Year: 2006

The BBC stretched a bit to get the headline:

Eating pizza “cuts cancer risk”

“Researchers claim eating pizza regularly reduced the risk of developing oesophageal cancer by 59%. The risk of developing colon cancer also fell by 26% and mouth cancer by 34%, they claimed. The secret could be lycopene, an antioxidant chemical in tomatoes, which is thought to offer some protection against cancer, and which gives the fruit its traditional red colour.”

You could get the lycopene without eating the pizza… but, OK, at least they are giving the credit to the lycopene in the tomatoes! Even though they call it a “chemical” rather than a naturally occurring nutritional component of the herb.

I couldn’t agree more with the sentiment of this article! But, beyond what the writer says about “medicalizing” bad behavior, there is also the trend to make every little thing a “medical condition” in order to sell a drug for it! “Restless Leg Syndrome” comes to mind. Right.

Stop “Medicalizing” Bad Behavior!

“It may be hard to recall, but once there was a time when people took responsibility for their behavior, without recourse to the psychiatric and psychological communities. It wasn’t even all that long ago. There was a day when drug addiction, alcoholism and other pathologies were seen for what they were: human failures by individuals who had lost control of their lives. Today, however, is the day of Too Much Medicine. Today, all sorts of bad behavior is being reclassified – as one disease or another. The latest is something doctors are referring to as ‘intermittent explosive disorder’ (IED). They’re tying it to road rage, which erupts when one driver cuts off another and the battle begins.”

“Big Pharma” loves this kind of stuff. Now they can create a drug to sell to “cure” the problem that was invented. It is a shame!

An ancient Chinese herbal remedy for diabetes Type 2 has been found effective in a study.

Chinese remedy “treats diabetes”

“A gardenia fruit extract used in Chinese medicine for centuries to treat adult onset diabetes is effective, scientists have found. The US team found a chemical from the fruit blocks the action of an enzyme which stops the production of insulin. The research, published in Cell Metabolism, could lead to new drugs, the scientists said.”

Do you eat out a lot? Have you noticed that portions at restaurants are getting bigger and bigger? Well, not surprisingly, a study indicates that these factors can increase the chances of obesity.

USA Today: Federal report lays out how restaurants can help take a bite out of obesity

“A new report suggests restaurants should dish food and fight fat at the same time, meaning menus with more fruits and vegetables, smaller portions and better nutritional information. With burgers, fries and pizza the Top 3 eating-out favorites in this country, restaurants are in prime position to help improve people’s diets and combat obesity. At least that’s what is recommended in a government-commissioned report being released Friday. The report, requested and funded by the Food and Drug Administration, lays out ways to help people manage their intake of calories from the growing number of meals prepared away from home, including at the nation’s nearly 900,000 restaurants and other establishments that serve food. The 136-page report prepared by The Keystone Center, an education and public group based in Keystone, Colo., said Americans now consume fully one-third of their daily intake of calories outside the home. And as of 2000, the average American took in 300 more calories a day than was the case 15 years earlier, according to Agriculture Department statistics cited in the report. Today, 64% of Americans are overweight, including the 30% who are obese, according to the report. It pegs the annual medical cost of the problem at nearly $93 billion.”

Further recommendations ask restaurants to consider providing better nutritional information to customers.

“Anti” means “against”, while “bio” means “life,” therefore, “antibiotics” are “against life,” that is, they are designed to kill “bad things” in our system, but sometimes they do more… such is the case for “Tequin” an antibiotic that can cause serious blood sugar complications, and it is being pulled from the market by manufacturer Bristol-Myers Squibb.

Tequin Being Recalled

“In February of this year, the U.S. FDA required increased warnings on the label of the drug. It is most dangerous to diabetics, the elderly, and those with kidney disease.”

Many other antibiotics have been pulled from the market in the last few years:

