Traditional medicine passes WHO health checks
Reuters Fri Nov 7
click for link
BEIJING (Reuters) - Health representatives from more than 70
countries gathered in Beijing on Friday to swap ideas on how to make
traditional medicine, ranging from acupuncture to leech treatment, more
widely available.
The two-day World Health Organization (WHO) event, built around
seminars on regulatory standards and folk medicine in cultures from
South Africa to Japan, is expected to end with member countries
agreeing to expand traditional medicine in their health care systems.
WHO officials at the event said blending traditional and Western medicine could make each more effective.
"Integration of traditional medicine into national health systems
will not only bring benefits to patients, but will also ensure safety
and proper use," assistant WHO director-general Carissa Etienne told
reporters at a briefing.
Speakers also called for research on traditional medicines, which
WHO director-general Margaret Chan called "a valuable source of leads
for therapeutic advances and the discovery of new classes of drugs."
Herbal and other treatments have sometimes been found effective in
studies. Artemisinin, a plant ingredient used in southern China for
centuries to fight malaria, became regarded as the best treatment for
the disease after research proved its ability to clear parasites
quickly.
Traditional medicine is used throughout China and in other
developing countries, even with access to Western-style health care
growing.
Leech therapy is used in parts of India to treat pain and skin
diseases, and hospitals in China often offer both Western treatment and
traditional cures like acupuncture or herbal antidotes.
In Canada and Germany, according to the WHO, more than seven in ten
people have tried folk treatments as alternatives or supplements to
modern health care.
Revenue from traditional medicine in Europe reached more than 3
billion euros ($3.82 billion) from 2003 to 2004, according to Zhang
Xiaorui, WHO coordinator on traditional medicine. The number for China
was $8 billion, she said.
"There are many examples where fast and effective traditional
medicines have existed," said Hans Hogerzeil, the WHO's director of
medicines policy and standards.
"They have then afterwards become more or less Western medicines
because the active ingredient has been identified and is now produced
in a standardized way."
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Prostate Cancer Halted in 36% of Patients Making Simple Changes to Food Choice and Exercise
The Telegraph (UK) click for link
By Kate Devlin, Medical Correspondent
Adopting a healthy lifestyle can help cancer patients even after they have been diagnosed with the disease, researchers believe.
A study found that almost four in ten patients with aggressive prostate cancer did not need planned surgery or radiotherapy after making simple lifestyle changes.
Doctors found that the adjustments slowed down or even halted the progression of their disease.
And they claim that there is no reason that the benefits could not be seen in other types of cancer.
Previous studies have shown that adopting a more healthy lifestyle can help to prevent different types of cancer developing.
Rising obesity rates have been linked to at least six different types of cancer, including breast cancer, the most common form of the disease in women.
Researchers at Addenbrooke's hospital in Cambridgeshire decided to test the effects of adopting a healthy lifestyle in 110 men who had been diagnosed with the aggressive form of prostate cancer.
Changes made included cutting down on salt and alcohol, eating more oily fish, losing weight and taking moderate amounts of regular exercise.
Some of the patients were also given vitamin and mineral supplements, which the findings show made no difference to their cancer.
All the patients also took small doses of aspirin, although the researchers say that there was no conclusive evidence that the drug helped patients.
Doctors monitor the progression of prostate cancer using a test for Prostate Specific Antigens (PSA).
These rise as tumours grow, but doctors found that lifestyle changes caused levels to stabilise and even fall for some patients in the trial.
The findings show that 40 of the patients, 36 per cent, did not need further treatment.
Robert Thomas, a consultant oncologist, from Addenbrooke's, who led the study, said: "Because prostate cancer is very slow growing it is possible for us to monitor its progress.
"(The same thing) is hard to evaluate other cancers. It would not be correct to delay chemotherapy or surgery to see whether the effects of a healthy lifestyle would be the same in breast cancer, for example.
"The main benefit of lifestyle changes in other types of cancer would probably be in helping to ensure that the disease did not recur."
Paul Sinclair, from Bedford, who took part in the trial, started drinking more pomegranate juice as one of the adjustments to his lifestyle.
He said that he was surprised in the difference that the changes made to his condition.
He said: "We followed (the disease) with a series of blood tests to monitor the levels, and they started reducing.
"The results I had in April/March this year were nearly normal, really much to my surprise."
Prostate cancer affects more men in Britain than any other form of the disease.
About 35,000 men are diagnosed with the condition every year and a third go on to die from the disease.
