January 21, 2010

Fish oil supplementation benefits septic patients
Life Extensions, January 20, 2010
An article published on January 19, 2010 in the online journal Critical Care reports the discovery of researchers at the University of Southampton in England of improvements in patients hospitalized for systemic inflammatory response syndrome or sepsis who received intravenous treatment with omega-3 fatty acids from fish oil.
In their introduction to the article, Philip Calder and his colleagues explain that “Sepsis results from a host inflammatory response to infection and is characterised by high circulating concentrations of inflammatory cytokines such as tumor necrosis factor (TNF)-α, interleukin (IL)-1β, IL-6 and IL-8. Although conditions other than infections can trigger a state of hyperinflammation, sepsis requires special attention since even with current treatments it is often associated with very high mortality.”
Dr Calder’s team randomized 23 patients hospitalized with sepsis in the intensive care unit (ICU) of Hospital Padre Américo in Portugal to receive a parenteral lipid emulsion with or without fish oil for up to six days. They found that patients who received fish oil had reduced blood levels of inflammatory agents, improved lung function and earlier hospital discharge.
"Recently there has been increased interest in the fat and oil component of vein-delivered nutrition, with the realization that it not only supplies energy and essential building blocks, but may also provide bioactive fatty acids,” Dr Calder commented. “Traditional solutions use soybean oil, which does not contain the omega-3 fatty acids contained in fish oil that act to reduce inflammatory responses.”
"This is the first study of this particular fish oil solution in septic patients in the ICU,” he announced. “The positive results are important since they indicate that the use of such an emulsion in this group of patients will improve clinical outcomes, in comparison with the standard mix."
http://www.lef.org/whatshot/2010_01.htm#Fish-oil-supplementation-benefits-septic-patients

Swiss warn on H1N1 vaccine with autoimmune disease
Last Updated: 2010-01-20 12:02:22 -0400 (Reuters Health)
* Says autoimmune patients should not take Novartis vaccine
* Regulator says could lead to intensifying of disease
ZURICH (Reuters) - Switzerland's medical regulator recommended patients with serious autoimmune diseases should not use an H1N1 flu vaccine from Novartis, saying there were no studies assessing the inoculation in that segment of the population.
Swissmedic said on Wednesday it could not be ruled out that either or both of the adjuvant -- which can enhance the immune response -- and the antigen, or less active ingredient, could lead to an intensifying of autoimmune diseases.
Autoimmune diseases, like rheumatoid arthritis, are caused by an overly active immune system attacking its own body, targeting substances which are normally present.
Novartis was not immediately available to comment.
http://www.reutershealth.com/archive/2010/01/20/eline/links/20100120elin023.html

Johnson & Johnson engaged in elaborate drug profit kickback scheme, says Dept. of Justice lawsuit
Mike Adams, NaturalNews.com January 21, 2010 

(NaturalNews) Drug maker Johnson & Johnson paid tens of millions of dollars in kickbacks to nursing home pharmacies in order to boost the sale of its drugs, says a Justice Department lawsuit.

The payments were often disguised as grants or "educational funding," says the lawsuit, and they were directed to Omnicare, a prominent nursing home pharmacy company.

The elaborate kickback scheme caused sales of Johnson & Johnson drugs to skyrocket. Sales of the antipsychotic drug Risperdal, for example, helped J&J drug purchases from Omnicare nearly triple from $100 million to $280 million a year.

An email released by the Justice Department shows an Omnicare executive writing:

"WE ARE SELLING MORE HIGH PRICED DRUGS (read Risperdal here) FOR THE PHARMACEUTICAL INDUSTRY!!"

Omnicare is already steeped in other accusations of fraud. The company agreed to pay the U.S. government $98 million in a settlement reached a few months ago (while admitting no guilt, of course). (http://www.cbsnews.com/stories/2009...)
Drugging the seniors
Today's nursing home patients are often treated much like prisoners, mentally shackled with chemical restraints known as pharmaceuticals. The mass-drugging of senior citizens in nursing homes has now reached criminal proportions. Rather than actually treating patients in ways that make them healthy, nursing home staff in some facilities have discovered it's much easier to just drug patients into a zombie-like state where they don't ask questions or cause trouble.

Johnson & Johnson medications are used as part of this "chemical restraint" recipe, which is actually a form of chemical abuse of senior citizens. J&J and Omnicare, of course, are far more concerned with selling medications than actually improving the quality of life for nursing home patients, so the more drugs are sold and consumed, the more "success" these companies think they have.

But what's the cost in human lives? What is the real human impact of drugging our senior citizens to the point where they're barely human?

Companies like Johnson & Johnson only seem to care about their own profits. They appear to have no compassion whatsoever for the lives of the people impacted by their patented chemical pharmaceuticals. They also appear to have no respect for the law: Bribing Omnicare with kickbacks, if proven by the Justice Department, is a felony crime.

But as usually happens in these cases, Johnson & Johnson will probably get off with a slap on the wrist: An affordable fine and a bit of bad press. Then, like most other pharmaceutical companies, they'll likely go right back to violating the law in order to sell more high-profit medications. Why? Because it works.

Pharmaceutical companies rarely face any real consequences for their crimes, even when they're caught red-handed. It's a curious thing, really. In any other industry, companies engaged in such blatant fraud would be shut down, their CEOs arrested and prosecuted in federal court. But when it comes to Big Pharma, all they have to do is pay a small fine, after which they're free to continue committing crimes.

It's nice to see the Justice Department finally going after these corporate crooks. Just last year, Pfizer was hit with a record $1 billion settlementwith the Justice Department for engaging in fraudulent drug advertising. (http://www.naturalnews.com/027276_P...)

It was a rare victory, however. Most of the time, drug companies get away with their crimes and face no real consequences for bribery, corruption, marketing fraud, scientific fraud, intimidation of scientists or elaborate financial kickback schemes that put extra dollars into the hands of doctors orpharmacies that push their drugs.

The pharmaceutical industry, in case you haven't noticed, is a criminal world where those who commit the boldest and most egregious crimes generate the highest profits. The risk of getting caught is so low -- and the financial rewards for committing crimes are so great -- that drug companies fully realize it pays to break the law.

That's why they'll keep breaking the law until something changes. As I've said before, I think it's time the Justice Department marched into the offices of these drug companies with pistols drawn and arrested the top CEOs for their crimes against humanity. Only by showing these drug companies that their executives are going to be prosecuted for their crimes can we hope to put an end to the criminal activities that have now become routine across the pharmaceutical industry.
http://www.naturalnews.com/027994_Johnson_&_kickbacks.html

Zero deaths caused by vitamins, minerals, amino acids or herbs
Mike Adams, the Health Ranger, NaturalNews.com January 21, 2010 

(NaturalNews) To hear opponents of natural medicine say it, vitamins and herbs are extremely dangerous for your health. They should be regulated, we're told, because they're so dangerous!

Statistics from the U.S. National Poison Data System prove otherwise. According to a 174-page report just published, the number of people killed in 2009 across America by vitamins, minerals, amino acids or herbal supplements is exactly zero.

Compare that to the 100,000 (or so) Americans killed each year by FDA-approved pharmaceuticals -- and that's even according to studies published in JAMA. Also consider the thousands of women harmed or killed by medically-unjustified cancer treatments following false positives from faulty mammograms. And don't forget about the more than 16,500 Americans killed each year from internal bleeding caused by NSAIDs (over-the-counter painkillers).

As the July 1998 issue of The American Journal of Medicine explains:

"Conservative calculations estimate that approximately 107,000 patients are hospitalized annually for nonsteroidal anti-inflammatory drug (NSAID)-related gastrointestinal (GI) complications and at least 16,500 NSAID-related deaths occur each year among arthritis patients alone." (Singh Gurkirpal, MD, "Recent Considerations in Nonsteroidal Anti-Inflammatory Drug Gastropathy", The American Journal of Medicine, July 27, 1998, p. 31S)

So if NSAIDs alone are killing 16,500 people a year (or likely much more now, as use of these drugs has risen significantly since 1998), and nutritional supplements are killing zero people a year, why do health regulators try to scare everybody about vitamins being so "dangerous?"

Pharmaceuticals, meanwhile, are openly allowed to be prescribed for off-label use, meaning that doctors can prescribe them for diseases and health conditions for which they've never even been tested!

What's wrong with this picture? It's clearly a war against nutrition -- a war against natural medicine -- being waged by the health regulators of the world who are conspiring with Big Pharma to keep the people trapped in a state of malnutrition (all while profiting from their disease by selling them more patented pharmaceuticals).

The Orthomolecular Medicine News Service published a full article on this issue. Here's what they had to say about the safety of nutritional supplements and the misguided attempts by world governments to limit or outlaw many supplements.
No Deaths from Vitamins, Minerals, Amino Acids or Herbs
Poison Control Statistics Prove Supplements' Safety

There was not even one death caused by a dietary supplement in 2008, according to the most recent information collected by the U.S. National Poison Data System. The new 174-page annual report of the American Association of Poison Control Centers, published in the journal Clinical Toxicology, shows zero deaths from multiple vitamins; zero deaths from any of the B vitamins; zero deaths from vitamins A, C, D, or E; and zero deaths from any other vitamin.

Additionally, there were no deaths whatsoever from any amino acid or herbal product. This means no deaths at all from blue cohosh, echinacea, ginkgo biloba, ginseng, kava kava, St. John's wort, valerian, yohimbe, Asian medicines, ayurvedic medicines, or any other botanical. There were zero deaths from creatine, blue-green algae, glucosamine, chondroitin, melatonin, or any homeopathic remedies.

Furthermore, there were zero deaths in 2008 from any dietary mineral supplement. This means there were no fatalities from calcium, magnesium, chromium, zinc, colloidal silver, selenium, iron, or multimineral supplements. Two children died as a result of medical use of the antacid sodium bicarbonate. The other "Electrolyte and Mineral" category death was due to a man accidentally drinking sodium hydroxide, a highly toxic degreaser and drain-opener.

No man, woman or child died from nutritional supplements. Period.

61 poison centers provide coast-to-coast data for the U.S. National Poison Data System, which is then reviewed by 29 medical and clinical toxicologists. NPDS, the authors write, is "one of the few real-time national surveillance systems in existence, providing a model public health surveillance system for all types of exposures, public health event identification, resilience response and situational awareness tracking."

Over half of the U.S. population takes daily nutritional supplements. Even if each of those people took only one single tablet daily, that makes 154,000,000 individual doses per day, for a total of over 56 billion doses annually. Since many persons take more than just one vitamin or mineral tablet, actual consumption is considerably higher, and the safety of nutritional supplements is all the more remarkable.

If nutritional supplements are allegedly so "dangerous," as the FDA and news media so often claim, then where are the bodies?

Those who wonder if the media are biased against vitamins may consider this: how many television stations, newspapers, magazines, and medical journals have reported that no one dies from nutritional supplements?
References:
Bronstein AC, Spyker DA, Cantilena LR Jr, Green JL, Rumack BH, Giffin SL. 2008 Annual Report of the American Association of Poison Control Centers' National Poison Data System (NPDS): 26th Annual Report. Clinical Toxicology (2009). 47, 911-1084. The full text article is available for free download at http://www.aapcc.org/dnn/Portals/0/... .

(Vitamins statistics are found in Table 22B, journal pages 1052-3. Minerals, herbs, amino acids and other supplements are in the same table, pages 1047-8.)
http://www.naturalnews.com/027993_vitamins_nutritional_supplements.html

New study: mango prevents and halts growth of colon and breast cancer cells
S. L. Baker, NaturalNews.com January 21, 2010 

(NaturalNews) Take a bite of a juicy, sweet mango and you are experiencing a delicious taste enjoyed by countless people from ancient times until today. According to the Orlando-based National Mango Board (NMG), a mango industry-sponsored research, promotion and consumer information program, mangos are known to be rich in vitamins C and A, as well as fiber. However, because little has been documented about any specific health benefits of eating the fruit, NMB has commissioned a variety of scientific studies to investigate these issues.

So far, this research initiative has turned up an unexpected and groundbreaking discovery: in laboratory experiments in Texas A&M University's AgriLife Research department mango fruit prevented or stopped cancer growth in certain breast and colon cell lines.

Food scientists Dr. Susanne Talcott and her co-researcher husband, Dr. Steve Talcott, used the five varieties of mangos (Kent, Francine, Ataulfo, Tommy/Atkins and Haden) most common in the US and specifically tested polyphenol extracts from the fruit on colon, breast, lung, leukemia and prostate cancer cells. Polyphenols are natural substances in plants that are antioxidants with the potential to protect the body from disease. The Talcotts zeroed in on evaluating polyphenolic compounds in mangos known as gallotannins, a class of natural bioactive compounds believed to help prevent or block the growth of cancer cells.

The results? The Talcotts' experiments showed that the mango extract demonstrated some cancer fighting ability when tested on lung, leukemia and prostate cancer cells. But when tested on the most common breast and colon cancers, mango compounds were found to have even stronger anticancer abilities. In fact, the mango extract caused the breast and colon cancer cells to undergo apoptosis -- programmed cell death.

"Additionally, we found that when we tested normal colon cells side by side with the colon cancer cells, the mango polyphenolics did not harm the normal cells," Dr. Susanne Talcott said in a statement to the press. "That is a general observation for any natural agent, that they target cancer cells and leave the healthy cells alone, in reasonable concentrations at least."

The researchers documented that the cancer cell cycle (the division process cells go through) was interrupted by mango extract. This is crucial information, Suzanne Talcott said in a press statement, because it could explain a possible mechanism for how the cancer cells are prevented or stopped by phytochemicals in mangos. "For cells that may be on the verge of mutating or being damaged, mango polyphenolics prevent this kind of damage," she explained.

The scientists have conducted additional research on the colon cancer cell lines because mangos contain small molecules that are readily absorbed in the colon as well as larger molecules that are not absorbed and remain present longer in the colon. Those facts could potentially make eating mangos a potent way to help prevent colon cancer. In fact, the Talcotts are hoping to next conduct a small clinical trial to see if mangos can prevent colon cancer in people at high risk for a malignancy because they have increased inflammation in their intestines.
http://www.naturalnews.com/027992_mango_brst_cancer.html

Antibiotic Resistant Germs Threaten while Colloidal Silver is Banned in EU
Paul Fassa, NaturalNews.com January 21, 2010 

(NaturalNews) Here's breaking news that's a double barrel blast. A November 2009 Henry Ford hospital report claims dangerous Methicillin-Resistant Staphylococcus Aureus (MRSA) bacteria are approaching epidemic status, and so are other antibiotic resistant microbes. And now: As of January 1, 2009, the EU (European Union) has effectively banned a well known natural antibiotic, colloidal silver.

These two events could seriously affect global health if the antibiotic resistant strains continue and if the American continent mimics the EU'scolloidal silver ban.

A Bit on MRSAs and Other Bad Bugs

There are numerous ways that bacteria become antibiotic resistant. When several are being killed off by a particular antibiotic, others are genetically working out survival strategies. It's a war, and the survivors find ways to defend, hide, and even neutralize that antibiotic. They can also find other genes to adopt and enhance their survival.

MRSAs were first announced as hospital infections that left you worse off than when you entered. According to Professor Keith Scott-Mumby, MD, PhD, author of How to Survive in a World Without Antibiotics, a lot of this was due to sloppy and lazy hospital hygiene, especially among surgeons and anesthesiologists. The reliance of antibiotics for infections replaced the importance of proper precautionary hygiene.

But MRSAs are not only from hospitals anymore. Community MRSAs, which originate outside of hospitals, are on the rise. Dr. Scott-Mumby mentions a new strain that is respiratory contagious and more virulent than the skin contagious MRSAs. If they work their way into vital organs, those staph infections can be lethal.

This is the result of over prescribing antibiotics and using an enormous amount of antibiotics on livestock in the food chain. Not only do livestock antibiotics get passed on to health unconscious consumers, but the livestock breed antibiotic resistant bacterial mutations that enter the food chain. Antibiotics are even appearing in some water supplies. As more antibiotics get consumed, more antibiotic resistant bacteria will appear.

What Does This Have to Do With Colloidal Silver?

Pharmaceutical antibiotics have side effects, including the death of much of one's necessary gastrointestinal (GI) friendly bacteria. According to many health experts, a correctly synthesized colloidal silver liquid is a potent antibiotic for pathogenic bacteria only. The good guys remain intact!

As the EU goes with its supplement bans, so eventually will the Americas go. This is what Big Pharma wants. They know good colloidal silver works, and they don't want the competition. Not all colloidal silver products are equally efficacious, but they are all expensive! So why not make your own colloidal silver for a lifetime supply on demand with quality control no matter what happens?

There are battery or wall current generators with silver electrodes available from under $100 to slightly over $200. But when you consider paying $20 or more for a small bottle over and over (if these MRSAs and other bacterial pathogens become epidemic because they can no longer be restrained by antibiotics), it's quite cost effective. Besides, you can use it for any infection, epidemic or not.

These kits produce colloidal silver by running a small current through electrodes in distilled water. Nano-particles and ions electrically discharged from the silver electrodes go into the solution. The lower the current, the smaller the particles are. Smaller is better with colloidal silver. Larger particles won't penetrate tissues and cells where the bad bugs are causing damage.

