HealthBeat News

Category: Health Freedom

  • Lettuce And Spinach To Be Secretly Irradiated! Say It Isn’t So!

    It Isn’t So!

    There has been somewhat of a flurry of outrage recently with the FDA announcement that on August 22, 2008, they published a final rule allowing the use of irradiation on fresh iceberg lettuce and fresh spinach. The FDA claims that this will make them "safer and last longer without spoiling."

    Opponents are claiming all sorts of evil ranging from the destruction of all nutritive value in treated foods (not that there is much these days anyway – see Dr. Myatt’s article "Vitaminless Vegetables") to actually causing the consumers of irradiated food to "glow in the dark"!

    So where is the truth in all of this? Somewhere in the middle, as usual.

    It is true that irradiation of food can kill certain bacteria, this rendering the food safer and less susceptible to spoilage – a boon to consumers who are less likely to become ill from eating contaminated food, and for the food industry who can enjoy a longer shelf-life and thus increased profits.

    It is also true that irradiation affects, alters, and reduces the nutritive values of foods – the FDA says as much in their "Final Rule" printed in the Federal Register / Vol. 73, No. 164 / Friday, August 22, 2008 / Rules and Regulations.

     http://www.fda.gov/OHRMS/DOCKETS/98fr/E8-19573.pdf (Warning: this is a stupefyingly boring paper to read!)

    According to this paper the FDA also reassures us that it really doesn’t matter that the nutritive values of foods are altered and vitamins are destroyed – after all, the FDA would have us believe that vitamins are not really necessary for health beyond the tiny amounts of the RDA’s…

    It is certainly NOT true that eating irradiated foods will cause someone to "glow in the dark" as one well-known activist wrote!

    In response to an article by that activist, who has a large readership for his very popular newsletter, we received this note from one of our HealthBeat News readers who is also a friend and neighbor:

    This was recently sent to me … just makes me crazy.  Thought you might find it interesting.
    Hope all if well with both of you.
    Jamie O

    Jamie then referred us to a very alarmist article by "Health Ranger" Mike Adams posted on his website naturalnews.com where he reports "beginning today, spinach and lettuce sold across the United States may now be secretly irradiated before it reaches grocery store shelves."

    This is the same article where he warns that those who eat irradiated foods will "glow in the dark."

    Folks, you need to know that I am no friend of the FDA – I think that it is a bureaucracy out-of-control.

    I also think that the jury is still out on the irradiation of food – I’m not yet convinced that it is entirely safe or healthy though I do concede that it is certainly effective for it’s stated purpose.

    I further think that writer Mike Adams, the self-described "Health Ranger", makes some good points about many things – there is much we agree upon.

    But for heaven’s sakes, let’s ease up on the rhetoric! I feel that there is nothing to be gained, and everything to be lost, by the sort of alarmist writing and outright fabrications that his article present. This kind of writing just gets us all branded as "nut-balls" and "conspiracy theorists" and diminishes our credibility.

    Let’s look at this "Health Ranger" article: http://www.naturalnews.com/023945.html

    Adams’ first claim is that "spinach and lettuce sold across the United States may now be secretly irradiated before it reaches grocery store shelves" further claiming that "irradiated foods will not be labeled as such, and consumers are going to be left in the dark about all this".

    Unfortunately, Adams’ article contains no references to tell me where he found this information – I had to look for it myself and after much research I must conclude that this just isn’t true.

    According to several FDA documents, "Irradiation of iceberg lettuce and spinach is voluntary on the part of food processors. FDA requires that foods that have been irradiated bear the "radura" logo along with the statement "Treated with radiation" or "Treated by irradiation.""

    This regulation is found in a number of sources, including the FDA press release regarding irradiation of lettuce and spinach: http://www.fda.gov/consumer/updates/irradiation082208.html – there are also statements regarding mandatory labeling here: http://law.justia.com/us/cfr/title21/21-3.0.1.1.10.html#21:3.0.1.1.10.2.1.3 and here: http://www.fda.gov/opacom/catalog/irradbro.html – They seem pretty clear to me…

    Next Adams gives us his "glow in the dark" statement. This is pure alarmist hyperbole, and is so silly that it is not really worth commenting on. Just shake your head in amazement that he (or his editors) would allow this to be published and move on…

    Then Adams claims that "The FDA, of course, insists that the levels of irradiation used to kill e.coli will have no effect whatsoever on the nutritional value of the food."

    This again is not quite true: As I read through the Federal Register referred to in this article it is quite clear that the FDA is aware that a number of nutrients are adversely affected by irradiation – they just don’t think it matters very much.

