Posts Tagged ‘United States’

by Paul Armentano, NORML

Cannabis and its active constituents appear to be safe and modestly effective treatments in patients suffering from a variety of chronic pain conditions, including neuropathy (pain due to nerve damage), according to a literature review to be published in The Clinical Journal of Pain.

An investigator from New York University, Department of Physical Medicine and Rehabilitation, conducted a PubMed search to survey the percentage of positive and negative published randomized controlled trials (RCTs) assessing cannabinoids as treatments for pain. Of the 56 hits generated, 38 published RCTs met inclusion criteria. Of these, “71 percent (27) concluded that cannabinoids had empirically demonstrable and statistically significant pain relieving effects, whereas 29 percent (11) did not.”

Cannabinoids appeared to be most effective in treating hard-to-treat neuropathic pain conditions. “[F]or notoriously difficult to treat conditions such as HIV neuropathy, … cannabinergic pain medicines, particularly inhaled cannabinoid botanicals, are one of the only treatments that have been shown to be safe and effective with the highest levels of evidence,” the review states.

Five to ten percent of the US population is estimated to suffer from neuropathic pain at some point during their lives.

The study concludes, “Overall, based on the existing clinical trials database, cannabinergic pain medicines have been shown to be modestly effective and safe treatments in patients with a variety of chronic pain conditions. … Incorporating cannabinergic medicine topics into pain medicine education seems warranted and continuing clinical research and empiric treatment trials are appropriate.”

A separate paper, published in January in the Harm Reduction Journal, concluded: “Prescribing cannabis in place of opioids for neuropathic pain may reduce the morbidity and mortality rates associated with prescription pain medications and may be an effective harm reduction strategy.”

by Michael Snyder, BLN

Most Americans do not realize this, but we are on the verge of a major doctor shortage in the United States.  All over America, good doctors are going broke.  The way that our health care system is currently set up, they simply cannot make it.  These days a lot of politicians are warning us about the dangers of “socialized medicine”, but the truth is that we already have it.  About half of all health care dollars in the United States are now spent by the federal government, and a lot of health insurance companies base reimbursements on what the federal government does.  In addition, there are a whole host of parasites that have gotten between the doctor and the patient these days.  Everyone wants a piece of the health care pie.  Health insurance companies, pharmaceutical giants, lawyers, health care “administrators” and government bureaucrats all make a sweet living off of the doctor/patient relationship.  It really is sickening.  And now Obamacare is going to make things much, much worse.  As you will read about later in this article, a stunning percentage of doctors say that they plan to leave the medical profession because of Obamacare.  What this means is that we are headed for a chronic doctor shortage and there is a good chance that there will be no doctor for you when you really need one in the years ahead.

Today, approximately 40 percent of all doctors in the United States are 55 years of age or older.  Large numbers of them are getting ready to retire.

Even before Obamacare was passed, we were already facing a massive shortage of doctors in the coming years.  The American Association of Medical Colleges has projected that we will experience a shortage of more than 150,000 doctors over the next 15 years.

Unfortunately, the passage of Obamacare is going to make this crisis even worse.  A whole host of surveys have shown that a massive number of doctors in America are headed for the exits because of the new health care law….

*According to a Merritt Hawkins survey of 2,379 doctors for the Physicians Foundation that was conducted in August 2010, 40 percent of all U.S. doctors plan to “retire, seek a nonclinical job in health care, or seek a job or business unrelated to health care” at some point over the next three years.

*A shocking IBD/TPP Poll taken in 2010 found that 45 percent of all U.S. doctors are considering leaving the medical profession or retiring early as a result of Obamacare.

At the moment, there are approximately 960,000 doctors in the United States.

So what is going to happen if a couple hundred thousand of them suddenly leave the medical profession?

Already we were in desperate need of a lot more doctors.  The following comes from an article in the Wall Street Journal….

Health-care reform will add an estimated 32 million people to the ranks of the insured, driving them to seek medical attention that in the past they may have avoided due to expense. The aging population will also create much greater demand. The number of seniors who need more medical care is expected to soar to 72 million by 2020—nearly double today’s number.

So what is going to happen if the number of doctors starts declining rapidly?

Most Americans think of doctors as being “wealthy”, but that is not the reality of what is going on out there these days as a recent CNN article explained….

Doctors in America are harboring an embarrassing secret: Many of them are going broke.

This quiet reality, which is spreading nationwide, is claiming a wide range of casualties, including family physicians, cardiologists and oncologists.

Americans spend more on health care than anyone else in the world and yet thousands upon thousands of doctors are going broke.

How can that be?

Well, one huge contributing factor is the mismanagement of the federal government.

The following comes from an article in the New York Post….

Existing government programs already reimburse physicians at rates that are often less than the actual cost of treating a patient. Estimates suggest that on average physicians are reimbursed at roughly 78% of costs under Medicare, and just 70% of costs under Medicaid. Physicians must either make up for this shortfall by shifting costs to those patients with insurance — meaning those of us with insurance pay more — or treat patients at a loss.