Considering the possibilities of a bacterial epidemic in a world without antibiotics, it seems worthwhile to look into having a perpetual silver colloidal manufacturing apparatus that creates a comprehensive antibiotic while not destroying your beneficial bacteria.
http://www.naturalnews.com/027989_colloidal_silver_superbugs.html

Jamie Oliver reduced to tears as America's fattest city resists his latest healthy eating crusade

Daily Mail (UK) 19th January 2010
Television chef Jamie Oliver was reduced to tears during his latest efforts to convert an Amercian community to healthy eating.
The usually upbeat good food crusader broke down after he met serious resistance while shooting scenes for his new series, Jamie Oliver's Food Revolution. 
More than half the residents of the country's fattest city, Huntington, West Virginia, are obese but most were blatantly uninterested in the chef's advice.
He sobbed as he said: 'They don't understand me. They don't know why I'm here.
A production source told the Sun: 'His tears was the lowest we've ever seen Jamie.
'He is normally so upbeat but the scale of this challenge got to him. Everywhere he turned, he was face with obstacles.
'People were outwardly hostile to some of the ideas he put forward.
'He felt so alone and thought at times of packing the whole thing in.'
Some members of the local press warned him to steer clear of their community.
One radio presenter blasted: 'We don't want to sit around and eat lettuce all day. 
'I don't think Jamie has anything that can change this town. He can try all he wants.'
Jamie was also left flabbergasted after he asks a group of school children to identify vegetables, mistaking tomatoes for potatoes. 
The programme, which will air on America's ABC network, is based on his British series Jamie's School Dinners.
http://www.dailymail.co.uk/tvshowbiz/article-1244158/Jamie-Oliver-tears-residents-Americas-fattest-city-resist-healthy-food-crusade.html#

South Korea restricts TV ads for junk

South Korea has announced curbs on television advertising for junk food in a bid to cut obesity and promote healthy eating among children.

The Telegraph (UK) 19 Jan 2010
Advertising of food high in fat, sugar and salt will be banned from all TV from 5pm to 7pm, the health ministry said, and will also be prohibited during children's programmes shown at any time.
The restrictions will apply to hamburgers, pizzas, instant noodles, chocolate and other candies and ice cream.

"The ban, to be enforced this month or in early February, applies to high-calorie, low-nutrient food, snacks and sweets," a ministry official in charge of food safety said.
Official data showed more than one-third of ads aired during children's TV programmes were for food, mostly for sweets, instant noodles and soft drinks.
Consumer groups have called for stricter measures to protect children from junk food, saying one out of five children in South Korea is overweight.
In March last year, the ministry banned the sale of junk food and drinks in schools and their neighbourhoods in a bid to tackle the growing problem of child obesity.
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/expat/expatnews/7025149/South-Korea-restricts-TV-ads-for-junk.html

Scientist finding many negative impacts of Roundup Ready GM crops

USDA doesn’t want to publicize studies showing negative impacts
The Organic Non-GMO Report, January 2010
Robert Kremer is a microbiologist with the US Department of Agriculture’s Agricultural Research Service and an adjunct professor in the Division of Plant Sciences at the University of Missouri. He is co-author of one of five papers published in the October 2009 issue of The European Journal of Agronomy that found negative impacts of Roundup herbicide, which is used extensively with Roundup Ready genetically modified crops. Kremer has been studying the impacts of glyphosate, the primary ingredient in Monsanto’s Roundup herbicide, since 1997.
The Organic & Non-GMO Report interviewed Mr. Kremer about his research and the reluctance of the USDA to publicize the findings of the five papers.
Please give me an overview of your research
RK: We started in 1997 wanting to see if this new system, Roundup Ready, would change the production of nematodes in soybean. We started looking at organisms in soybean roots and saw microorganisms colonizing the roots. We suspected that glyphosate was having an impact. There was a root fungi problem that seemed to be encouraging sudden death syndrome (SDS). 
We saw the increase of these fungi in the Roundup Ready (genetically modified) system, both soybeans and corn.
What types of things are you seeing in the Roundup Ready system? 
RK: This system is altering the whole soil biology. We are seeing differences in bacteria in plant roots and changes in nutrient availability. Glyphosate is very systemic in the plant and is being released through the roots into the soil. Many studies show that glyphosate can have toxic effects on microorganisms and can stimulate them to germinate spores and colonize root systems. Other researchers are showing that glyphosate can immobilize manganese, an essential plant micronutrient.
What are glyphosate’s impacts on beneficial soil bacteria?
RK: The most obvious impact is on rhizobia, a bacterium that fixes nitrogen. It has been shown that glyphosate can be toxic to rhizobia. (Nitrogen fixing bacteria are important to soils because nitrogen is the most commonly deficient nutrient in many soils.)
What about research showing increased incidence of Fusarium in Roundup Ready GM crops?
RK: We’ve taken field surveys and seen an increase in Fusarium with the use of glyphosate. Some Roundup Ready varieties even without using glyphosate tend to be more susceptible to being impacted by Fusarium. It could be an unintended consequence of genetic manipulation that could make it more susceptible.
Your paper also mentioned the potential of glyphosate to contaminate groundwater.
RK: Yes, under certain circumstances. The big assumption for claims that glyphosate is benign is that it isn’t immediately absorbed by the soil. But research is showing that isn’t necessarily true; that it is still available in the soil.
If soil is full of phosphorous, glyphosate could leach into ground water. For example, farmers may use manure from confined animal feeding operations as a fertilizer. The soil will then contain high amounts of phosphorus, which overwhelms the soil. Any glyphosate that hits the soil will be a potential contaminant. It can stay in the soil or it might run off into streams or waterways.
What about glyphosate resistant weeds?
RK: We have eight different species of glyphosate resistant weeds in Missouri. Some species of Johnson Grass are found in fields where Roundup is used year after year. It is a very aggressive weed.
To solve the problem of weed resistance, genetic engineers are developing soybeans that tolerate Roundup and Dicamba, another herbicide. They are incorporating another gene resistant to another herbicide. When resistance happens again, will they then develop a plant resistant to five or six herbicides? It’s an illogical circle.
With so much glyphosate being used, what types of long-term impacts do you think could occur? 
RK: We are already seeing glyphosate-resistant weeds. If we continue to use glyphosate in the same fields year after year, it’s a matter of time until microbial communities in the soil will shift to more detrimental species. 
The use of glyphosate stimulates detrimental pathogens in the growing season but they go back down after the growing season. Eventually, they may build up in the soil and not go back down.
Are many researchers looking at the possibly negative impacts of glyphosate or Roundup Ready crops?
RK: There are a handful of researchers. There is more research looking at the production of these crops.
The papers published in the European Journal of Agronomy received no publicity in the United States. Why is that?
RK: I was working with USDA-ARS to publish a news release about these studies. I’ve gone all the way to the administrators, but they are reluctant to put something out. Their thinking is that if farmers are using this (Roundup Ready) technology, USDA doesn’t want negative information being released about it. This is how it is. I think the news release is still sitting on someone’s desk.
What about your future research?
RK: We’re looking at some methods that could be used to overcome negative effects if we continue to use Roundup Ready crops, such as supplementation of nutrients by foliar application. 
I’m more interested in sustainable agriculture. More farmers are interested in using cover cropping to maintain soil quality and other organic amendments. But it’s a steep learning curve for them.
http://www.non-gmoreport.com/articles/jan10/scientists_find_negative_impacts_of_GM_crops.php

Retail Meat Linked to Urinary Tract Infections: Strong New Evidence
ScienceDaily (Jan. 20, 2010) — Chicken sold in supermarkets, restaurants and other outlets may place young women at risk of urinary tract infections (UTI), McGill researcher Amee Manges has discovered. Samples taken in the Montreal area between 2005 and 2007, in collaboration with the Public Health Agency of Canada and the University of Guelph, provide strong new evidence that E. coli (Escherichia coli) bacteria originating from these food sources can cause common urinary tract infections.
Eating contaminated meat or food does not directly lead to a UTI. While some E. coli such as O157:H7 can cause serious intestinal disease, these E. coli bacteria can live in the intestine without causing problems. In women however, the bacteria can travel from the anus to the vagina and urethra during sex, which can lead to the infection.
The research team is also investigating whether livestock may be passing antimicrobial-resistant bacteria on to humans. This is due to the use of antibiotics to treat or prevent disease in the animals and to enhance their growth, which may lead them to develop resistance to the medication. When animals are slaughtered and their meat is processed for sale, the meat can be contaminated with these bacteria.
"These studies might open the door to discussions with policymakers," Manges said, "about how antibiotics are used in agriculture in Canada. It's certainly something we need to continue studying."
The public should not be alarmed. Manges advises that consumers should cook meat thoroughly and prevent contamination of other foods in the kitchen. Although some infections caused by these E. coli are resistant to some antibiotics, the infections can still be treated. Manges hopes that understanding how these bacteria are transmitted will help reduce infections. She also hopes more attention will be focused on how meat is produced in Canada. Her research is part of a broader study concerning food safety and is financed through funding by the Government of Canada, Public Health Agency of Canada, in collaboration with the Laboratory for Foodborne Zoonoses, specifically the Canadian Integrated Program for Antimicrobial Resistance Surveillance, and also the Division de l'inspection des aliments, Ville de Montréal.
http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2010/01/100120144005.htm

Fish oil protects against cellular aging
Last Updated: 2010-01-19 16:31:23 -0400 (Reuters Health)
* Study explains why omega-3 fish oil helps heart patients
* More study needed to say if it works in healthy people
CHICAGO (Reuters) - A diet rich in omega-3 fatty acids helps keep the DNA of heart patients from unraveling, which may help explain why fish oil is so beneficial after a heart attack, U.S. researchers said on Tuesday.
"Cardiologists have known for a long time now that omega-3 fish oil seems to be beneficial for patients with coronary heart disease," said Dr. Ramin Farzaneh-Far of the University of California, San Francisco, whose study was published in the Journal of the American Medical Association.
"A number of studies over the last 20 years or so have shown that after patients have had a heart attack, taking fish oil through diet or supplements is able to reduce the risk of a subsequent heart attack or death from coronary heart disease," Farzaneh-Far said in a telephone interview.
What has not been clear is why fish oil is so beneficial.
"In this study, we decided to look at a new mechanism by which omega-3 fatty acids might work," Farzaneh-Far said.
The team focused on telomere length - the length of protective caps on the ends of chromosomes that carry DNA.
Fraying or shortening of these protective caps can lead to premature aging and cancer, a new understanding of aging that helped Elizabeth Blackburn and the two other Americans win the 2009 Nobel Prize in Medicine.
Farzaneh-Far and colleagues measured the length of telomeres in blood cells in 608 heart attack patients to see if there was any association between the levels of omega-3 fatty acids and the change in telomere length over time.
"We found a very clear association that increasing levels of the amount of omega-3 fish oil in the blood was associated with a decrease in the rate of biological aging," Farzaneh-Far said.
Those with the highest levels of omega-3 fatty acids had the longest telomeres, while patients with low levels of the compounds had shorter telomeres, he said.
None of the patients were given supplements and the team did not collect dietary information, so it is not clear just how much fish oil it took to have an effect. While fish oil is a primary source of omega-3 fatty acids, they are also found in walnuts, flaxseed oil and leafy green vegetables.
The findings offer a biological explanation for why fish oil helps heart patients.
It may be that omega-3 fatty acids counteract oxidative stress - a cell-damaging chemical reaction that can shorten telomeres, Farzaneh-Far said.
Or it may be that fish oil increases the production of telomerase - an enzyme that lengthens and repairs shortened telomeres.
"Both of those mechanisms have to be proven," he said.
Farzaneh-Far said the team only studied the effects of fish oil and cellular aging in heart patients, so it is not clear if the association would hold true in healthy people.
"There is no reason to think that it wouldn't. But we haven't shown that," he said.
http://www.reutershealth.com/archive/2010/01/19/eline/links/20100119elin016.html

Science: Backing up the satiety and metabolic claims
Nutraingredients.com, 20-Jan-2010
In the second part of our focus on weight management, NutraIngredients looks at the science behind the claims – from boosting fullness to energy burning.
The slimming ingredients market can be divided into five groups based on the mechanisms of action: increasing energy expenditure; modulating carbohydrate metabolism; increasing satiety or suppressing appetite; increasing fat oxidation or reducing fat synthesis; and blocking dietary fat absorption.
With the World Health Organization estimating that by 2015, there will be more than 1.5 billion overweight consumers, incurring health costs beyond $117 billion per year in the US alone, the opportunities for a scientifically-substantiatedweight management food product are impressive.
The market for food, beverage and supplement weight management products is already valued at $3.64bn (2009 figures) in the US, according to Euromonitor. In Western Europe, the market was worth $1.3bn in 2009.
Two of the biggest areas are satiety – or boosting the feeling of fullness – and boosting heat generation, which means people burn more energy.
Satiety
The concept of satiety works by maintaining a feeling of fullness for longer. Branded ingredients like Kemin’s Slendesta potato extract, Lipid Nutrition’s PinnoThin derived from the seeds of the Korean pine nut tree (Pinus koraiensis), and DSM’s Fabuless (formerly Olibra) made from palm and oat oil, are already solid performers in this market.
Many ingredients work via the same mechanism, which involves boosting levels of appetite-related hormones like satiety hormone glucagon-like peptide 1 (GLP-1), peptide YY (PYY), and cholecystokinin (CCK).
Prebiotics have also been linked to satiety effects. A human study using Beneo-Orafti’s Orafti P95 Oligofructose found that daily consumption of the prebiotic lost an average of one kilogram over 12 weeks, with results linked to increased PYY levels and decreased levels of the hunger-promoting hormone ghrelin (American Journal of Clinical Nutrition, 2009, Vol. 89, pp. 1751-1759).
Metabolic modification
Capsaicin, the compound gives red chilli pepper its heat, has been reported by several studies to boost heat generation by the body, which means people burn more energy.
A laboratory study from the National Chung Hsing University in Taiwan, found that capsaicin may inhibit the growth of fat cells (Journal of Agricultural and Food Chemistry, 2007, Vol. 55, pp. 1730-1736), while a human study with capsaicin, in combination with green tea extracts, found that (Clinical Nutrition, doi: 10.1016/j.clnu.2009.01.010) an alternative mode of action with promotion of the feeling of fullness and sustained satiety.
Another botanical capable of stimulating metabolism is black pepper. The main irritating component in black pepper, piperine, is said to bind to so-called Transient Receptor Potential Vanilloid (TRPV1) receptors in the brain and other parts of the nervous system.
TRPV1 works as the bodys thermometer and, once activated, turns up the heat by boosting heat production by the body.
Sabinsa’s LeanGard blend includes piperine (Bioperine), in combination with its other branded ingredients ForsLean and Garcitrin. ForsLean is an extract derived from Coleus forskohlii roots and reportedly helps to build lean body mass and optimize body composition, while Garcitrin contains calcium salt hydroxycitric acid (HCA) and garcinol, a polyisoprenylated benzophenone isolated fromGarcinia cambogia and Garcinia indica. These fruits are thought to reduce fatty acid, lipid synthesis as well as to improve lean body mass.
A human study in 2008 reported that the blend was associated with a reduction of body weight of more than five per cent and an increase in the basal metabolic rate (BMR) of 4.5 per cent.
http://www.nutraingredients.com/Research/Science-Backing-up-the-satiety-and-metabolic-claims

Running 'improves memory' in mice
Fresh research may help explain why regular exercise can improve brain power, say Cambridge scientists.
BBC Health News, January 20, 2010
The report, which was published in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, found mice which exercised performed better on memory tests.
These mice also grew more new cells in a part of the brain linked to memory than those which did not exercise.
The authors believe the new brain cells were behind the improvement in cognitive performance.
The aim of the study, which was carried out by scientists from the Department of Experimental Psychology at the University of Cambridge and researchers at the National Institute on Aging in Baltimore, was to find out why exercise might improve brain function.
Previous research had suggested that exercise helps mental performance in both people and animals. Studies had also shown that exercise increases the number of new brain cells in rodents.
Unlimited action
The new finding in this study is that mice which exercise are better able to distinguish between memories of similar things. The authors believe this is explained by the additional brain cells generated by exercise.
The study was conducted on two groups of mice over a period of 105 days. The mice were trained to touch a box on a computer screen to get food pellets.
One group were then allowed unlimited access to an exercise wheel. They ran over 20km (12 miles) a day on average. The control group were not able to exercise.
Both groups were then repeatedly shown two boxes on a screen, one of which provided a treat when it was touched.
The mice learned which box released the treat, and then the boxes were moved around. First the boxes were moved close together, which made it harder for the mice to remember which one to touch to get the food.
The exercising mice did better on this task than the non-exercising mice.
Similar memories
The task was then made easier by placing the boxes further apart so that they seemed more distinct. This time there was no difference in the performance of the exercising and non-exercising mice.
“ a valuable contribution in understanding the effects of exercise on brain health and function. ” 
Stan Colcombe, Bangor University
"Keeping similar memories distinct is an important part of having a good memory" says the senior author of the study, Timothy Bussey from Cambridge University.
"It is this aspect of memory that is improved by exercise, our study shows.
"The human equivalent might be remembering which car parking space you have used on two different days in the previous week. It becomes difficult to distinguish memories when events are similar."
By the end of the experiment, the animals which exercised had more than twice as many new brain cells as those that did not.
These cells were in the hippocampus, an area of the brain which is important in memory and learning.
The Cambridge team believes the results of their study may well extrapolate to humans, a view shared by another researcher who studies the impact of exercise on memory.
Stan Colcombe, from Bangor University, said: "Their data strongly suggest that new neurons created after exercise can play a role in improving cognitive function, which likely has direct implications for human research into the effects of exercise on neurocognition."
He described the research as "a very elegant experiment" which "made a valuable contribution in understanding the effects of exercise on brain health and function".
http://news.bbc.co.uk/go/pr/fr/-/2/hi/health/8467811.stm