    Adams further claims that irradiation removes all the nutritive value from food by destroying all phytonutrients: "lowering the value to zero by destroying all the phytonutrients does not, in the opinion of the FDA, alter its nutritional value at all."

    I have a little bit of a problem with the absolute nature of this statement – my review of available research indicates that irradiation does indeed alter and reduce some nutrient, phytonutrient, and vitamin levels – but it does not somehow mysteriously suck all the nutritive value from food – that is just silly.

    Adams does lighten up a bit with the next statement: "irradiating food destroys much of its nutritional content, including vitamins, carotenoids, anthocyanins and other delicate protective nutrients that are right now providing the last, desperate nutritional defense against the American diet of meat, milk, fried foods and processed junk."

    Fair enough – so perhaps irradiation only destroys some of the nutritive value – but if Americans are relying on that silly little bit of wilted lettuce and soggy slice of tomato to transform their deluxe cheeseburger and fries into something even remotely healthy they are sadly, tragically misinformed.

    What really upsets me with the "Health Ranger" and this article is that it is clearly misleading and very alarming – obviously written to "stir up" and agitate his audience who he feels will accept these statements at face value as some sort of "gospel truth." He gets away with this by failing to provide any references for his statements. If the FDA has stated that labeling is not necessary for example, where is the reference to the FDA document where this can be found?

    Like many HealthBeat rea
    ders, I will continue to read Adams’ articles – but I’m afraid he has lost forever some of the confidence and trust that I had in his work.

    The moral of this story? Be sure, when you read any health article that is making any sort of claim that there are verifiable references for what is being said.

    Opinion is one thing – but if something is being presented as a statement of fact, well, if it ain’t referenced, it ain’t so!

  • Gardasil, Mandatory Vaccinations, And Health Freedom – What Can History Teach Us?

    Do we learn nothing from history?

    Be it the "Swine Flu" vaccine in the 1970’s that caused more deaths than the swine flu did, or the polio vaccine in 1955 that cause more disease than it prevented (known as "The Cutter Incident"), it looks like we need to be reminded over and over again that when we monkey around by introducing foreign substances into people there are likely to be unforeseen, unintended, and serious – even lethal – repercussions.

    But that is just recent history – were you aware that there have been mandatory vaccination programs since the later part of the 1800’s? And that respected physicians of that day exposed the folly, ineffectiveness, and danger of those programs just as there are respected physicians who do the same today? And that those physicians, then and now, are systematically ridiculed, marginalized, harassed, and even ruined by the allopathic vaccine industry that stands to lose obscene amounts of money should the truth about vaccination become common knowledge?

    Let’s follow the money for a moment: Merck is the Big Pharma giant responsible for the vaccine Gardasil. This is said to be the most expensive vaccine in common use, with a price tag of $360 per three-injection series and Merck is said to have sold some 16 million doses of the stuff so far. Now, if a three dose series is $360, then presumably each dose is worth $120. Multiplied by 16 million, that works out to $1,920,000,000.

    That’s one billion, nine hundred and twenty million dollars folks. Darned near two billion dollars!

    Do we begin to see why there might be a big push going on to make this vaccination "mandatory"? Especially when there are reports that women, given freedom of choice, are not flocking to be vaccinated and sales are sagging (and profits too…)

    Remember, this is the company that also brought you such stellar performers as Vioxx, Fosamax, and Singulair… and has the money and power to "make things happen."

    Even the mainstream media is now beginning to follow the money-trail, with reporters like CBS News investigative correspondent Sharyl Attkisson finding heavy financial connections between Big Pharma, the American Academy of Pediatrics, Every Child By Two (a lobbying group created to promote early childhood vaccination and located within a stone’s throw of the White House in Washington, DC), and vaccination proponent Dr. Paul Offit – the pediatrician and vaccine patent-holder who has been reprimanded by congress for his conflicts of interest.

    Don’t get me wrong – everyone needs to make a living and pay their bills and the money has to come from somewhere – but when these organizations and doctors are taking money from Big Pharma they really shouldn’t be presenting themselves as impartial, public-service, free-from-industry-and-financial-influence when they are presented as experts promoting these drugs and vaccines.

    As I was doing a bit of research on Gardasil and other vaccines I came across a fascinating, chilling little tidbit: I visited Medscape – that medics-only online repository of medical information, supposed to be impartial and unimpeachable in it’s content. I was looking for an article titled "HPV Vaccine Adverse Events Worrisome Says Key Investigator," which was posted on July 26, 2008. In it’s place I found an article titled "HPV Vaccine Deemed Safe and Effective, Despite Reports of Adverse Events" and a note explaining that the first article had been removed following "editorial review."
    Removed, mind you – not left there, perhaps with an editorial caveat or warning about it’s suitability or impartiality so that the readers might draw their own conclusions – but removed. Gone. Dare I say censored? Suppressed?