So guess who has to make up the difference?

You and I.

When we go to see the doctor we get smacked with a huge bill in order to make up for the Medicare and Medicaid patients.

Things have gotten so bad that a lot of doctors won’t even see Medicare and Medicaid patients anymore.

Just check out what some researchers found when they called around to doctors in Illinois back in 2010.  The following comes from an article in the New York Times….

The study used a “secret shopper” technique in which researchers posed as the parent of a sick or injured child and called 273 specialty practices in Cook County, Ill., to schedule appointments. The callers, working from January to May 2010, described problems that were urgent but not emergencies, like diabetes, seizures, uncontrolled asthma, a broken bone or severe depression. If they were asked, they said that primary care doctors or emergency departments had referred them.

Sixty-six percent of those who mentioned Medicaid-CHIP (Children’s Health Insurance Program) were denied appointments, compared with 11 percent who said they had private insurance, according to an article being published Thursday in The New England Journal of Medicine.

Today, one out of every 6 Americans is on Medicaid.  Without Medicaid, millions of children would not receive health care.

But now large numbers of doctors are rejecting patients on Medicaid because they simply cannot afford to treat them.

And now as Obamacare is fully implemented over the next few years it is going to make our health care mess a whole lot worse.

Obamacare is going to burden our doctors with a gigantic mountain of new regulations and red tape.  It is going to become incredibly difficult to make a living as a doctor and the federal government is going to be pretty much running the entire health care system.

Did you know that Obamacare is so oppressive that it is even causing the cancellation of new hospitals?

According to the executive director of Physician Hospitals of America, Obamacare has already forced the cancellation of at least 60 doctor-owned hospitals that were scheduled to open.

In addition, as Obamacare is fully rolled out the wait to see a doctor is likely to get much longer.  If you urgently need to see a doctor you may simply be out of luck.

If you doubt this, just check out what happened in Massachusetts.  As a result of Romneycare, the average wait to see a doctor in Massachusetts is now much, much longer….

In fact, we have already seen the start of this process in Massachusetts, where Mitt Romney’s health care reforms were nearly identical to President Obama’s. Romney’s reforms increased the demand for health care but did nothing to expand the supply of physicians. In fact, by cracking down on insurance premiums, Massachusetts pushed insurers to reduce their payments to providers, making it less worthwhile for doctors to expand their practices. As a result, the average wait to get an appointment with a doctor grew from 33 days to over 55 days.

Is that the kind of health care system that you want?

The more doctors that leave the system, the worse that things are going to get.

We need a system where doctors can make a living.  It is just as simple as that.

The following is one example of a doctor that is going broke from a recent CNN article….

Beau Donegan, senior executive with a hospital cancer center in Newport Beach, Calif., is well aware of physicians’ financial woes.

“Many are too proud to admit that they are on the verge of bankruptcy,” she said. “These physicians see no way out of the downward spiral of reimbursement, escalating costs of treating patients and insurance companies deciding when and how much they will pay them.”

Donegan knows an oncologist “with a stellar reputation in the community” who hasn’t taken a salary from his private practice in over a year. He owes drug companies $1.6 million, which he wasn’t reimbursed for.

The following is another example from that same article….

Dr. Neil Barth is that oncologist. He has been in the top 10% of oncologists in his region, according to U.S. News Top Doctors’ ranking. Still, he is contemplating personal bankruptcy.

That move could shutter his 31-year-old clinical practice and force 6,000 cancer patients to look for a new doctor.

Are you starting to get the picture?

There are already not enough doctors, and the number of doctors is going to continue to decline unless something is done.

We need to fundamentally restructure the way that health care is done in the United States.  What we are doing now is not working, and Obamacare is going to make things much worse.

Today, the average medical school student graduates with over $295,000 of student loan debt.

So if doctors can’t make any money, then where is the incentive to go into so much debt?

Something has gone very wrong.

It isn’t as if we are not spending enough money on health care.  Just consider the following stats….

-What the United States spent on health care in 2009 was greater than the entire GDP of Great Britain.

-According to the Bureau of Economic Analysis, health care costs accounted for just 9.5% of all personal consumption back in 1980.  Today they account for approximately 16.3%.

-Over the past decade, health insurance premiums have risen three times faster than wages have in the United States.

-According to a report released in 2010, Americans spend approximately twice as much as residents of other developed countries do on health care.

So we are definitely spending more than enough money on health care.

So where is it all going?

Well, it is going to the parasites….

-According to a report by Health Care for America Now, America’s five biggest for-profit health insurance companies ended 2009 with a combined profit of $12.2 billion.

-The chairman of Aetna, the third largest health insurance company in the United States, brought in a staggering $68.7 million during 2010. Ron Williams exercised stock options that were worth approximately $50.3 million and he raked in an additional $18.4 million in wages and other forms of compensation.  The funny thing is that he left the company and didn’t even work the whole year.