Plant loss 'leads to fewer bees'

BBC Science News, January 19, 2010
The decline of honeybees seen in many countries may be caused by reduced plant diversity, research suggests.
Bees fed pollen from a range of plants showed signs of having a healthier immune system than those eating pollen from a single type, scientists found.
Writing in the journal Biology Letters, the French team says that bees need a fully functional immune system in order to sterilise food for the colony.
Other research has shown that bees and wild flowers are declining in step.
Two years ago, scientists in the UK and The Netherlands reported that the diversity of bees and other insects was falling alongside the diversity of plants they fed on and pollinated.
Now, Cedric Alaux and colleagues from the French National Institute for Agricultural Research (INRA) in Avignon have traced a possible link between the diversity of bee diets and the strength of their immune systems.
"We found that bees fed with a mix of five different pollens had higher levels of glucose oxidase compared to bees fed with pollen from one single type of flower, even if that single flower had a higher protein content," he told BBC News.
“ You've now got large areas of monoculture; and that's been a fairly major change in what pollinating insects can forage for ” 
David Aston British Beekeepers' Association
Bees make glucose oxidase (GOX) to preserve honey and food for larvae against infestation by microbes - which protects the hive against disease.
"So that would mean they have better antiseptic protection compared to other bees, and so would be more resistant to pathogen invasion," said Dr Alaux.
Bees fed the five-pollen diet also produced more fat than those eating only a single variety - again possibly indicating a more robust immune system, as the insects make anti-microbial chemicals in their fat bodies.
Other new research, from the University of Reading, suggests that bee numbers are falling twice as fast in the UK as in the rest of Europe.
Forage fall
With the commercial value of bees' pollination estimated at £200m per year in the UK and $14bn in the US, governments have recently started investing resources in finding out what is behind the decline.
In various countries it has been blamed on diseases such as Israeli Acute Paralysis Virus (IAPV), infestation with varroa mite, pesticide use, loss of genetic diversity among commercial bee populations, and the changing climate.
The most spectacular losses have been seen in the US where entire colonies have been wiped out, leading to the term colony collapse disorder.
However, the exact cause has remained elusive.
A possible conclusion of the new research is that the insects need to eat a variety of proteins in order to synthesise their various chemical defences; without their varied diet, they are more open to disease.
David Aston, who chairs the British Beekeepers' Association technical committee, described the finding as "very interesting" - particularly as the diversity of food available to UK bees has declined.
"If you think about the amount of habitat destruction, the loss of biodiversity, that sort of thing, and the expansion of crops like oilseed rape, you've now got large areas of monoculture; and that's been a fairly major change in what pollinating insects can forage for."
As a consequence, he said, bees often do better in urban areas than in the countryside, because city parks and gardens contain a higher diversity of plant life.
Diverse message
While cautioning that laboratory research alone cannot prove the case, Dr Alaux said the finding tied in well with what is happening in the US.
There, collapse has been seen in hives that are transported around the country to pollinate commercially important crops.
"They move them for example to [a plantation of] almond trees, and there's just one pollen," he said.
"So it might be possible that the immune system is weakened... compared to wild bees that are much more diverse in what they eat."
In the US, the problem may have been compounded by loss of genetic diversity among the bees themselves.
In the UK, where farmers are already rewarded financially for implementing wildlife-friendly measures, Dr Aston thinks there is some scope for turning the trend and giving some diversity back to the foraging bees.
"I'd like to see much greater awareness among land managers such as farmers about managing hedgerows in a more sympathetic way - hedgerows are a resource that's much neglected," he said.
"That makes landscapes much more attractive as well, so it's a win-win situation."
The French government has just announced a project to sow nectar-bearing flowers by roadsides in an attempt to stem honeybee decline.
http://news.bbc.co.uk/go/pr/fr/-/2/hi/science/nature/8467746.stm

247 Americans Die Every Day from Doctors not Washing Their Hands
David Gutierrez, NaturalNews.com  January 20, 2010 

(NaturalNews) A study commissioned by the lead hospital accrediting agency in the United States found that doctors and nurses fail to wash their hands with alarming frequency, contributing to the 247 deaths caused each day by preventable hospital infections.

The Joint Commission, which accredits hospitals, nursing homes and other health care facilities, has joined with eight major hospitals to address low hand washing rates nationwide. The program began in the spring, when the hospitals conducted rigorous assessments of hand washing compliance among their staff. They found that doctors and nurses washed their hands only 30 to 70 percent of the time that they entered or exited a patient's room, averaging 50 percent.

Hand washing upon entering and exiting a room is a key part of the Joint Commission accreditation requirements and has been recommended by both the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention and the World Health Organization. Hospitals or other facilities cited for more than two violations must be cited.

The hospitals then assessed what obstacles were preventing health care providers from adequately washing their hands. In some cases, the problems were logistical and easy to fix by means such as moving hand washing stations to more convenient locations or adding stands where workers could put down objects they might be carrying. In other cases, problems seem to stem from an attitude of impunity and are harder to fix.

"Certainly there are some individuals who believe they are above the law,'' Joint Commission President Mark Chassin said, "and their peers and others are reluctant to call their omissions to their attention." 

Hospitals have tried to address these problems through techniques such as constant monitoring and reorganizations of hospital hierarchies.

"It seems really simple, but even this one turns out to be complicated," Chassin said. 

Since the implementation of corrective strategies, hand washing compliance at the participating hospitals has risen to 74 percent, still short of the long-term goal of 90 percent.

"The acid test is sustainability," Chassin said. "They want to be above 90 percent all the time, consistently with no variation."
http://www.naturalnews.com/027981_doctors_hand_washing.html

Six Deadly Chemicals You're Carrying in Your Body
E. Huff, NaturalNews.com  January 20, 2010 

(NaturalNews) A recent biomonitoring study conducted by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC), the Fourth National Report on Human Exposure to Environmental Chemicals, has revealed that out of 212 chemicals tested, all 212 were found to be in the blood and urine of most Americans. Six chemicals in particular, found in virtually every person, were identified by the CDC as probable health hazards.

Every two years the CDC conducts the chemical study which identifies human exposure to toxic chemicals. This year 75 new chemicals were added to the assay that had never before been studied in the U.S. population. Every chemical tested in the study, including the 75 new ones, was found to be present in most or all of the study participants.

The six most widespread chemicals identified, all of which are also highly dangerous, include polybrominated diphenyl ethers (PDEs), bisphenol A(BPA), Perfluorooctanoic acid (PFOA), acrylamide, mercury, and methyl tert-butyl ether (MTBE). 

Flame retardant PDEs are chemicals added to all sorts consumer products that are meant to decrease fire risk. They are known to build up in human fat tissue, causing damage to the nervous system, liver and kidneys. Studies also implicate PDEs in causing sexual dysfunction, thyroid problems andbrain disorders.

Bisphenol A, a chemical that has received much attention recently, is another toxin added primarily to plastic products and can linings that contributes to many of the same problems that PDEs do. More than 90 percent of those tested in the CDC study were found to have BPA in their bodies.

Perfluorooctanoic acid, a chemical first developed by 3M and later used by DuPont, is used in non-stick cookware, stain-resistant clothing, certainfood packaging and other heat-resistant products. Studies verify that PFOA contributes to infertility and other reproductive problems. Liver and immune system dysfunction are also associated with the use of PFOAs.

Acrylamide is a chemical carcinogen that forms when carbohydrate foods are cooked at high temperatures. French fries, fried chicken, and even coffee are all examples of foods that have high acrylamide content. The chemical is also used in plastics, cosmetics and water treatment products. Perpetual exposure to acrylamides is responsible for causing cancer and neurological dysfunction.

Most people are aware of the dangers of mercury, another common toxin found in most Americans. Mercury can cause permanent brain damage.

Methyl tert-butyl ether (MTBE) is a gasoline additive that is not used today, however it has been detected in water supplies as well as in most Americans' bodies. Second-hand cigarette smoke also releases MTBE which caused neurological and reproductive problems.

The report indicates suggestions to help avoid these chemicals and the products that contain them. Cleansing and detoxification regimens are highly effective at continually ridding the body of toxic build-up.
http://www.naturalnews.com/027980_synthetic_chemicals_exposure.html

Staff at Wellesley School Get Wrong Shot

By Associated Press
Tuesday, January 19, 2010
WELLESLEY, MA — Wellesley school officials say several staff members at an elementary school had to be taken to the hospital after being injected with insulin rather than the swine flu vaccine they were supposed to get.
Superintendent Bella Wong said no students were ever in danger at Friday’s vaccine clinic for staff at Schofield Elementary School and all the people who got the wrong shot have recovered.
Wong, in a letter to staff and parents Monday, said the insulin belonged to students with diabetes and was provided by their parents.
Wong said in the letter that the school nurse who administered the insulin to staff has been placed on paid administrative leave pending an investigation. She did not give the nurse’s name.

Breast cancer screening benefits questioned

Telegraph UK, January 19, 2010

The NHS breast cancer screening programme should be reviewed as 7,000 women a year may wrongly receive a diagnosis of cancer, experts have warned.

Despite assertions that screening saves 1,400 lives a year, there is no evidence the programme has cut deaths, the article in the Journal of the Royal Society of Medicine said.
Controversy over the benefits of breast cancer screening were first raised last year when experts said women were not being told of the potential harms in leaflets given out to encourage attentance.

Women may be wrongly told they have cancer and so undergo unnecessary treatment and screening may detect tumours that would not progress to be harmful and so could also be removed needlessly. The unnecessary treatments may expose women to chemotherapy, radiotherapy or surgery which itself has harmful effects.
Experts at the Nordic Cochrane Centre has now calculated that 7,000 women in Britain are being wrongly diagnosed with breast cancer as a result of screening.
In 2006 there were 45,400 women and 300 men diagnosed with breast cancer in Britain, according to data held by Cancer Research UK.
Figures from the charity show in the 1970s only five out of 10 patients lived for five years after diagnosis compared with eight out of ten now.
Two authors from the Nordic Cochrane Centre, an independent research centre, evaulated the NHS screening programme's annual report and said many of its assertions are not backed by the evidence.
Mortality rates for breast cancer began dropping before the screening programme was introduced in 1988 and have dropped just as much in women too young to be called for screening showing that the reduction in deaths is probably due to better treatment and not screening, it said.
Lead author Karsten Juhl Jørgensen said one in five women who have been screened for ten years will have been recalled for some suspect finding on their mammography raising concern they have cancer only to be given the all clear.
Some of those women will have had further testing such as a biopsy taken by inserting a needle into the 'tumour' and three per cent will have had surgery.
The article went on to say that women who attend for screening are often more health conscious so their prognosis will be better and screening tends to find cancers that are slow growing and both factors contribute to the idea that women whose cancers are detected via screening have better survival rates.
It said:"Most of the pronounced decline in breast cancer mortality is likely caused by improved treatment, which can explain why it has been similarly large among the young women who have not been invited to screening. Other factors, such as increased ‘breast awareness’, may also have contributed."
Professor Julietta Patnick, Director of the NHS Cancer Screening Programmes said: “This paper is not based on any new data. The NHS Breast Screening Programme, the independent Advisory Committee on Breast Cancer Screening and numerous independent screening practitioners have all responded previously pointing out the inaccuracies in the author’s selection and use of the statistics on breast screening.
"Numerous independent studies have shown breast cancer screening reduces mortality. A report from the World Health Organisation’s International Agency for Research on Cancer (IARC) concluded that there is a 35 per cent reduction in mortality from breast cancer among regularly screened women aged 50 - 69 years old.
"In the UK the independent Advisory Committee on Breast Cancer Screening estimated that for every 400 women screened regularly by the NHS Breast Screening Programme over a 10 year period, one woman fewer will die from breast cancer than would have died without screening, and the current NHS Breast Screening Programme saves an estimated 1,400 lives each year in England."
A spokesman for the Department of Health said: "Cancer remains a high priority for this Government. The Cancer Reform Strategy, published in December 2007 sets out a clear direction for cancer services over the next five years and shows how we will deliver cancer outcomes that are amongst the best in the world.
"We know that, generally, the earlier a cancer is diagnosed the greater the chance it will be treated successfully. During 2007/08, the NHS Breast Screening Programme screened over 1.7 million women and 14,110 cancers were detected.”

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/health/healthnews/7019952/Breast-cancer-screening-benefits-questioned.html

Stress really CAN cause heart attacks, say researchers
Daily Mail on Sunday (UK), 17th January 2010
Getting stressed really is bad for your heart, according to new research.
For years, stress has been linked to heart attacks and other heart complaints but with very little medical evidence to back it up.
Now a major trial by doctors at University College London has proved for the first time that people who get stressed are also likely to have heart disease.
The study involved 514 men and women, with an average age of 62. None had signs of heart disease.
Each underwent stress tests and then levels of cortisol - a chemical produced by the body at times of stress and which causes arteries to narrow - were measured. Their arteries were also scanned for any signs of furring and narrowing.
Those people who were stressed by the tests were twice as likely to have furred arteries as those who remained calm, the study in the European Heart Journal found.
Cardiologist Professor Avijit Lahiri said: 'This study shows a clear-cut relationship between stress and silent coronary artery disease. This is the first clear proof.'
http://www.dailymail.co.uk/health/article-1243852/Stress-It-really-cause-heart-attacks-say-researchers.html#

U.S. Government Wants Farmers to Dump Heavy Metals on Fields
Kim Evans, NaturalNews.com  January 19, 2010 

(NaturalNews) Ash leftover from burning coal contains arsenic, mercury, lead and other heavy metals. These days, the U.S. government is encouraging farmers to dump it right on their fields, and effectively, right onto the public's food supply. According to the Wall Street Journal, each year 125 to 130 million tons of ash and sludge are left over from burning coal - which is enough to fill one million railcars. The government is encouraging farmers to dump it on their fields as a way to dispose of the toxic waste.

Lead in the body has been linked to brain shrinkage, learning difficulties and violent behavior. According to the University of Massachusetts Amherst,lead stays in soil for hundreds of years and accumulates in green produce.

Arsenic is another known poison; it's known to cause cancer, neurological disturbances, and instant death. A lethal dose is about 70 to 200mg.

Mercury is widely known to affect the brain and brain development. It's associated with autism and 1 in 110 children are being born with autism-related problems. In the 1950's, only 1 in 5,000 children had autism-related problems.

Let's look into the future and see what might happen if the government gets their way. Society at large will become dumber and more violent due to the lead. Cancer rates will increase from the current 40 percent chance you'll have a problem with it. More people will become incapable of contributing to society and a burden to those around them. More people will die of diseases with mysterious causes; many arsenic deaths will likely be blamed on heart attacks. As people become more violent, everyone will be more likely to become a victim. More people will be abused by their spouses - and children by their parents. More jails will be built - adding enormous costs to the nation. People's lives will be stolen because of the toxic effects of substances in their foods on their brains.

These poisons damage our genes, so more children will be born sick and damaged. People will be told their diseases are genetic. If they believe it, they'll likely also believe they have no power to change their situation. Many may try "advances" in medicine involving genetic manipulation. If you thought GMO's were bad...

There is an upside for pharmaceutical companies and those in Washington who financially benefit from them. More and more drugs will be sold in a nation that four out of five inhabitants already pop at least one prescription pill weekly. These folks will keep getting richer as the entire nation suffers.

The government will likely continue spouting the same nonsense about "small amounts of known poisons not hurting anyone," all while neglecting to acknowledge that with time small amounts of poisons build in the body - eventually becoming large amounts that are well known to harm.

Much of the medical world will likely continue with the party line about not knowing the causes of disease - and will be utterly incapable of making the direct connection between eating poisons and getting sick. As the population becomes more neurologically damaged from consuming these poisons, they'll have a harder time making the connection too.

The dumping of toxic waste onto the food supply is a sham from an administration that purports to care about health. Any government with a real interest in the health of its people should encourage farmers to add organic nutrients and minerals to their depleted soils. It's an obvious contrast to encouraging the addition of known poisons - poisons already indicted in far too many health problems in a nation plagued with chronic disease.
http://www.naturalnews.com/027982_heavy_metals_food_crops.html

Celery is an Ancient Healing Food
Brett Brown, NaturalNews.com  January 20, 2010 

(NaturalNews) Celery has a long history of use and is truly an ancient healing food. At first glance celery may seem rather unimpressive, but the more you look into its background and medicinal uses the more you realize that we must have been misinformed on the usefulness of this plant. Traditionally celery, or Apium Graveolens, was used to treat an array of ailments and was very bitter in taste. It is believed to have originated from the Mediterranean basin, and has been harvested since about 850 B.C. Its medicinal properties are believed to be from its volatile oils which are found in all parts of the plant, but seem to be concentrated in its seeds. Ayurvedic physicians used celery to treat colds, flu, water retention, poordigestion, arthritis, liver, and spleen ailments.