* Vioxx. The king of withdrawn drugs and well documented in previous chapters for causing 60,000 fatal heart attacks and strokes and as many as 160,000 heart attacks and strokes all by itself.
* Bextra Similar drug to Vioxx, withdrawn for similar reasons.
* Rezulin: Given fast-track approval by the Food and Drug Administration (FDA), Rezulin was linked to 63 confirmed deaths and probably hundreds more. “We have real trouble,” a Food and Drug Administration (FDA) physician wrote in 1997, just a few months after Rezulin’s approval. The drug wasn’t taken off the market until 2000.
* Baycol (made by Bayer AG) – a cholesterol-lowering drug taken by 700,000 Americans – was pulled off the market on Wednesday, August 8th. It had been linked to 31 U.S. deaths. At least nine more fatalities abroad are known.
* Lotronex: Against concerns of one of its own officers, the Food and Drug Administration (FDA) approved Lotronex in February 2000. By the time it was withdrawn 9 months later, the Food and Drug Administration (FDA) had received reports of 93 hospitalizations, multiple emergency bowel surgeries, and 5 deaths.
* Propulsid: A top-selling drug for many years, this drug was linked to hundreds of cases of heart arrhythmias and over 100 deaths.
* Redux: Taken by millions of people for weight loss after its approval in April 1996, Redux was soon linked to heart valve damage and a disabling, often lethal pulmonary disorder. Taken off the market in September 1997.
* Pondimin: A component of Fen-Phen, the diet fad drug. Approved in 1973, Pondimin’s link to heart valve damage and a lethal pulmonary disorder wasn’t recognized until shortly before its withdrawal in 1997.
* Duract: This painkiller was taken off the market when it was linked to severe, sometimes fatal liver failure.
* Seldane: America’s and the world’s top-selling antihistamine for a decade, it took the Food and Drug Administration (FDA) 5 years to recognize that Seldane was causing cardiac arrhythmias, blackouts, hospitalizations, and deaths, and another 8 years to take it off the market.
* Hismanal: Approved in 1988 and soon known to cause cardiac arrhythmias, the drug was finally taken off the market in 1999.
* Posicor: Used to treat hypertension, the drug was linked to life-threatening drug interactions and more than 100 deaths.
* Raxar: Linked to cardiac toxicities and deaths.
* Cylert FDA received 13 reports of pemoline-associated hepatic failure leading to liver transplantation or death, representing an incidence rate 10 to 25 times greater than that of the general population.
* Palladone Withdrawn due to a high risk of accidental overdose when administered with alcohol
* Tysabri Was expected to become the world’s leading treatment for MS, but was pulled from the market after a patient died from a rare central nervous system infection.

Genesis 6:3 (Modern King James Version) “And Jehovah said, My spirit shall not always strive with man, in his erring; he is flesh. Yet his days shall be a hundred and twenty years.” (Emphasis mine.)

Oldest Living Woman Turns 128

128 years! It gives us something to shoot for… and it IS possible! Happy Birthday, Cruz!

I have been saying that this has been going on a LONG time! Now, others apparently are seeing it as well!

Drug Companies Are Inventing “New Diseases!”

“The practice of ‘diseasemongering’ by the drug industry is promoting non-existent illnesses or exaggerating minor ones for the sake of profits, according to a set of essays published by the open-access journal Public Library of Science Medicine. The special issue, edited by David Henry, of Newcastle University in Australia, and Ray Moynihan, an Australian journalist, reports that conditions such as female sexual dysfunction, attention deficit hyperactivity disorder (ADHD) and ‘restless legs syndrome’ have been promoted by companies hoping to sell more of their drugs.”

This is unconscionable. As the old saying goes, “Caveat Emptor,” (Let the buyer beware.) You need to realize that healthcare is just another area of commerce to these people, and scams are still scams! Dr. Mercola in his Health Blog puts it well: “Always remember that the drug companies are trying to sell you something. They’re not really concerned whether you’re sick, well, get healthy, or stay ill; they just want to get you to buy their products so they can increase profits to their shareholders. That is the mandate of nearly every corporation, and I haven’t seen a drug company that has gone off this path. And they will do whatever it takes to do that, including selling you cures for diseases that don’t exist.”

Well, Naturopaths and other Natural Health professionals have been saying for years that our fruits and vegetables are losing nutritional value over the “days of yesteryear.” Now, it seems that the more mainstream health world is coming to understand this as well.

Fruits and Veggies Losing Nutritional Value

“Donald Davis, a biochemist at the University of Texas, said that of 13 major nutrients in fruits and vegetables tracked by the Agriculture Department from 1950 to 1999, six showed noticeable declines — protein, calcium, phosphorus, iron, riboflavin and vitamin C. The declines ranged from 6 percent for protein, 15 percent for iron, 20 percent for vitamin C, and 38 percent for riboflavin. ‘It’s an amazing thing,’ said Davis, adding that the decline in nutrient content has not been widely noticed.'”

“Not been widely noticed…” except for the natural health field. Come on, folks!

So… yet another drug is approved for “over the counter” sales… this time a fat blocker that has been linked in one study to abnormal cell growth… which could lead to cancer.

FDA Approves Dangerous Fat Blocker

“In one study, Xenical was found to cause abnormal cell growth in the lining of the colon, an early cancer indicator. And, since Xenical has been approved as a prescription drug in America, 28 incidents of breast cancer have been reported, or 14 times the number who used the appetite depressant Meridia.”

Omega-3 fatty acids could prevent or inhibit the growth of liver cancer cells, say researchers from the University of Pittsburgh at today’s annual meeting of the American Association for Cancer Research:

Omega-3s Could Stop Liver Cancer Cells Growth

“’It has been known for some time that omega-3 fatty acids can inhibit certain cancer cells. So, we were interested in determining whether these substances could inhibit liver cancer cells. If so, we also wanted to know by what mechanism this inhibition occurs,’ explained lead researcher Tong Wu, from the University of Pittsburgh School of Medicine.”