-There were more than two dozen pharmaceutical companies that made over a billion dollars in profits each during 2008.

-According to the CDC, the percentage of Americans that say that they have taken a prescription drug within the last month has risen to almost 50 percent.

-Lawyers are certainly doing their part to contribute to soaring health care costs. According to one recent study, the medical liability system in the United States added approximately $55.6 billion to the cost of health care in 2008.

Are you starting to understand?

This gigantic mess is causing an increasing number of Americans to seek medical care outside of the country.  According to numbers released by Deloitte Consulting, a whopping 875,000 Americans were “medical tourists” in 2010.

Our health care system is irretrievably broken.  The federal government has messed it up beyond all recognition and it is not going to get better any time soon.

by S.D. Wells, NaturalNews

Molecular engineers working in laboratories for Monsanto, the giant American biotech company, aregene-splicing vegetable seedlings with poisonous pesticides and herbicidesso the plants are inherently protected from the insects and worms that might damage them.The majority of products Americans eat daily contain some form of GMO soy, corn, canola (rapeseed) oil or cotton seed oil. Research shows that consuming the popular herbicide/pesticideRoundupleads to themutation of cellsin the human body, in turn fueling the development of malignant tumors and other various forms of cancer.

In other words, as the plants grow up from the ground, they already contain genes from toxic concoctions, therefore helping corporations and their “cooperating” farmers maximize profits. Some countries are terrified and outraged, knowing there arenot sufficient studies on the long term effectsfrom this bio-engineering “guessing game,” and are boycotting American exports of major vegetables, dairy, and meat products for this specific reason, including Germany.

Consider this: What if over half of all the food being sold in grocery stores contained pesticides that you couldn’t taste or smell, withno warnings on the labels, and then you got cancer from eating them after ten years? Or, what if a pregnant mother could get her baby vaccinated in the womb with an insecticide, so that no insects would ever bite the child after it was born? Would anyone be crazy enough to do it, especially if it was FDA approved?

More than 85% of all corn, soy and canola oil are GMO

The bad news is in, and it may not be changing for quite awhile. GMO vegetables and all of their by-products are not labeled as GMO in the United States.Currently, 93% of soy, canola and cottonseed oil, 86% of corn, 95% of sugar beets, 13% of squash, and rice is on the cutting board now. As much as 77% of the world’s soy is GMO also. Think for a moment about all of the popular products that have some kind of processed soy or corn in them; it would take an entire book to list them all. GM potatoes and tomatoes have been taken off the market.

To appreciate the size of thishealth and environmental disaster, one should understand the 96% rule. For the first time ever, science has created models that combine the clinical and genetic similarities of rodents, great apes and humans for determining the odds of acquiring cancer.

A comparison of genetic blueprints with that of the human genome shows that our closest living relatives share 96% of our DNA (http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/health/3…). Before now, scientists had hypothesized that it was only about 35%. The FDA and CDC quite often denounce research regarding popular cancer causing foods, additives, and artificial sweeteners because tests are only run on rats and mice, but not humans. Now we know we are affected by toxins, just like the other animals.

To pour salt in the wound, GMO pesticides not onlykill most of the nutrients in foods,but most GMO plants die after one year and new seeds must be purchased from Monsanto. It’s all part of the money making scheme (http://paraschopra.com/publications…).

What’s the cure? Eat only organic food from local farmers markets and health-food grocery stores. And if you say it’s more expensive, you’re wrong. Surgery and chemotherapy for stomach, kidney and colon cancer far exceed the price of non-GMO foods, drinks, candy and gum (and that’s with health insurance). Also, let your voice be heard about GMO labeling. (MillionsagainstMonsanto.com)

Sources for this article include:

http://www.ers.usda.gov/Data/Biotec…

http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/health/3…

http://www.newswithviews.com/Smith/…

http://www.csa.com/discoveryguides/…

http://www.betterhealth.vic.gov.au/…

http://paraschopra.com/publications…

http://news.nationalgeographic.com/…

http://www.organicconsumers.org/mon…

http://www.treehugger.com/corporate…

http://www.treehugger.com/corporate…

http://www.ghorganics.com/GM%20food…

http://www.naturalnews.com/033504_G…

http://www.buzzle.com/articles/cott…

Learn more:http://www.naturalnews.com/034209_GMOs_questions.html#ixzz1eReqB3Nu

from the IAOMT

For the first time in history, the U.S. Department of State (DOS) is evaluating international regulations that would ban mercury-containing products including silver/amalgam dental fillings, which contain 50% mercury and are already in the mouths of more than 122 million Americans.