Our common celery stalk is mostly composed of about 83% water and a healthy amount of fiber. This is well known. What is not well know is the fact that celery also contains many micronutrients which it receives from rain, sunshine, and the soil medium from which it is grown. We have been led to believe that celery does not have much to it when in fact celery truly contains a wealth of health improving nutrients that we can obtain from it. Celery has a profile that is much more than water and fiber!

The effects of celery on the body are diuretic, expectorant, carminative, anti-asthmatic, and digestive aid. Celery is a good source of vitamin K, vitamin C, potassium, folate, and fiber. It also contains molybdenum, manganese, vitamin B1, vitamin B2, vitamin B6, calcium, magnesium, phosphorus, iron, and tryptophan. Celery also contains about 35 milligrams of a beneficial sodium complex; this is useful in reducing stomach acid levels and raising our hydrochloric acid levels which in turn improves digestion.

Celery has been used for many years in Chinese medicine to alleviate high blood pressure, and this practice is beginning to pick up steam in America. It is believed that the phthalides in celery relax the arteries and allow the vessels to dilate which enables the blood to flow more freely. These phthalides also relieve our stress hormones and in turn the less stressed our body is the lower our blood pressure becomes. Celery is also a very good source of potassium, calcium and magnesium, all of which have been associated with reduced blood pressure.

Celery is also a good source of vitamin C, and along with that comes all the benefits that vitamin C carries with it. Some of these benefits include a boost in the immune system and a reduction in the symptoms and severity of colds. Vitamin C is also an antioxidant which has been shown to lower inflammation in many cases such as arthritis and asthma. Vitamin C is crucial in the production of collagen.

Celery contains compounds called coumarins that help in the prevention of free radicals, thus decreasing the potential for cells to become cancerous due to mutation. Coumarins also have been shown to enhance the activity of certain types of white blood cells, immune defenders that target harmful cells, including cancer cells. In addition, compounds in celery called acetylenics have been shown to stop the growth of tumor cells.

Celery is just one of the many ancient healing foods from our past. As our methods of researching whole foods develop, we are finding out more and more about what we are eating for dinner, and as we have just found out, celery is truly much more than just water and fiber!
http://www.naturalnews.com/027977_celery_healing.html

Friendly Bacteria Love the Humble Apple
ScienceDaily (Jan. 20, 2010) — Why does an apple a day keep the doctor away? New research published in the open access journal BMC Microbiologycontributes to our understanding of why eating apples is good for you.
Microbiologists from the National Food Institute at the University of Denmark fed rats on a diet that was rich in whole apples, apple juice, purée or pomace, or put them on a control diet. They then analysed the microbial content of the rats' digestive systems to see if eating apples had any impact on the numbers of presumed 'friendly' bacteria in the gut.
"Certain bacteria are believed to be beneficial for digestive health and may influence the risk for cancer. We faced a well-known problem though -- many types of bacteria cannot be easily cultured in the lab," said research leader Professor Tine Rask Licht. The team therefore used genetics instead of culture techniques to examine the microbiology of the intestines. 16S rRNA is a molecule that is only found in bacteria and its make up is unique to each species or strain. "By working out the sequences of 16S rRNA molecules in the rats' intestines and matching these to known bacterial profiles of 16S rRNA, we could determine which microorganisms were abundant in each group of rats," explained Licht.
So what was the verdict? "In our study we found that rats eating a diet high in pectin, a component of dietary fiber in apples, had increased amounts of certain bacteria that may improve intestinal health," said co-researcher Andrea Wilcks. "It seems that when apples are eaten regularly and over a prolonged period of time, these bacteria help produce short-chain fatty acids that provide ideal pH conditions for ensuring a beneficial balance of microorganisms. They also produce a chemical called butyrate, which is an important fuel for the cells of the intestinal wall."
Of course, further research is needed to determine whether the digestive system of humans responds to apples in the same way as rats, but these findings certainly suggest that Europe's favourite fruit has a well-deserved place in our 5-a-day.
http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2010/01/100119213138.htm

Med Students Say Conventional Medicine Would Benefit by Integrating Alternative Therapies
ScienceDaily (Jan. 20, 2010) — In the largest national survey of its kind, researchers from UCLA and UC San Diego measured medical students' attitudes and beliefs about complementary and alternative medicine (CAM) and found that three-quarters of them felt conventional Western medicine would benefit by integrating more CAM therapies and ideas.
The findings will be published in the online issue of Evidence-based Complementary and Alternative Medicine (eCAM) on January 20, 2010.
"Complementary and alternative medicine is receiving increased attention in light of the global health crisis and the significant role of traditional medicine in meeting public health needs in developing countries," said study author Ryan Abbott, a researcher at the UCLA Center for East-West Medicine. "Integrating CAM into mainstream health care is now a global phenomenon, with policy makers at the highest levels endorsing the importance of a historically marginalized form of health care."
CAM, which includes therapies such as massage, yoga, herbal medicine and acupuncture, is characterized by a holistic and highly individualized approach to patient care. It's emphasis is on maximizing the body's inherent healing ability; getting patients involved as active participants in their own care; addressing the physical, mental and spiritual attributes of a disease; and preventive care. While interest in these fields has increased dramatically in the United States in recent years, information about such therapies has not yet been widely integrated into medical education.
"Even with the high prevalence of CAM use today, most physicians still know little about non-conventional forms of medicine," said study author Michael S. Goldstein, Ph.D., a senior research scientist at the UCLA Center for Health Policy Research and professor of Public Health and Sociology, UCLA. "Investigating medical students' attitudes and knowledge will help us assess whether this may change in the future."
The team of UCLA and UC San Diego experts in the fields of CAM, integrative medicine, Western medicine, medical education and survey development created a novel 30-question survey and sent it to 126 medical schools throughout the United States. In return, the team received 1,770 completed surveys from a pool of about 68,000 medical students nationwide, roughly three percent.
While the current results offer valuable insight into medical students' perceptions of CAM, given the low response rate, researchers plan future studies to further refine the tool and see if the findings can be more generalized.
Researchers found that although medical students endorsed the importance of complementary and alternative medicine, obstacles remain that may prevent future doctors from recommending these treatments in their practices. According to the findings:

• 77 percent of participants agreed to some extent that patients whose doctors know about complementary and alternative medicine in addition to conventional medicine, benefit more than those whose doctors are only familiar with Western medicine.
• 74 percent of participants agreed to some extent that a system of medicine that integrates therapies of conventional and complementary and alternative medicine would be more effective than either type of medicine provided independently.
• 84 percent of participants agreed to some extent that the field contains beliefs, ideas, and therapies from which conventional medicine could benefit.
• 49 percent of participating medical students indicated that they have used complementary and alternative treatments however few would recommend or use these treatments in their practice until more scientific assessment has occurred.

"Our research suggests that persuading doctors to integrate CAM will require investment in the types of clinical research that form the backbone of Western medicine," adds Abbott. "Even now, medical schools have the opportunity to train the next generation of medical practitioners in health care systems outside of conventional medicine. Core values of CAM can help students develop a more holistic and individualized approach to patient care."
The study also found that the further along in school the student was, the more likely they were to believe their learning regarding CAM therapies was sufficient. Still, researchers note that more than 60 percent of participants favored more education related to this field during their time in medical school. Although more than half of all U.S. medical schools currently offer some type of CAM course, researchers say these courses could be augmented or streamlined into more formal, standardized curricula.
"Although the content of integrative medicine programs remains controversial, medical schools across the country are moving forward with ambitious new programs to teach the next generation of health care leaders," said Dr. Ka Kit Hui, Wallis Annenberg Chair in Integrative East-West Medicine at UCLA, founder and director, UCLA Center for East-West Medicine, and chair, of UCLA's Collaborative Centers for Integrative Medicine. "Through the Collaborative Centers for Integrative Medicine, UCLA has become one of the nation's leading academic centers for integrative medical education. UCLA offers training programs for health sciences students and residents, as well as fellowships for clinicians and researchers."
Hui added that the importance of integrative medical education is increasingly being realized outside of UCLA. Forty-four highly esteemed academic medical centers now comprise the Consortium of Academic Health Centers for Integrative Medicine, which was established to advance the principles and practices of integrative health care within academic institutions. It provides a community of support for academic missions and a collective voice for influencing change. The Consortium also helps disseminate evidence-based information on CAM, informs health care policy, and supports medical education.
The study was funded by the National Institutes of Health, the Gerald Oppenheimer Family Foundation, and the Annenberg Foundation.
Additional authors include Ron D. Hays, Ph.D., UCLA professor of medicine and senior health scientist at RAND; Dr. Jess Mandel, associate professor and assistant dean of undergraduate medical education, UC San Diego; Babbi Winegarden, Ph.D., assistant dean, Educational Development and Evaluation, UC San Diego; Dale Glaser, Ph.D., adjunct assistant professor, San Diego State University; and Laurence Brunton, Ph.D., professor of pharmacology and medicine, UC San Diego.
http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2010/01/100120083743.htm

Promising probiotic treatment for inflammatory bowel disease
Society for General Microbiology, January 19, 2010
Bacteria that produce compounds to reduce inflammation and strengthen host defences could be used to treat inflammatory bowel disease (IBD). Such probiotic microbes could be the most successful treatment for IBD to date, as explained in a review published in the February issue of theJournal of Medical Microbiology.
IBD is inflammation of the gastro-intestinal tract that causes severe watery and bloody diarrhoea and abdominal pain. It is an emerging disease that affects 20 out of 100,000 genetically susceptible people in Europe and North America. The most common manifestations of IBD are Crohn's disease and ulcerative colitis. While the exact causes are unclear, IBD is known to be the result of an overactive immune response that is linked to an imbalance of the normal types of bacteria found in the gut.
Several recent studies have identified butyric acid as a potential therapeutic agent for IBD. Some gut bacteria produce butyric acid naturally in the intestines, but in IBD patients some of these strains are heavily depleted. Trials in mice have shown that injecting one such strain Faecalibacterium prausnitzii into the digestive tract is effective at restoring normal levels of gut bacteria and treating the symptoms of IBD. In addition, novel identified butyrate-producing strains, such as Butyricicoccus pullicaecorum, have been shown to exert similar effects.
Butyric acid has well-known anti-inflammatory effects and is able to strengthen intestinal wall cells - making it an ideal therapeutic agent against IBD. In addition to butyric acid, it is hypothesized that strains such as F. prausnitzii and B.pullicaecorum secrete other anti-inflammatory compounds that may enhance the therapeutic effect.
Prof. Filip Van Immerseel, a medical microbiologist from Ghent University in Belgium said that a new treatment for IBD would be welcomed. "Conventional drug therapy has limited effectiveness and considerable side effects. Probiotics are live bacterial supplements or food ingredients, which when taken in sufficient numbers confer health benefits to the host," he said. Previous trials of probiotics to treat IBD using mainly lactic acid bacteria have given mixed results. "Now we realise that lactic acid is used for growth by a certain population of bacteria that produce butyric acid, which could explain why some of the older studies had a positive outcome. Recent trials focussing on butyric acid-producing bacterial strains have been extremely promising and could lead to a new treatment for IBD."
Developing an effective probiotic treatment for IBD will not be easy, however. "As butyric acid-producing bacteria are naturally depleted in IBD patients, we will need to identify strains that are able to colonize the gut without being outcompeted. Many bacterial species produce butyric acid and possibly other anti-inflammatory molecules so it's a case of finding which is the most robust under these conditions," said Prof. Van Immerseel.
http://www.eurekalert.org/pub_releases/2010-01/sfgm-ppt011410.php

Porridge can help protect against asthma

Times of India, 20 January 2010,

Feed your child porridge from an early age to protect him/her against asthma, suggests a new research. 

In the study, researchers found that the risk of asthma later in childhood was reduced by almost two-thirds in babies first fed oats before they reach five months, compared with those introduced to them later, reports The Daily Express . 

To reach the conclusion, Finnish scientists studied almost 1,300 children between 1996 and 2000. The results have been published in the British Journal of Nutrition. The researchers said: "Our findings imply that delaying the introduction of oats in infancy may increase the risk of asthma by the age of five in some children. "Animal and cell experiments suggest oats may affect the immune system and have anti-inflammatory properties." 
http://timesofindia.indiatimes.com/life/health-fitness/health/Porridge-can-help-protect-against-asthma/articleshow/5480364.cms

South Korean Scientists Identify Traditional Remedy for H1n1 Flu
Asia Pulse Pte Ltd  01-19-10
SEOUL, Jan 19 Asia Pulse - South Korean scientists have identified a substance commonly used in traditional Oriental medicine that can destroy the Type-A H1N1 flu virus responsible for thousands of deaths worldwide last year, a state-run research institute said Monday.
The Korea Institute of Oriental Medicine (KIOM) said the team led by Ma Jin-yeul, head of KIOM's Center for Herbal Medicine Improvement Research, extracted materials from "common" herbal substances widely used in traditional remedies.
The medicine, known by its scientific name KIOM-C, is made from a dozen of such herbs and was given to mice infected with the Type-A flu virus.
"The mice were given liquid medication every other day with dissections carried out to monitor the effects," Ma said. He said in animals given KIOM-C, all traces of the virus vanished after nine days of treatment.
Animals that received other drugs during the extensive tests died.
"Laboratory tests conducted at the local company BioLeaders Corp. showed the potent anti-viral qualities of the drug made from a substance found in Oriental medicine," the principle research scientist said.
Without going into details on exact materials used, the researcher said basic materials such as Angelicae Gigantis Radix, Cnidii Rhizoma, peony and licorice were used in the medicine.
BioLeaders, associated with local pharmaceutical firm Green Cross Corp., operates a hightech, internationally recognized Bio Safety Level-3 laboratory and is one of the few centers in the country that can test infectious diseases.
He hinted that test data showed the medication prevented the virus from spreading within the body and may actually help protect people from getting sick. Such capabilities outweigh those offered by existing drugs.
Ma claimed that while more detailed tests needed to be carried out the latest development could open new horizons for applying traditional medicine to combat viruses like H1N1 and typical seasonal cold. He said local clinics specializing in Oriental medicine will be given exact details on the herbs to use in the near future.
"The ultimate goal of the current research is to make the medicine available in a tablet form around the world that can be easily consumed like the widely used Tamiflu anti-viral drug," he said.
He speculated that such a tablet could reach the market in about three years.
KIOM, based 160 kilometers south of Seoul in the city of Daejeon, said because the drug is made from "all natural" substances it does not carry the negative side effects, including rapid weight loss and nausea, usually associated with such antiviral drugs as Tamiflu.
It said a local patent was secured in November with protection being requested under the International Patent Cooperation Treaty.
The institute under the Ministry of Education, Science and Technology said it will expand research in the coming years to further develop the material and could consider cooperation with foreign pharmaceutical companies.
http://www.lef.org/news/LefDailyNews.htm?NewsID=9212&Section=Disease

Ancient Chinese Herbal Remedy More Powerful At Killing H1N1 Than Prescription Antivirals
David Gutierrez, NaturalNews.com  January 19, 2010 

(NaturalNews) An ancient Chinese remedy that was used to fight the 1918 Spanish flu pandemic may prove effective against the H1N1 swine flu, according to a study conducted by researchers from Kaohsiung Medial University in Taiwan and published in the American Chemical Society's Journal of Natural Products.

The plant is known by the scientific name Ferula assa-foetida, but is known colloquially in many regions as "Dung of the Devil" due to the foul smell of its sap. It grows mostly in Iran, Afghanistan and China, and has been traditionally used to treat everything from the flu and children's colds to asthma, bronchitis, constipation, flatulence, and epilepsy. It is considered an antimicrobial and digestive aid, and has also been traditionally used as a contraceptive and abortifacient. The researchers noted that more than 230 medicinal compounds have been identified in plants of the ferula genus.

The researchers tested F. assa-foetida samples acquired from a Chinese herb store in Taipei against samples of H1N1 influenza, then compared the plant's effectiveness with that of the prescription antiviral drug adamantine. The researchers found that the herbal medicine proved more effective at killing H1N1 in the laboratory than the prescription drug.

A number of influenza strains, including some varieties of H1N1, have shown great success in evolving resistance to adamantine.

The tests were conducted before the outbreak of the H1N1 variety known popularly as "swine flu," and therefore the results may not apply to that strain. The next step is to test F. assa-foetida against influenza viruses that are actually infecting humans or other animals.

"Overall, the present study has determined that sesquiterpene coumarins from F. assa-foetida may serve as promising lead components for new drug development against influenza A (H1N1) viral infection," the researchers wrote.

