Wednesday, December 30, 2009

FDA approves Crestor for people who have no health problem to correct

(NaturalNews) Big Pharma has been trending this direction for a long time: marketing medicines to people who don't need them and who have nothing wrong with their health. It's all part of a ploy to position prescription drugs as nutrients -- things you need to take on a regular basis in order to prevent disease.

The FDA recently gave its nod of approval on the matter, announcing that Crestor can now be advertised and prescribed as a "preventive" medicine. No longer does a patient need to have anything wrong with them to warrant this expensive prescription medication: They only need to remember the brand name of the drug from television ads.

This FDA approval for the marketing of Crestor to healthy people is a breakthrough for wealthy drug companies. Selling drugs only to people who are sick is, by definition, a limited market. Expanding drug revenues requires reaching people who have nothing wrong with them and convincing them that taking a cocktail of daily pharmaceuticals will somehow keep them healthy.

All this is, of course, the greatest quackery we've yet seen from Big Pharma, because once this floodgate of "preventive pharmaceuticals" is unleashed, the drug companies will be positioned to promote a bewildering array of other preventive chemicals you're supposed to take at the same time. Did you take your anti-cancer pill today? How about your anti-diabetes pill? Anti-cholesterol pill? Don't forget your anti-Alzheimer's pill, too.

Medications are not vitamins

The very idea that these drugs can somehow prevent a person from becoming sick in the future strains the boundaries of scientific credibility. Only natural therapies like nutrition can prevent the onset of disease, not patented chemicals that don't belong in the human body in the first place.

The logical argument of the drug companies who push these "preventive" prescriptions is essentially that the human body is deficient in pharmaceuticals, and that deficiency can only be corrected by taking whatever brand-name drugs they show you on television. Forget about deficiencies in zinc, or vitamin D, or living enzymes; what your body really needs is more synthetic chemicals!

The FDA agrees with this loopy logic. And why wouldn't it? Subscribing to this pharmaceutical delusion is an easy way to instantly expand Big Pharma's customer base by tens of millions. Overnight, the market for Crestor ballooned from a few million people with high cholesterol to the entire U.S. population of 300 million people.

If Crestor can help healthy people be healthier (which it can't, but let's play along with this delusion for the sake of argument), then it's only a matter of time before they start adding Crestor to infant formula. I mean, why not? If it's so good for healthy people, then it must make babies healthier, too, right?

So let's add Crestor to sports drinks. Let's sprinkle it into the iodized salt supply. Let's drip it into the municipal water! (Don't laugh: This idea of dripping cholesterol drugs into the water supply has already been suggested by more than one doctor.) Let's merge the pharmaceutical supply with the food supply and charge people prescription drugs prices for "functional" foods laced with these chemicals!

Pharmaceutical deficiency

That's really where all this is headed. When medicines are approved as preventive "nutrients" for the human body, it's only a matter of time before the industry starts talking about your "pharmaceutical deficiency."

Not taking any medications? You have a pharmaceutical deficiency, and it needs to be corrected by taking more prescription drugs. But don't bother with actual nutrition, because nutrients have absolutely no role in preventing disease, the FDA claims. No nutrient has ever been approved by the FDA for the prevention or treatment of any disease whatsoever.

The message from the FDA is quite clear on this: Nutrients are useless, and you should eat medications as if they were vitamins.

Patented Big Pharma chemicals, after all, provide all the nutrition you'll ever need!

Scientists find turmeric and black pepper spices may prevent breast cancer

(NaturalNews) Seasoning food with turmeric and black pepper can do more than just spice up a meal. Researchers at the University of Michigan (U-M) Comprehensive Cancer Center have found that the compounds curcumin, which is derived from turmeric, and piperine, derived from black pepper, could play an important role in preventing and even treating breast cancer.

Previous research has already provided evidence that curcumin and piperine may be potential cancer treatments. However, the new U-M study, just published online in the journal Breast Cancer Research and Treatment, is the first to suggest exactly how these natural spice compounds could prevent cancer. The research shows curcumin and piperine target stem cells (unspecialized cells that can give rise to any type of cell in an organ). This is of major significance because cancer stem cells comprise the small number of cells inside a tumor that fuel the growth of malignancies.

Current chemotherapy agents are useless against these cells -- that's why cancer can recur and spread despite rounds of heavy duty, toxic chemo. But if cancer stem cells could be eliminated and/or their growth shut down, cancer should be controlled.

"If we can limit the number of stem cells, we can limit the number of cells with potential to form tumors," lead author Madhuri Kakarala, M.D., Ph.D., a clinical lecturer in internal medicine at the U-M Medical School and a research investigator at the VA Ann Arbor Healthcare System, said in a statement to the media. And the new study shows curcumin and piperine work along these lines. The spice derivatives are able to do what chemo can't -- they limit the self-renewal of stem cells.

Killing cancer cells with zero toxicity to healthy cells

For the U-M study, the research team applied a solution of curcumin and piperine to cell cultures at the equivalent of about 20 times the potency of what a person would take in through diet. Then a series of tests were performed on the cells to look at markers for breast stem cells and the effect curcumin and piperine had on the levels of stem cells.

The result? Piperine enhanced the effects of curcumin and the compounds interrupted the self-renewal process that is the hallmark of stem cells which initiate cancer. More good news: the compounds had no effect on the normal process of cell development known as cell differentiation. That means the spice compounds are not toxic to normal breast tissue.

"Women at high risk of breast cancer right now can choose to take the drugs tamoxifen or raloxifene for prevention, but most women won't take these drugs because there is too much toxicity. The concept that dietary compounds can help is attractive, and curcumin and piperine appear to have very low toxicity," Dr. Kakarala stated.

In addition, tamoxifen and raloxifene are designed to target estrogen. But not all breast cancers are estrogen driven. In fact, the most aggressive and deadly forms of breast cancer that are more likely to occur in women with strong family histories of the disease or with a specific genetic susceptibility to breast cancer are typically not affected by estrogen and tend to be difficult to treat. But due to the fact curcumin and piperine limit the self-renewal of stem cells, the spice compounds could impact malignancies whether they are estrogen sensitive or not.

Dr. Kakarala and colleagues are moving forward on an initial Phase 1 clinical trial in people to determine the best tolerated dose of curcumin and piperine. The study is expected to start signing on volunteer research subjects in spring of 2010.

For more information:
http://www2.med.umich.edu/prmc/medi...

FDA continues world colonization, opens another international facility in Mexico

(NaturalNews) In its supposed efforts to improve food safety, the U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA) recently announced the opening of its third Latin American facility located in Mexico City. Since an increasing quantity of fruits, vegetables, and medical devices are being imported into the U.S. from Mexico, FDA officials believe setting up outposts there will improve the food safety process.

Throughout the past year, FDA has opened ten facilities around the globe. Because of numerous recent contamination outbreaks, regulators claim that establishing permanent international offices will improve their ability to operate effectively.

The agency plans to work collaboratively with international governments and food regulators to harmonize regulatory standards, establish new food safety guidelines, and improve product handling safety protocols.

U.S.-based staff is now working in FDA facilities in China, India, Chile, Costa Rica, Mexico, and several European countries. Native regulatory agencies in these countries are still said to be in charge of monitoring food safety, but FDA is there to provide an additional point of control for helping these agencies meet U.S. safety standards and avoid food contamination and other problems.

Dr. Murray Lumpkin, FDA Deputy Commissioner for International Programs, says that at the new Mexican facility, FDA staff will work with the Mexican government and its regulatory bodies to establish certification programs that will help them to conform to U.S safety expectations. He believes the relationship will help foster openness and allow for better oversight of the import and export process between the two nations.

Comments by Mike Adams, the Health Ranger

I find it fascinating that the FDA is opening "safety" offices around the world, and yet at the same time it refuses to even conduct safety testing of pharmaceuticals right here in the USA.

Did you know that the FDA conducts no tests whatsoever on the drugs it approves? Instead, it relies on drug companies to conduct their own clinical trials, and then the FDA just believes whatever the drug companies say.

So why not do the same thing with food? Don't test anything yourself, but rely on the food companies to test all their own food while automatically believing their results...

The reason this isn't done is because companies tend to lie about the results of their own testing. They obviously have a financial incentive to find no problems. This is true with food companies and it's just as true with drug companies, which is why there's so much fraud in Big Pharma's clinical trials.

