredited. The flurry of episodes has led many people to ask why authors, editors and
independent expert reviewers all failed to detect the problems before publication. If you are interested in this type of thing, check out: http://www.nytimes.com/2006/05/02/health/02docs.html?_r=2&oref=slogin&oref=slogin
11. Doctors Object to Gathering of
Drug Data: Although virtually unknown to consumers, the information has long been
considered the most potent weapon in pharmaceutical sales — computerized dossiers
showing which physicians are prescribing what drugs. Armed with such data, a drug sales
representative can pressure a doctor to write more prescriptions for a name-brand medicine
or fewer orders for a competitor’s drug. More at: http://www.nytimes.com/2006/05/04/business/04prescribe.html
12. Prescription for an Obsession?
New evidence links drug used to treat Parkinson’s disease with a rash of addictive
behaviors. Researchers are looking into the possibility that dopamine may turn some
Parkinson’s patients into obsessive pleasure seekers. Full story at: http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2006/03/18/AR2006031801179.html
Speaking of obsessive behaviors, do you remember the Ambien article
from a few issues back? It appears that people are now taking that as an excuse for other
things they have done (no one seems to want to take responsibility for their own actions).
It has been suggested that the recent Patrick Kennedy accident was because he was
influenced by anything but alcohol. And this one had me laughing my ass off
(no URL because I heard it on TV): A woman who has been on a strict Weight Watchers
program has gained 100 pounds. She claims it is because she was taking Ambien for a
sleep disorder. Now, we know some folks get up in the middle of the night and eat and do
not know it, but her claim that it is not her fault she ate several packages of Oreos and
tubs of ice cream – it certainly must be Ambien’s fault. Excuse me, you
fat bitch, but if you are on a strict diet, why do you even have Oreos and ice cream in
your house? And why, do you suppose, she ate that stuff instead of something healthy? Even
if Ambien made her want to eat, she could have had something besides forbidden foods that
shouldn’t even be in her house. Don’t blame drugs for things that are your own
fault. 13. Newspapers are often wrong on neurologic disorders. Articles about neurological conditions ranging from Alzheimer’s disease to traumatic brain injury commonly contain errors or use stigmatizing language, according to a recent study. More at: http://www.medpagetoday.com/Neurology/AlzheimersDisease/tb/2889 14. The U.S. Food and Drug
Administration, the agency that claims to be responsible for protecting consumers from
dangerous food and drug products, has just surrendered its primary responsibility.
Recently, an FDA advisory panel
voted to recommend that a dangerous prescription drug Tysabri, which was withdrawn from
the market a year ago due to its promoting of a deadly brain disease, should now be put
back on the market. But here’s the really shocking part: The justification for
this decision to reinstate a drug with known deadly side effects is based on the idea that patients
should now weigh the risks of dangerous drugs
and decide for themselves whether the risks outweigh the benefits, if any. Stop the music for a minute. Do you realize that with
this decision, the FDA has just rendered itself irrelevant? If patients are going to be
held responsible for making risk vs. benefits decisions on prescription drugs, then why do
we need the FDA at all? Full story at: http://www.newstarget.com/019331.html On the other hand, why the heck do we need
doctors, if we’re to make the risk/benefit assessment ourselves? Oh, yeah, I
remember, they have to write the prescriptions for all those deadly drugs. Pardon me, I
think I’m going to throw up, now... 15. The National Institutes of Health (NIH) has convened a scientific panel to review the safety of soy baby formula and genistein, a plant estrogen found in soy. Genistein can mimic the effects of estrogen in humans, which has raised concerns about effects on human development and reproduction. The panel intends to look into these possible effects, such as the research that suggests soy consumption could affect the menstrual cycle. More at: http://www.usatoday.com/news/health/2006-03-14-soy-panel_x.htm Gee, d’ya think? 16. What Are the Effects of Direct-to-Consumer Drug Advertising? The U.S. and New Zealand are the only industrialized countries that allow direct-to-consumer advertising of prescription drugs, although New Zealand is planning a ban. Is it time for the U.S. to also ban the practice? (YES!!!) In a debate in the open access medical journal PLoS Medicine, authors with divergent viewpoints lay out the possible public health benefits and harms from such advertising. More at: http://medicine.plosjournals.org/perlserv/?request=get-document&doi=10.1371/journal.pmed.0030145 17. Allowing the Drug Companies to Poison Our Children
recounts how the congressional
leadership snuck a provision protecting vaccine manufacturers from being held accountable
for any damage done by their products in the Defense appropriations bill last
December. The provision was added just hours before the bill was rushed to the floor and
voted on in the dead of night. Most members probably did not even realize the vaccine
provision was in the bill. Full story at: http://www.commondreams.org/views06/0322-22.htm
Hearing things like this make me wonder if the human race is worth
saving at all. WHY would you put something about vaccines in a Defense Department
Bill in the first place, unless you were trying to be sneaky and dishonest, and pull
