Some imported rice has levels of lead high enough to pose health risks, especially to children, scientists found.

An analysis of rice imported from Asia, Europe and South America showed levels far beyond FDA recommendations, researchers said at the National Meeting & Exposition of the American Chemical Society in New Orleans on Monday.

"Such findings present a situation that is particularly worrisome given that infants and children are especially vulnerable to the effects of lead poisoning," lead researcher Tsanangurayi Tongesayi said in a press release. "For infants and children, the daily exposure levels from eating the rice products analyzed in this study would be 30-60 times higher than the FDA's provisional total tolerable intake (PTTI) levels. Asians consume more rice, and for these infants and children, exposures would be 60-120 times higher. For adults, the daily exposure levels were 20-40 times higher than the PTTI levels."

The analysis follows a recent report that more than half a million kids in the United States had blood lead levels of conern in 2010. That report was based on new guidelines from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention that parents of children with lead levels of 5 micrograms per deciliter should be alerted. In the past, the standard was 10 micrograms per decileter.

The good news? Overall, lead levels in children have dropped. The average fell to 1.3 micrograms per decileter using the data from 2007-2010.

Rice from Taiwan, China, Czech Republic, Bhutan, Italy, India and Thailand had the highest amounts of lead. Researchers are still analyzing samples from Pakistan, Brazil and other countries.

My interest in iron metabolism began around 1986 when I read an article published in The Mayo Clinic Proceedings by Virgil Fairbanks who was then chief of iron metabolism. His article, "Hemochromatosis or Iron Overload - the Neglected Diagnosis" was a scathing attack on the medical profession for ignoring excess iron in the body. Physicians were more interested in anaemias and low iron deficiency and did not really perform the necessary tests of iron metabolism to diagnose the opposite end of the spectrum - iron overload. He described conditions directly related to excess iron in the body such as arthritis, diabetes, psychiatric illness, and liver disease.

These conditions were very common in my medical practice, and I decided to find out how many of my patients had excess iron, and it turned out to be a significant number, as many as 30% of my patients. When I began to lower the iron levels, my patients improved, and I published some research articles on the subject in some rather prestigious medical journals. By 1989, doctors began publishing research which showed that iron was also a risk factor in cancer at levels that were far less than what they had thought safe in the past. In September 1992, a classic article in Circulation by Jerome Sullivan showed that excess iron was also a risk factor in heart disease, second only to cigarette smoking as a cause of heart attacks in men. Sullivan's study sent shock waves through the medical and nutritional communities because doctors have been prescribing supplementary iron, and nutritionists have been insisting that food be fortified with iron, and this was a reminder that excess iron is very dangerous. In the following year, studies were published which showed that vitamin E and vitamin C reduced the rates of heart attacks and angina, and when you put all of these studies together, you realize that iron is capable of inducing free radical or oxidative pathology.

A kindergartner in New York is banned from attending her school until she gets a chicken pox shot, but because her newborn baby sister has a rare condition, she could risk killing her if she received it.

If five-year-old FrankieElizabeth Warner gets the vaccine, doctors say she could kill her newborn sister who has an auto-immune disorder.

The vaccine's pathogens make the baby susceptible to getting the chickenpox, as she is not strong enough to fight it off.

I'm sure many of you have seen reports on a recent study published in the journal Nature suggesting a possible mechanism linking red meat consumption to heart disease. The day after one such report was published in the New York Times, I received numerous emails and numerous Facebook and Twitter messages from concerned red meat enthusiasts. This is understandable, but rest assured it's not yet time to switch over to soy burgers.

The researchers in this study published a paper a while back proposing that a chemical called TMAO (trimethylamine N-oxide) increases the risk of heart disease. In this study, they hypothesized that eating red meat may increase levels of TMAO in the bloodstream, which would in turn ramp up your chances of having a heart attack. Sounds plausible, right?

There's another hypothesis that also seemed plausible for why red meat increases the risk of heart disease (if we even accept that, which I do not; more on this in a moment). It's called the "diet-heart hypothesis", and you're all very well aware of it whether you know it by name or not. It holds that eating cholesterol and saturated fat increase cholesterol levels in the blood, and high cholesterol levels in the blood cause heart disease. This theory became so widely accepted that few people even question it anymore. The problem is it's simply not true. Recent research has shown that dietary saturated fat and cholesterol are not associated with heart disease after all, and even if they were, high cholesterol levels in the blood are not the culprit. I've written about this extensively in the past, and I will be starting a brand new series with updated information this month.

If you're paleo or Bulletproof, by now you may have heard about the New York Times and Forbes articles on a new study about red meat purporting to link it to heart disease. This post is to protect your meat rights with accurate, unbiased science.

Most people know at least one person who has - or will have - heart disease. Hundreds of commercials each day advertise drugs for heart disease. A constant drumbeat of news articles condemns saturated fat and meat as the culprit in heart disease, fueling fear with attention grabbing headlines.

Heart disease impacts all of society, even if we aren't going to get it because we have sky high HDL ("good" cholesterol) and near zero inflammation.

