"First need in the reform of hospital management? That's easy! The death of all dietitians, and the resurrection of a French chef." ~ Martin H Fischer quotes

Modern science is beginning to vindicate the ancient wisdom of our palates ... Butter, for instance, and without which -- some argue -- French cuisine would not be possible, actually contains a saturated fat (the dietetic equivalent of a four letter word!), with a trans- fatty acid configuration, that -- get this! -- lowers blood cholesterol levels, triglycerides and exhibits heart-protective properties.

Known as vaccenic acid, this naturally occuring trans-fatty acid is found in the fat of ruminants, e.g. goats, cows, deer, and is also found in human milk. It is converted into rumenic acid, a type of conjugated linoleic acid, which is known to have a broad range of potential health benefits.

Butter, after all, contains fat ... rich, warm, satisfying and yummy fat. Fat, having been exorcised from the American diet for so long in favor of simple and complex carbohydrates, has been an essential nutrient (and a key constituent of all the tissues in our body) that many of us have been told we must go without, lest we die of clogged arteries. Instead, we are dying of clogged arteries from the carbohydrate heavy, oxidized unsaturated fatty acid-rich diet that was supposed to be much healthier for us. An ounce of fat is equal to a pound of carbohydrate, when it comes to staving off primal cravings for authentic nourishment.

Less than one month after Pfizer recalled nearly 1 million packages of faulty birth control pills, Glenmark Generics has recalled its version of the oral contraceptives because of a packaging error that landed the pills in the wrong order.

The India-based drug company has warned that seven lots of norgestimate and ethinyl estradiol tablets distributed to U.S. pharmacies between Sept. 21 and Dec. 30, 2011, "could leave women without adequate contraception, and at risk for unintended pregnancy."

"Select blisters were rotated 180 degrees within the card, reversing the weekly tablet orientation and making the lot number and expiry date visible only on the outer pouch," the company said in a statement released Friday, explaining the packaging error.

There is something rather disturbing happening behind-the-scenes in the Paleo community that I've seen unfolding before my eyes over the past six months or so. And in fact, it is becoming even more overt lately with various prominent bloggers writing about their questioning of long-term low-carb dieting for optimal health, including highly-respected people such as Dr. Kurt Harris, Stephan Guyenet, Richard Nikoley, Chris Kresser, Paul Jaminet, Danny Roddy, Dr. Garrett Smith, Matt Stone, and I'm sure many others. At the same time low-carb stalwarts like Dr. Jack Kruse have tried to bridge the gap that's beginning to grow between the Paleo and low-carb communities with a workable solution for us all to follow.

PaleoHacks.com featured a question last summer questioning whether Paleo is low-carb or not and noted this sudden shift away from the low-carb aspect that some people choose to include as part of their Paleo diet. It's all leading to a great deal of confusion and concern in the low-carb community with innocent people not knowing who or what to believe anymore. That's why this is disturbing to me and could quite possibly jeopardize the entire ancestral health movement if we're not careful to be mindful of the damage that is being done to the overall cause. There's still time to mitigate any damage that has been done and to unite behind the overall mission to help those people who just don't care about nutrition and how it impacts their health.

I will clear one issue up right away for the sake of getting it out there. No, a Paleo diet isn't necessarily a low-carb one. But as Professor Loren Cordain author of The Paleo Diet told me in a pre-interview chat I recorded last week (listen to the full interview airing on March 7, 2012 on The Livin' La Vida Low-Carb Show), "The evolutionary diet supports low-carb...it's a pretty good fit." When I brought up to him how I'm disheartened that there has been this sudden rise in antagonism about low-carb from the Paleo community lately, Cordain was quick to point out that, "It's very difficult to eat Paleo and eat high-carb. I don't think most people can do it." So what's the deal with all these subtle and not-so-subtle attempts to disparage a way of eating that is beloved by so many of us for being a lifesaver for our health?

"According to Hippocratic tradition, the safety level of a preventive medicine must be very high, as it is aimed at protecting people against diseases that they may not contract." ~ Marc Girard, Autoimmune hazards of hepatitis B vaccine.

Startling new research published in the journal Apoptosisindicates that hepatitis B vaccine, which is designed to prevent Hepatitis B virus-induced damage to the liver, actually causes liver cell destruction.

In the study titled "Hepatitis B vaccine induces apoptotic death in Hepa1-6 cells," researchers set out to "...establish an in vitro model system amenable to mechanistic investigations of cytotoxicity induced by hepatitis B vaccine, and to investigate the mechanisms of vaccine-induced cell death."

They found the hepatitis B vaccine induced a "loss of mitochondrial integrity, apoptosis induction, and cell death" in liver cells exposed to a low dose of adjuvanted hepatitis B vaccine. The adjuvant used was aluminum hydroxide, which is increasingly being identified as a contributing cause of autoimmune disease in immunized populations.

The discovery that the hepatitis B vaccine damages the liver (hepatotoxicity) confirms earlier findings (1999) that the vaccine increases the incidence of liver problems in U.S. children less than 6 years old by up to 294% versus unvaccinated controls.

Another study published in the journal Hepatogastroentology in 2002, observed that Hepatitis B vaccination was statistically associated with gastrointestinal reactions including: hepatitis, gastrointestinal disease and liver function test abnormalities in comparison to other vaccine control groups.

This, however, is only the tip of the iceberg...

A gluten-free, casein-free diet may lead to improvements in behavior and physiological symptoms in some children diagnosed with an autism spectrum disorder (ASD), according to researchers at Penn State. The research is the first to use survey data from parents to document the effectiveness of a gluten-free, casein-free diet on children with ASD.