something over on the people. It’s just about time to FEED THE HOGS, people! I suggest no congressional bill be allowed to have any riders. 18. Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld has made more than $5 million from selling shares in the firm that discovered and developed the flu drug Tamiflu. He also retains shares worth $25 million or more. Tamiflu is bought in mass quantities by the government in order to treat a predicted outbreak of avian flu. The drug was developed by Gilead Sciences. Mr. Rumsfeld was on the board of Gilead between 1988 and 2001, and was chairman starting in 1997. When he left to join the Bush administration, he retained a large shareholding. In 2003, the year before concerns about bird flu began, the company took a loss. But in 2004, Tamiflu sales nearly quadrupled, and then nearly quadrupled again in 2005. Divestiture of his stocks in the corporation is not required by the Office of Government Ethics or the Department of Defense Standards of Conduct Office. Story at: http://www.commondreams.org/headlines06/0312-06.htm Now you know one of the major players who stands to profit from this
hoax. He should not be allowed to hold a federal office. And from what I’ve heard, Tamiflu doesn’t do squat against
bird flu. Elderberry or Oreganol will kill that virus outright. Tamiflu won’t. 19. Creating and treating disease is a
significant economic driver in the United States. From junk food producers to drug
manufactures to healthcare workers, millions of people profit from promoting disease. Full story at: http://www.newstarget.com/019337.html
20. Does the image of a fast food
restaurant in a school bother you? How does going out for a bacon double cheeseburger and
some fries at your nearest children’s hospital sound? Astoundingly, 24% of pediatric
hospitals in North America have a fast food outlet in them according to a recent study by
Canadian health experts. More at: http://www.enn.com/today.html?id=10192 I visited the VA hospital in Portland,
Oregon many times in the past and their entire cafeteria consists of various junk food
vendors (including Burger King). The hospital next door (Oregon Health Sciences
University) didn’t have specific vendors in their own little stalls, but the menu was
still junk (mostly pizza and hamburgers). This is not restricted to children’s
hospitals. And both have vending machine areas full of the worst possible crap anyone
could possibly consume. Ever notice when you go to the dentist, they have free lollipops
or donuts? Talk about a way to get repeat business! 21. Most varieties of Airborne, the
popular “herbal” remedy used by professionals who travel frequently by air to
prevent colds, contain sucralose (Splenda). Three of the four products in the Airborne
line -- Airborne Original, Airborne Lemon-Lime, and Airborne Jr. -- contain sucralose. The
fourth uses [refined]
sugar. Airborne claims its products are a combination of seven herbs, which are put
through a patented extraction process and then combined with amino acids, anti-oxidants
and electrolytes. It is sold as a dietary supplement rather than a drug, so its claims and
ingredients have not been evaluated by any health agency. You can read all their BS claims at their website: http://www.airbornehealth.com/ingredients.html One of the secret reasons that Splenda is used to sweeten many
products is that they are using a loophole in the law. If a product has less than four
calories per serving it can be legally called “zero calories.” Splenda
is a combination of artificial sweeteners and has sugar in it (as well as chlorine). But because
of this loophole, companies can get away with using sugar and questionably
proven artificial sweeteners, whose safety is highly uncertain. Some other
products you might not know about that have added Splenda include diet sodas, some
breakfast cereals, and even some canned fruits. Read those labels! 22. The Myth of “Mood Stabilizing” Drugs. There’s a huge gap between claims made for these drugs and evidence for their safety and effectiveness - yet they are now being dished out even to young children. More at: http://www.newscientist.com/channel/fundamentals/mg19025471.200 23. Food producers are jumping on the natural health bandwagon, but even their new “natural” products contain harmful substances. You can’t always trust the products you find in the health food store, and if you want to know which ingredient commonly used in so-called “natural” products is just as bad as MSG, check out: http://www.newstarget.com/019355.html 24. Every psychiatric expert involved in writing the standard diagnostic criteria for disorders such as depression and schizophrenia has had financial ties to drug companies that sell medications for those illnesses, a new analysis has found. Is there even one professional who isn’t in this business to line their pocketbooks? Get the rest of the story at: http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2006/04/19/AR2006041902560.html 25. Eleven new studies, published in the
journal Public Library of Science Medicine, accuse the pharmaceutical industry of
“disease mongering” - a practice in which the market for a drug is inflated by
convincing people they are sick and in need of medical treatment. More at: http://www.guardian.co.uk/science/story/0,,1751362,00.html Like we haven’t told you this
story before… 26. The tyranny of the FDA and its recent threatening of cherry growers who dared to publish scientific information emphasizing the health benefits of cherries. They (the cherry growers) were threatened and censored as part of the FDA’s “de-education campaign” to keep the American people ignorant about healing foods, herbs and nutritional supplements. Story at: http://www.newstarget.com/019366.html If the FDA keeps this up, pretty soon we’ll need a prescription from an M.D. to buy produce at the grocery store. ‘Scuse me, I think I have to throw up again.. |