Health & WellnessS


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Monsanto threatens to sue over GMO labeling in Vermont

Christina Sarich
Natural Society
Tue, 25 Mar 2014 02:11 UTC
GMO Protest
© Natural Society
The citizens of Vermont want GMO foods to be labeled. As NaturalSociety's Anthony Gucciardi reported in 2013, a bill which has already passed the House awaits a final O.K. by the Senate. If Monsanto gets their way though, as made evident in heated testimony given at the Statehouse this past Wednesday before a Judiciary Committee, not only will the bill get stalled in the Senate, but Monsanto points to the fact that the state will have to spend around a million dollars just to defend the bill in court.

You can guess who is on Monsanto's latest pay-roll. Sen. Dick Sears, D-Bennington, chairman of the Senate Judiciary committee warned that, although he 'supports a labeling bill', he feels that there are potential litigation costs which could hinder state finances.

He also mentions that dairy would also be excluded from the bill, but currently there is no GMO dairy in Vermont.

Agreeing with Monsanto's interests and testifying that the new law would have to be defended is Assistant Attorney General Bridget Asay, stating that even if the state was successful in passing a GMO-labeling bill, the legal challenge could end up costing more than $5 million, and the state would not be able to recover legal fees. She estimates that the total cost would include potential reimbursement for a victorious plaintiff - Monsanto, Dow, Syngenta, and their poison-filled coffers.

The 'expert' testimony arguing against the labeling law likely did not include the potential costs if genetically modified organisms are allowed to continue to run rampant in our food supply - including costs to organic farmers, and the possibility that just three companies could end up owning the seed rights to just about every food we eat, once they are genetically modified and have cross-pollinated non-GMO crops.
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Alarm Clock

Roundup's reach: Present in all tested human and animal samples

Sayer Ji
Greenmedinfo.com
Tue, 18 Mar 2014 15:58 UTC
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"The presence of glyphosate residues in both humans and animals could haul the entire population towards numerous health hazards, studying the impact of glyphosate residues on health is warranted and the global regulations for the use of glyphosate may have to be re-evaluated."

A newly released study published in Environmental & Analytical Toxicology highlights the chemical dangers associated with the GMO agricultural system, which relies heavily on the herbicide known as glyphosate (aka Roundup), and to which widespread exposure through the environment and our food is increasingly becoming inevitable.

The study titled, "Detection of Glyphosate in Animals and Humans," aimed to investigate glyphosate residues in different biological samples from humans and animals, in order to gain insight into the modern day exposure situation.
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Arrow Up

Butter consumption reaches a 40-year high

Dr. Mercola
Mercola.com
Mon, 24 Mar 2014 12:36 UTC
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© twochums.com
Long vilified butter is making a comeback. Butter consumption in the US has reached its 40-year peak, according to new data from the dairy industry. The butter boom, at least in part, has been attributed to a shift in consumer preferences away from processed foods and back toward natural foods.

It has also helped that USDA began the process of banning trans fats from the American food supply last fall.1

During the past decade, Americans have increased their butter intake by 25 percent - but it's really taken off over the past five years. Butter consumption has now reached 5.6 pounds per capita, compared to 4.1 pounds in 1997.2 While butter hit its 40-year high, margarine fell to its 70-year low.

Even Unilever Foods (maker of Country Crock margarine) just added real butter to Rama, their most popular spread in Germany, in order to rescue dwindling sales.3

After decades of believing the myth that butter clogs arteries and causes heart attacks, people are now beginning to realize that partially hydrogenated vegetable oils, margarine, and shortening.

So-called "heart healthy spreads," are the culprits - not wholesome saturated fats like butter. The now discredited "lipid hypothesis"4 is thankfully going the way of bloodletting and lobotomies. It's time to bury the myth that butter is bad for you - for good.