The study was funded by the Taiwanese National Science Council and Department of Health.
http://www.naturalnews.com/027970_H1N1_Chinese_Medicine.html

Severe form of psoriasis ups heart disease risk
Last Updated: 2010-01-18 16:10:14 -0400 (Reuters Health)
NEW YORK (Reuters Health) - People with severe forms of the inflammatory skin disease psoriasis are more likely to die of heart-related causes and stroke than those without the condition, new research shows.
In fact, for people with the severe form of psoriasis, the condition is a bigger risk factor for heart- and stroke-related death than high blood pressure, Dr. Joel M. Gelfand of the University of Pennsylvania School of Medicine in Philadelphia, one of the researchers on the study, told Reuters Health.
The findings "should be a very strong message" for people with severe psoriasis to get other risk factors like high blood pressure, high cholesterol, and excess weight under control, Gelfand said.
In psoriasis, cells build up on the skin surface and form itchy and sometimes painful scales and red patches. Joint inflammation may also occur. Up to one in 25 of adults have psoriasis, and about one in five of those have severe disease that warrants treatment with powerful inflammation-suppressing drugs like methotrexate.
Because such drugs carry a high risk of side effects, Gelfand noted, most people with severe psoriasis actually go untreated. "In the last 10 years or so there's been an explosion in new drugs approved for psoriasis," he added. "They're too new to know what their full use will be in the psoriasis population."
Gelfand and his colleagues first reported in 2006 that severe psoriasis upped a person's heart attack risk. The illness has since been linked to an increased risk of stroke.
In the current study, he and his colleagues matched 3,603 patients with severe psoriasis to 14,330 people who were free from the disease and followed them for about three years, on average. Three percent (108) of those with severe psoriasis died of heart- or stroke-related causes, compared with about two percent (301) of those without psoriasis.
People with severe psoriasis were nearly 60 percent more likely to die of causes related to heart disease or stroke than those without the disease, the researchers found.
Even once Gelfand and his team accounted for smoking, high blood pressure, and diabetes, the psoriasis patients' risk of death due to these causes was still 57 percent higher, suggesting that the skin disease in and of itself was the link.
This meant that there was one extra death per 283 people with severe forms of psoriasis per year, compared to those without the disease.
The relationship among factors that increase heart and blood vessel disease risk and psoriasis is very complex, Gelfand noted; for example, smoking and obesity both boost psoriasis risk, while people with psoriasis are known to be more likely to develop diabetes, which in turn ups heart disease risk.
Genes that make people susceptible to psoriasis have been linked to heart disease as well, he added, and the type of inflammation associated with heart- and stroke-related disease is very similar to that involved in psoriasis.
Teasing out the reasons for the link, and figuring out whether treating psoriasis could reduce heart disease risk, will require more research, he and his colleagues conclude.
SOURCE: European Heart Journal, online December 27, 2009.
http://www.reutershealth.com/archive/2010/01/18/eline/links/20100118elin005.html

Global healthcare fraud costs put at $260 billion
Last Updated: 2010-01-18 10:35:12 -0400 (Reuters Health)
LONDON (Reuters) - Some 180 billion euros ($260 bln) is lost globally every year to fraud and error in healthcare -- enough to quadruple the World Health Organisation's and UNICEF's budgets and control malaria in Africa, experts said on Monday.
A study by the European Healthcare Fraud and Corruption Network (EHFCN) and the Centre for Counter Fraud Services (CCFS) at Britain's Portsmouth University found that 5.59 percent of annual global health spending is lost to mistakes or corruption.
"Every euro lost to fraud or corruption means that someone, somewhere is not getting the treatment that they need," said Paul Vincke, EHFCN's president and one of the report's authors.
"They are ill for longer, and in some cases they simply die unnecessarily. Make no mistake -- healthcare fraud is a killer."
The report reviewed 69 exercises in 33 organisations in six countries to measure healthcare fraud and error losses.
The combined expenditure assessed was more than 300 billion pounds ($490 bln) and the experts extrapolated their findings from Britain, the United States, New Zealand, France, Belgium and the Netherlands to get a global picture.
Data from developing nations would not have changed the global figure, the authors said, but were hard to come by, since the study included only exercises based on statistically valid samples with measurable levels of accuracy.
The report found evidence for many different types of fraud, from pharmacists dividing prescriptions into small packages to claim extra fees, to drug companies organising price cartels, to doctors over claiming travel costs and abusing government grants, to patients making fraudulent insurance claims.
Two doctors were found to have claimed a government improvement grant for their clinic which they then spent on setting up a car import-export business.
RANGE OF SCAMS
A Thomson Reuters report published last October found that the U.S. healthcare system wastes between $505 billion and $850 billion every year, with around 22 percent of that going on fraudulent insurance, kickbacks for referrals for unnecessary services and other scams..
The World Health Organisation's latest estimate of global healthcare expenditure was $4.7 trillion (3.3 trillion euros). The fraud report's 260 billion loss figure is based on an average of 5.59 percent of spending being lost to fraud.
Jim Gee, chair of the CCFS, said Monday's report proved it was possible to measure the nature and extent of losses to fraud and error, and this was vital to tackling the issue.
"It may be embarrassing for some organisations to find out just how much they are losing," he said in the report.
"Because of the direct, negative impact on human life of losses to fraud, it is never easy to admit they take place."
But Gee said the first step to combating fraud was for governments and institutions to stop "being in denial" about it.
"If an organisation is not aware of the extent or nature of its problem, then how can it apply the right solution?"
The European Healthcare Fraud and Corruption Network (EHFCN) was set up to help the region's healthcare organisations find and cut losses on fraud and error so that more money could be better spent on patient care.
Similar networks exist in the United States and Canada.
http://www.reutershealth.com/archive/2010/01/18/eline/links/20100118elin007.html

Some 390 tons of US ground beef recalled
Last Updated: 2010-01-18 16:44:44 -0400 (Reuters Health)
WASHINGTON (Reuters) - Some 390 tons of ground beef produced by a California meat packer, some of it nearly two years ago, is being recalled for fear of potentially deadly E. coli bacterium tainting, U.S. officials said on Monday.
California, and shipped mainly to California outlets, the U.S. Department of Agriculture's food safety arm said.
An initial problem, in ground beef shipped by the plant from Jan. 5 to Jan. 15, was discovered during a regular safety check, the Food Safety and Inspection Service said.
It said it had received no reports of illnesses associated with consumption of the recalled products.
During a follow-up review of the company's records, government inspectors determined additional products produced and shipped in 2008 to be of concern because they may have been contaminated with E.coli, the service said in a notice on its web site.
This batch was produced from Feb. 19, 2008, to May 15, 2008. It also had been shipped to distribution centers, restaurants and hotels within California, the notice said.
"While these products are normally used fresh, the establishment is taking this action out of concern that some product may still be frozen and in commerce," it said.
E. coli is a potentially deadly bacterium that can cause kidney failure in the most serious cases.
The service said it routinely conducts checks to verify that recalling firms notify customers, including restaurants, of the recall and that steps are taken to make sure the product is no longer available to consumers.
http://www.reutershealth.com/archive/2010/01/18/eline/links/20100118elin012.html

Antioxidant-rich fruit and veg may cut lymph cancer risk

Nutraingredients.com, 19-Jan-2010

Increased intakes of antioxidant-rich vegetables may reduce the risk of developing non-Hodgkin lymphoma by about 30 per cent, says a new study.
Increased dietary intakes of specific antioxidant nutrients, like vitamin C, alpha-carotene, and proanthocyanidins were also individually associated with significant reductions in risks for the cancer, according to results published from the Iowa Women's Health Study in the International Journal of Cancer.
Non-Hodgkin lymphoma is a cancer that starts in the lymphatic system and ecompasses about 29 different forms of lymphoma. According to the American Cancer Society, over 50,000 new cases are diagnosed in the US every year.
A reduction in the risk was also recorded for dietary manganese, the first time such a link has been reported, “and thus this will require replication”, said the researchers.
“These results support a role for vegetables, and perhaps fruits and associatedantioxidants from food sources, as protective factors against the development of non-Hodgkin lymphoma and follicular lymphoma in particular,” said the researchers.
Study details
Led by James Cerhan, from the Mayo Clinic College of Medicine, the researchers analysed dietary intakes for 35,159 Iowa women aged between 55 and 69. During the course of the study 415 cases of non-Hodgkin lymphoma were documented.
Dietary vitamin C intakes were associated with a 22 per cent reduction in lymphoma risk, while alpha-carotene, proanthocyanidins, and manganese were associated with 29, 30, and 38 per cent reductions in risk.
No associations with multivitamin use or supplements for the nutrients were observed.
Increased intakes of fruits and vegetables were associated with a 31 per cent reduction in risk, while yellow/orange and cruciferous vegetables were linked to a 28 and 18 per cent reduction.
“Most studies have not shown an association with supplemental intake of antioxidant nutrients, suggesting that any association is likely to be mediated through foods,” said the researchers.
“This has mechanistic implications (potential synergies between antioxidants; other anticarcinogenic compounds in these foods) and also suggests that prevention approaches will likely need to be targeted toward foods and food groups and not individual nutrients, particularly taken as supplements,” they concluded.
Source: International Journal of Cancer Volume 126 Issue 4, Pages 992-1003 "Antioxidant intake from fruits, vegetables and other sources and risk of non-Hodgkin's lymphoma: the Iowa Women's Health Study" C.A. Thompson, T.M. Habermann, A.H. Wang, R.A. Vierkant, A.R. Folsom, J.A. Ross, J.R. Cerhan
http://www.nutraingredients.com/Research/Antioxidant-rich-fruit-and-veg-may-cut-lymph-cancer-risk

Tea compounds may boost attention span: Unilever

Nutraingredients.com, 19-Jan-2010

The tea compounds L-theanine and caffeine at levels obtained in a single cup of tea may improve attention, says a new study from Unilever.
A combination of 97 milligrams of L-theanine and 40 milligrams of caffeine was associated with improvements in attention,
Publication of the study comes a year after EFSA turned down Unilever-submitted health claims linking black tea consumption and improved mental focus. The European scientific assessor said in January 2009 that the dossier failed to demonstrate causality.
While no one was available for comment from Unilever prior to publication, global media relations director, Trevor Gorin, told NutraIngredients.com in 2009 following EFSA’s opinion that his company stood by the claims.
The new study supports the association between tea and attention, although it did not report any benefits for alertness. The findings of the randomized, placebo controlled, double-blind, cross-over study in the journal Appetite.
The study, led by Suzanne Einöther from sensation, perception and behaviour at Unilever R&D Vlaardingen, recruited 29 healthy regular tea and/or coffee drinkers to take part in the study. The average age was 30.6, 11 were men, and the body mass index was between 20 and 30 kg/m2.
People were randomized to consume a drink containing L-theanine (Suntheanine, Taiyo) and caffeine mixed with iced tea powder in water, or a placebo (water with iced tea powder) separated by between 6 and 14 days, and subsequently completed a cognitive test at baseline, and then 10 and 60 minutes after drinking.
“This study provided further evidence that the L-theanine/caffeine combination improves attention on the switch task,” wrote the researchers. “The improvement in accuracy in combination with unaltered response speed is in line with previous studies.
“Tentative evidence was [also] found that the effect of the L-theanine/caffeine combination on attention is not specific to the visual modality, as we found faster responses in both the visual and auditory modality on the intersensory task after the combination as compared to placebo,” they added.
“Taken together with the previous studies, we conclude that a high dose of L-theanine combined with caffeine, at the level of a single cup of tea, can help to improve attention,” they concluded.
Source: Appetite “L-theanine and caffeine improve task switching but not intersensory attention or subjective alertness”  S.J.L. Einother, V.E.G. Martens, J.A. Rycroft, E.A. De Bruin
http://www.nutraingredients.com/Research/Tea-compounds-may-boost-attention-span-Unilever

Fish Oil Given Intravenously to Patients in Intensive Care Has Many Benefits, Study Finds
ScienceDaily (Jan. 19, 2010) — A randomised controlled trial of fish oil given intravenously to patients in intensive care has found that it improves gas exchange, reduces inflammatory chemicals and results in a shorter length of hospital stay.
Researchers writing in BioMed Central's open access journal Critical Care investigated the effects of including fish oil in the normal nutrient solution for patients with sepsis, finding a significant series of benefits.
Philip Calder, from the University of Southampton, UK, worked with a team of researchers to carry out the study in 23 patients with systemic inflammatory response syndrome or sepsis in the Hospital Padre Américo, Portugal. He said, "Recently there has been increased interest in the fat and oil component of vein-delivered nutrition, with the realization that it not only supplies energy and essential building blocks, but may also provide bioactive fatty acids. Traditional solutions use soybean oil, which does not contain the omega-3 fatty acids contained in fish oil that act to reduce inflammatory responses. In fact, soybean oil is rich in omega-6 acids that may actually promote inflammation in an excessive or unbalanced supply."
Calder and his colleagues found that the 13 patients in the fish oil group had lower levels of inflammatory agents in their blood, were able to achieve better lung function and left hospital earlier than the 10 patients who received traditional nutrition.
According to Calder, "This is the first study of this particular fish oil solution in septic patients in the ICU. The positive results are important since they indicate that the use of such an emulsion in this group of patients will improve clinical outcomes, in comparison with the standard mix."
Vera M Barbosa, Elizabeth A Miles, Conceicao Calhau, Estevao Lafuente and Philip C Calder. Effects of a fish oil containing lipid emulsion on plasma phospholipid fatty acids, inflammatory markers, and clinical outcomes in septic patients: a randomized, controlled clinical trial. Critical Care, 2010; (in press)
http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2010/01/100118204043.htm

Worrisome Trends Show Eroding U.S. Competitive Advantage in World Science and Engineering Environment
ScienceDaily (Jan. 18, 2010) — The state of the science and engineering (S&E) enterprise in America is strong, yet its lead is slipping, according to data released at the White House January 15 by the National Science Board (NSB). Prepared biennially and delivered to the President and Congress on even numbered years by Jan. 15 as statutorily mandated, Science and Engineering Indicators (SEI) provides information on the scope, quality and vitality of America's science and engineering enterprise. SEI 2010 sheds light on America's position in the global economy.
"The data begin to tell a worrisome story," said Kei Koizumi, assistant director for federal research and development (R&D)in the President's Office of Science and Technology Policy (OSTP). Calling SEI 2010 a "State of the Union on science, technology, engineering and mathematics," he noted that quot;U.S. dominance has eroded significantly."
Koizumi and OSTP hosted the public rollout at which NSB Chairman Steven Beering, National Science Foundation (NSF) Director Arden L. Bement, Jr., and NSB members presented SEI 2010 data and described a mixed picture. NSB's SEI Committee Chairman Lou Lanzerotti noted the good news for those in the S&E community about public attitudes, "Scientists are about the same as firefighters in terms of prestige," he said. His presentation focused attention on NSB's Digest, also released January 15, highlighting important trends and data points from across SEI 2010.
Over the past decade, R&D intensity--how much of a country's economic activity or gross domestic product is expended on R&D--has grown considerably in Asia, while remaining steady in the U.S. Annual growth of R&D expenditures in the U.S. averaged 5 to 6 percent while in Asia, it has skyrocketed. In some Asian countries, R&D growth rate is two, three, even four, times that of the U.S.
In terms of R&D expenditures as a share of economic output, while Japan has surpassed the U.S. for quite some time, South Korea is now in the lead--ahead of the U.S. and Japan. And why does this matter? Investment in R&D is a major driver of innovation, which builds on new knowledge and technologies, contributes to national competitiveness and furthers social welfare. R&D expenditures indicate the priority given to advancing science and technology (S&T) relative to other national goals.
NSB SEI 2010 Committee Member Jose-Marie Griffiths discussed another key indicator: intellectual research outputs. "While the U.S. continues to lead the world in research publications, China has become the second most prolific contributor." China's rapidly developing science base now produces 8 percent of the world's research publications, up from its just 2 percent of the world's share in 1995, when it ranked 14th.
Patents are another measure of valuable contributions to knowledge and inventions to societies. Inventors from around the globe seek patent protection in the U.S. U.S. patents awarded to foreign inventors offer a broad indication of the distribution of inventive activity around the world. While inventors in the U.S., the European Union (EU) and Japan produce almost all of these patents, and U.S. patenting by Chinese and Indian inventors remains modest, the number of patents earned by Asian inventors is on the rise, driven by activity in Taiwan and South Korea.
The Digest contains these and other key indicators, such as the globalization of capability; funding, performance and portfolio of U.S. R&D trends; and the composition of the U.S. S&E workforce. What's more, the Digest is electronically linked with detailed data tables and discussions in the main volumes of SEI. It can also be downloaded to laptops, iPods or other devices. "This makes the data much more accessible and digestable to policymakers, as well as to members of the general public who may wish to read about and understand the data that describe the state of their economy," said Lanzerotti.
Calling SEI a "biennial production and a daily source of pride for NSF," Bement characterized it as a guide to the future. "It is not just where we stand; it's about where we're heading," he said, quoting 19th century British scientist Lord Kelvin, "'If you cannot measure it, you cannot improve it.'"
Representing OSTP Director John Holdren and his OSTP colleagues, in closing Koizumi said, "We promise to put your work to good use."
SEI is prepared by NSF's Division of Science Resources Statistics (SRS) on behalf of the National Science Board. The publication is subject to extensive review by outside experts, interested federal agencies, Board members and SRS internal reviewers for accuracy, coverage and balance.
In further carrying out its responsibility to advise the President and Congress on science and engineering issues, in February, the NSB will release a companion, policy piece, Globalization of Science and Engineering Research.
http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2010/01/100115182635.htm

Tipping Point? West Antarctic Ice Sheet Could Become Unstable as World Warms
ScienceDaily (Jan. 18, 2010) — A new study examines how ice sheets, such as the West Antarctic Ice Sheet, could become unstable as the world warms.
The team from Oxford University and Cambridge University developed a model to explore how changes in the 'grounding line' -- where an ice sheet floats free from its base of rock or sediment -- could lead to the disintegration of ice sheets and result in a significant rise in global sea level.
'The volume of ice locked up in the West Antarctic Ice Sheet is equivalent to a sea level rise of around 3.3 metres,' said Dr Richard Katz of Oxford University's Department of Earth Sciences, an author of the report. 'Our model shows how instability in the grounding line, caused by gradual climatic changes, has the potential to reach a 'tipping point' where disintegration of the ice sheet could occur.'
At the moment the model -- that uniquely takes into account the three dimensional shape of ice sheets -- is still fairly simple, but the researchers hope to eventually include more detail on how ice sheets interact with their base slopes and show the behaviour of individual ice streams.
When the team applied their theoretical and mathematical model to the West Antarctic Ice Sheet they found that, contrary to earlier assessments, a scenario which would see instability grow as the grounding line recedes was likely. In the case of the Pine Island Glacier it may already be occurring.
'Global climate models often assume that, as the world warms, ice sheets will melt at a steady rate, leading to gradual rises in sea level -- but ice sheets are much more complex structures than this,' said Dr Katz. 'We need to do a lot more work to build better models of how ice sheets behave in the real world. Only then can we start to predict how this behaviour might change in the future as the climate changes.'
A report of the research, 'Stability of ice sheet grounding lines', is published in Proceedings of the Royal Society A. The research was conducted by Dr Richard Katz of Oxford University's Department of Earth Sciences and Professor M Grae Worster of Cambridge University's Institute of Theoretical Geophysics.
http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2010/01/100116103350.htm

90 Percent of Parents Misled by Food Nutrition Labels
E. Huff, NaturalNews.com  January 19, 2010 

(NaturalNews) Recent research conducted by the British Heart Foundation (NHF) has revealed that about 90 percent of British mothers do not properly understand food nutritional labels. Most of the women falsely believe that products claiming to be good sources of certain vitamins or rich in whole grains are healthy, despite the fact that many of them are actually chock full of unhealthy ingredients.