    Fortunately, with a bit of careful searching, this article can be found elsewhere – though for how long, no-one knows. So that it may remain available to our HealthBeat News readers, I have placed the contents of this article in our archives. We believe that it should be the author of this article Allison Gandey who should decide the fate of her research and work – not Medscape or Merck. Ms. Gandey is welcome to contact us if she feels it should be removed…

    But I have digressed – this was supposed to be an article about mandatory vaccination programs, and it was prompted by recent news articles reporting that New York was considering a new law – Assembly Bill 10942 – would make all vaccines recommended by the CDC mandatory for all children to attend school. Not only that, but for the first time vaccines would become mandatory for infants and toddlers.

    Additionally, according to sources like the "Home School Legal Defense Association" this bill would allow doctors to give a vaccine to children without the consent or knowledge of the parents. Says the Association: "Theoretically, a doctor could ask if a 12-year-old girl had a boyfriend and when told “yes”, the doctor could tell this young girl that she would recommend the HPV vaccine to prevent her from getting cancer. The doctor could administer the vaccine without ever getting the parents’ consent and without their knowledge."

    Best of all, this boon-to-Big Pharma would require all children in the state to be given EVERY vaccine recommended by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) – some twenty in all, some of which require multiple doses to achieve their desired "effect."

    So, once again we have legislators looking to remove from us any ability to exercise free will or choice with respect to our health.

    Perhaps the biggest question for us here is just who is at risk when someone is not vaccinated? It would seem to us that the person most at risk is the person who has decided to be at risk. We hear from the CDC, the FDA, the AMA, Big Pharma and others that vaccinations are supposed to "stop the spread of disease" and that this is justification for forced vaccination. But is this really so? Smallpox is said to have been "eradicated" through near universal vaccination – but the truth is that there are still isolated outbreaks of this disease today. People still get sick with this disease – most recover, a tiny few succumb. Smallpox vaccinations have not been given routinely to children since 1977. Why? the WHO would have us believe that because smallpox has been "eradicated" they are no longer needed. Could the truth be that no-one is willing to deal with the liability issues created by a vaccination that causes as much suffering and misery as it is said to prevent?

    Vaccinations are a contentious issue. There is ample evidence that vaccines can cause harm and illness. There is ample evidence that vaccination is considerably less than fully effective in preventing disease. There are many people who are suspicious of vaccination, and given the choice would rather take their chances with the disease than with the vaccination. As a kid I can remember "Chicken-pox parties" where moms would gather their children around an infected kid so that all could "enjoy" the illness and subsequent immunity. In fact, the earliest form of "vaccination" for smallpox was simply to rub against the open lesion of an mildly infected person. This usually resulted in a limited, mild infection which conferred immunity. This time-honored practice, known as Variolation, is of course scorned by "modern" medicine.

    Those who refuse vaccination expose only themselves to any possible risk of illness – those who wish to be "protected" are free to be vaccinated and then smile smugly at their "unprotected" neighbors. They are welcome to have a hearty "told you so" at my expense if I spend a day or two longer in bed with the flu because of my decision to forego
    the risks of immunization.

    We are not entirely anti-vaccination – indeed, Dr. Myatt has been known to prescribe certain vaccinations to some patients in order to stimulate immunity. But this is a carefully considered recommendation, not a wholesale mass inoculation program as Big Pharma would like to see.

    We support the right of informed people to make their own decisions. We feel that it is just plain wrong for government or Big Business to force any drug or vaccine or chemical on anyone. Especially when the motivation looks more like profit than health.

    Further reading / Resources:

    • "The Cutter Incident" book review – http://www.bmj.com/cgi/content/full/332/7543/733
    • smallpox myths – http://www.the7thfire.com/Politics%20and%20History/SmallpoxMyths.htm
    • thiomersol controversy – http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Thiomersal_controversy
    • "Worst Vaccine Bill Ever" article – http://www.infowars.net/articles/may2008/300508vaccines.htm
    • Reflections on the 1976 Swine Flu Vaccination Program – http://www.cdc.gov/ncidod/EID/vol12no01/05-1007.htm
    • NY Times – "The Rush To Vaccinate" article – http://www.nytimes.com/2007/03/25/opinion/25CIfry-revere.html
    • Wall Street Journal Article Questions Cost-effectiveness of Gardasil – http://online.wsj.com/article/SB121928503311259059.html?mod=googlenews_wsj
    • "DR. PAUL OFFIT: QUOTE MACHINE FOR HIRE" – http://www.ageofautism.com/2008/05/dr-paul-offit-q.html
    • 60 Minutes-REMINDER of who Dr. Paul Offit is: – http://www.whale.to/a/offit.html
    • "Serious Questions About HPV Vaccine" CBS article – http://www.cbsnews.com/stories/2008/07/07/eveningnews/main4239462.shtml
    • VaccineEthics.org article: "HPV Roundup: Gardasil safety worries, Cervarix FDA delays, more on mandates" – http://blog.vaccineethics.org/2008/07/hpv-roundup-gardasil-safety-worries.html
    • Variolation and historical inoculation – http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Inoculation

  • "Double Standards" and Natural, "Non-Conventional" Health Care

    I was discussing the subject of drugs and drug testing with a friend online the other day, and thought that the following might be of interest to HealthBeat readers:

     

    My friend wrote:

    The problem: pilots are human, and subject to all the normal problems everyone else goes through. When a pilot gets depressed, they cannot seek help, or they will be grounded for a period that can last for years.

    Why is it OK for police, judges, firemen, other jobs with great social responsibility, to be successfully treated with anti-depressants, but pilots are expected to be superhuman physically and mentally?

    And I replied:

    Hi,

    You are quite right – it is really NOT ok for there to be such a double-standard. No one is functioning at their best when filled with side-effect producing pharmaceuticals. Fortunately the FAA has the oversight and the clout to do something about it – most other professions do not, and you have judges making bad decisions that affect peoples lives, cops putting themselves, their partners, and the public at risk with dulled reflexes, crane operators making bad picks with dulled judgment, and so on.

    It is worth remembering however that depression is not caused by a Zoloft or Paxil or Effexor deficiency, anxiety is not caused by a Valium or Xanax deficiency, high blood pressure is not caused by a Norvasc deficiency, diabetes is not caused by a drug deficiency… and yet these are common problems that people use sense and reaction-time dulling drugs for.

    Fair enough perhaps if you get this stuff "covered" by some health care plan, and it doesn’t affect your employability, and you really don’t care that you are disabled to some degree by side effects…

    But in the case of a pilot, this is a big concern. Conventional treatment for many illnesses using conventional drugs will ground a pilot, resulting in a sudden and severe loss of income – no wonder many attempt to self-treat. While hypertension or arrhythmias or diabetes will be found on the FAA physical, depression can be hidden with varying degrees of success.

    But it need not be so. Given the financial incentive for a pilot to maintain the ability to fly, perhaps it might be worth stepping outside of the "corporate medical insurance plan" box and seeking some alternative, non-conventional health care.

    A visit with a naturopathic physician, while reportable to the FAA, could be legitimately reported simply as "Nutritional and Dietary Counseling" even though the desired effect of such counseling might be the correction of imbalances that may be manifesting as, say, neurotransmitter imbalances resulting in feelings of depression. Result: reporting legitimately accomplished with privacy maintained.

    As far as drugs go, a good Naturopathic Medical Doctor would perform neurotransmitter testing and make dietary and supplement changes to correct out-of-range neurotransmitters, without using reportable drugs. This is not fantasy or psychic woo-woo stuff – we do it successfully, every day here. Though we can prescribe drugs (Dr Myatt is an NMD – Naturopathic Medical Doctor – and is fully licensed and in possession of a DEA number which allows her to prescribe any FDA-approved drug) we very rarely do so – it just isn’t necessary. Drugs are more like Band-Aids – they treat the symptoms while the patient heals them self. We treat the causes, resulting in much faster and more complete healing.

    Further, dietary supplements like L-5HTP, SAMe, St. Johns Wort, bromelain, grape seed extract, niacin, etc. are NOT reportable to the FAA as "drugs"…

    We are constantly amazed at the medical "problems" that folks drug themselves for that we correct without drugs. Some examples; hypertension – easily correctable without Norvasc or other drugs, type 2 diabetes – not just correctable but curable without drugs, allergies – yep, drugless relief, high cholesterol – back to healthy ranges without drugs, GERD – a "slam-dunk" with Nexium NOT required, heart arrhythmias – most respond nicely to drugless treatment (we have a lawyer patient who was told after 3 successive ecg’s that he had a permanent and irreversible heart block – that he was "a ticking time-bomb" and would likely need a pacemaker. After a month of drugless treatment his cardiologist repeated the ecg and shook his head saying "If I were a lawyer I would not want to have to go into court to explain this – it is gone and your heart is fine – and that is not supposed to happen!") The list goes on and no, but you get the idea – mankind survived and thrived for millennia without the help of modern drugs – what the heck has changes so in the last century to make us any different?