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Prescription Drugs Kill 300% More Americans than Illegal Drugs
Monday, November 10, 2008 by: David
Gutierrez
(NaturalNews) A report by the Florida Medical Examiners Commission has
concluded that prescription drugs have outstripped illegal drugs as a
cause of death.
An analysis of 168,900 autopsies conducted in
Florida in 2007 found that three times as many people were killed by
legal drugs as by cocaine, heroin and all methamphetamines put
together. According to state law enforcement officials, this is a sign
of a burgeoning prescription drug abuse problem.
"The abuse
has reached epidemic proportions," said Lisa McElhaney, a sergeant in
the pharmaceutical drug diversion unit of the Broward County Sheriff's
Office. "It's just explosive."
In 2007, cocaine was responsible for 843 deaths, heroin for 121, methamphetamines for 25 and marijuana for zero, for a total of 989 deaths. In contrast, 2,328 people were killed by opioid painkillers,
including Vicodin and Oxycontin, and 743 were killed by drugs
containing benzodiazepine, including the depressants Valium and Xanax.
Alcohol directly caused 466 deaths, but was found in the bodies of 4,179 cadavers in all.
While the number of dead bodies containing heroin
jumped 14 percent from the prior year, to a total of 110, the number of
deaths influenced by the painkiller oxycodone increased by 36 percent,
to a total of 1,253.
Across the country, prescription drugs have become an increasingly popular alternative to the more difficult to acquire illegal drugs. Even as illegal drug use among teenagers have fallen, prescription drug abuse
has increased. For example, while 4 percent of U.S. 12th graders were
using Oxycontin in 2002, by 2005 that number had increased to 5.5
percent.
It's not hard for teens to come by prescription drugs,
according to Sgt. Tracy Busby, supervisor of the Calaveras County,
Calif., Sheriff's Office narcotics unit.
"You go to every
medicine cabinet in the county, and I bet you're going to find some
sort of prescription medicine in 95 percent of them," he said.
Adults can acquire prescriptions by faking injuries, or by visiting multiple doctors and pharmacies for the same health complaint. Some people get more drugs than they expect to need, then sell the extras.
"You
have health care providers involved, you have doctor shoppers, and then
there are crimes like robbing drug shipments," said Jeff Beasley of the
Florida Department of Law Enforcement. "There is a multitude of ways to
get these drugs, and that's what makes things complicated."
And
while some people may believe that the medicines' legality makes them
less dangerous than illegal drugs, Tuolumne County, Calif., Sheriff's
Office Deputy Dan Crow warns that this is not the case. Because
everybody reacts differently to foreign chemicals, there is no way of
predicting the exact response anyone will have to a given dosage. That
is why prescription drugs are supposed to be taken under a doctor's
supervision.
"All this stuff is poison," Crow said. "Your body will fight all of this stuff."
Tuolumne County Health Officer Todd Stolp agreed. A prescription drug taken recreationally is "much like a firearm in the hands of someone who's not trained to use them," he said.
While
anyone taking a prescription medicine runs a risk of negative effects,
the drugs are even more dangerous when abused. For example, many
painkillers are designed to have a delayed effect that fades out over
time. This can lead recreational users to take more drugs before the
old ones are out of their system, placing them at risk of an overdose.
Likewise, the common practice of grinding pills up causes a large dose
of drugs to hit the body all at once, with potentially dangerous
consequences.
"A medication that was meant to be distributed over 24 hours has immediate effect," Stolp said.
Even more dangerous is the trend of mixing drugs with alcohol, which, like most popularly abused drugs, is a depressant.
"In
the case of alcohol and drugs, one plus one equals more than two," said
Tuolumne County Sheriff's Office spokesperson Lt. Dan Bressler.
Florida
pays careful attention to drug-related deaths, and as such has
significantly better data on the problem than any other state. But a
recent study conducted by the U.S. Drug Enforcement Agency (DEA)
suggests that the problem is indeed national. According to the DEA, the
number of people abusing prescription drugs in the United States has
jumped 80 percent in six years to seven million, or more than those
abusing cocaine, Ecstasy, heroin, hallucinogens an inhalants put
together.
Not surprisingly, there has been a corresponding
increase in deaths. According to the Drug Abuse Warning Network, the
number of emergency room visits related to painkillers has increased by
153 percent since 1995. And a 2007 report by the Justice Department
National Intelligence Drug Center found that deaths related to the
opioid methadone jumped from 786 in 1999 to 3,849 in 2004 - an increase
of 390 percent.