The DOS will present their official position on the use of mercury in amalgam fillings and other medical devices at a stakeholder meeting on Monday, October 24th, from 11:00 AM to 12:30 PM at the DOS headquarters on 2201 C Street, N.W., Washington, D.C. Injured consumers and members of the International Academy of Oral Medicine and Toxicology (IAOMT) will attend the meeting to encourage a ban on mercury/silver dental amalgam fillings.

The U.S. government’s monumental decision about mercury fillings is being made in preparation for the third session of the United Nations Environmental Programme (UNEP) Intergovernmental Negotiating Committee (INC3), scheduled for later this month in Nairobi, Kenya. The committee was created with the specific purpose of developing a global, legally-binding instrument on mercury due to its significant negative effect on human health and the environment.

Mercury, a potent neurotoxin used in dental amalgam fillings, can damage the brain, kidneys, and nervous system, and is particularly harmful to the fetus and young children. Substantial, peer-reviewed, scientific evidence proving these dangers is documented in IAOMT’s Petition for Reconsideration, which was filed with the United States Food and Drug Administration (FDA) in 2009.

The hazards of mercury filings have also been addressed by other international groups. In 1991, the World Health Organization (WHO) concluded that dental amalgam is “the greatest source of mercury exposure for the general population, exceeding those from food and air.”

In the United States, President Obama has recognized the hazards of mercury since 2008, and he emphasized the need to protect children from being exposed to mercury in his September 8, 2011 speech to Congress.

Yet, no actions to defend the American public from the known risks of mercury/silver dental fillings have been taken, although a recent submission by the U.S. to UNEP’s Intergovernmental Negotiating Committee supports “further consideration of dental amalgam by the INC…with the goal of potential or gradual phasedown of dental amalgam and ongoing research for affordable, viable alternatives.”

Such a position is unacceptable to Dr. David Kennedy, past president of IAOMT, who explains, “Using the excuse of alternative materials to further delay protecting the public is illogical because safe alternatives to mercury fillings have already been used for more than 20 years.”

Leo Cashman, executive director and volunteer for the non-profit, consumer advocacy group Dental Amalgam Mercury Solutions (DAMS), agrees: “Dental amalgam is not viable when the costs of mercury poisoning to the individual, to families, and to the healthcare industry are considered.”

“If we accept the current treaty language of UNEP, WHO, and the U.S. State Department, as well as their associated health declarations that I completely disagree with, the treaty will be about an ‘infinite phase down’ which won’t even begin phasing down mercury/silver amalgam dental filling placement until 2020 the soonest, but more likely 2030, with requested exemptions by the FDI”, says Dr. David Simone, who will be representing IAOMT at the DOS meeting. He reiterates, “The way it stands now, the UNEP Mercury Instrument is designed to keep placing mercury amalgams in all populations for another 20 years at least.”

Freya Koss, President of the PA Coalition for Mercury-Free Dentistry, was diagnosed with myasthenia gravis after having an old mercury amalgam filling drilled out and replaced with a new one, and she will be at the meeting to insure that the DOS keeps mercury fillings in a proposed ban portion of the INC treaty.

Marie Flowers, President of Dental Amalgam Mercury Solutions (DAMS), experienced neurological symptoms following the removal of a mercury amalgam filling and will likewise be at the DOS meeting on Monday. Flowers has commented, “The U.S. lags behind countries such as Sweden, who initiated a mercury phase out in 1987, followed by Denmark and Norway, who banned dental mercury amalgam in 2009.

Nashville’s Fox 17 anchor Stacy Case told her personal story of mercury poisoning to the FDA at a recent Town Meeting in San Francisco: “I had four amalgams unsafely removed and replaced with four shiny mercury fillings, and I got out of bed one day and couldn’t walk.” However, Case recovered from her diagnosis of multiple sclerosis after her fillings were safely removed. Her message to the U.S. government is clear: “Use your power and position for good. Please right this wrong!”

IAOMT and other groups are strongly urging the DOS to support the position of the U.S. Government as stated in February 2009 by Nancy Sutley, Chair of the White House Council on Environmental Quality, who announced, “Mercury poses a serious threat to public health in communities around the world…The United States will play a leading role in working with other nations to craft a global, legally binding agreement that will prevent the spread of mercury into the environment and improve the health of workers, pregnant women, and children throughout the world.”

Monday’s DOS meeting about the U.S. position on the INC treaty will set the international stage for the future of mercury in dentistry, which many hope will be the end of drilling a potent neurotoxin into the mouths of an unsuspecting international public.

by Brett Lorenzen, EWG

Over the past year, industrial produce growers and pesticide makers have made much ado about EWG’s Shopper’s Guide to Pesticides in Produce, which assembles federal testing data on many fruits and vegetables and makes it easy for consumers to see which have the most pesticide residues – and which have the least. The industry has ramped up efforts to attack the Guide, with the help, ironically, of a federal grant funded with your tax dollars.