That's why scientists are working on novel ways to understand heart disease, and also why it's so tempting to use breakthrough research to write catchy news headlines demonizing red meat. Let's dig in on the last high profile recent news and see what it actually means for you and your health.

The government of the Netherlands, one of 27 European Union countries, continues to clamp down on alternative medicine. The Netherlands Food and Consumer Product Safety Authority (NVWA) has the tools in place to restrict communication of information about the beneficial effects of food and nutrients to promote health and effectively curb disease. And, most importantly, this bureaucracy makes all decisions as to how strict the rules are applied.

Netherlands law is backed up and strictly enforced by new EU rules based on very rigid codes regarding health claims for foods and dietary supplements. The power is held by the European Food Safety Authority (EFSA). These regulations are now in force in every European Union country.

The noose tightens

When we go back in history, we see that already in 1958 the Dutch Medicine Laws defined all substances in nature as medicines, if they were in any way presented as suitable for curing or preventing a disease. So once a common beet, or vitamin C, was associated with a preventive medicinal effect, it legally became a drug. This was the start of censorship and control, and has been buttressed by subsequent European regulations. Slowly but relentlessly, since 1958, all substances in nature are being brought into the realm of medical care.

Since December 14, 2012, the date the new EU rules came into force, the stage is set for stepped-up enforcement of the law. This serves the pharmaceutical-dominated belief system of the controlling officials that "medical claims" (like how vitamin C helps against colds) are illegal. Now huge fines up to $30,000 may be imposed. Doctors, therapists and other clinicians are at risk . . . even journalists and publishers. We think you'd better know what's going on and learn from people who were unlucky. Perhaps "unlucky" is not the precise word. "Victimized" might be more accurate.

Here's an outrage that must be changed: Big Pharma has been systematically price-gouging the Medicare program for seniors and people with disabilities -- and raking in billions in excessive profits. The 11 largest global drug companies made an astonishing $711 billion in profits over the 10 years ending in 2012, and they got a turbo-charged boost when the Medicare Part D prescription drug program started in 2006, according to an analysis of corporate filings by Health Care for America Now (HCAN).

The drug companies hold the power to charge America's consumers whatever they want. Worse, Medicare -- the nation's largest purchaser of drugs -- is prohibited by law from seeking better prices. The result of this shortsighted policy is dramatic. In 2006, the first year of Medicare's prescription drug program, the combined profits of the largest drug companies soared 34 percent to $76.3 billion. And unlike other industries, such as Big Oil, drug companies get something even better than a tax subsidy -- they get a government program.

There is nothing wrong with a company making profits -- that's what they're supposed to do. But the drug industry's profits are excessive as a result of overcharging American consumers and taxpayers. We pay significantly more than any other country for the exact same drugs. Per capita drug spending in the U.S. is about 40 percent higher than in Canada, 75 percent greater than in Japan and nearly triple the amount spent in Denmark.

There's a good chance you've never personally seen a factory farm or CAFO (concentrated animal feeding operations) - and there's a reason for this.

CAFOs are traditionally hidden from public view. Certain states (like Iowa, where big agriculture rules the roost economically and politically) are even considering making undercover videos taken on such farms - which often show shocking scenes of animal cruelty and filth - illegal.

Quite simply, they don't want you to see what's really going on, because if you did, you would probably turn away in disgust at the mere thought of eating the foods produced there.

Yet, the vast majority of the food produced in the United States comes from these industrial-sized CAFOs.

In the documentary film above, A River of Waste: The Hazardous Truth About Factory Farms, you can see first-hand the toll that the modern industrial system of meat and poultry production has on human health and the environment, and realize why a prompt call to action is urgently needed.

By now, many environmentally conscious consumers are wary of bisphenol A, a chemical in food containers, plastic bottles and other household items.

A California state agency is wary, too, and will soon decide whether to call the compound a reproductive toxicant and place restrictions on it. In 2009, when it last took up the matter, a panel of experts said there wasn't enough evidence.

Since then, a flurry of research in the Bay Area and across the nation has made deeper inroads into understanding the role that BPA may play in cardiovascular disease, neurodevelopment, infertility and other health conditions.

Scientists still don't entirely understand BPA, which is believed to be an endocrine disruptor that mimics the hormone estrogen. But dozens of studies published in the last three or so years have brightened the spotlight on a chemical that scientists estimate exists in the bodies of 90 percent of the U.S. population.

British supermarket chain Asda has recalled all of its budget corned beef range after veterinary drug phenylbutazone was found in some samples.

The product was withdrawn last month after traces of horse DNA were discovered, and further analysis revealed the presence of "bute" at the level of four parts per billion (4ppb).

It is the first time bute has been found in a meat sample, according to the Food Standards Agency, and no other Asda products are thought to be affected. The FSA assured customers that the chances of anyone falling ill after eating such meat were minimal.

"Horse meat containing phenylbutazone presents a very low risk to human health," said Chief Medical Officer Professor Dame Sazone.

"Phenylbutazone, known as bute, is a commonly used medicine in horses. It is also prescribed to some patients who are suffering from a severe form of arthritis."

Millions of ready meals have been pulled from supermarket shelves across Europe after tests revealed that meat labelled as beef actually contained large quantities of horsemeat.