Many experts attribute the trend to the
increasing popularity among doctors of prescribing painkillers,
combined with a leap in direct-to-consumer marketing by drug companies.
For example, promotional spending on Oxycontin increased threefold
between 1996 and 2001, to $30 million per year.
Sonora, Calif.,
pharmacist Eddie Howard reports that he's seen painkiller prescriptions
jump dramatically in the last five years.
"I don't know that there is that much pain out there to demand such an increase," he said.
The
trend concerns Howard, and he tries to keep an eye out for patients who
are coming in too frequently. But he admits that there is little he can
do about the problem.
"When you have a lot of people waiting for prescriptions, it's hard to find time to play detective," he said.
Still, the situation makes Howard uncomfortable.
"It almost makes me a legalized drug dealer, and that's not a good position to be in," he said.
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Excess Calcium Intake Can Raise Your Risk of Cardiovascular Disease
Sunday, November 09, 2008 by: Teri Lee Gruss
(NaturalNews) Are postmenopausal women putting themselves at increased risk for cardiovascular disease and hip fractures by consuming excessive calcium? That is a question that two recent studies shed light on, one published January 2008 in the British Medical Journal (BMJ) and one published in the December issue of the American Journal of Clinical Nutrition (AJCN).
The British Medical Journal published the results of a University of Auckland, New Zealand study designed to assess the effects of calcium supplements on healthy postmenopausal women's risk for cardiovascular events including heart attack, stroke and sudden death.
The randomized, placebo controlled trial involved 1,471 postmenopausal women with an average age of 74 years old and was conducted over a five year period.
732 women were randomized to take calcium citrate (Citrical) in a 400 mg dose before breakfast and a 600 mg dose in the evening for a total of 1000 mg per day of supplemental calcium. 739 women were randomized to take a placebo. The women were evaluated every 6 months.
21 women in the calcium treated group and 10 women in the placebo group experienced a heart attack, the most common CVD (cardiovascular disease) event found. The calcium treated group had a 47% higher incidence of heart attack, stroke or sudden death.
Researchers, headed by Dr. Ian Reid, concluded that "Calcium supplementation in healthy postmenopausal women is associated with upward trends in cardiovascular event rates. This potentially detrimental effect should be balanced against the likely benefits of calcium on bone".
Dr. Reid noted that the study "does not unequivocally show an adverse cardiovascular effect of calcium but suggests that this matter needs to be considered carefully before calcium supplementation can be broadly advocated".
The AJCN published the results of a meta analysis study conducted at University Hospital Zurich that, according to Professor Heike Bischoff-Ferrari, found no protective association between hip fractures and intake of calcium over 555 mg per day.
Researchers reviewed randomized controlled studies involving over 5600 women 58 years old or older and found, according to a Reuters report that "calcium supplementation may increase the risk for hip fracture by 64%".
Professor Bischoff-Ferrari suggested that current recommendations for calcium may be too high and recommendations for vitamin D too low.
The current calcium AI (adequate intake) for American males and females:
Age:AI for calcium:
1-3 years....500 mg
4-....8800 mg
9-13....1300 mg
14-18....1300 mg
19-50....1000 mg
51 ....>1200 mg
Adequate intake is a recommendation that is made by the Food and Nutrition Board of the Institute of Medicine of the National Academy of Sciences (FNB/IOM/NAS). An AI recommendation is made when board members don't believe that there is enough scientific evidence to establish a RDA (recommended dietary allowance) for a specific nutrient.
According to the academic text Understanding Nutrition "An AI must rely more heavily on scientific judgments because sufficient evidence is lacking. An AI is expected to exceed average requirements. AIs are more tentative than RDA".
Current calcium recommendations are based on "balance studies" which measure the point at which calcium intake equals calcium excretion. Research suggests that this balance occurs at approximately 550 mg.
The FNB/IOM has established the Tolerable Upper Intake Level (UL) for calcium at 2500 mg daily for all age groups.
The FNB/IOM is reassessing the AI for vitamin D and most likely will increase recommendations when they conclude their review, which could take several years. Is it time for the FNB/IOM to reassess recommendations for calcium intake too?
Have you heard about the Calcium Paradox?
The World Health Organization says of the calcium paradox: "hip fracture rates are higher in developed countries where calcium intake is higher than in developing countries where calcium intake is lower (and this) clearly calls for an explanation". Yes it does.