But when it comes to pharmaceuticals, the FDA isn't really interested in safety. It's only interested in promoting more drugs and boosting the revenues of the drug companies. That's why the FDA doesn't even bother to test drugs in the first place.

Sources for this story include:

http://www.prnewswire.com/news-rele...

Pharmaceuticals are more dangerous to your health than terrorists' exploding underwear (satire)

(NaturalNews) As all of North America now seems to be focused on the issue of one terrorist wearing a pair of exploding underwear, I might as well comment on this latest bit of security theater that seems to have transfixed the nation. Pictures of the exploding underwear "bomb" have now surfaced on the 'net. You can view them at ABC News: http://abcnews.go.com/Blotter/north...

Here is exactly what the text on this page says (I'm not making this up, this is seriously true): (warning: Some of the content here is graphic, read at your own risk...)

"The first photo, to the left, shows the slightly charred and singed underpants with the bomb packet still in place."

I don't know what you think, but if you did an underwear search of all the passengers flying these days, you'd probably find half of them are wearing underwear that's slightly charred and singed with the "bomb packet" still in place.

The gastrointestinal health of the general population is atrocious! And by the time you add in some airport food and in-flight processed food snacks, pretty much everyone on the airplane is setting off a little bomb packet by the time they get off the plane. (Why do you think everybody can't wait to get off in such a hurry?)

Processed food has turned us all into in-flight terrorists!

Frankly, I'm not sure what's more of a threat to public health: Lousy airport security or the digestive effects of in-flight meals. But they both have one thing in common: Underwear...

How to explode your rectum without harming anyone nearby

The ABC News story mentioned above goes on to state that this terrorist's underwear was packing 80 grams of an explosive powder called PETN, which government tests have revealed can blow a (tiny) hole in the wall of an airplane.

This is all brilliant stuff, of course. Truly brilliant. This whole idea that underwear explosives might destroy an airplane all makes sense except for the fact that the terrorist's butt cheeks are in the way!

Had this explosive packet actually been set off, I can tell you exactly what would have happened: There would have been a really loud pop, immediately followed by in-flight pieces of exploding butt cheeks.

I'm not trying to be funny here. This is a true description of the way bombs work. They explode outward, destroying whatever is closest to them first. And this guy actually had this bomb wedged in between his butt cheeks. A sort of "wedgie bomb", if you will. A wedgie with a bang.

This is a serious discussion. There was an attempted assassination of a Middle Eastern prince that happened not long ago. It was even reported in the press. The assassin had somehow managed to shove explosives into his rectum -- I swear I'm not making this up -- and waltzed right through security with it. He then shuffled toward his target, fired off the bomb and subsequently blew his butt cheeks all over the room... without harming anyone else.

Brilliant, huh?

Think about it. In World War II films, you know how you always see brave soldiers throwing themselves on an enemy grenade to protect their squad buddies? That actually works because whoever is on top of the grenade absorbs the explosion. It's basic physics.

In the case of super wedgie terrorist, he's sitting right on top of the explosive powder! Who do you think is going to absorb the full force of the explosion? It's going to be the guy sitting on it.

This is physics 101. A small bomb in somebody's underwear is really only a threat to the idiot wearing the underwear.

The first rule of making bombs is that you probably should not be sitting on top of them when they go off.

Please remove your shoes and your underwear...

Predictably, U.S. authorities have now talked this up into a huge security threat. And sooner or later, it's all bound to lead up to mandatory underwear searches!

I can see it now: A row of air passengers stands nervously at the gate, nearly ready to board the plane when TSA enforcers approach and suddenly demand that everybody bend over and pull down their underwear for a quick search for "explosives."

Sadly, most Americans are so brain-numbed by security propaganda, they would probably go along with it!

So why not just go all the way with this and pass a new TSA rule requiring all Americans to fly with no underwear!

The captain comes on the intercom, saying, "Visibility is 80 miles, we're climbing to 29,000 feet, and we're expecting this flight to be a little breezy..."

Yep, it's undies off when boarding planes from now on. As you pass through security, you can toss your water bottles in one bin, your underwear and panties in another bin, and your self respect in a third. Essentially, if these security searches get any more personal, they're going to undress us from head to toe and make us wear medical gowns, chained to our seats like convicts in a prisoner transport plane. Once we land, we can reclaim our underwear and, if we're lucky, a bit of our lost pride.

Your bra just might contain a bomb...

Don't you just love how air travel authorities keep coming up with new stuff that you have to throw away because it might be a bomb? Remember when we could bring actual water on airplanes? Those were the good old days.

Then one day they declare "Your water might be a bomb!" So millions of passengers now ditch their water at the security gate, throwing it all to waste.

Then they came up with the idea that terrorists could "mix binary liquids" to make liquid bombs in the airplane toilet, and they used that to ban all liquids. So much for your toothpaste, contact lens solution, herbal tinctures and superfood beverage. Toss it in the trash if you want to get on this plane, buddy!

Now they're going after your underwear. And it won't be long before you have to strip down to your birthday suit and hand over your undies for an "inspection" -- right before they send you through the low-frequency X-ray machine that scans your body parts and displays them on a screen as if you were butt naked.

Just wait for a female terrorist who hides some explosives in her bra one day. Following that, a new TSA security rule will be initiated and all flights will become bra-less. No underwear, no bras, no water... what the heck is happening here? Are airlines going to shave our heads and tattoo barcodes on our arms, too, just in case they lose track of which person was handcuffed to which seat?

Absurd security

This is all getting beyond the point of absurdity. If a terrorist wants to pack a little explosive powder and stuff it down their pants, or up their rectum, or have it surgically sewn into their abdomen, there's nothing we can do to stop that short of strip-searching every single passenger.

And that's not security: That's just a demeaning police state that treats its own people like criminals. If we all have to fly without underwear and bras, the terrorists win!

Besides, all this ridiculous security isn't about saving lives. If U.S. authorities wanted to save lives, they would ban aspartame, or outlaw chemotherapy, or arrest the crooks at the drug companies who are killing over a hundred thousand people every single year -- a far greater number than those killed by in-flight acts of terror (even including 2001 and 9/11).

Even if there were no airport security at all, the risk of being killed by an in-flight act of terror would be a fraction of the risk of being killed by pharmaceuticals in any given year. So why are U.S. authorities going crazy about airport security when so many Americans are dying from pharmaceutical toxicity every single day? Statistically speaking, the number of people killed by dangerous prescription medications is equivalent to one jumbo air liner falling out of the sky and crashing to the ground every single day.

Yet that threat to health and safety goes entirely unmentioned. Un-investigated. Un-noticed.

So while over 100,000 Americans are dying each year from dangerous medications, the mainstream media has us all fixated on a pair of exploding underwear? Are you kidding me?

The whole thing has become a complete circus. Real threats to your safety are ignored while miniscule threats are hyped up as if they were life-and-death to everyone.

And yet, amazingly, most air travelers still go along with it!

This just goes to show you how easily the population can be controlled by fear. I never thought that a photo of a pair of singed underwear would scare a hundred million adults into giving up their freedoms, but this is what has apparently taken place.

How about zero-security flights?

Here's an idea: Airlines should offer optional zero-security flights. On those flights, there are no security checks. Anyone with a valid concealed-carry permit could bring any weapons they want, and the pilot and co-pilot can be armed, too. You can pass right through security with no X-rays, no checks, no delays. You simply sign a disclaimer and go right from the check-in counter to your boarding gate with zero hassles.

I would gladly fly on these zero-security flights. You know why? Because 99.99% of the people flying on those planes would be cops packing heat, ex-military people packing heat and concealed-carry citizens packing heat. Any terrorist stupid enough to try something on such a flight would find himself facing a citizen's army of vigilant passengers.

Zero-security flights would be the safest airplanes in the sky, because no terrorist, hijacker or violent criminal would dare board one.

Plus, we all get to keep our underwear on.

Risk of suicide and heart attacks goes up when men are told they have prostate cancer

(NaturalNews) Imagine you are a man who has just been told you have a disease that might kill you -- prostate cancer. And the treatment may involve surgery, chemotherapy, radiation and/or hormones that could rob you of your virility, wreck your sex life and even interfere with your ability to urinate. Sound depressing and even terrifying? To some men, this disturbing news may actually be a lot more dangerous than their prostate cancer. A new study just published in PLoS Medicine has found that men newly diagnosed with prostate cancer have an increased risk of cardiovascular events and suicide -- with the youngest men being the most vulnerable.