    It also amazes me that folks insure their automobile but don’t expect the insurance company to pay for their tune-ups, oil changes, new tires, or new muffler – but when you suggest to someone that they might part with a few of their hard-earned dollars for a health care consultation or vitamins or supplements they react with horror, expecting that to either be "covered" by "the plan" or they just won’t do it. Yet in the case of a pilot, that refusal to take some personal responsibility for one’s own health could result in being grounded with the loss of income that would result.

    The analogy would be to knowingly drive on your bald tire, waiting for it to blow out on the road so that you can call road service to come out and put the spare on… and still not bothering to get new tires "because the insurance won’t cover it."

    So, if you have aviation buddies who are dancing around the FAA trying to avoid reporting ground-able stuff have them tap us – I’ll bet we can help keep ’em flying… and get them healthier than they’ve ever been…

    As an aside, I would love to have the opportunity to apply some simple dietary and vitamin techniques to a training class of aviators, with a parallel class as a control – I’m certain we could  demonstrate improvements in strength, stamina, endurance, coordination, alertness, resistance to fatigue and illness,  reaction times, and more… at little cost to Unka Sam.

    Cheers,
    Nurse Mark

  • Health Freedom Restrictions Predicted by Country’s Founding Fathers

    Dr. Benjamin Rush and Thomas Jefferson, signers of the Declaration of Independence (in case you forgot), knew 200+ years ago that our health freedoms were in danger of restriction. They said:

    "The Constitution of this Republic should make special provision for Medical Freedom as well as Religious Freedom… To restrict the art of healing to one class of men and deny equal privileges to others will constitute a Bastille [prison] of medical science. All such laws are un-American and despotic."
    Benjamin Rush, M.D., signer of the Declaration of Independence

    "I know of no safe depository of the ultimate powers of the society but the people themselves: and if we think them not enlightened enough to exercise their control with a wholesome discretion, the remedy is not to take it from them, but to inform them."
    Thomas Jefferson, signer of the Declaration of Independence

    Today, the FDA wants to restrict your health freedom and doesn’t believe you are smart enough to make your own decisions. Many "FDA approved" drugs have been found to be dangerous and even lethal, their approval later withdrawn (or not — recent examples include Vioxx and Ketek), while many vitamins and herbs have been "outlawed" even though they continue to be found safe after hundreds of years of use.

    Instead of taking safe and effective supplements off the market because they are making "health claims" that do not meet FDA approved standards, wouldn’t it be more "American" (in the old, Declaration of Independence sense of the word), to require labels which state: "these health claims are supported by scientific evidence but have not been approved by the FDA." Then you and I would know that the claims made were not blessed with Holy Water by the FDA (which only means a company has $$$, not good science).

    As free adult Americans, shouldn’t we be allowed this choice?

    In Health,
    Dr. Dana Myatt (who still believes in American Democracy and the U.S. Constitution)

  • FDA Declares BPA Safe!

    It looks like the plastics industry has gotten to the FDA – no surprise really, considering the amounts of money involved – and FDA commissioner Andrew von Eschenbach now assures us that he just can’t find any evidence of danger from bisphenol A — BPA — in plastic products such as baby bottles.

    It seems that "Andy" is one of those people who could be tied to a tree and have endless streams of fact paraded before him and still refuse to be confused by it.

    His mind has been made up for him by the chemical industry and he will not be swayed by mere fact – even fact in the form of a report from the U.S. department of Health and Human Services which clearly states “[T]he possibility that bisphenol A may alter human development cannot be dismissed,”. We covered this report in a previous HealthBeat News article.

    Nope, better to dismiss that one and go with the study that was funded by the chemical industry – after all, who would know better if those chemicals are safe than the people who make ’em, right? Yep, the same nice folks who brought us DDT, The Bhopal disaster, and Agent Orange…

    Well, we’re not buying it Andy. BPA is a nasty, toxic chemical. No amount of exposure to it is an "acceptable risk."

    This stuff is ubiquitous – it is everywhere, not just in clear plastic bottles. So I for one will do my best to avoid the exposures that I can see in the hope that the exposure that I cannot know or avoid will not prove to be too toxic.

    And say, why must baby bottles (and so many others) be made from BPA containing plastic anyway?

    Mankind did just fine for an awfully long time with good ol’ glass…