Comment: Read more on Why Butter is Better:

10 Reasons Why I Love Butter
Butter and your heart: The facts
In Defense of Nutritious, Delicious Grassfed Butter
Ghee or Clarified Butter: A Good Source of Saturated Fat
Butter is bad - a myth we've been fed by the 'healthy eating' industry

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Life Preserver

Conquer insomnia for good

Richard Wiseman
Mail Online
Tue, 25 Mar 2014 11:01 UTC
In a major new book, Professor Richard Wiseman explains the simple tricks and techniques you can use to get the sleep you need.
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© Getty imagesPerhaps the worst aspect of spending the night feeling you¿re unable to sleep is the anxiety it causes. Over the course of a night, this anxiety disrupts your sleep even more, creating a vicious downwards cycle
How much sleep did you get last night? If the answer is 'not much', then you're not alone. A third of us have difficulty sleeping, and perhaps the worst aspect of spending the night feeling you're unable to sleep is the anxiety it causes. Over the course of a night, this anxiety disrupts your sleep even more, creating a vicious downwards cycle.

If this sounds familiar, the first thing to remember is that you are probably getting more sleep than you think. Research shows that we all tend to underestimate how much of the night we spend sleeping.

In one study, for instance, the time insomniacs spent actually sleeping during the night was compared with how much they thought they had slept. The insomniacs were convinced that they had slept for only an average of about three hours per night, whereas in reality they had been asleep for an average of nearer seven hours.

Psychologist Jeremy Mercer, from Flinders University in South Australia, has attempted to discover the cause of this strange phenomenon. In one study he invited insomniacs to his sleep laboratory, woke them when tests showed they were in the 'dreaming' stage of sleep known as Rapid Eye Movement (REM) and asked them whether they had just been asleep.

Remarkably, many of the volunteers believed that they had been wide awake despite having been sound asleep, thus raising the intriguing possibility that they were essentially dreaming about being awake.
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Bacon n Eggs

Mainstream psychiatrists getting up to speed with new research linking diet and mental health

Gisela Telis
The Washington Post
Mon, 24 Mar 2014 09:35 UTC
meat
© unknown
Jodi Corbitt had been battling depression for decades and by 2010 had resigned herself to taking antidepressant medication for the rest of her life. Then she decided to start a dietary experiment.

To lose weight, the 47-year-old Catonsville, Md., mother stopped eating gluten, a protein found in wheat and related grains. Within a month she had shed several pounds - and her lifelong depression.

"It was like a veil lifted and I could see life more clearly," she recalled. "It changed everything."

Corbitt had stumbled into an area that scientists have recently begun to investigate: whether food can have as powerful an impact on the mind as it does on the body.

Comment: For more of the benefits of the ketogenic diet see:

The Ketogenic Diet - An Overview

Beyond weight loss: a review of the therapeutic uses of very-low-carbohydrate (ketogenic) diets

The fat-fueled brain: unnatural or advantageous?

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Clipboard

Survey: Half of American adults believe in at least one medical conspiracy theory

Andrew M. Seaman
Yahoo! News
Tue, 18 Mar 2014 16:27 UTC
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© ASheepnomore.net
About half of American adults believe in at least one medical conspiracy theory, according to new survey results.

Some conspiracy theories have much more traction than others, however.

For example, three times as many people believe U.S. regulators prevent people from getting natural cures as believe that a U.S. spy agency infected a large number of African Americans with the human immunodeficiency virus (HIV).

J. Eric Oliver, the study's lead author from University of Chicago, said people may believe in conspiracy theories because they're easier to understand than complex medical information.

"Science in general - medicine in particular - is complicated and cognitively challenging because you have to carry around a lot of uncertainty," Oliver said.

Comment:
Those who believe in medical conspiracies and actually question the junk science of modern medicine have facts and reasons that support their views:

Nigeria launches seven billion dollar case against Pfizer
Almost 800 adverse reactions to swine flu vaccine identified
New Scientific Data Forces Government to Reverse Its Stance on Fluoride in the Water Supply
New GMO Food Additives To Be Introduced Without Full Safety Appraisal
Doctor Psychopath: Anatomy of a tragedy
Top ten actual medical conspiracies
The cholesterol - heart disease scam: How the medical-industrial complex is raking in billions at our expense
Scientists fail to find a link between saturated fat and heart disease
Plants Bite Back: The Surprising, All-Natural Anti-Nutrients and Toxins in Plant Foods

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Attention

Canada: suspected Ebola in returning traveler

Mouctar Bah
Agence France Press
Tue, 25 Mar 2014 06:19 UTC
Health officials in Guinea battled to contain west Africa's first outbreak of the deadly Ebola virus as neighbouring Liberia reported its first suspected victims and a traveller returning to Canada was hospitalised with suspicious symptoms.
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© AFP Photo/Cynthia GoldsmithAn electron micrograph image of an Ebola virus virion obtained March 24, 2014 from the Centers for Disease Control (CDC) in Atlanta, Georgia
At least 59 people are known to have died in Guinea's southern forests and there are six suspected cases in Liberia which, if confirmed, would mark the first spread of the highly contagious pathogen into another country.