Researchers from the Karolinska Institute in Stockholm, Sweden, and Harvard University used the Swedish Cancer Register to identify 168,584 men 30 years old or older who were diagnosed with prostate cancer between 1961 and 2004. The research team then turned to Sweden's Causes of Death Register and Inpatient Register to compile information on how many of these men suffered from subsequent fatal or non-fatal cardiovascular events and suicides.

The results showed that prior to 1987, men were approximately 11 times more likely to have a fatal cardiovascular event during the first week after they were told they had prostate cancer than men without the disease. Throughout the first year after their diagnosis, men with prostate cancer were about twice as likely to have a heart attack as men without prostate cancer. After 1987, men diagnosed with prostate cancer were about three times as likely to have a cardiovascular event during the first week as undiagnosed men, and they had a persistent, slightly raised risk in the first year.

Although not many men in the study killed themselves (136 in all), the researchers did find a significant increase in suicides associated with a prostate cancer diagnosis, too. The relative risk of suicide throughout the study period was 8.4 during the first week and 2.6 during the first year after diagnosis.

What's particularly tragic about men literally dying from the consequences of stress after being told they have prostate cancer is that many of them actually should have little to fear -- they just haven't been told the true facts about their disease. Although about one in six men will be diagnosed with prostate cancer during his lifetime, only one in 35 will actually die from prostate cancer.

What's more, many men who have been told they have prostate cancer probably had unnecessary screening for the disease in the first place (http://www.naturalnews.com/026787_c...). A study in the September 28, 2009, issue of the Archives of Internal Medicine concluded there's no convincing scientific evidence that screening prevents deaths from prostate cancer. In fact, when men are found to have early-stage cancers, they are often told treatment is necessary when no treatment may be needed at all. Their cancers may never be life threatening but aggressively treating their disease may lead to a host of health problems and even life threatening complications.

To their credit, the authors of the new study mentioned these issues. "Treatments for prostate cancer (for example, surgical removal of the prostate) may be more effective if they are started early but they can cause impotence and urinary incontinence, so should men be treated whose cancer might otherwise never affect their health?" they wrote. "In addition, receiving a diagnosis of prostate cancer is stressful and there is growing evidence that stressful life events can increase an individual's risk of becoming ill or dying from a heart attack, stroke, or other cardiovascular events and of becoming mentally ill."

Reference:
Fall K, Fang F, Mucci L, Ye W, et al. 2009. "Immediate Risk for Cardiovascular Events and Suicide Following a Prostate Cancer Diagnosis: Prospective Cohort Study." PLoS Med 6(12): e1000197. doi:10.1371/journal.pmed.1000197

For more information:
http://www.plosmedicine.org/article...
http://www.naturalnews.com/prostate...

Toxic Burden: Women Put 515 Chemicals on Their Faces Every Day

(NaturalNews) A study published by Bionsen, a company in the United Kingdom that sells aluminum-free body products, found that the average woman applies 515 chemicals to her face a day. Makeup, perfumes, lotions, mascara, and other beauty products all contribute to the toxic brew that is causing health problems for many women.

The study revealed that the typical woman uses about 13 different beauty products a day. Most of these products contain at least 20 ingredients and additives, many of which can have a detrimental effect on the body and skin. Perfumes alone were found to contain up to 400 different ingredients.

Other products that were tested include lipstick, body lotions and mascara which contained an average of 30 ingredients each. Aside from aluminum, many of these products contain other harmful ingredients like synthetic dyes, fragrances, and parabens. When applied continually, the many beauty products that women use are exposing them to wide range of carcinogens.

The perpetual advent of new and innovative beauty products has led to a massive increase in product usage over the years. What was once a basic cleansing protocol has turned into a lifestyle of trying the latest and greatest products in an effort to maintain youthful beauty. As a result, women are exposed to more toxic carcinogens from beauty products than ever.

An Environmental Working Group (EWG) study from 2006 found that less than one percent of all cosmetic products are made from ingredients that have all undergone safety assessments. The great majority of products contain known carcinogens, reproductive toxins and various other harmful chemicals that cause serious diseases like cancer.

The EWG study found that the average person uses up to 25 personal care products per day. Among these, about 200 different chemicals will have been added to scent, preserve, synthesize and stabilize them for consumption. Many of these ingredients will end up causing hormonal disruption and immune dysfunction. In younger people, developmental problems are likely to result from excessive product use.

Makeup usage among younger girls has also increased. About 90 percent of 14-year-old girls now use makeup, according to a research study conducted by Mintel Internation Group in 2004. Sixty-three percent of girls as young as seven are now using lipstick, eyeliner, eye shadow and mascara.

As consumers are becoming more aware of many beauty product ingredients and the harm they are causing, product manufacturers are beginning to remove many of them from their formulations. Those concerned would do best to purchase only products that have minimal or no toxic ingredients. Greatly reducing one's cosmetic arsenal is the next best option.

Sources for this story include: http://www.telegraph.co.uk/health/h...
http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/artic...

Acute Pharmaceutical Toxicity killed Brittany Murphy - Could it be killing millions more?

(NaturalNews) The entire pharmaceutical industry is based on the idea that for whatever's wrong with you, there's a patented chemical pill that can make it better. Feeling some anxiety? There's a pill for that. Have high blood pressure? There's a pill for that, too. Suffering from sleepless nights? There's yet another pill for that, too.

Importantly, modern medicine and the pharmaceutical industry both believe there is no limit to how many prescription medications you can simultaneously take. If you have ten health problems, they've got ten different pills for you. And when those pills cause twenty different dangerous side effects, they're ready for twenty more prescriptions for you to dutifully swallow.

This idea that health is achieved by taking prescription chemicals is ludicrous from the start. And yet it's the foundation of the pharmaceutical industry. Take as many pills as you "need", they insist. Don't worry: They're all FDA approved!

This is akin to believing that if it's safe to drive 65mph in your truck, and it's also safe to drive 65mph on your motorcycle, then if you load your motorcycle onto your truck, it's now safe to drive 130mph.

The fatal flaw in the theory behind pharmaceuticals

As you already guessed, there's a fatal flaw in this pharmaceutical approach to sick care: Pharmaceuticals have never been tested in combination with other drugs. So all the so-called "gold standard science" is absolutely worthless at knowing what might happen when half a dozen pharmaceutical drugs are combined in a patient's body. Brittany Murphy may have been on as many as TEN drugs!

Despite the fact that no combination testing has ever been done on pharmaceuticals, they are regularly prescribed in combination. Obviously, this creates a whole new realm of unknown risk based on the way multiple drugs might chemically interact in the human body.

The more pharmaceuticals you take, the more dangerous they become. While one pharmaceutical chemical may at first seem harmless (even though just one drug can actually kill you), when you start adding a second, third, fourth and fifth prescription on top of that, you're dealing with Acute Pharmaceutical Toxicity (APT) that's never even been tested in clinical trials.

Pharmacists are trained to help people avoid the most toxic two-drug combinations, but they rarely have any real knowledge about what happens when you combine three, four, five or more drugs. No one does. The science has simply never been done on that question. It's no wonder: With all the possible combinations and permutations of pharmaceutical toxicity, it would take literally trillions of clinical trials to test them all.

So this whole idea that you can take a drug to treat one problem, then take a second drug to treat a second problem, and a third to treat a third problem... this entire approach to health care, upon which modern medicine is largely based, is flawed from the start. In clinical trials, patients are tested for one drug at a time. Never five or six (or ten).

So all the clinical trials that have ever been conducted by the pharmaceutical industry need to be thrown out the window for patients who take more than one drug. And that's just about everybody! Ask any senior citizen which prescription drugs they take, and most of them (the ones who can still remember, anyway) will rattle off a shockingly long list of toxic chemicals that have never been tested in combination. Just because one drug in isolation seems "safe" in one trial in no way means it's going to be safe when combined with half a dozen other toxic chemicals taken by the patient at the same time.