The critics claim that the Guide’s “Dirty Dozen” list discourages people from eating adequate amounts of fresh produce, arguing that none of the levels of pesticide detected are deemed unsafe by the Environmental Protection Agency. Most consumers, of course, understand perfectly well that the Shoppers Guide is a just that – a handy guide. If they are concerned about pesticide residues, it provides a concise summary of the data, which, as the industry points out, is “long and somewhat cumbersome.” And EWG makes a point of encouraging everyone to eat more fruits and vegetables, not less.

What conventional growers and their pesticide industry allies don’t like to focus on is what’s been happening with long-term trends in pesticide residues. What the data shows is that overall, the percentage of samples on which pesticides are detected has been increasing ­– from 42 percent prior to the Shopper’s Guide to more than 70 percent in 2008.

The chart below shows the overall rate of pesticide detections from 1994 to 2008. The red portion of the bar at the bottom reflects samples that carried 4 or more pesticide residues, and the grey portion at the top shows what percentage contained no residue.

There’s a break in the chart between 2002 and 2003. That’s when the US Department of Agriculture changed its sampling procedures. Before 2003, if a pesticide decomposed into multiple chemicals that were themselves on the list to be monitored, each one was counted as a separate “exposure.” But in 2003, USDA began counting the original pesticide and its breakdown offspring as just a single exposure. In effect, it changed its counting method to make the numbers smaller – at a time when pesticide formulas were getting more complex.

Despite what was (arguably) a bit of accounting sleight-of-hand, the number of different residues found on fruits and vegetables continued to rise. In fact, from the time the Shopper’s Guide made its debut in 2003 to 2008, the number of samples carrying two or more residues doubled, and the number showing four or more almost tripled. In 2003, one of every three samples contained at least one pesticide residue, and one of every 12 contained several. By 2008, nearly eight of every 10 samples contained at least one, and one in six contained four or more. The trend is similar for samples with two or three residues. The only category that shrank was samples with only one residue.

During the life of the Shopper’s Guide, in other words, your odds of being exposed to pesticide residues on fruits and vegetables have almost doubled, and your odds of being exposed to multiple pesticides have more than doubled.

Not only that, but as the next graphic shows, from 1994 to 2008 the number of samples with residues exceeding the legal limits set by EPA went up tenfold. In other words, there is a ten times greater chance that the produce you eat today is carrying residue levels EPA deems risky. Again, this is despite the fact that fewer pesticide formulations are being monitored, and more produce is being grown organically.

Why are growers applying more pesticides to fruit and vegetable crops? Farm consolidation is likely part of the reason. As this 2007 data from USDA’s Agricultural Resource Management Survey shows, more than 87 percent of the nation’s fruits and vegetables came from just 8 percent of the farms, which owned 79 percent of the cropland.  By contrast, 68 percent of the farms, combined, own only 4 percent of the land and grow less than 1 percent of the crops.

The reason is that you simply can’t raise fruits and vegetables on mega-farms profitably without using pesticides to lower labor costs. Pesticides, while expensive, are cheaper than farm workers – even when they’re underpaid. Couple this with weak regulations that simply require pesticide users to “read the label,” a lack of compliance monitoring and generous liability protections for most uses, the need to ship produce great distances to consumers, and you have an environment where larding on more pesticide always makes economic sense.

Give the consumers some credit

The more you look at the data, the more you see the real problem with US fruit and vegetable consumption. Consumers are opting for produce that is chemical-free while industrial agriculture is applying increasingly complex chemicals to its crops and ever-increasing amounts of residues are going home on its fruits and vegetables. While EPA says those residues are “safe,” growing numbers of consumers are choosing to avoid them when they can.

That consumer mistrust is largely a product of pesticides’ history. Pesticide makers (and the government) use testing regimes aimed at ensuring that their products won’t kill people immediately, but they pay scant attention to potential long-term environmental and health effects. The policy is, basically, “wait to see what happens.” Inevitably, problems eventually do show up and then tend to attract substantial publicity. Testing new chemicals on your customers is not a strong marketing strategy, but it is one the industry has relied on for more than 60 years.

It was, after all, weak regulation of agricultural chemicals that led Rachel Carson to write Silent Spring, triggering the modern environmental movement more than 60 years ago. And new concerns keep cropping up. Pesticides are under scrutiny for their effects on monarch butterfly populations and bees. They have been linked to birth defects (repeatedly) and numerous adulthealth problems. And that’s just in the last few years.

When your product is designed to kill, your marketing is based on a “trust us” mentality, and your record of pursuing profits over consumer interests is so dismal that you scare your customers, business-as-usual is not likely to be a good strategy – no matter how many taxpayer dollars you throw at it.