"Research has shown that children with ASD commonly have GI [gastrointestinal] symptoms," said Christine Pennesi, medical student at Penn State College of Medicine. "Notably, a greater proportion of our study population reported GI and allergy symptoms than what is seen in the general pediatric population. Some experts have suggested that gluten- and casein-derived peptides cause an immune response in children with ASD, and others have proposed that the peptides could trigger GI symptoms and behavioral problems."

The team -- which included Laura Cousino Klein, associate professor of biobehavioral health and human development and family studies -- asked 387 parents or primary caregivers of children with ASD to complete a 90-item online survey about their children's GI symptoms, food allergy diagnoses, and suspected food sensitivities, as well as their children's degree of adherence to a gluten-free, casein-free diet. The team's results appeared online this month in the journal Nutritional Neuroscience.

A diet lacking in omega-3 fatty acids, nutrients commonly found in fish, may cause your brain to age faster and lose some of its memory and thinking abilities.

Omega-3 fatty acids include the nutrients called docosahexaenoic acid (DHA) and eicosapentaenoic acid (EPA).

The link between omega-3's and brain aging comes from a study published in Neurology, the medical journal of the American Academy of Neurology.

More: Supplement Your Knowledge of Omega Fats

"People with lower blood levels of omega-3 fatty acids had lower brain volumes that were equivalent to about two years of structural brain aging," said study author Zaldy S. Tan, MD, MPH, of the Easton Center for Alzheimer's Disease Research and the Division of Geriatrics, University of California at Los Angeles.

For the study, 1,575 people with an average age of 67 and free of dementia underwent MRI brain scans. They were also given tests that measured mental function, body mass and the omega-3 fatty acid levels in their red blood cells.

Scientists at Washington University School of Medicine in St. Louis have made a surprising discovery about the origin of diabetes. Their research suggests that problems controlling blood sugar -- the hallmark of diabetes -- may begin in the intestines.

The new study, in mice, may upend long-held theories about the causes of the disease. Because insulin is produced in the pancreas and sugar is stored in the liver, many scientists have looked to those organs for the underlying causes of diabetes.

The findings are reported Feb. 16 in the journal Cell Host & Microbe.

In the new research, scientists studied mice that are unable to make fatty acid synthase (FAS) in the intestine. FAS, an enzyme crucial for the production of lipids, is regulated by insulin, and people with diabetes have defects in FAS. Mice without the enzyme in the intestines develop chronic inflammation in the gut, a powerful predictor of diabetes.

"Diabetes may indeed start in your gut," says principal investigator Clay F. Semenkovich, MD. "When people become resistant to insulin, as happens when they gain weight, FAS doesn't work properly, which causes inflammation that, in turn, can lead to diabetes."

A new strain of influenza A has been found in fruit bats, indicating for the first time that bats, like birds, can be carriers of the virus, though it is not believed risky to humans, according to US health authorities.

"This is the first time an influenza virus has been identified in bats, but in its current form the virus is not a human health issue," said Suxiang Tong, head of the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention's pathogen discovery program.

"The study is important because the research has identified a new animal species that may act as a source of flu viruses."

The influenza A virus was detected in a sample of three of 316 live little yellow-shouldered bats captured at two different sites in Guatemala.

That type of bat is not known to bite humans but feeds on fruit, and is native to Central and South America.

Previous flu pandemics, such as the 2009 H1N1 pandemic, which came to the public's attention as "swine flu," have been known to originate in animals and eventually transform so that they gain the ability to infect people.

"Fortunately, initial laboratory testing suggests the new virus would need to undergo significant changes to become capable of infecting and spreading easily among humans," said Ruben Donis, chief of the Molecular Virology and Vaccines Branch in CDC's Influenza Division.

"A different animal -- such as a pig, horse or dog -- would need to be capable of being infected with both this new bat influenza virus and human influenza viruses for reassortment to occur."

More details about the findings are published in the US journal the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences.

Chicago - Is it possible that artificial colors added to our food could be causing behavioral problems in children?

Concerns about synthetic food dyes led many manufacturers in Europe to stop using then. But as CBS 2's Mary Kay Kleist reports, the dyes are used here in everything from cereal to crackers to toothpaste.

Doctors diagnosed Kendall King with Attention Deficit Hyperactivity Disorder, or ADHD, last year and put her on powerful drugs.

But her mother, Kelly King, says, "It just didn't feel right to me."

Bellinger, DC. 2012. A strategy for comparing the contributions of environmental chemical and other risk factors to children's neurodevelopment. Environmental Health Perspectives.

Three common environmental chemicals-- lead, organophosphate pesticides and methylmercury-- may have effects on children's IQ in the overall population to the impacts of major medical conditions such as preterm birth or ADHD - two of the most prevalent in U.S. children. The finding from this reanalysis of published data hints that the societal toll of exposures to these invisible yet widespread contaminants - lead, organophosphate pesticides and methylmercury - may be more severe than what previous studies of individual risk would suggest.

Lead had the most severe calculated impact, with an estimated drop in IQ of 23 million points in the population. In contrast, the predicted loss due to preterm birth was 13 million points. Any drop in IQ is considered detrimental to people's success and society's needs.

In one of the first studies of its kind, the author analyzed published data from 25.5 million children and compared estimates of population-wide IQ loss from exposures to those of several well-known childhood medical conditions. This new approach to categorizing population risk could help researchers identify the most harmful exposures and evaluate the success of intervention programs.