The list of drugs taken by Brittany Murphy boggles the mind

According to information leaked to the press, Brittany Murphy was found near prescription medications of all the following drugs:

• Topamax (an anti-seizure medication)
• Methylprednisolone (anti-inflammatory drug)
• Fluoxetine (antidepressant)
• Klonopin (anxiety medication)
• Carbamazepine (bipolar medication)
• Ativan (anxiety medication)
• Vicoprofen (pain reliever)
• Propranolol (hypertension drug)
• Biaxin (an antibiotic)
• Hydrocodone (pain medication)

That's a whopping ten medications that Brittany Murphy may have been swallowing all at once.

Now, you can search PubMed, the National Library of Medicine and the archives of the FDA, and you will never find a single clinical trial testing these ten drugs in combination. It's never been done (and never will be). Big Pharma, you see, isn't interested in finding out what happens when their various drugs are combined in the same patient at the same time. Why? Because they know the results would be disastrous.

The result was certainly disastrous for Brittany Murphy. Her FDA-approved, doctor-prescribed, Big Pharma-promoted combination of toxic drugs appears to have cost her her life.

How many other patients are dying from Acute Pharmaceutical Toxicity? (APT)

Brittany Murphy surely isn't the only Big Pharma customer who has been killed by Acute Pharmaceutical Toxicity. But no one knows the actual number because no one keeps track!

The FDA simply doesn't want to know. That's why reporting drug side effects and deaths to the FDA remains entirely voluntary. Big Pharma doesn't want anyone looking too closely at this issue, either. Coroners, for their part, rarely ask about pharmaceuticals as a possible cause of death. Typically, they just blame the death on whatever organ failed, calling it a "heart attack", for example, even when the heart attack might have been brought on by toxic pharmaceuticals.

Imagine if police detectives worked the same way. Investigating a crime scene where someone was thrown from a ten-story window and plunged to their death on the street below, imagine if the detective reported the cause of death as being, "Hitting the ground."

That's the way coroners work with the cause of death in patients killed by pharmaceuticals. They routinely ignore the real cause -- the chemical cause -- and just name whatever organ happened to fail first. "Liver failure" is a popular one. But what caused the liver to fail in the first place? It usually has something to do with Acute Pharmaceutical Toxicity.

Why celebrities need real nutrition

I've said it before, but celebrities lead extremely stressful lives. Being a movie star is no easy career choice -- it involves long hours, stressful travel and crazy work schedules.

Sadly, many movie stars have turned to pharmaceuticals to try to keep them functioning through the extreme stresses of a movie shoot. This inevitably leads to devastating consequences.

What professional actors need more than medication is nutrition. Only high-density nutrition can help them cope with the enormous stresses their careers demand. That's why I think more movie stars need to be drinking Boku Superfood, or Living Fuel, or Pure Synergy, or other high-quality superfoods every single day.

I continue to believe that if Brittany Murphy had ditched all those dangerous psychotropic drugs and instead turned to superfoods and high-density nutrition, she'd be alive and well today.

The bigger question in all this, though, is: Could millions of people around the world be dying right now from Acute Pharmaceutical Toxicity? If so, how would we even know?

Sources for this story include:

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/new...

Wednesday, December 23, 2009

Oceans at a Tipping Point for Ecological CollapseOceans at a Tipping Point for Ecological Collapse

(NaturalNews) Many experts believe that the world's oceans are at a crucial tipping point in which major ecological collapse is imminent. Overfishing, pollution, and general destruction of sea life is putting the oceanic system and its delicate ecosystems in dire straits.

Brian Skerry, an undersea photojournalist interviewed by a journalist from The Boston Phoenix, elaborated on what he was witnessing in the oceanic system. Decaying coral reefs, endangered species, and the massive reduction in population of certain sea creatures are among the devastating realities that has caused this diver to avoid eating seafood.

Every year, over 100 million sharks are killed. The North Atlantic right whale population, which was once a highly populous species in the region, is down to about 400. Atlantic cod is said to be about 10 percent of what it once was. Most commercial fish populations have been reduced by 90 percent or more. The Atlantic Ocean is becoming highly acidic and the Pacific Ocean is becoming a giant garbage dump. And all of these things have occurred in about 50 years.

Some scientists believe that if things don't change and current practices continue as they are, the ocean will be barren of all sea life by 2048. Others believe this notion is drastic and unrealistic, but the point remains that the careless treatment of the world's oceans is likely to have catastrophic results if not curtailed.

Overfishing in certain areas has led to increases in coral reef decay and death. Catching shrimp, for instance, involves dragging a net along the bottom of the ocean floor which catches all sorts of other ocean wildlife. Only a small portion of the catch is actually shrimp, leading to the dumping of the rest of the then-dead by-catch back into the ocean.

Some of the ocean damage has also been inflicted by severe hurricanes and tsunamis which are outside of man's control. Yet there is no denying that ruthless ocean harvesting practices are causing problems that would otherwise not occur if proper ocean stewardship practices were followed.

While some suggest that international regulations should be mandated, the consequences of giving control over natural resources to an international global government would likely prove disastrous for American sovereignty. Many current regulations are actually harming the waters more than they are helping them. Incentives that encourage proper stewardship are one possible option that would preserve freedom and liberty while avoiding totalitarian restrictions over the waters.

Sources for this story include: http://www.enn.com/wildlife/article... http://thephoenix.com/Boston/News/9...

Prescription narcotics cause more deaths than both heroin and cocaine

(NaturalNews) On the heels of the sudden death of celebrity actress Brittany Murphy (http://www.naturalnews.com/027781_B...), people are once again raising the question of just how dangerous prescription drugs might really be.

Some are arguing, however, that street drugs are the real danger, not prescription drugs. But the following study demonstrates why prescription drugs are far more dangerous than illegal recreational drugs.

According to a new study conducted by physicians at St. Michael's Hospital and the Institute for Clinical Evaluative Sciences (ICES) in Toronto, the number of deaths due to prescription opioid use has doubled between 1991 and 2004. Following the introduction of oxycodone into Toronto's drug formulary in 2000, there has been a 500% increase in deaths due to the drugs.

Researchers reviewed over 7,000 files from the Office of the Chief Coroner in Ontario and found that between the years of 1991 and 2004, oxycodone prescriptions increased by more than 850 percent, representing about one-third of the opioid prescriptions given in 2006. (This is the largest prescription increase among all opioid drugs.)

Following the addition of this drug into the provincial drug benefit plan in 2000, deaths from opioid usage rose by 41 percent. Shockingly, deaths from prescription opioids like oxycodone were far greater than deaths from heroin. The vast majority of people who died from opioids had visited their doctor and received a prescription for the drug within a month of their death.

The total number of opioid-related deaths in Toronto in 2004 is estimated to be 27.2 per million people. Study authors said they hope to shed light on the tremendous dangers associated with prescription opioid drugs.

Coked up on prescription smack

It's the dirty little secret of the pharmaceutical industry: More people are killed by prescription opioids than all those killed by heroin and cocaine combined. And that probably even includes all the shootings of gang bangers in northern Mexico.

Prescription drug abuse is now more common than street drug abuse -- by far! And yet Big Pharma rakes in huge profits from all the patient addictions to their opioids. And by "opioids", what I mean is narcotics. They are, in fact, one and the same.

So of all the drug addicts in America today, you can divide them into two camps:

1) People addicted to street drugs.
2) People addicted to prescription drugs.

The people in group #1 (street drugs) are taken to jail where they are given prison sentences. People in group #2 (prescription drugs) are taken to their doctor where they are given prescription refills. It's all really the same narcotics, it's just that one group is legal and the other is illegal.

And what really determines whether a particular narcotic is legal or illegal? Whether or not Big Pharma profits from it. If Big Pharma makes money off the narcotics, they're considered legal.

Big Pharma, you see, earns tens of billions of dollars each year from drug addicts. And just by coincidence, it turns out that their prescription narcotics are extremely addicting, guaranteeing repeat business. The business model is so dang lucrative, you might think they were drug dealers...

Why do you think the main sponsors for the Partnership For A Drug-Free America are the drug companies themselves? It's because Big Pharma is trying to eliminate the competition. By keeping up the so-called "War on Drugs" front, the pharmaceutical industry can make sure it dominates the market for narcotics. After all, if you're going to feed narcotics to a nation full of junkies, why not make a hefty profit on it? That's the thinking of drug companies, it seems, as they have done basically zilch to effectively stem the abuse of their own prescription narcotics.