The most common labeling scheme identified by researchers was the front-labeling of foods that are high in fat and sugar with glowing health claims. While partially true in some cases, phrases like "naturally-flavored" and "no artificial ingredients" were found to be commonly used on breakfastproducts that are high in refined sugar and bad saturated fats. One cereal claiming to boost heart health and maintain a healthy body was found to have more sugar per serving than a doughnut. Another breakfast cereal bar claiming to be high in vitamins was found to have more saturated fatand sugar than a piece of chocolate cake.

Food manufacturers have received heavy criticism in recent years for alleged advertising strategies that target children with unhealthy foods. Reluctant parents often give in because of health claims that, when examined more closely, seem to contradict the nutrition label. Unfortunately, most busy parents fail to recognize advertising discrepancies.

When asked in the survey, participants indicated that they would prefer a nutrition labeling system that was consistent and placed entirely on the front of food packaging. As it currently stands, product manufacturers are not required to label their products in any specific manner other than the mandatory nutritional facts label located on product backs. This is true both in the U.K. and in the U.S. 

Spokesmen from various food companies countered the claims of the study, indicating that the labeling on their packaging is both truthful and transparent. All ingredients can be found on the nutrition label as can the amounts of fat, salt and sugar. Food producers are continually adjusting their product formulations to meet the demands of their customers, they say, cutting things like sodium and saturated fat and including healthier ingredients.

Researchers from BHF, however, continue to demand that stricter labeling laws be put in place in order to alleviate some of the confusion over food nutrition. They believe that a standardized system of labeling will help to clarify how healthy a product really is and lead to a more informed consumer base.
http://www.naturalnews.com/027972_nutrition_labels_parents.html

New study confirms bisphenol A found in plastic is linked to heart disease
S. L. Baker, NaturalNews.com  January 19, 2010 

(NaturalNews) According to the American Heart Association, cardiovascular disease is the number one killer in the U.S. Various forms of the disease take the lives of over 80 million Americans a year. And while we've all heard about the risk factors for cardiovascular disease -- including smoking, being overweight, high cholesterol and lack of exercise -- it appears it's time to add bisphenol A, better known as BPA, to that list.

This chemical has been used for decades in polycarbonate plastic products including refillable drink containers, plastic eating utensils and baby bottles as well as the epoxy resins that line most food and soft-drink cans. Now a new study just published in the journal PLoS ONE provides the most compelling evidence so far that BPA exposure is dangerous to the cardiovascular system.

Using 2006 data from the US government's National Health and Nutrition Examination Survey (NHANES), researchers from the Peninsula Medical School at the University of Exeter in the UK studied urinary BPA concentrations and found a significantly strong link between BPA exposure and heart disease. In 2008, these same scientists discovered that higher urinary BPA concentrations were associated with a long list of medical problems in adults, including liver dysfunction, diabetes and obesity. This research team was also the first to report evidence that BPA was linked tocardiovascular disease -- and their new research offers further confirmation of a strong connection between BPA and heart ailments.

Despite the fact the new study found that urinary BPA concentrations were one third lower than those measured from 2003 to 2004, higher concentrations of BPA were still associated with heart disease. "This is only the second analysis of BPA in a large human population sample. It has allowed us to largely confirm our original analysis and exclude the possibility that our original findings were a statistical 'blip'," David Melzer, Professor of Epidemiology and Public Health at the Peninsula Medical School and the research team leader, said in a statement to the media.

"We now need to investigate what causes these health risk associations in more detail and to clarify whether they are caused by BPA itself or by some other factor linked to BPA exposure. The risks associated with exposure to BPA may be small, but they are relevant to very large numbers of people. This information is important since it provides a great opportunity for intervention to reduce the risks," added scientist Tamara Galloway, Professor of Ecotoxicology at the University of Exeter and senior author of the paper.

As NaturalNews has previously reported, BPA exposure has been shown in other studies to be associated with neurological problems (http://www.naturalnews.com/025801_B...), diabetes and aggressive behavior in little girls (http://www.naturalnews.com/027382_B...). Unfortunately, the FDA has demonstrated little ability or interest in taking decisive measures to protect consumers from this chemical (http://www.naturalnews.com/024593_t...).Your best strategy to avoid BPA? Eat natural, fresh foods and stay away from cans, bottles and other plastic containing products that are not certified BPA-free. 
http://www.naturalnews.com/027974_bisphenol_A_heart_disease.html

Reversing itself, FDA expresses concerns over health risks from BPA
Washington Post
Saturday, January 16, 2010; A01 
The Food and Drug Administration has reversed its position on the safety of Bisphenol A, a chemical found in plastic bottles, soda cans, food containers and thousands of consumer goods, saying it now has concerns about health risks.
Growing scientific evidence has linked the chemical to a host of problems, including cancer, sexual dysfunction and heart disease. Federal officials said they are particularly concerned about BPA's effect on the development of fetuses, infants and young children.
"We have some concern, which leads us to recommend reasonable steps the public can take to reduce exposure to BPA," said Joshua Sharfstein, FDA's deputy commissioner, in a conference call to reporters Friday.
Regulators stopped short of banning the compound or even requiring manufacturers to label products containing BPA, saying that current data are not clear enough to support a legal crackdown. FDA officials also said they were hamstrung from dealing quickly with BPA by an outdated regulatory framework.
Sharfstein said the agency is conducting "targeted" studies of BPA, part of a two-year, $30 million effort by the administration to answer key questions about the chemical that will help determine what action, if any, is necessary to protect public health. The Obama administration pledged to take a "fresh look" at the chemical.
BPA, used to harden plastics, is so prevalent that more than 90 percent of the U.S. population has traces of it in its urine, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. Researchers have found that BPA leaches from containers into food and beverages, even at cold temperatures.
The FDA's announcement came after extensive talks between federal agencies and the White House about the best approach to an issue that has become a significant concern for consumers and the chemical industry.
One administration official privy to the talks said the FDA is in a quandary. "They have new evidence that makes them worried, but they don't have enough proof to justify pulling the stuff, so what do you do?" said the official, who spoke on the condition of anonymity. "You want to warn people, but you don't want to create panic."
The FDA had long maintained that BPA is safe, relying largely on two studies funded by the chemical industry. The agency was faulted by its own panel of independent science advisers in 2008, which said its position on BPA was scientifically flawed because it ignored more than 100 published studies by government scientists and university laboratories that raised health concerns about BPA. Recent data found health effects even at low doses of BPA -- lower than the levels considered safe by the FDA.
The chemical industry, which produces more than 6 billion tons of BPA annually and has been fighting restrictions on its use, said Friday's announcement was good news because the agency did not tell people to stop using products containing the chemical.
"The science continues to support the safety of BPA," said Steven Hentges of the American Chemistry Council.
In a statement, the industry group said: "Plastics made with BPA contribute safety and convenience to our daily lives because of their durability, clarity and shatter-resistance. Can liners and food-storage containers made with BPA are essential components to helping protect the safety of packaged foods. . . . ACC remains committed to consumer safety, and will continue to review new scientific studies concerning the safety of BPA."
Bisphenol A was discovered to be a synthetic estrogen in the 1930s. By the 1950s, chemists found BPA could be used to make polycarbonate plastics, giving them a "shatterproof" quality, and the uses for the chemical exploded.
But recently, consumers have placed increasing pressure on manufacturers and retailers to migrate away from BPA. In 2008, Babies R Us and other major retailers told suppliers they would no longer stock baby bottles made with BPA. Last year, the six largest manufacturers of baby bottles announced they would voluntarily stop selling bottles made with bisphenol A to consumers in the United States.
But BPA remains in the epoxy linings of most canned goods, including baby formula. Research has shown that it leaches from the linings into liquid formula, but not powered formula.
Environmental groups, public health advocates and consumer organizations applauded the FDA for recognizing concern about BPA, but some said the agency didn't go far enough.
"It's really a shame after all of the studies out there that they didn't do anything to protect the public health," said Urvashi Rangan, director of technical policy at Consumers Union. "How many pieces of evidence do we need before we have enough to act?"
Canada declared BPA a toxin and banned it from baby bottles in 2008. Similar restrictions have taken root in Chicago, Minnesota, Connecticut and Suffolk County in New York. In Congress, Sens. Dianne Feinstein (D-Calif.), Charles E. Schumer (D-N.Y.) and Rep. Edward J. Markey (D-Mass.) have filed a bill that would block BPA from all food and drink packaging.
As it awaits additional research results, the FDA plans to change the way it classifies BPA so that it can exercise tighter controls over the chemical, Sharfstein said. Currently, BPA is approved as a "food additive," which means manufacturers are not required to tell the government which products contain BPA and in what amounts. The agency wants to reclassify it as a "food contact material," which would require greater disclosure from manufacturers and would allow the FDA to take fast action if it determined that the material posed a health risk.

Public release date: 29-Dec-2009
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Contact: John Mata
john.mata@oregonstate.edu
541-737-6874
Oregon State University 
Chlorophylls effective against aflatoxin
Oregon State University, December 29, 2009
CORVALLIS, Ore. – A new study has found that chlorophyll and its derivative chlorophyllin are effective in limiting the absorption of aflatoxin in humans. Aflatoxin is produced by a fungus that is a contaminant of grains including corn, peanuts and soybeans; it is known to cause liver cancer – and can work in concert with other health concerns, such as hepatitis.
Levels of aflatoxin are carefully regulated in the United States, but are often found in the food supplies of developing nations, especially those with poor storage facilities.
OSU scientist George Bailey, a distinguished professor of environmental and molecular toxicology, pioneered studies of aflatoxin in China, where he found that in one region, one out of every 10 adults died from liver cancer.
But what has the science world particularly intrigued with this follow-up study is the methodology used by the researchers – a new "Phase 0" approach that safely tests low levels of carcinogens in human volunteers to measure the total aflatoxin exposure and to determine the effect of dietary chlorophlls on reducing this exposure.
Results of the study were just published in the journal Cancer Prevention Research.
Bailey and several other researchers, including lead author Carole Jubert, were part of the recent study. The journal also included a perspective written by a pair of Johns Hopkins researchers – Thomas Kensler and John Groopman – who praise the methodology and suggest that these Phase 0 "microdosing" studies should be expanded.
They wrote: "…microdosing studies with carcinogens have the potential to provide important insights into chemopreventive interventions and to enhance the overall clinical development and safety evaluation of preventive agents."
The Phase 0 study "…may open the door for all kinds of new research," said Jubert, a former researcher in Bailey's lab at OSU's Linus Pauling Institute. Jubert now works for Life Microsystems, an OSU spinoff company that hopes to continue work with natural products grown in Oregon, including pure chlorophylls.
"The technology is not particularly difficult," she added. "It's just a novel approach to evaluate toxin exposure in humans."
In their study, Jubert and her colleagues gave very low doses of aflatoxin labeled with carbon-14 isotopes as a tracer to four human volunteers. They then gave the volunteers the same doses of aflatoxin along with doses of either chlorophyll or chlorophyllin, which previously had been shown to reduce carcinogen bioavailability in trout and rats. Using an accelerator mass spectrometer, they measured the rate of aflaxtoxin bioavailability. This technique is extremely sensitive, the researchers say, allowing measurement of minute amounts of any labeled compound.
Their research revealed rapid absorption of aflatoxin, which was significantly limited after the chlorophyll and chlorophyllin treatments.
"The beauty of this kind of 'Phase 0' study is the use of ultra-sensitive technology and 'microdoses' of environmental carcinogens to study toxicokinetics within the human body," said John Mata, an OSU pharmacologist and second author on the study. "These measurements can be important because they allow us to better design future studies to understand the effects of dietary constituents on cancer risk.
"In this case, clearly the results merit further study," Mata added. "We showed that aflatoxin is absorbed quite rapidly and that chlorophyll and chlorophyllin have an ameliorating effect, preventing the toxin from getting into the bloodstream. Further studies can more precisely explore the interactions, as well as dosage levels."
Jubert and Mata also have tested the feasibility of using similar technology on human exposure to other toxins, including smokers who ingest carcinogens through cigarette smoke.
Mata, a professor in OSU's College of Veterinary Medicine, is a pharmacologist who previously worked in the drug industry. He said Phase 1 studies are designed to see if a compound is safe; Phase 2 expands the scope of the project, and Phase 3 looks at the compounds' efficacy. Phase 0 represents a new concept – a way to measure the kinetics of a drug by using extremely small doses that pose little risk to the volunteers.
In this case, the amount of radiation given the human volunteers was equal to that you would encounter from a one-hour airplane ride; the level of aflatoxin administered was 1/30th the amount the Food and Drug Administration allows in a peanut butter sandwich.
http://www.eurekalert.org/pub_releases/2009-12/osu-cea122909.php

Ban butter to save our hearts, says doctor

Butter should be banned in a bid to save thousands from heart disease, a leading heart surgeon claims.

The Telegraph UK   18 Jan 2010

Dr Shyam Kolvekar said that he is "increasingly concerned" about the nation's eating habits as he is seeing patients as young as 30 in need of heart bypass surgery due to a diet "overloaded" with saturated fat.
According to a national diet survey, nine out of 10 of children, 88 per cent of men and 83 per cent of women in Britain eat too much saturated fat, consuming a fifth too much each day.

It is estimated that by reducing saturated fat intake in line with government recommendations could prevent at least 3,500 deaths per year.
Experts say that over time a diet too high in saturated fats can lead to raised blood cholesterol and a build up of fatty deposits in the arteries that supply the heart.
This increases the risk of heart disease and heart attacks. Cardiovascular disease is responsible for 198,000 deaths a year and costs the economy £7.9 billion a year.
Dr Kolvekar, at University College London Hospital, said: "The amount of children who eat too much saturated fat really is astonishing.
"It's because most kids start the day with some toast and butter, it's a staple of breakfast, but not very good for you. Porridge is a much better alternative, much better than sausage and eggs which are also high in fat.
"I am also seeing lots of patients who are incredibly young. You associate heart problems with people in their 50s and 60s but I am seeing people as young as 30.
"For some people it's genetic but for most it's just their lifestyle choices. The three main factors are diet, smoking and exercise.
"By adjusting your diet by replacing butter with a healthy spread or margarine is a very simple thing to do and makes a whole world of difference."
He went on: "In reality people don't stick to complicated diets.
"By banning butter and replacing it with a healthy spread the average daily fat intake would be reduced by 8g – that's 40 per cent of a women's GDA - Guideline Daily Amount. The GDA for a woman is 20g and for a man it's 30g.
"People should also avoid any foods that are solid at room temperature like cheese and red meat. And if you can't survive without red meat then make sure you cut all the fat off it.
"This would save thousands of lives each year and help to protect them from cardiovascular disease – the UK's biggest killer.
"By the time I see people it's usually too late, but the frustrating thing is that often the need for heart surgery could have been prevented by following a healthier, lower sat fat diet.
"Simple food swaps can make a big difference."
Leading medical writer and GP, Dr Sarah Jarvis added: "My patients are often simply not aware of how much saturated fat they're eating and the damage this causes until it's too late.
"Simple food swaps every day can help dramatically.
"A great example is North Karelia in Finland, where there has been an 82 per cent reduction in heart disease amongst men over the last 40 years, from 1969 to 2002.
"This has been directly linked to a decrease in butter consumption."
Dr Kolvekar also said he is often asked what to eat by his patients. He creates a "healthy heart" breakfast for them to follow.
He continued: "This breakfast doesn't reinvent the wheel, it's about making small changes that could one day save your life."
Top nutritionist Jacqui Morrell added: "It's very easy to eat too much saturated fat.
"For example, two slices of buttered toast and a full fat latte contains 16.1g of saturated fat, so that's already 80 per cent of the Guideline Daily Amount GDA for a woman at breakfast.
"However, just by swapping butter for a low fat spread and using 1 per cent milk you make a 92 per cent reduction."