And there are fears the virus may have crossed continents, with a man returning to Canada from Liberia seriously ill in hospital after experiencing symptoms consistent with the virus, health officials said.

"As of this morning six cases have been reported of which five have already died -- four female adults and one male child. One of the suspected cases, a female child, is under treatment," Liberian Health Minister Walter Gwenigale said in a statement.
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Health

Guinea Ebola outbreak thought to have spread to Liberia

Mouctar Bah
Agence France Press
Tue, 25 Mar 2014 06:12 UTC
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© AFP Photo/P.Déré/V.LefaiMap locating towns hit by Guinea's Ebola outbreak
Aid workers and health officials in Guinea battled Monday to contain west Africa's first outbreak of the deadly Ebola virus as neighbouring Liberia reported its first suspected victims.

At least 59 people are known to have died in Guinea's southern forests but the Liberian cases, if confirmed, would mark the first spread of the highly contagious pathogen into another country.

"As of this morning six cases have been reported of which five have already died -- four female adults and one male child. One of the suspected cases, a female child, is under treatment," Liberian Health Minister Walter Gwenigale said in a statement.

"The team is already investigating the situation, tracing contacts, collecting blood samples and sensitising local health authorities on the disease," he added.

Gwenigale did not specify the victims' nationalities, but Doctors Without Borders (MSF) said they were Liberian residents who had attended funerals in the Ebola-hit area of Guinea, which has strong "family ties" with northern Liberia.

"People come to attend funerals on one side and unfortunately they unwittingly get infected and then return home," Brussels-based MSF emergency coordinator Marie-Christine Ferir told AFP.
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Health

Rashes from wipes, liquid soaps on the rise

HealthDay News
my foxny.com
Sun, 23 Mar 2014 14:13 UTC
Rash
© iStockphoto.com / Tracy Hebden
Allergic skin reactions to a preservative used in pre-moistened wipes and liquid soaps are on the increase, a doctor says.

"In the last two or three years, we've suddenly seen a big increase in people with this type of allergy," Dr. Matthew Zirwas, director of the contact dermatitis center at Ohio State University's Wexner Medical Center, said in a center news release. "For some patients, their rash has been unexplained and going on for years."

The chemical preservative, methylisothiazolinone, is found in many water-based products, including pre-moistened wipes, cosmetics, liquid soaps, hair products, sunscreen, and laundry and cleaning products.
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Pills

Vascular surgeon: Why I've ditched statins for good

Haroun Gajraj
The Telegraph
Sun, 23 Mar 2014 10:15 UTC
As experts clash over proposals that millions more of us take statins to prevent heart disease and stroke, a vascular surgeon explains why he feels better without them.
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Dr Haroun Gajraj: 'After looking more closely at the research, I’d concluded that statins were not going to save me from a heart attack and that my cholesterol levels were all but irrelevant.
When I had a routine health check-up eight years ago, my cholesterol was so high that the laboratory thought there had been a mistake. I had 9.3 millimoles of cholesterol in every litre of blood - almost twice the recommended maximum.

It was quite a shock. The GP instantly prescribed statins, the cholesterol-lowering drugs that are supposed to prevent heart disease and strokes. For eight years, I faithfully popped my 20mg atorvastatin pills, without side effects. Then, one day last May, I stopped. It wasn't a snap decision; after looking more closely at the research, I'd concluded that statins were not going to save me from a heart attack and that my cholesterol levels were all but irrelevant.

Comment: Vascular surgeons write a damning report about lowering cholesterol drugs:

The statin industry is the utmost medical tragedy of all times.

See also:

- No reason at all to limit saturated fat in the diet according to the largest most comprehensive review
- From the Heart: Saturated fat is not the major issue
- Consequences of replacing saturated fats with carbohydrates or Ω-6 polyunsaturated fats: The dietary guidelines have it wrong

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