Much like the tobacco companies, drug companies secretly want people to be addicted to their products.

Sources for this story include:

http://www.eurekalert.org/pub_relea...

http://www.eurekalert.org/pub_relea...

High-sugar diet alters intestinal bacteria, making losing weight more difficult

(NaturalNews) A report published in the new journal Science Translational Medicine has made an interesting discovery concerning the relationship between sugar intake and the balance of intestinal flora. Researchers have discovered that a diet high in sugar and fat substantially alters the bacterial composition in the gut, making it difficult to maintain a healthy weight.

Dr. Jeffrey Gordon of Washington University in St. Louis has been accumulating research for years that highlights the role intestinal bacteria plays in regulating bodily weight. Intestinal flora, sometimes called "good" bacteria, is vital for the proper digestion of food and assimilation of nutrients into the blood. When digestive bacteria is out of balance or otherwise altered, the body is unable to convert otherwise indigestible foods into digestible form.

The research, conducted on mice, experimented with implanting various strains of bacteria into mice in order to observe their effects. The two primary divisions of bacteria, Firmicutes and Bacteroidetes, compose approximately 90 percent of all bacteria. Studies by Dr. Gordon have revealed that Firmicutes bacteria are more efficient at digesting food that the body is unable to digest on its own.

With this in mind, Dr. Gordon decided to experiment with the various bacteria in gnotobiotic mice, or mice which had no bacteria in their intestines because they were raised in a sterile environment. What he found was that gnotobiotic mice who received bacteria from obese mice became obese as well. Similarly, those gnotobiotic mice who received lean-mice bacteria tended more towards leanness.

The same experiment was tried with human intestinal bacteria and similar results were achieved. What also became apparent was that mice who received bacteria from lean human intestines had a much higher proportion of Bacteroidetes than they did Firmicutes.

These mice, who began with a low-fat diet rich in healthy plants, were switched to a high-sugar, high-fat diet following the implant of the lean human bacteria. It was discovered that within 24 hours, the two phyla compositions switched resulting in the Firmicutes bacteria becoming more dominant than the Bacteroidetes bacteria.

This study illustrates the powerful correlation between diet and health in a way that has not typically been studied by researchers. The foundation of bodily health lies in the gut where bacterial colonies are designed to properly route and process nutrients for use in the body. When they get thrown out of balance due to improper diet, the entire body becomes susceptible to all sorts of diseases, including obesity.

Sources for this story include

http://www.latimes.com/features/hea...

Former head of CDC lands lucrative job as president of Merck vaccine division (opinion)

(NaturalNews) You've heard it before, how the pharmaceutical industry has a giant "revolving door" through which corporations and government agencies frequently exchange key employees. That reality was driven home in a huge way today when news broke that Dr. Julie Gerberding, who headed the CDC from 2002 through 2009, landed a top job with Merck, one of the largest drug companies in the world. Her job there? She's the new president of the vaccine division.

How convenient. That means the former head of the CDC was very likely cultivating a relationship with Merck all these years, and now comes the big payoff: Heading up a $5 billion division that sells cervical cancer vaccines (like Gardasil), chickenpox vaccines and of course H1N1 swine flu vaccines, too.

So what's the problem with all this? The problem is that private industry and government health offices such as the CDC or FDA should never be so cozy. When they are, it creates an environment of collusion between Big Government and Big Pharma. We've already seen this with the government-led push for swine flu vaccines that are manufactured (and sold) by drug companies like Merck.

You might even say that the CDC already functions as the marketing division of the pharmaceutical industry. It was the CDC that pushed so hard for swine flu vaccines, even amid the obvious realization that swine flu was no more dangerous than seasonal flu. To this day, the CDC still hasn't bothered to recommend vitamin D for the prevention of either seasonal flu or swine flu. It remains heavily invested in the lucrative vaccine approach -- an approach that just happens to financially benefit the very corporations that are hiring ex-CDC employees like Dr. Gerberding.

How to triple your salary by selling out to industry

Getting a job offer from Big Pharma, by the way, is one of the most-desired career paths for many CDC employees (and FDA workers, for that matter). It's easy to accomplish it, too: Just operate in your government position as if you were a Big Pharma lackey. If you produce enough good business for the drug industry, sooner or later they'll offer you a lucrative position that doubles or triples your government salary (or even better).

Now, I don't want to lump all CDC employees in this same pathetic group, because there are indeed a great many bright, honest scientists working at the CDC who do excellent work tracking pandemics and trying to save lives. They are overshadowed, however, by those ambitious profit seekers who see their CDC job as merely a stepping stone for a far better-paying job at a major drug companies. And by any measure, Dr. Gerberding just cashed in big.

Her actual salary at Merck hasn't been publicly released yet, but given that she's heading up a $5 billion vaccine industry, it's probably not chump change. I'd bet she's now making at least ten times the salary of the President of the United States (and probably a lot more).

So now, Dr. Gerberding's new job involves the incessant promotion of yet more vaccines -- a job not very different from the one she held at the CDC, come to think of it. More vaccines for more diseases afflicting more people... it's just another day at Merck, where the world is never so healthy that it doesn't need one more mandatory vaccine.

As a special bonus to Merck in all this, Dr. Gerberding has a wealth of contacts not merely throughout the CDC, but also at the World Health Organization. When you're the former head of the CDC, the top public health officials of the world are literally just one call away. But starting today, that call is a commercial, corporate-sponsored call, not a public health call. There's a huge difference.

Does Dr. Gerberding suffer from an "ethics deficiency?"

My question in all this is whether Dr. Gerberding has any real ethics when it comes to issues like vaccines and public health. If she does have such ethics, why would she accept a job with a company that has been engaged in outright scientific fraud? (http://www.naturalnews.com/027582_M...)

Why would she go to work for a company that maintained a "hit list" of doctors to attack and "neutralize?" This is true -- it came out in recent court documents (http://www.naturalnews.com/027116_M...).

Why would she take a job with a company that has a pattern of threatening doctors who speak out against its drugs? (http://www.naturalnews.com/026420_M...)

Why would she be okay with the idea of working for a company that commits scientific fraud by hiding documents showing its drugs to be dangerous? (http://www.naturalnews.com/024072_Z...)

Why would she feel okay about working for a company that dumps chemicals and vaccine waste products into the public water system? (http://www.naturalnews.com/023124_w...)

Why would she want to collect a paycheck from a company that has been caught hiring ghost writers to pen "independent" science papers submitted to science journals, when they were actually crafted by Merck? (http://www.naturalnews.com/023052_M...)

Why would she feel comfortable representing a company that committed blatant scientific fraud with its Vytorin cholesterol drug study? (http://www.naturalnews.com/022485_s...)

Maybe Dr. Gerberding is fine with all this. Maybe she has really "flexible" ethics. Or maybe she suffers from an "ethics deficiency" -- an epidemic disease for which Merck apparently has no vaccine at all.

In any case, she's now allied herself with a company engaged in so many repeated acts of fraud that in my opinion all its executives should be arrested and prosecuted for crimes against humanity. Those executives will now include Dr. Gerberding, it seems.

Did the CDC cover Merck's back?

You might say, though, that she hasn't done anything yet for Merck. But check this out: As a previous NaturalNews story explains, when a fourteen-year-old girl named Jessica died following a cervical cancer vaccine injection (made by Merck), the CDC covered for Merck and pointed the finger at the girl's birth control pills.

Care to guess who was heading the CDC at the time of this maneuver? Dr. Julie Gerberding, now a top Merck executive.

You pat my back and I'll pat yours.

For years, under the lead of Dr. Gerberding, the CDC has maintained a rather bizarre position that Merck's vaccines are so safe that all side effects should be dismissed outright. This is explained in a Dallas Morning News article (http://www.dallasnews.com/sharedcon...), among other places.

The CDC, in other words, has been running defense for Merck for many years, downplaying vaccine side effects and insisting that Merck's vaccines are safe. Now that the president of Merck's vaccine division and the former chief of the CDC are one and the same, it brings up obvious questions of whether there was some level of ongoing collusion between the CDC and Merck and how deeply Dr. Gerberding might have been involved.