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/health/healthnews/7010677/Ban-butter-to-save-our-hearts-says-doctor.html

Most Americans are Wellness "Wannabes"
NewsRx.com  01-15-10
Most Americans make New Years' resolutions focused on wellness, and rightfully so - new research shows Americans have a long way to go toward achieving wellness based on the three pillars of health: healthy diet, responsible supplement use and regular exercise. The "Life...supplemented" My Wellness Scorecard National Study evaluated Americans' wellness regimens on a scale from "AlphaWELL" (those who are proactive about their health) to "OhWELL" (those who do not live healthy lifestyles). Results show three out of every four Americans fall into the category of "WannabeWELL" (44 percent) or "OhWELL" (33 percent) (see also Council for Responsible Nutrition).
"These 'WannabeWELLs' are on the cusp of wellness," says William Cooper, M.D., medical director of cardiovascular surgery at Wellstar Kennestone Hospital and advisor to the "Life...supplemented" campaign. "They want to be healthier, but may not know where to start. What many Americans need are the proper tools to get healthy: simple, easy-to-understand wellness tips and health information."
Study participants took the My Wellness Scorecard, an online assessment tool created with registered dietitians and other wellness experts that evaluates diet, exercise and supplement use, revealing trends in the American lifestyle.
For example, just over half of Americans (51 percent) report that they do a fairly good job of avoiding processed, fatty and cholesterol-rich foods, but 27 percent admit they eat too much fatty food like red meat and cream cheese. Although 63 percent try to eat two to three servings of whole grains every day, many aren't paying attention to their intake of oils (30 percent) or consumption of salt (24 percent). Also, 46 percent don't track how much fiber they eat, and just 37 percent report to limit the salt they use in cooking and read food labels carefully to limit other sources of salt and sodium.
Americans fare better when it comes to daily or weekly habits. More than half of American adults take a multivitamin, and 45 percent report taking a dietary supplement other than a multivitamin. The number one reason supplement users take supplements is for general health. A third try to adhere to their exercise regimens at least two to three times a week (36 percent) and nearly two-thirds (61 percent) exercise for 30 minutes or more.
"Healthy diet, vitamins and other supplements, and exercise work together to form a foundation for wellness," says Dr. Cooper. "The more education Americans have about these three pillars, the easier it will be to live healthy lifestyles."
To find out whether you're an OhWELL, an AlphaWELL or somewhere in between, take My Wellness Scorecard online (at no charge) at www.lifesupplemented.org. The scorecard provides a personalized wellness assessment with realistic steps to take toward better health - and a starting point for developing your own personal wellness regimen with your physician or other healthcare professional. And, from now through February 28, you could win a $15,000 sweepstakes prize (no purchase necessary) by entering America's Wellness Challenge sweepstakes at lifesupplemented.org.
Methodology: The 2009 "Life...supplemented" My Wellness Scorecard National Study was conducted October 2 through October 9, 2009 by Ipsos Public Affairs. The survey was conducted on-line and included a national sample of 1,172 adults aged 18 and older from Ipsos' U.S. on-line panel. Weighting was employed to balance demographics and ensure that the sample's composition reflects that of the U.S. adult population according to the Census data and to provide results intended to approximate the sample universe. A survey with an unweighted probability sample of this size would have an estimated margin of error of +/- 2.9 percentage points. Ipsos also conducted the 2007-2009 "Life...supplemented" Healthcare Professionals Impact Studies.
About "Life...supplemented": "Life... supplemented" is a consumer wellness campaign dedicated to driving awareness about the mainstream use of dietary supplements as an integral part of a proactive personal wellness regimen that combines healthy diet, supplements and exercise. The campaign is managed by the Council for Responsible Nutrition, the leading trade association for the dietary supplement industry, under its affiliated 501??(3), the CRN Foundation. Learn more about AlphaWELLS, WELLS, WannabeWELLS and OhWELLS by clicking on My Wellness Scorecard at http://www.lifesupplemented.org/.
Keywords: Alternative Medicine, Cardiology, Cardiovascular, Food, Food Labeling, Surgery, Therapy, Treatment, Wellness, Council for Responsible Nutrition.
This article was prepared by Hospital Business Week editors from staff and other reports. Copyright 2010, Hospital Business Week via NewsRx.com.
http://www.lef.org/news/LefDailyNews.htm?NewsID=9209&Section=Vitamins

Mediterranean diet protects against stomach cancer
Last Updated: 2010-01-15 14:39:15 -0400 (Reuters Health)
NEW YORK (Reuters Health) - Eating the Mediterranean way can help reduce your risk of stomach cancer, a large study from Europe shows.
"The results add to the evidence for the role of the Mediterranean diet in reducing cancer risk and add further support for the need to continue to promote the Mediterranean diet in areas where it is disappearing," Dr. Carlos A. Gonzalez of the Catalan Institute for Oncology in Barcelona and his colleagues say.
The traditional diets of Greece, Italy and other Mediterranean countries have many health benefits, they point out in the American Journal of Clinical Nutrition, including protection against cancer. But there is less information on how eating this way might influence risk of specific cancer types. Gonzalez and his team looked at gastric cancer, the second-leading cause of cancer death worldwide.
To investigate whether diet might be protective against the disease, the researchers analyzed data from the European Prospective Investigation into Cancer and Nutrition (EPIC) study on 485,044 men and women 35 to 70 years old from 10 European countries.
All had been given a score on an 18-point scale based on how closely their diet adhered to the Mediterranean ideal of being rich in fruit, vegetables, legumes, fish, cereals and olive oil, with a relatively low intake of red meat and dairy products.
During nine years of follow-up, 449 of the study participants developed gastric cancer.
People with the highest relative Mediterranean diet scores were 33 percent less likely to develop the disease than people whose eating patterns were furthest from the Mediterranean ideal. Gastric cancer risk fell 5 percent for every one-point increase in a person's Mediterranean diet score.
Just 23 percent of people diagnosed with gastric cancer will survive for five years, the researchers note. "Therefore, identifying dietary recommendations that can help reduce incidence is important for the effective management of this cancer," they conclude.
SOURCE: American Journal of Clinical Nutrition, online December 9, 2009.
http://www.reutershealth.com/archive/2010/01/15/eline/links/20100115elin006.html

Exercise protects and improves the aging brain
Last Updated: 2010-01-15 14:46:15 -0400 (Reuters Health)
NEW YORK (Reuters Health) - Two new studies provide more evidence that regular aerobic exercise not only staves off the problems with thinking and memory that often come with age, but it can actually help turn back the clock on brain aging.
In one study, researchers found evidence that engaging in moderate physical activity such as brisk walking, swimming, or yoga in midlife or later may cut the risk of developing mild thinking problems.
In the other study, a group of elderly individuals who already had mild problems had improvements in their mental agility after six months of high-intensity aerobic activity.
People with mild mental impairments of the kind studied - known as mild cognitive impairment -- typically have some memory difficulties, such as forgetting people's names or misplacing items. Each year, 10 to 15 percent of individuals with mild cognitive impairment will develop dementia, as compared with 1 percent to 2 percent of the general population. Previous studies in animals and humans have suggested that exercise may improve thinking and memory.
To investigate further, Seattle-based researchers studied 33 adults with mild cognitive impairment. Twenty-three spent 45 to 60 minutes on a treadmill or stationary bicycle four days a week for six months, while the other 10 "control" subjects did stretching exercises but kept their heart rate low.
Six months of intense aerobic exercise "improved cognitive abilities of attention and concentration, organization, planning, and multi-tasking," study chief Dr. Laura Baker noted in an email to Reuters Health. In contrast, cognitive function test scores continued to decline in the group that didn't have vigorous exercise.
Might it be possible to get the same brain benefit from lower intensity aerobic exercise?
"In theory, yes," Baker said, "but we are just now starting the studies that will help us know how little is enough. In the next five years, we'll have a much better idea about the minimum 'dose' of exercise needed (how often, duration of exercise sessions, how much exertion is needed) without compromising the cognitive benefits."
Baker, who is from the University of Washington School of Medicine and the Veterans Affairs Medical Center, Geriatric Research, Education, and Clinical Center, also noted that the average magnitude of mental improvement with aerobic exercise was "bigger for women than for men."
And while she's not exactly sure why, she noted that, for the women in the study, aerobic exercise improved the body's sensitivity to insulin, a hormone that plays an important role in providing energy to the muscles and organs of the body and to the brain. "Contrary to our expectations, aerobic exercise did not improve insulin sensitivity for the men," Baker said.
EXERCISE TO WARD OFF MENTAL DECLINE
The other study, by Dr. Yonas E. Geda and colleagues at Mayo Clinic in Rochester, Minnesota, involved 1,324 elderly adults free of dementia in 2006-2008. Experts determined that 198 had mild cognitive impairment and 1,126 had normal cognitive function.
Those who said they had engaged in moderate exercise such as brisk walking, aerobics, yoga, strength training or swimming in their 40s, 50s and beyond were less apt to have mild cognitive impairment, the researchers found.
Moderate exercise in midlife was associated with a 39 percent reduced likelihood of developing mild cognitive impairment, and moderate exercise in late life was associated with a 32 percent reduction in the odds of mental decline. The findings were consistent among men and women.
These two studies, both published in the Archives of Neurology, contribute to a growing body of literature supporting the benefits of a physically active lifestyle on the brain.
SOURCE: Archives of Neurology, January 2010.
http://www.reutershealth.com/archive/2010/01/15/eline/links/20100115elin007.html

Dried fruit show potential as green tea extract carriers
Nutraingredients.com, 18-Jan-2010
Fortifying dried fruit pieces like apple with green tea extracts may boost the antioxidant content of the finished product by four-fold, suggests a joint study from the US and Italy.

Addition of the green tea extract to dried apple pieces also did not affect the colour of the fortified product, with the green tea compounds potentially preventing undesirable browning, according to new findings published in the Journal of Food Science.
“The novel green tea-apple product would be advantageous for two reasons,” wrote the researchers from the University of Milan and the University of Georgia. “[Firstly,] from an economic point of view, it would provide a greater variety of dehydrated apple products available in the marketplace, and [secondly] from a nutritional perspective, since apple consumption is very high throughout the world, this novel product could offer consumers a simple opportunity for regular consumption.”
According to recent report from Frost & Sullivan, the market for green tea extracts, currently worth around $44m (€29.7m), is expected to grow by more than 13 per cent over the next seven years.
The F&S analysts state that science is the reason for the ingredient's growing popularity, and that it is generally accepted that green tea has a beneficial role in reducing Alzheimer's, certain cancers, cardiovascular and oral health.
Study details
Led by Vera Lavelli, the researchers fortified dried apple pieces with green tea extract (Java Green Tea, Twinings of London) at a level equivalent to the green tea catechin content of four cups of green tea.

Antioxidant levels, measured using the ferric reducing/antioxidant power (FRAP) and 2,2-diphenyl-1-(2,4,6-trinitrophenyl)hydrazyl radical (DPPH) scavenging capacity assays, showed a four-fold increase, compared to non-fortified apple pieces, said the researchers.
Furthermore, these antioxidant levels remained almost unchanged during storage at 30 °C for one month. “The GT-fortified product retained 80 and 100 per cent of the initial contents of the monomeric flavan 3-ols and total procyanidins, respectively,” said the researchers.
In terms of the appearance of the apple pieces, the researchers note that the colours of the green tea-fortified product and a commercially available dehydrated apple product were similar.
“Results highlighted some advantages of using dehydrated apples as a target for green tea fortification, which deserve further trials to investigate potential applications for fortification of other dehydrated fruits,” they concluded.
Source: Journal of Food Science "Formulation of a Dry Green Tea-Apple Product: Study on Antioxidant and Color Stability"  V. Lavelli, C. Vantaggi, M. Corey, W. Kerr
http://www.nutraingredients.com/Research/Dried-fruit-show-potential-as-green-tea-extract-carriers

Vitamin D plus calcium may protect everyone from fracture: Study
Nutraingredients.com, 15-Jan-2010
Daily supplements which combine vitamin D and calcium may reduce the risk of fractures for everyone, regardless of age or gender, say the results of a huge study.
Almost 70,000 people participated in the US and Europe and found that the vitamin-mineral combination significantly reduced fractures by 8 per cent, and hip fractures by 16 per cent, according to results of a pooled analysis published in the British Medical Journal.
However, supplemental vitamin D on its own in daily doses equivalent to 10 to 20 micrograms had no effects on fracture prevention, said the study, led by researchers at Copenhagen University in Denmark.
“What is important about this very large study is that goes a long way toward resolving conflicting evidence about the role of vitamin D, either alone or in combination with calcium, in reducing fractures,” said co-author of the study, Professor John Robbins from the University of California, Davis.
History of use
The combination of vitamin D and calcium has long been recommended to reduce the risk of bone fracture for older people, particularly those at risk of or suffering from osteoporosis, which is estimated to affect about 75m people in Europe, USA and Japan.
The action of the nutrients is complimentary, with calcium supporting bone formation and repair, while vitamin D helps the body absorb calcium.
Indeed, the European Food Safety Authority (EFSA) accepted a health claim linking calcium and vitamin D to bone health in older women in 2008 following a disease-reduction claim application, made under article 14 of the European Union’s nutrition and health claims regulation and submitted by Abtei Pharma Vertriebs, a GlaxoSmithKline company.
The dossier claimed that chewing tablets with calcium and vitamin D improves bone density in women over the age of 50, and may reduce the risk of osteoporotic fractures and hip fractures. The proposed dosages were 1000mg calcium and 800 IU vitamin D3.
The new study reports that the bone boosting effects of vitamin D plus calcium may also extend to other age groups and to both sexes.
Study details
The researchers used data from seven major randomised trials of vitamin D with calcium or vitamin D alone, providing data from 68,517 people. The average age of the participants was 69.9, and 15 per cent of the people were men.
According to findings published in the BMJ, trials which used only vitamin D at a dose of 10 or 20 micrograms showed no significant reductions in fracture risk. When 10 micrograms of the vitamin was taken with calcium, however, reduced risks of fracture and hip fracture of 8 and 16 per cent, respectively. The combination was effective “irrespective of age, sex, or previous fractures”, said the researchers.

“This study supports a growing consensus that combined calcium and vitamin D is more effective than vitamin D alone in reducing a variety of fractures,” said Robbins. “Interestingly, this combination of supplements benefits both women and men of all ages, which is not something we fully expected to find. We now need to investigate the best dosage, duration and optimal way for people to take it,” he added.
Estimates suggest that in the absence of primary prevention the number of hip fractures worldwide will increase to approximately 2.6 million by the year 2025, and 4.5 million by the year 2050.
Osteoporosis weakens bone strength which increases the likelihood of hip fracture, a problem that increases with age.
No benefits from higher doses
Commenting independently on the results, Rob Dawson, senior communications officer for UK charity the National Osteoporosis Society told NutraIngredients: “The research highlights the important role that vitamin D and calcium play in bone strength.
“Of course, many people will not need a calcium and vitamin D supplement. If you already get all the calcium that you need from your diet, and vitamin D from exposure to sunshine, then a supplement will not be necessary. There is no evidence to suggest that taking more than the required level will provide any extra benefit for your bones.
“However, when it comes to fracture prevention, this study does suggest a very small protective benefit of combined calcium and vitamin D supplementation in older people,” he added.
Source: British Medical Journal “Patient level pooled analysis of 68 500 patients from seven major vitamin D fracture trials in US and Europe” B. Abrahamsen for the DIPART (vitamin D Individual Patient Analysis of Randomized Trials) Group

Salted foods may increase cancer risk: Japanese study
Foodnavigator-usa.com, 15-Jan-2010
Increased intake of salt may boost the risk of heart disease, while increased consumption of salted foods may increase the risk of cancer, says a new study from Japan.
A study with almost 80,000 men and women showed that salted foods like salted fish roe were associated with a 15 per cent increase in total cancer, while high sodium intake was associated with a 20 per cent increase in cardiovascular disease (CVD) risk, according to findings published in the American Journal of Clinical Nutrition.
“To our knowledge, this is the first prospective cohort study to simultaneously examine associations between sodium and salted foods and the risk of cancer and CVD,” wrote the researchers, led by Manami Inoue from the National Cancer Center in Tokyo.
“Our findings support the notion that sodium and salted foods have differential influences on the development of cancer and CVD,” they added.
Salt – some but not too much
Salt is of course a vital nutrient and is necessary for the body to function, but the average daily salt consumption in the western world, between 10 and 12g, vastly exceeds recommendations from WHO/FAO of 5 grams per day to control blood pressure levels and reduce hypertension prevalence and related health risks in populations.
In countries like the UK, Ireland, the USA, and other Western countries, over 80 per cent of salt intake comes from processed food, and people therefore do not realize they are consuming it.
Study details
Inoue and co-workers examined the influence of salt and salt-preserved foods on the risk of CVD or cancer in 77,500 Japanese men and women aged between 45 and 74. Dietary patterns were estimated using a 138-iten food frequency questionnaire.
During the course of their follow-up, 2,066 cases of CVD and 4,476 cases of cancer were diagnosed. The most common forms of cancer documented were gastric, colorectal, and lung cancer.