People don’t refuse to eat vegetables because of the Shopper’s Guide. If they refuse at all, it’s because they don’t want to eat vegetables from people they don’t trust. Big Ag constantly defends mega-farm, chemical-intensive farming methods and downplays the never-ending river of studies that show the dangers of pesticide exposure. Growers and pesticide makers should spend their money to address the real problems, rather than spending taxpayer dollars on marketing campaigns that pretend those problems don’t exist and on attacking simple consumer information tools. They should rethink their testing programs and work with the EPA to develop a system people can have faith in. They should look at how pesticides are applied and push for monitoring systems that ensure accountability and result in produce that consumers actually want. They should look at their production models and change to farm more sustainably, with less chemical dependence.

Consumers’ interest is what makes the Shopper’s Guide so popular; the Shopper’s Guide doesn’t drive consumer interest. EWG’s message is so widely heard because it gives consumers what they want. Big Ag should try that.

 

from HealthFreedomNetwork.com

We’ve heard time and again how bad white sugar is for us.  White, processed sugar is like the crack cocaine of the culinary world.  Once you’re hooked, you can’t get enough of it.  It’s extremely addictive, provides no nutrition whatsoever, and is actually nutrient-negative in that it draws nutrients from your body in leech-like fashion.

Nearly everyone at least marginally knows those facts.  So.. why does sugar do these things and, more importantly, what can those of us with a sweet tooth do to avoid it without resorting to other questionable sugar replacements like aspartame (see Issue #375) or high fructose corn syrup (HFCS)?

How Sugar Operates

White sugar comes from either sugar cane or from beets – most sugar in the United States comes from sugar beets, in fact.  Essentially, while the sugars coming from the plants themselves are somewhat different, once they’ve been through the heavy processing that white (and even brown) sugar undergoes, they’re essentially the same.

So once white sugar taken from the bag is ingested, it’s nothing like what it was when it was first harvested.  Sugar in most processed forms, in fact, is confusing to our bodies.  Most types of sugars cause our metabolism to temporarily go into overdrive (remember those sugar highs as a kid?) and this causes us to use more energy.  The sugar itself gives us most of that new energy, but the other nutrients required to keep our bodies functioning while we’re in this agitated state have to come from somewhere.

Those nutrients are usually leeched from our body itself, mostly from our bones, blood, and muscle tissue.  On a temporary basis, this is not a long-term problem since we can replace that loss.  For this reason, sugars aren’t something that should be entirely avoided per se, but they should be moderated.  Processed (non-whole or raw) sugars should be replaced with natural options whenever possible, since these options (see below) are often just as sweet and don’t have nearly the detrimental effects.

When white sugar is used continually in a diet high in its use, it leads to obesity, diabetes, and heart disease.  It likely leads to other chronic ailments like cancer as well, but there’s no direct proof of that.  These problems come because of the heightened (and prolonged) metabolism created with the long-term use of sugar and in its nutrient-leaching.  Our bodies struggle to make up for the losses, leading to obesity.

Natural Alternative to White Sugar

Probably the best alternative to processed sugar is honey, preferably organic, raw honey with no processing whatsoever.  This is not an option for diabetics, however, since honey is still a natural sugar, so it has the same blood glucose effects.

Molasses is another favorite and is easy to come by. This is actually sugar, but blackstrap molasses is not over-processed and is actually the first stage in the sugar making process.  It is still a sugar, however, so diabetics should moderate.

Another option is maple syrup (actual, natural syrup, not flavored liquid sugar).  It’s sweet, high in minerals, and tasty.  Again, however, this is a sugar, albeit natural, so it has blood glucose affects.

A great option, if you can find some, is barley malt syrup.  This is complex carbohydrates made into a syrup, but not nearly as heavily processed as HFCS. It’s gentle on the metabolism and doesn’t alter blood glucose in a measurable way.

Raw brown sugar, sold in stores under various brands with similar names, is sugar cane-based brown sugar that has skipped the final bleaching process which removes much of the raw sugar’s minerals and nutrients pulled from it.  It’s still sugar, of course.

Date sugar is good stuff and is basically the sugar naturally in dates themselves, which is very potent stuff.  Use in extreme moderation and you’ll need a lot less of it to equal white sugar in recipes.  Again, diabetics use caution.

Stevia is a relatively new thing on the market and has been promoted heavily as a sugar substitute.  Do some research and decide for yourself whether it’s a substitute for you.

Another option is to eat fruit when your sweet tooth craves.  This is the preferred option for non-recipe sugar use.  Fruit of any kind is naturally great for you in many ways, but like anything really good for you, use moderation.

by Ethan A Huff, NaturalNews

Chlorine, fluoride, and the various other chemical poisons already added to the nation’s drinking water supplies are apparently not enough for the self-appointed experts whose insatiable lust to force-medicate the world is never satisfied. A recent report inThe Dailyoffers credence to the insane notion that adding lithium, a drug currently used to treat mental disorders, to drinking water will be beneficial in helping to reduce suicide and violent crime rates.