Some of the word games played by Dr. Gerberding demonstrate amazing Clintonian-like speech patterns designed to deflect blame from Merck's vaccines. Listen to this exchange where Dr. Gerberding indirectly admits that vaccines can cause autism (or as she says, "Autism-like symptoms," which is exactly the same thing, as the symptoms define the disease in the first place). Watch it yourself in this segment on YouTube -- this is a must see video segment on the link between vaccines and autism:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Dh-n...

Who else is on the Merck team at the CDC?

That the CDC's chief would be offered one of the very top jobs at Merck now makes me wonder just how deep the culture of collusion between Merck and the CDC really goes. How many other CDC employees are in line for future job offers from Merck -- and what might they do in order to win those jobs?

There's a solution to all this, of course: Pass a law that bans employees of the CDC, FDA, FTC, EPA or USDA from ever working for pharmaceutical companies. The people who run the regulatory agencies and public health offices should never be allowed to leap into employment at the very same companies they were once regulating. There's just too much risk of cross-contamination of influence, which is why we have the corruption and collusion problems we're seeing today with the FDA, FTC and CDC, all of which seem to be operating as marketing extensions of the pharmaceutical industry.

As long as the revolving door remains wide open between Big Pharma and Big Government, there will be a strong tendency towards corporate collusion that betrays the people whom government is supposed to serve. Instead of our government serving the People, in other words, it increasingly exists to serve the interests of Big Business. And big business doesn't get much bigger than Big Pharma.

After all, inventing fictitious disease, creating pandemic panics, then selling questionable patented drugs to gullible consumers is a lucrative business model. And now the official job of the former head of the CDC is to make sure it all stays that way. So roll up your sleeves, folks: There's a vaccine with your name on it, and Dr. Gerberding is here to make sure Merck sticks it to ya.

Sources for this story include:
http://www.naturalnews.com/023792_H...

http://www.dallasnews.com/sharedcon...

http://www.reuters.com/article/idUS...(NaturalNews) You've heard it before, how the pharmaceutical industry has a giant "revolving door" through which corporations and government agencies frequently exchange key employees. That reality was driven home in a huge way today when news broke that Dr. Julie Gerberding, who headed the CDC from 2002 through 2009, landed a top job with Merck, one of the largest drug companies in the world. Her job there? She's the new president of the vaccine division.

How convenient. That means the former head of the CDC was very likely cultivating a relationship with Merck all these years, and now comes the big payoff: Heading up a $5 billion division that sells cervical cancer vaccines (like Gardasil), chickenpox vaccines and of course H1N1 swine flu vaccines, too.

So what's the problem with all this? The problem is that private industry and government health offices such as the CDC or FDA should never be so cozy. When they are, it creates an environment of collusion between Big Government and Big Pharma. We've already seen this with the government-led push for swine flu vaccines that are manufactured (and sold) by drug companies like Merck.

You might even say that the CDC already functions as the marketing division of the pharmaceutical industry. It was the CDC that pushed so hard for swine flu vaccines, even amid the obvious realization that swine flu was no more dangerous than seasonal flu. To this day, the CDC still hasn't bothered to recommend vitamin D for the prevention of either seasonal flu or swine flu. It remains heavily invested in the lucrative vaccine approach -- an approach that just happens to financially benefit the very corporations that are hiring ex-CDC employees like Dr. Gerberding.

How to triple your salary by selling out to industry

Does Dr. Gerberding suffer from an "ethics deficiency?"

Did the CDC cover Merck's back?

Who else is on the Merck team at the CDC?

Nearly 100 percent of women reject tamoxifen drug despite claims that it prevents breast cancer

(NaturalNews) A study published in the journal Breast Cancer Research and Treatment has found that women overwhelmingly reject the breast cancer prevention drug tamoxifen even when given a thorough, personalized analysis of its risks and benefits. University of Michigan researchers administered the information about the drug to 632 women and found that only one percent of participants actually ended up taking it.

Originally formulated to prevent recurrences in women who have already had breast cancer, tamoxifen is now being touted as a breast cancer prevention drug.

The women who participated in the study were given detailed information about how the drug would work for them based on a number of personalized factors. These included medical and family history, age, and race. After completion, only 29 percent of women said they would research the drug further. A mere six percent said they were likely to actually take tamoxifen.

Following the study, of the 29 percent who said they would seek out more information about tamoxifen, only six percent actually did. Among those who said they were likely to take it, a measly one percent followed through.

Eighty-percent of the women who participated in the study indicated that they were most concerned about the side effects of the drug, which include sexual problems, hot flashes, blood clots, cataracts, and endometrial cancer. Despite concern among some that women are not taking the drug because they don't know about it, Dr. Peter Ubel from the University of Michigan noted that the real reason women are not taking tamoxifen is because of the many dangers associated with it.

Comments by Mike Adams, the Health Ranger

This is a fascinating study because it shows that when women are properly informed about the dangers of cancer drugs, they almost universally reject them.

This is why the cancer industry works so hard to keep women ignorant by distancing them from accurate information about the dangers of chemotherapy, radiation, surgery and anti-cancer drugs. The more women know about these things, the more they reject conventional cancer treatments altogether (and the more they seek out alternative therapies).

Alternative (natural) therapies are non-toxic, safe, affordable and highly effective at both preventing and treating cancer.

Sources for this story include:
http://www2.med.umich.edu/prmc/medi...

Big Pharma kills yet another celebrity: Brittany Murphy on multiple prescriptions at time of death

(NaturalNews) It's not normal to die at age 32 of a heart attack. To make that happen, you normally have to be taking chemical substances of some kind, either recreational drugs or prescription drugs. Actress Brittany Murphy, who died this last weekend from a heart attack, was reportedly taking prescription drugs to treat the symptoms of the flu (not to actually treat the flu itself, mind you, just the symptoms of the flu). She was found collapsed in her shower after her heart gave out.

If prescription drugs are the cause, this would be just the latest celebrity death caused by pharmaceuticals. Other celebrity deaths recently caused by pharmaceuticals include:

• Heath Ledger
http://www.naturalnews.com/022602_d...

• Patrick Swayze
http://www.naturalnews.com/027030_c...

• Bernie Mac
http://www.naturalnews.com/023817_B...

• Michael Jackson
http://www.naturalnews.com/026517_M...

• Farrah Fawcett
http://www.naturalnews.com/026511_c...

And from the realm of politics and the media, the following celebrities have also been killed by pharmaceuticals:

• Tony Snow
http://www.naturalnews.com/023626_c...

• Tim Russert
http://www.naturalnews.com/023434.html

• Peter Jennings

If you add it all up and include all the non-celebrities killed by Big Pharma, these dangerous prescription medications are racking up a body count that makes terrorists look like amateurs.

Pharmaceutical industry is a giant fraud

The pharmaceutical industry, as operated today, is based almost entirely on scientific fraud, bribery of doctors, misleading advertising and corrupt regulatory agencies like the FDA. Most prescription medications simply don't help most people. They only mask symptoms while ignoring the underlying causes of disease.

Nearly all pharmaceuticals are sold with the Big Lie... the implied (but false) promise that "These drugs will make you healthier." That's why drug ads always show happy, healthy people popping their pills. (Well, technically they never even show them popping the pills. They just show them doing yoga, hiking in the woods, or whatever looks good.)

I can't think of a single pharmaceutical that actually makes you healthier. Almost universally, prescription medications cause long-term damage to the heart, liver, kidneys and nervous system. Over time, they erode your health, accelerate your apparent aging and promote chronic degenerative disease.

Nutrients can make you healthier and prevent disease, but pharmaceuticals have no such abilities. That's because the human body was never designed to digest patented chemicals. It was, as you probably learned in high school health class, designed solely to digest natural foods and nutrients provided by Mother Nature.

Of course, pharmaceuticals are very seductive. The idea that you can pop a pill and have all your health problems corrected is very appealing to many people. This is perhaps what got into Brittany Murphy. She mistakenly believed FDA-approved drugs would protect her health when, in reality, they took her life.

NaturalNews mourns her death and hopes that others will learn the truth about dangerous prescription drugs and seek out safer, more natural alternatives that can save their lives.

Why celebrities need really good nutrition

Being a celebrity is extremely stressful and demanding. The long work hours, lack of time in nature, sunlight deficiency, frequent travel and poor sleep quality all add up to a lifestyle that can devastate your health. That's why celebrities, more than almost anyone, need to pursue a super clean diet with lots of superfoods.