Statistical analysis showed that people with the highest intakes of sodium – 6,844 milligrams, equivalent to about 17 grams of salt – had a 19 per cent higher risk of cardiovascular disease, compared to people with the lowest average intakes – 3,084 milligrams of sodium, equivalent to about 7 grams of salt.
Sodium and salt itself was not associated with cancer risk, but the consumption of salted foods did have an impact on cancer risk, said the researchers.
In addition to the increased risk of all cancers associated with salted fish roe consumption, a link between pickled vegetables and a higher risk of gastric cancer was observed. Moreover, higher consumptions of dried and salted fish and salted fish roe were linked to a higher risk of gastric and colorectal cancer, said the researchers.
“The present results suggest that the associations of cancer with specific foods with high salt concentrations, such as salted fish roe, are not due to the amount of salt per se, but rather to other causes,” added Inoue and co-workers.
One possible explanation could be the presence of carcinogens called N-nitroso compounds these foods, which may be formed from nitrate or nitrite preservatives.
“An additional, inseparable explanation is the destruction of the gastric mucosal barrier by a high intragastric salt concentration, which leads to inflammation, diffuse erosion, and degeneration,” they added.
Source: American Journal of Clinical Nutrition 2010, Volume 91, Pages 456-464 “Consumption of sodium and salted foods in relation to cancer and cardiovascular disease: the Japan Public Health Center-based Prospective Study”  R. Takachi, M. Inoue, T. Shimazu, S. Sasazuki, J. Ishihara, N. Sawada, T. Yamaji, M. Iwasaki, H. Iso, Y. Tsubono, S. Tsugane for the Japan Public Health Center-based Prospective Study Group
http://www.foodnavigator-usa.com/Science-Nutrition/Salted-foods-may-increase-cancer-risk-Japanese-study

Blueberry Drink Protects Mice from Diabetes, Obesity
David Gutierrez, NaturalNews.com January 17, 2010 

(NaturalNews) A special blueberry drink fortified by processing it with bacteria that naturally occur on the fruit's skin proved effective at preventing the development of obesity and diabetes in mice predisposed to the conditions, in a study conducted by researchers from the University of Montreal, the Institut Armand-Frappier and the Université de Moncton, and published in the International Journal of Obesity.

Researchers "biotransformed" juice from the North American lowbush blueberry by fermenting it with Serratia vaccinii, a bacteria naturally found on the berry's skin. They then fed mice either the biotransformed juice or unmodified blueberry juice for three days. All the mice had been bred for resistance to the hormone leptin, thus predisposing them to obesity, insulin resistance, diabetes and high blood pressure

"Consumption of fermented blueberry juice gradually and significantly reduced high blood glucose levels in diabetic mice," lead author Tri Vuong said. "After three days, our mice subjects reduced their glycemia levels by 35 percent."

The mice drinking the biotransformed juice also ate less and gained less weight than the mice in the control group.

"Results of this study clearly show that biotransformed blueberry juice has strong anti-obesity and anti-diabetic potential," senior author Pierre S. Haddad said. "Biotransformed blueberry juice may represent a novel therapeutic agent." 

The researchers are unsure why the biotransformed juice proves so much more effective, but they believe that the fermentation process enhances the effectiveness of the fruit's naturally occurring antioxidants. The researchers suggested that these antioxidants might assist the activity of the hormone adiponectin, which is associated with a lower risk of obesity. 

The anthocyanins found in blueberries have also previously been linked to a reduced risk of retinopathy, an eye disorder, in diabetics.

"The identification of the active compounds in biotransformed blueberry juice may result in the discovery of promising new anti-obesity and anti-diabetic molecules," Haddad said.

An estimated 24 million people in the United States suffer from diabetes, and another 57 million are considered pre-diabetic.
http://www.naturalnews.com/027959_blueberries_diabetes.html

Nutrients stimulate brain connections, could treat Alzheimer's
Sherry Baker, NaturalNews.com January 17, 2010 

(NaturalNews) The earliest stages of Alzheimer's disease (AD) are marked by a major loss of the brain connections needed to process information and to retain memory. While there are drug therapies used to help delay progression of AD, those medications are loaded with side effects and, if they work at all, the effects only last for the short term. Eventually the disease continues to rob those with Alzheimer's of their memory, thinking ability and quality of life. But scientists at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) have recently discovered that a combination of naturally occurring nutrients could do what Big Pharma drugs can't. In research just published in the journal Alzheimer's and Dementia, the nutrient mix stimulated the growth of new brain connections, technically known as synapses -- and the supplements were shown to have potential to improve memory in Alzheimer's patients.

Richard Wurtman, the Cecil H.Green Distinguished Professor of Brain and Cognitive Sciences at MIT, did the basic research that led to the new experimental treatment and was part of the research team that conducted the clinical trial. Wurtman believes loss of synapses is the root cause of Alzheimer's disease. In previous animal studies, Wurtman has found that specific nutrients boost the number of dendritic spines (small outcroppings of neural membranes) and, when those spines contact other neurons, the formation of new synapses takes place. "If you can increase the number of synapses by enhancing their production, you might to some extent avoid that loss of cognitive ability (in Alzheimer's)," he said in a statement to the media.

To test this idea, the research team conducted a clinical trial involving 225 Alzheimer's disease patients. The scientists used a cocktail of three nutrients (uridine, choline and the omega-3 fatty acid DHA) found in breast milk and certain foods plus other ingredients (B vitamins, phosopholipids and antioxidants). Uridine (a nutrient in beets and molasses), choline (found in egg yolks and wheat germ) and the omega-3 fatty acid DHA (one of the two long-chain omega-3s in fish such as salmon) are known to be precursors to the fatty molecules that make up brain cell membranes which form synapses.

Patients with mild Alzheimer's drank the cocktail (in the form of a nutrient drink called Souvenaid, made with the collaboration of the French company Danone, known as Dannon in the U.S.) or a control beverage daily for about three months. The research subjects who received the nutrients showed a statistically significant level of improvement compared to those who received a placebo drink. In fact, 40 percent of the patients receiving the nutrient mix showed improved performance in a test of verbal memory (memory for words, as opposed to memory of locations or experiences) known as the Wechsler Memory Scale.

http://www.NaturalNews.com/z027954_nutrients_Alzheimers.html

Swine flu was as elusive as WMD. The real threat is mad scientist syndrome
Remember the warnings of 65,000 dead? Health chiefs should admit they were wrong –yet again – about a global pandemic

                                Simon Jenkins
guardian.co.uk, Thursday 14 January 2010 20.30 GMT

Let me recap. Six months ago I reviewed the latest bit of terrorism to emerge from the government's Cobra bunker, courtesy of Alan Johnson, home secretary. Swine flu was allegedly ravaging the nation. The BBC was intoning nightly statistics on what "could" happen as "the deadly virus" took hold. The chief medical officer, Sir Liam Donaldson, bandied about any figure that came into his head, settling on "65,000 could die", peaking at 350 corpses a day.
Donaldson knew exactly what would happen. The media went berserk. The World Health Organisation declared a "six-level alert" so as to "prepare the world for an imminent attack". The happy-go-lucky virologist, John Oxford, said half the population could be infected, and that his lowest estimate was 6,000 dead.
The "Andromeda strain" was stalking the earth, and its first victims were clearly scientists. Drugs were frantically stockpiled and key workers identified as vital to be saved for humanity's future. Cobra alerted the army. Morgues were told to stand ready. The Green party blamed intensive pig farming. The Guardian listed "the top 10 plague books".
If anyone dared question this drivel, they were dismissed by Donaldson as "extremists". When people started reporting swine flu to be even milder than ordinary flu, he accused them of complacency and told them to "wait for next winter". He was already buying 32m masks and spending more than £1bn on Tamiflu and vaccines. Surgeries refused entry to those with flu symptoms, referring them to a government "hotline" where prescription drugs were ordered to be made available without examination or doctor's note. Who knows how many died of undiagnosed illness as a result? Lines were instantly jammed. It was pure, systematic government-induced panic – in which I accept that the media played its joyful part.
This week the authorities admitted that, far from a winter upturn in swine flu, there has been a slump. From 100,000 a week at the peak, there were just 12,000 last week. After the coldest winter for decades, when deaths might be expected to rise, the rate is below that of seasonal flu. In the UK, 360 people have died under its influence, most with prior "non-flu" conditions. Swine flu is not nice – I have had it – but bears no ­relation to the government hysteria.
I accept that anyone can make a mistake, and authority has some duty to err on the side of caution. As Alastair Campbell implied on Tuesday, Iraq might have had weapons of mass destruction, so Blair was right to go to war just in case. But it is reasonable to ask, as the Chilcot inquiry is doing, why precaution on such a colossal and potentially ­destructive scale was justified when those who questioned the need for it have since been proved right. Is anyone asking about flu?
Swine flu is not the first time we have suffered this nonsense. I have a stack of predictions by senior scientists on BSE/CJD in 1995. It would "lead to 136,000 deaths" – a spurious exactitude used to convey plausibility – and "could infect up to 10 million Britons". This led to an obscene £5bn campaign of cattle destruction and compensation. When the prediction proved wildly wrong, the government excused itself with a classic Rumsfeld-ism: "The absence of evidence is not the evidence of absence."
This was followed by Sars 2003, a "panic gripping the world". The World Health Organisation declared that "One in four Britons could die". The medical doom-monger, Dr Patrick Dixon, said that Sars had "a 25% chance of killing tens of millions", whatever that meant. The madcap Tory health spokesman, Liam Fox, demanded the arrest and quarantining of all recent travellers from Asia, including 30,000 Asian students.
In the event, some 800 people died with Sars worldwide, against 21,000 who died in Britain in the seasonal flu epidemic of 1999/2000.
Undaunted, within a year the same alarmists were at work on avian flu. With now habitual hyperbole, Donaldson predicted 50,000 deaths, with "an upper limit", graciously conceded, of 750,000. When one dead swan slumped on a beach in Scotland, BBC reporters went crazy as inspectors stumbled through the seaweed, clad in anti-nuclear armour. Within a year the horror had passed. The global mortality was put at 262, with not one death in Britain. Another fiasco was brushed under the carpet.
The Blair government, and now Brown's, have proved adept at using scare politics to divert attention from other troubles. During foot-and-mouth Blair was quick to don a yellow jumpsuit for photographers and intone as if he alone stood between an illness (that is in fact harmless to humans) and armageddon. This time the swine flu coincided with two other "mystery diseases", MRSA and C-difficile, which killed 10,000 Britons in 2007 alone. But those deaths lay squarely at the doors of unclean NHS hospitals. Hence there were no scary stories or predictions about them from Donaldson.
Donaldson and his eager virologists will doubtless stick loyally to their predictions since it is "too early to be complacent". His allies at the BBC did their bit on Wednesday with a Horizon programme that turned a serious study of virology into grotesque scaremongering, with solemn music and voices crying, "there's no escape", "this could take a devilish turn", and "we don't even know how many viruses there are!" Children writhed in agony from smallpox.
Mad scientist syndrome is rampant. Had these scares been disseminated by a private firm, a local authority or a newspaper (as was anti-MMR), they would be damned from on high with demands that heads roll. As it is, the government's Scientific Advisory Group for Emergencies sails gaily on, still graced by the presence of Sir Roy Anderson, who ­happens also to draw a six-figure salary as a non-executive director of GlaxoSmithKline, which made hundreds of millions from the government's panic. Anderson, and GSK, vigorously deny any conflict of interest.
The Council of Europe's head of health, Wolfgang Wodarg, is one of the few who have dared blow the whistle on the links between "Big Pharma" and national and ­supranational agencies. He this week persuaded the council to stage a debate on the "enormous gains" made by GSK and others from the swine flu pandemic. He seeks details of relations between the companies and the WHO, given that stockpile contracts kick in the moment that ­organisation uses the word "pandemic". It did so for the first time last year, with reckless alacrity.
I am not aware of the WHO or the General Medical Council or any of the medical colleges investigating these matters, or any check on conflicts of interest of government doctors who work for drugs companies. I am not aware of any Whitehall or Commons committee, any National Audit Office or competition inquiry into the supply of these drugs. All I know is that a huge amount of health money, time and effort was last year diverted from possibly critical therapies into what looked from the start to be yet more terror virology.
This is why people are ever more sceptical of scientists. Why should they believe what "experts" say when they can be so wrong and with such impunity? Weapons of mass destruction, lethal viruses, nuclear radiation, global warming … why should we believe a word of it? And it is a short step from don't believe to don't care.
http://www.guardian.co.uk/commentisfree/2010/jan/14/swine-flu-elusive-as-wmd

Millions of patients 'should not be prescribed antidepressants'
Millions of people should not be prescribed antidepressants because their brains resist the drugs, a study has indicated.

The Telegraph UK,  14 Jan 2010

Half of patients do not respond when they are given the medications, which can be powerful tool in helping the depressed to feel better. Instead of raising levels of a "happiness chemical", called serotonin, in their brain, they lower them.
The researchers found with some brain cells "the more antidepressants try to increase serotonin production, the less serotonin (they) actually produce,” said Dr Rene Hen, from Columbia University in New York and a researcher at the New York State Psychiatric Institute, who led the study.

He and his team believe that the findings could lead to ways to identify patients for whom the drugs will not work, before they are prescribed expensive and ultimately pointless treatments.
But they also hope that their research could someday lead to ways to overcome the problem, so that the drugs can be used to help more people.
Their study, published in the journal Neuron, found that some brain cells reacted negatively to antidepressant medication.
Tests on mice show that the drugs had no such effect on the animals when they were genetically engineered to have more of these cells.
The team behind the study now plan to test their findings on a group of human patients.
They hope that drugs could be developed to prevent the actions of these cells and allow the medication to work as intended and increase serotonin production.
Most antidepressants, including selective serotonin reuptake inhibitors (SSRI's), such as prozac, work by increasing serotonin levels.
An estimated one in seven people will develop depression serious enough to need treatment at some point in their life.
Across England around 31 million prescriptions are written for antidepressants every year.
The Mental Health Foundation estimates that use of the drugs has doubled over the last 10 years.

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/health/healthnews/6981217/Millions-of-patients-should-not-be-prescribed-antidepressants.html

Cesium: A Cancer Cure that Slipped through the Cracks
Paul Fassa, NaturalNews.com January 17, 2010

(NaturalNews) Cesium, an extremely alkaline mineral, has been used effectively on cancer since the 1930s. Cesium chloride is considered a potent cancer treatment for even stage four levels of cancer and cancer metastasized throughout the body, including lymphoma and leukemia. It is relatively inexpensive and safe. Selling or purchasing cesium chloride is not illegal.

Nevertheless, practitioners who use it are often attacked by the Medical Mafia. Because health practitioners risk dire consequences for using it in their practice, most cancer victims using cesium as a treatment need to rely on the cesium vendor`s guidance for proper use. Unlike Essiac tea and apricot kernels, this is a cancer treatment protocol that requires little knowledgeable supervision.

Cesium Cancer Treatment History

In the 1930s, a physicist named A. Keith Brewer got into cancer research. He focused on the membranes surrounding normal cells, rapidly growing cells, and dead tissue. His research evolved into a protocol using cesium chloride. A trial involving 30 patients with various forms of cancer resulted in all 30 surviving their cancers.

That was before chemotherapy had begun wiping out cancer victims' immune systems. So those 30 patients were not damaged by chemotherapy. This was not the case for Dr. H. E. Sartori, who began his cesium cancer therapy program with 50 patients in April 1981 at Life Sciences Universal Medical Clinics in Rockville, Md.

Almost all of these cancer patients were in terminal condition or had undergone the full range of cut (surgery), burn (radiation), and poison (chemotherapy) the AMA could offer. They were virtually mainstream medical rejects. Yet half of them survived their cancers from Dr. Sartoris` cesium therapy.

Dr. Sartori, originally from Austria, left the States in 1992 after his clinic was raided and harassed by various agencies. He went to Thailand to continue his practice, but in 2006 wound up being arrested for murder in Australia when an Australian patient of his died. His current status is unknown by this journalist. It appears the Medical Mafia is everywhere!

Cesium Chloride Basics

Cancer cells are anaerobic and acidic. Their outer membranes are often impenetrable from normal antibodies and from killer cells once the immune system is compromised. Cancer cells start forming when the outer walls of cells are inflamed by toxins and carcinogens. Those outer walls become hardened, making it difficult for oxygen to enter while still taking in glucose.

Then the cells resort to fermenting glucose for its energy instead of oxidizing it. The fermentation results in a decreased pH (under 6.5) in the cell with an increase of lactic acid, which overwhelms the cell`s DNA/RNA capacity to control cell growth. Then uncontrolled growth of cancerous cells occurs.

Cesium chloride is one of a very few molecules that can penetrate cancer cells. Cesium`s high alkalinity shoots the cell`s pH to 8.0 or higher (normal is 7) while the serum (blood) pH stays at or below normal. This sudden rise in alkalinity would destroy any cell in a few days. However, normal cells do not take in the cesium chloride. It targets only the cancer cells. DMSO gets cesium into cancer cells even more effectively.

This process leeches out some of the serum potassium in one`s body. So potassium needs to be monitored and supplemented accordingly to prevent potassium depletion. Another concern is ensuring the uric acid from dead cancer cells doesn`t affect the kidneys. Both situations are easily and inexpensively remedied.

Though one can administer cesium chloride after purchasing it, some guidance from the vendor is necessary. This is available. Do your research, starting with the sources below.

http://www.naturalnews.com/027960_cesium_cancer_cure.html