According to a recent report from Harvard School of Public Health, the "average daily intake (of calcium) in countries such as India and Japan is as low as 300 mg and that fracture rates are low" in these countries.
According to the WHO "In countries with a high fracture incidence, a minimum of 400-500 mg of calcium intake is required to prevent osteoporosis. The interaction between calcium intake and physical activity, sun exposure, and intake of other dietary components (e.g. vitamin D, vitamin K, sodium, protein) and protective phytonutrients, needs to be considered before recommending increased calcium intake in countries with low fracture incidence in order to be in line with recommendations for industrialized countries".
In other words, in countries with low fracture rates and low incidence of fractures, recommendations for increased calcium intake are not appropriate.
In the mean time...how can you avoid excess calcium intake?
Assess your daily calcium intake from diet and supplements. Get out a piece of paper and add up your total daily calcium intake from foods and all nutritional supplements that you take. Learn the calcium content of the foods that you regularly eat. You can use the USDA Standard Reference data base to find the calcium content of hundreds of foods. You will find it at the following link: (http://www.nal.usda.gov/fnic/foodcomp/D...) .
Consider the following dietary sources of calcium:
· 1 cup milk 300 mg
· 1 cup calcium fortified orange juice300 mg
· 1 cup low fat yogurt345-400 mg
· 1 ounce cheddar cheese has about 204 mg
· 1 cup cottage cheese300 mg
· ½ cup cooked beans45-113 mg
· ½ cup cooked spinach115 mg
· ½ cup cooked broccoli 35 mg
You can see that two servings of yogurt, one of milk and one ounce of cheese contains about 1300 mg of calcium. If you add daily vegetable and bean sources of calcium and multiple vitamin mineral and calcium/vitamin D supplements you may well be exceeding the daily AIs for calcium and may also be exceeding the daily UL. Is calcium deficiency really as likely as we have been led to believe?
Millions of American women use calcium/vitamin D supplements like Bayer's Citrical™ and Wyeth's Caltrate™. Both of these pharmaceutical companies heavily promote their calcium supplements.
Dosage suggestions on these products range from 400 mg to over 1200mg a day. Your daily dietary intake of calcium is your best guideline for deciding if and how much supplemental calcium you may (or may not)need.
Since our food supply is increasingly fortified with calcium, don't forget to add calcium fortified food sources like fruit and vegetable juices, butter substitutes, cereals, and dry beverage mixes into your daily totals. According to the USDA nutrient database just one cup of General Mill's whole grain Total cereal contains 1000 mg of calcium, and that doesn't include the milk. Are people really aware of just how much calcium is in their daily diets?
Like other vital nutrients, optimal amounts of calcium promote health but excesses come with serious adverse side effects. Excess calcium puts us at increased risk for soft tissue calcification, atherosclerosis, heart attack, stroke and, according to new evidence, increased risks for hip fractures.
How much calcium do we really require for bone health, cardiovascular health, overall health? That is becoming less clear, but well designed large scale studies are indicating that we may require much less than we have been led to believe.
Sources:
BMJ, 1/15/2008, Vascular events in healthy older women receiving calcium supplementation: randomised controlled trial (http://www.bmj.com/cgi/content/full/bmj...)
American Journal of Clinical Nutrition, Vol. 86, No. 6, 1780-1790, December 2007, Calcium intake and hip fracture risk in men and women: a meta-analysis of prospective cohort studies and randomized controlled trials (http://www.ajcn.org/cgi/content/abstrac...)
Understanding Nutrition, E. Whitney & S. Rolfes, Wadsworth, 2002, p. 14
Calcium content of commonly eaten foods:
UCLA: Calcium Content of Food (http://gotblood.ucla.edu/Documents/Calc...)
Harvard School of Medicine:
(http://body.aol.com/learn-about-it/oste...)
Recommendations for preventing osteoporosis, World Health Organization
(http://www.who.int/nutrition/topics/5_p...)
Journal of Food Composition and Analysis
Volume 18, Issue 6, September 2005, Pages 595-598
Calcium fortification of food can add unneeded dietary phosphorus
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200+ Baking Soda Tips
Last month, Abha Light presented the effectiveness of Baking Soda in the treatment of cancer, HIV and fungal infections.
So, what else can you do with Baking Soda? If you're curious, learn 200 more things you can do with this natural alkalyzing agent.
Click here to download the 15-page document.
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