Only through very powerful, potent foods can celebrities hope to maintain anything close to a healthy life while under the stresses of celebrity existence. (And make no mistake, being a celebrity is harder than you think. The stresses are unbelievable...)

The smart celebrities are already on natural diets -- Woody Harrelson, Suzanne Somers, Daryl Hannah and so on. They will tend to far out-live others who pursue extremely stressful lifestyles while trying to survive on a diet of processed foods and FDA-approved pharmaceuticals.

There is no doubt in my mind that Brittany Murphy's life could have been saved by reading NaturalNews. If she had been taking vitamin D supplements, immune-boosting herbs and following a diet of healthy superfoods, she would very likely still be alive today. That's just my opinion, of course, as I don't yet know all the medical details about her death, but for someone to die of a heart attack at age 32, their health has to be severely compromised in one or more significant ways.

The sad part is that the conventional medical industry never tells people the truth about nutrition and disease prevention, so even people who consider themselves to be "well informed" are lacking basic knowledge about vitamin D, minerals, phytonutrients, living foods, superfoods and so on. To my knowledge, Brittany was not known as a health food person, so she most likely followed conventional health information (junk food, drugs and surgery). And that's almost certainly what killed her.

Sources for this story include:
http://www.gather.com/viewArticle.a...
http://www.benzinga.com/general/689...
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/wor...

New research: natural exposure to everyday germs may protect kids from disease as adults

(NaturalNews) Gone are the days when play time for kids often meant getting dirty making mud "pies", splashing in mud puddles and creeks, and climbing trees -- and when children washed their hands, mostly just before a meal, it was with plain soap and water. Modern day parents often take pride in keeping their little ones squeaky clean and as germ-free as possible, dousing them with antibacterial soaps and hand sanitizers. But new Northwestern University research suggests that normal exposure to everyday germs is a natural way to prevent diseases in adulthood.

The study, published in the December 9th edition of the journal Proceedings of the Royal Society B: Biological Sciences, is the first to investigate whether microbial exposures early in life affect inflammatory processes related to diseases in adulthood. Remarkably, the Northwestern study suggests exposure to infectious microbes in childhood may actually protect youngsters from developing serious illnesses, including cardiovascular diseases, when they grow into adults.

"Contrary to assumptions related to earlier studies, our research suggests that ultra-clean, ultra-hygienic environments early in life may contribute to higher levels of inflammation as an adult, which in turn increases risks for a wide range of diseases," Thomas McDade, lead author of the study, said in a statement to the media. McDade is associate professor of anthropology in Northwestern's Weinberg College of Arts and Sciences and a faculty fellow at the Institute for Policy Research.

He added that humans have only recently lived in super clean environments and it could well be time to put down the antibacterial soap. That's because the new research suggests that inflammatory systems need a reasonably high level of exposure to common everyday germs and other microbes to develop and work properly in the body.

"In other words, inflammatory networks may need the same type of microbial exposures early in life that have been part of the human environment for all of our evolutionary history to function optimally in adulthood," stated McDade.

The Northwestern University researchers specifically studied how environments early in life might affect production of C-reactive protein (CRP), a protein that rises in the blood due to inflammation, in adulthood. Research concerning CRP, which is an important part of the immune system's fight against infection, has primarily focused on the protein as a possible predictor of heart disease. Scientists previously have mostly conducted CRP research in affluent settings, including the U.S., where there are relatively low levels of infectious diseases.

McDade and colleagues were interested in what CRP production looks like in the Philippines where residents have with a high level of infectious diseases in early childhood compared to Western countries. However, compared to Western countries, the people of the Philippines have relatively low rates of obesity (which is associated with CRP) and cardiovascular diseases.

How the research was conducted

The research team worked with data from a longitudinal study of Filipinos which began in the 1980s with 3,327 Filipino mothers in their third trimester of pregnancy. The mothers were interviewed about breast feeding and care giving and their households were assessed for socioeconomic levels, hygiene (including whether homes included domestic animals) and how many people lived in the home.

Researchers also visited with the mothers after their babies were born and then every two months for the first two years of the children's lives. From that point on, the researchers followed up with the children every four or five years until the research subjects were approximately 22 years of age. During this entire period, records were kept on the children documenting their height and weight and any infectious diseases they contracted.

Blood tests revealed Filipino participants in their early 20s had CRP concentrations on average of .2 milligrams per liter -- that's about five to seven times lower than the average CRP levels for Americans of the same age.

"In the U.S we have this idea that we need to protect infants and children from microbes and pathogens at all possible costs," McDade concluded. "But we may be depriving developing immune networks of important environmental input needed to guide their function throughout childhood and into adulthood. Without this input, our research suggests, inflammation may be more likely to be poorly regulated and result in inflammatory responses that are overblown or more difficult to turn off once things get started."

For more information:
http://www.northwestern.edu/newscen...

Wave of sickness and disease now striking Baby Boomers

(NaturalNews) Research is now showing that today's "baby boomers", the generation currently eclipsing age 60, is the first generation to be less healthy than the generation before them. Those in this age group are more susceptible to debilitating diseases than in years past, stemming primarily from poor diet and lack of proper exercise.

Professor Teresa Seeman, a researcher from the University of California, examined those today in their 60s, 70s, and 80s and compared her findings to people from the same age groups examined ten years ago. She came to the startling conclusion that about one in five people in their 60s today requires assistance in accomplishing daily activities. This number is 50 percent higher than it was a decade ago.

A common theme that emerged from the research is that technological advancements have played a significant role in creating poor health. As Americans have generally been weaned off of physical labor and instead placed in front of computer screens throughout the years, the level of physical activity among the population has dropped significantly.

The lack of effective exercise was emphasized by a 50 percent increase over the last ten years in people in their 60s having trouble performing simple activities such as walking a quarter-mile or climbing a small set of stairs. There was also a 40 percent increase in study subjects having trouble bending their knees to crouch, kneel, or get up from a chair.

Significant societal and technological advancements that were of great benefit to the Baby Boomers when they were younger is proving to be their downfall in their current stage of life. Those in this age group are fatter and weaker than previous generations were at the same age, and they are more susceptible to chronic ailments that severely curtail their quality of life.

Experts recommend the obvious, mainly an improved diet and increased physical activity. They also warn the current younger generations to become disciplined in living a healthy lifestyle now in order to help offset the things that are currently plaguing their parents and grandparents.

Dr. Ian Campbell, general practitioner and medical director of the charity Weight Concern, expressed concern over the growing reliance on pharmaceutical drugs rather than on lifestyle changes as the appropriate remedy for the problem. He recommends a more preventive approach in dealing with illness.

Perhaps the conditions of economic turmoil in America will drive the younger generations back to the fields where physical labor and nutritious bounty are sure to help undo some of the damage that's been done by a convenient, technology-driven lifestyle.

Sources for this story include

http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/art...

More CO2 in the atmosphere leads to accelerated growth of certain tree species

(NaturalNews) Scientists from the University of Wisconsin-Madison and the University of Minnesota at Morris have found that increased levels of atmospheric carbon dioxide have led to the rapid growth of certain tree species. The quaking aspen, a popular North America deciduous tree, has seen a 50 percent acceleration in growth over the past 50 years due to increased CO2 levels.

Trees are necessary climate regulators since they process carbon dioxide and give off oxygen. Humans process oxygen and give off carbon dioxide, working harmoniously with natural plant life to maintain proper atmospheric composition. Since natural forests represent about 30 percent of the earth's surface, they are highly effective at segregating greenhouse gases.

The quaking aspen is a vibrant, dominant tree found in both Canada and the United States. It is considered to be a "foundation species", meaning that it helps dictate the dynamics of the plant and animal communities that surround it. Roughly 42 million acres in Canada and 6.5 million acres in Wisconsin and Minnesota are composed of aspen trees.

Elevated levels of CO2 will naturally lead to increased plant growth since CO2 is a precursor to plant food. Tree-ring analyses verified that aspen trees have been growing at an increasingly accelerated pace over the years because of this phenomenon.

Because accelerated growth was not seen in other tree species like oak and pine, scientists admit they will have to further investigate the issue. Similarly, drier regions where the trees were found did not experience the same rapid growth rates as those found in the wetter regions.