Much likefluoride, lithium alters the brain’s normal production of serotonin and norepinephrine, which in turn artificially alters the way an individual thinks and how he or she feels about a given situation. Lithium is literally a mind-altering, antidepressant chemical substance that those promoting it openly admit modifiesbrainfunction. And yet they purport that forcibly inducing these chemicalchangeson the unwitting populations of the world is a good and acceptable idea.

“Lithium certainly dampens impulsivity, which would explain how it reducessuiciderates,” said Dr. Allan Young, a psychiatry professor at Imperial College London and big time promoter of lithium-lacedwater, toThe Daily. “When you change these resilience factors inthe brain, you see other changes too. People are less timid and shy, for example.”

And in the same conversation with that reporter, Young humorously wonders with seemingly insidious arrogance why he has received slews of angry letters from the concerned public about his proposal to mass-medicate the world with this new type ofdrug. Could it be, Dr. Young, thatpeoplewould rather think for themselves without having self-appointed “experts” like yourself superciliously play the role of God by deciding for others what they should and should not consume of their own free will?

In his push to begin poisoningwater supplieswith lithium, Young also cites Americans having been easily swayed to accept genetically-modified (GM) foods as a reason why the US is a “likely candidate for early implementation” of lithium-laced water. He and others are openly pushing to getlithiumin the water as soon as possible in order to, asThe Dailyputs it, “cultivate a more serene social order.”

Sources for this story include:

http://www.thedaily.com/page/2011/0…

Learn more:http://www.naturalnews.com/032576_lithium_drinking_water.html#ixzz1OT9wIZ3p

from Health Freedom Network Newsletter #375

Heart disease is the number one preventable killer in North America. It’s been the leading cause of death in the United States for decades. Yet 95% of heart disease-related deaths are caused by an entirely preventable problem called cellular inflammation.

Cellular inflammation is a natural response by our bodies to specific environmental conditions. This can be from oxidative stress, sympathetic stress responses, and improper cell signaling. Many common things in our current lifestyles are to blame for these types of responses and treating those root causes is key to reducing (or eliminating) heart disease.

Assuming that no other serious illnesses are present, such as diabetes, nearly every person can prevent heart disease with simple knowledge tools and without pharmaceuticals. To do this, the underlying cause of the three stresses listed above should be understood. Often, all three are present as cause-effect cycles take place.

Oxidative Stress

This is most commonly caused by excessive free radical formation and/or a deficiency in anti-oxidants in nutritional intake. When this is present, the body will do things to naturally attempt to counteract the issue at hand. In the short term, the body’s reactions are proper and work well. For the long term, however, these reactions will lead to cellular signal misalignment and other chronic issues that lead to heart disease.

The easiest way to counteract oxidative stress is to eat a natural, healthy diet full of anti-oxidant foods.

Sympathetic Stress

This usually comes as a response to oxidative stress or to other environmental stresses. A stressful career, home life, financial situation, etc. is likely to cause sympathetic stress responses. If they go on long enough, these can bring catecholamine overload, which ends in what we commonly term “burnout.” Again, these are natural responses that can often deal with the issue for the short term. Longer term, however, they are a serious problem.

The obvious fix for this situation is to eliminate the stress’ cause. This may require a change of job or career, a different lifestyle, or similar. Most of our modern lives are over-stressed because of our lifestyle choices: careers we’re unsuited for, debt-based financial decisions, and families whose every member exists in an environment of extreme stress.

Improper Cell Signaling

This problem is usually a result of either one or both of the two stresses above. Various cells in our bodies will misfire or fail to receive signals from other cells. This can happen for a variety of reasons and in a variety of ways. Most often, when measuring for heart disease risk, it will be shown in the blood’s balance of lipoprotein (a) and plasminogen.

If plasminogens are too prevalent, they will bind with the receptors that should have lipoprotein (a) instead, leading to blood clotting. Lipoprotein (a) dissolves blood clots internally while plasminogens create them – the two should always be in balance so that internally, blood clots do not form for long and externally, wounds can clot and heal. Internal blood clots are the leading cause of heart attack.

Another test would be for the presence of C Reactive Proteins (CRPs). This protein is always present in the blood, but usually at low levels. Under stress, the body produces more of it and levels will elevate in response to inflammation. For acute infections and other sicknesses, this is a good thing as CRP binds with dead or dying cells to allow for easy disposal by the body. CRPs have a short lifespan in the body (less than 48 hours), so they must be continually produced to keep levels high. Over the long term, high CRP levels can have many adverse effects on the body, possibly including cancer.

Reducing CRP levels can be accomplished first by removing the stress that caused the inflammation to begin with and secondly by maintaining proper cell signaling through a diet rich in B vitamins and omega-3s. Healthy fats and proteins are also important to proper cell alignment.

Overall Heart Health

Of course, the overall health of the heart is the deciding factor in heart attack risk. Good diet and nutrition, proper exercise, and a lifestyle free of long-term stress are key to your overall health and well being, including that of your heart.

by Neil Z. Miller, NaturalNews

A new study, published in Human and Experimental Toxicology (http://het.sagepub.com/content/earl…), a peer-reviewed journal indexed by the National Library of Medicine, found that nations with higher (worse) infant mortality rates tend to give their infants more vaccine doses. For example, the United States requires infants to receive 26 vaccines — the most in the world — yet more than six U.S. infants die per every 1000 live births. In contrast, Sweden and Japan administer 12 vaccines to infants, the least amount, and report less than three deaths per 1000 live births.

The authors of the study, Neil Z. Miller and Dr. Gary Goldman, conducted a literature review to determine the immunization schedules for the United States and all 33 nations with better infant mortality rates than the United States. The total number of vaccine doses specified for infants aged less than one year was then determined for each country. The 34 nations were then organized into data pairs consisting of total number of vaccine doses specified for their infants and infant mortality rates. A scatter plot of the data pairs provided evidence of a positive correlation:infant mortality rates and vaccine doses tend to increase together.

Nations were also grouped into five different vaccine dose ranges. The mean infant mortality rates of all nations within each group were then calculated. Analysis showed“a high statistically significant correlation between increasing number of vaccine doses and increasing infant mortality rates.”

It is instructive to note that many developing nations require their infants to receive multiple vaccine doses and have national vaccine coverage rates (a percentage of the target population that has been vaccinated) of 90% or better, yet their infant mortality rates are poor. Infant mortality rates will remain high in nations that cannot provide clean water, proper nutrition, improved sanitation, and better access to health care.

Nations with higher (worse) infant mortality rates give their infants, on average, more vaccine doses. This positive correlation, derived from the data, elicits an important inquiry: Are some infant deaths associated with over-vaccination? Is it possible that some nations are requiring too many vaccines for their infants and the additional vaccines are a toxic burden on their health?

Sudden infant death syndrome (SIDS):

There is some evidence that a subset of infants may be more susceptible to SIDS shortly after being vaccinated. For example, Torch found that unvaccinated babies who died of SIDS did so most often in the fall or winter while vaccinated babies died most often at 2 and 4 months — the same ages when initial doses of DPT were given to infants. He concluded that DPT “may be a generally unrecognized major cause of sudden infant and early childhood death, and that the risks of immunization may outweigh its potential benefits.” It appears as though some infant deaths attributed to SIDS may be vaccine related, perhaps associated with biochemical or synergistic toxicity due to over-vaccination.

All nations have an obligation to determine whether their immunization schedules are achieving their desired goals.

You may download the complete study at:http://het.sagepub.com/content/earl…

Funding Acknowledgment:This research received no specific grant from any funding agency in the public, commercial, or not-for-profit sectors.Open Access:The National Vaccine Information Center (NVIC) donated $2500 and Michael Belkin donated $500 (in memory of his daughter, Lyla) for open access to the journal article (making it freely available to all researchers). NVIC is dedicated to preventing vaccine injuries and deaths through public education.

Learn more:http://www.naturalnews.com/032306_vaccines_infant_mortality.html#ixzz1Lgnn6Buf

by Aaron Turpen, Health Freedom Network Newsletter Editor (via Truth2America)

Several states, including Nevada and North Carolina, have introduced legislation that would license and control (and ultimately outlaw) non-mainstream health practices. These include alternative medical treatments such as acupuncture, Ayurveda, holistic medicine, homeopathy, etc.

There are several reasons for this push, not the least of which is pressure from mainstream medicine as it sees more and more people going to alternatives they like to call “complementary and alternative medicine” or CAM. Doctors use this term in a semi-derisive manner to refer to things like acupuncture and the like. They prefer CAM because it implies that these are add-on medical treatments rather than replacements for western (supposedly) science-based medical practice.

The bills function by creating licensing boards that get to decide who can and can’t practice any form of regulated health care in the state. Like doctors, nurses, and even morticians, this would put alternative health practitioners at the mercy of overseers who may or may not be sympathetic to the type of practice the practitioners use.

This is the first step towards regulating what those health and wellness professionals can and can’t say, prescribe, or use for treatment.

The bills, of course, are being touted as a way to “bring disparate medical practices together” and “regulate alternative practitioners for public safety.” They’ll do neither.

The mainstream medical press has been rife lately with reports of what they consider to be malpractice and false claims by alternative medical supporters. The news loves to show the mother whose child dies because she refused cancer treatments that, incidentally, would not have saved the child either – only prolonged the suffering. But the news does not show people like the woman featured in Issue #375 of theHealth Freedom Network Newsletter, Jessica Ainscough, who is using an alternative called the Gerson Therapy to combat her cancer (she’s winning).

The fight over who gets to decide what type of medical treatment and wellness options you have is continual. The control freaks who make up our government are intent on regulating every aspect of our lives, including (and especially) health options.

It’s time for the American people to stand up, refuse, and resist these attempts to nanny our lives. It’s time for us to take back our freedom to choose for ourselves!