Comments by Mike Adams, the Health Ranger

An interesting side effect of increased carbon emissions by human activity is that plants will grow more quickly. CO2 is to plants as oxygen is to humans, so the more CO2 is in the atmosphere, the more quickly many plants can grow.

Of course, plants produce oxygen as the "waste" product of their respiration, and that's a poison to other plants, so there's a natural balancing effect that keeps oxygen and CO2 levels in balance over the long haul.

This is why greenhouse gases are called "greenhouse gases", by the way -- because they turn the planet into a really effective greenhouse where plants grow like crazy. Of course, the clear-cutting of rainforest in the Amazon (and elsewhere) kills any chance of those regions taking part in that accelerated plant growth. Even in a high-CO2 environment, human beings can destroy plant life with bulldozers.

It's interesting that plants and humans breathe the same air but extract very different chemical elements from it: Humans need oxygen while plants need carbon dioxide. For both species to survive, the air needs to contain both chemicals in balance. Currently, the oxygen content of the air is roughly around 20% (and falling).

Sources for this story include:

http://www.eurekalert.org/pub_relea...

Friday, December 18, 2009

http://www.naturalnews.com/027766_H1N1_vaccines_swine_flu.html

(NaturalNews) All of a sudden, H1N1 vaccines are available all across America. Walgreens and other pharmacies are pushing the vaccines as if there were an "everything must go" liquidation sale under way. Hurry, get your swine flu vaccine today before everybody figures out they're useless!

The marketability of vaccines has a strict time limit. They're only in demand during the fear phase of a pandemic, and that fear phase has long since faded for H1N1. Virtually everyone who wants an H1N1 vaccine has already received one, and the rest of the population is beginning to notice something quite curious: People who got the vaccine are no better off than those who skipped it. In fact, there's no difference in mortality between those who were vaccinated and those who weren't, indicating yet again that the swine flu vaccine was a medical hoax to begin with.

If you don't believe me, just ask the potentially hundreds of thousands of parents who gave their children one of the recently recalled H1N1 children's vaccines. These vaccines were recalled because they were found to be so weak that they were medically useless. But observant parents are noticing a curious fact: Children who received the "useless" (recalled) vaccine have been no worse off than those who received a full-strength vaccine.

The strength of the vaccine, in fact, appears to be entirely irrelevant to the health outcomes of children. Vaccine or not, strong or weak, children's reaction to the pandemic has virtually nothing to do with any treatments offered by conventional medicine.

In fact, the greatest determining factor in the health outcomes of children has most likely been their blood levels of vitamin D. But that isn't tracked by medical professionals... nor even prescribed by them. So we'll probably never know the exact correlation between vitamin D and H1N1 prevention.

Millions of useless vaccines

So now we have a situation where the U.S. government has spent billions of dollars acquiring H1N1 vaccines that, by the time they were delivered for consumption, were already irrelevant to public health. Does anybody really believe at this point that swine flu is a deadly pandemic that will kill you if you don't receive a vaccine? You'd have to really look hard to find someone so uninformed (and brainwashed) that they're making the H1N1 vaccine a priority in their life right now.

So what we're going to end up with here is a huge stockpile of H1N1 vaccines that nobody wants. Sure, the pharmacies, clinics and hospitals will try to push as many of them as they can (even offering free vaccines sooner or later, just to get people into their stores), but in the end, they're inevitably going to be sitting on millions of extra doses of vaccine with nowhere to inject them.

There are two solutions for this, from Big Pharma's point of view:

Strategy #1 - Drum up more fear with the aim that it will boost consumer demand for vaccines. This can be accomplished by getting the mainstream media to highlight the few isolated cases of infants or children dying from H1N1 infections (all of whom are almost certainly vitamin D deficient, again).

Strategy #2 - Mandate mass vaccinations. This is unlikely to happen now that H1N1 appears to have fizzled out. The public won't go for mandatory shots unless the situation gets a whole lot worse. Of course, Big Government can always force such mandates upon the public, but in the current political climate, such an effort would be met with a backlash of public protest.

So that leaves the last option: Flushing H1N1 vaccines down the drain, and this is exactly what will eventually be done with millions of unsold doses. After all the hype, all the empty promises, all the billions of dollars spent and all the fear mongering, a huge portion of these drugs are just going to be flushed down the toilet, essentially, because that's how hospitals, pharmacies and even drug makers get rid of excess pharmaceuticals.

Polluting the environment with H1N1 vaccines

There's a huge environmental concern in all this, of course: What's the effect of dumping millions of doses of H1N1 DNA / RNA into the public sewer system? No one really knows. It's yet another grand Big Pharma experiment. And how about the chemical additives, preservatives and adjuncts added to the vaccines? What impact will all those chemicals have on the environment?

It's a startling fact that the sewage expelled by one city ends up in the public drinking water of the next city downstream. Sewage is treated, of course, to achieve EPA-regulated "safe" status before it's dumped back into the rivers, but the EPA doesn't regulate something called "DNA pollution." DNA and RNA can be dumped into the sewage systems in virtually unlimited quantities, without any regulatory oversight (the FDA doesn't regulate drug disposal either).

If you think about it, then, this whole swine flu fiasco has been a huge scam of paying money to the drug companies in order to flush swine flu genetic material down the drain. This is the brilliance of government-led health policy, by the way: Spend good money to pollute the planet with potentially dangerous genetic material that might one day end up recombining with some other opportunistic viral candidates circulating in the wild.

What a clever way to help cause the next great pandemic, huh? It's almost a perfect recipe for vaccine repeat business: Take today's most virulent pandemic strain, replicate it in pharmaceutical labs around the world, then dump it into the environment for mass distribution. That's essentially what's happening here. It sounds insane, but it's exactly what's about to take place when the H1N1 liquidation sales are over and medical retailers just start flushing all these vaccines down the drain.

No EPA regulations

There are no EPA regulations that limit the dumping of vaccines directly into the public sewage system, by the way. Dumping excess pharmaceuticals down the drain is routine in modern medicine. Hospitals, clinics, pharmacies and patients routinely flush pharmaceuticals down the drain. This is why you can now find HRT drugs, antidepressants and blood pressure drugs in the fish near any major U.S. city.

So many drugs are now dumped into the sewers that rivers have become Big Pharma runoff zones that poison the fish and destroy aquatic life. No wonder the world's oceans are dying -- they're all being bathed in Big Pharma's chemical waste!

But that's not the end of this story: In places all across America, sewage waste is used to make fertilizer that's spread on crops. The solid sewage waste is called "biosolids" or "black gold," and it's used by farmers and gardeners as a soil additive. What the people using this toxic sludge don't realize is that it's contaminated with Big Pharma's toxic chemicals. And soon, it may be contaminated with H1N1 vaccine material from all the millions of unused doses that pharmacies couldn't manage to peddle to consumers.

In the end, all those unused vaccines will eventually end up as crop fertilizer. It's yet another reason to avoid monoculture crops and grow your own food using biodynamic gardening methods, huh?

Wednesday, December 30, 2009

Medications are not vitamins

Pharmaceutical deficiency

Killing cancer cells with zero toxicity to healthy cells

Comments by Mike Adams, the Health Ranger

How to explode your rectum without harming anyone nearby

Please remove your shoes and your underwear...

Your bra just might contain a bomb...

Absurd security

How about zero-security flights?

The fatal flaw in the theory behind pharmaceuticals

The list of drugs taken by Brittany Murphy boggles the mind

How many other patients are dying from Acute Pharmaceutical Toxicity? (APT)

Why celebrities need real nutrition

Wednesday, December 23, 2009

Coked up on prescription smack

How to triple your salary by selling out to industry

Does Dr. Gerberding suffer from an "ethics deficiency?"

Did the CDC cover Merck's back?

Who else is on the Merck team at the CDC?

How to triple your salary by selling out to industry

Does Dr. Gerberding suffer from an "ethics deficiency?"

Did the CDC cover Merck's back?

Who else is on the Merck team at the CDC?

Comments by Mike Adams, the Health Ranger

Pharmaceutical industry is a giant fraud

Why celebrities need really good nutrition

How the research was conducted

Comments by Mike Adams, the Health Ranger

Friday, December 18, 2009

Millions of useless vaccines

Polluting the environment with H1N1 vaccines

No EPA regulations

NaturalNews

NaturalNews Links

About Me

Followers

Blog Archive