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Alternative Medicine in the News
March 2010 edition 62
published weekly
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Mainstream Drugs are Neither Safe nor Effective- Part 1
February 03, 2010 by: Tony Isaacs
For generations we have been told by mainstream medicine that their
drugs are safer and more effective than natural alternatives such as
those man has used for healing for thousands of years. Similarly, we
have been told that herbs and other natural alternatives are unproven,
usually of little or no value and often may be dangerous. History tells
us an entirely different story.
Proponents of mainstream drugs
and critics of natural healing usually cite the lack of scientific
studies proving the effectiveness or safety of herbs and natural
alternatives. Likewise, mainstream drug advocates point to the wealth
of studies which prove the effectiveness and safety of patented
mainstream drugs. However, relatively few comprehensive studies have
been conducted on herbs other than to find a compound that can be
synthesized or uniquely isolated so it can be patented and profited
from by the drug companies. Drug companies are by far the largest
source of funding for medical studies and the cost of such studies is a
huge barrier for natural alternatives. The FDA trial process costs
hundreds of millions of dollars, and no one can afford to get a natural
item approved that they cannot control. Whole herbs and extracts of
herbs that contain multiple compounds found in nature cannot be
patented.
Despite the complicated, expensive and time consuming
process of getting FDA approval, many point to all the harmful drugs
that have been approved as an indication that the system is deeply
flawed and rigged in favor of those who have the money. It has been
shown that studies tend to return positive results for the funders up
to eight times more often than independent studies on the same item.
The
FDA approval process did not prevent us from having rigged studies on
Vioxx. Nor did it prevent rigged studies for decades on the safety -
and even claimed health benefits - of smoking cigarettes. Those are
just two examples in a very long list of drugs and other items
mainstream science told us were safe but weren`t. For example:
thalidomide, heroin, opium, cocaine, Avandia, Fosamax, Prozac, Paxil,
Aleve, Bextra, Aspartame . . the list goes on and on.
Another
problem with mainstream medical studies is the apparent lack of quality
standards employed by pharmaceutical companies in selecting doctors who
oversee drug testing. A New York Times investigation in 2007 found that
in Minnesota alone at least 103 doctors who had been disciplined or
criticized by the state medical board received a total of $1.7 million
from drug makers between 1997 to 2005. The median payment over that
period was $1,250; the largest was $479,000.
One such doctor was
Dr. Faruk Abuzzahab, whom the Minnesota Medical board accused of a
"reckless, if not willful, disregard" for the welfare of 46 patients, 5
of whom died in his care or shortly afterward. The board suspended his
license for seven months and restricted it for two years after that.
One of Dr. Abuzzahab`s patients was David Olson, whom the psychiatrist
tried repeatedly to recruit for clinical trials. Drug makers paid Dr.
Abuzzahab thousands of dollars for every patient he recruited. In July
1997, when Mr. Olson again refused to be a test subject, Dr. Abuzzahab
discharged him from the hospital even though he was suicidal, records
show. Mr. Olson committed suicide two weeks later.
To be continued . . .
Sources included:
http://news.blogs.nytimes.com/2007/...
http://www.naturalnews.com/027962_P...
The JOURNAL of the AMERICAN MEDICAL ASSOCIATION (JAMA) Vol 284, No 4, July 26th 2000
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_o...
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Mainstream Drugs are Neither Safe nor Effective- Part 2
February 03, 2010 by: Tony Isaacs
Mainstream medicine assures us that their drugs are more effective than
nature and that they have been scientifically proven to be both
effective and safe. What mainstream medicine does not tell us is how
they have rigged studies, withheld evidence of harm and paid doctors to
prescribe their drugs.
The drug industry has been riddled with
scandal again and again - including faked studies, rigged studies,
hidden evidence of dangers, ghostwritten articles, fake medical
journals, sex scandals, and much more. Merck, Vioxx. Pfizer, Avantis,
GlaxoKilineSmith, Baxter Labs, the list goes on and on and on and
leaves virtually no major pharmaceutical company untouched:
http://www.guardian.co.uk/uk/2002/f...
http://www.bmj.com/cgi/content/extr...
All
one has to do to get an idea of how riddled with scandal the drug
industry has been is to do a simple internet search for "drug company
scandals". Absolutely shameful!
The latest example:
http://www.healthiertalk.com/pfizer...
Another
problem with mainstream drugs is the influence peddling of the
pharmaceutical companies to get doctors to prescribe their medicines.
Many doctors receive incentives for prescribing drugs - such as
honorariums, free lunches and other gifts, and even free massages and
cruise trips, to name a few. There have been a number of scandals
concerning drug companies essentially bribing doctors to prescribe
their drugs, and there have been many cries for reform to insure that
drugs are prescribed according to the patient's best interests and not
the financial interests of doctors and drug companies.
Besides
all the incentives, some doctors make profits directly from the drugs
they prescribe, often with unhealthy consequences for their patients.
In an article that appeared in the New York Times in May 2007 it was
revealed that two of the world's largest drug companies are paying
hundreds of millions of dollars to doctors every year in return for
giving their patients anemia medicines, which regulators now say may be
unsafe at commonly used doses.
The same article noted that:
"Federal
laws bar drug companies from paying doctors to prescribe medicines that
are given in pill form and purchased by patients from pharmacies. But
companies can rebate part of the price that doctors pay for drugs,
which they dispense in their offices as part of treatment. Doctors
receive the rebates after they buy the drugs from the companies. But
they also receive reimbursement from Medicare or private insurers for
the drugs, often at a markup over the doctors purchase price."
See: http://news.blogs.nytimes.com/2007/...
No
wonder a Harris Poll found that only 13% of Americans believe that
pharmaceutical companies are "generally honest and trustworthy".
Sources included:
http://news.blogs.nytimes.com/2007/...
http://www.naturalnews.com/027962_P...
The JOURNAL of the AMERICAN MEDICAL ASSOCIATION (JAMA) Vol 284, No 4, July 26th 2000
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_o...
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Mainstream Drugs are Neither Safe nor Effective- Part 3
Over 95% of the 24,000 plus FDA approved medicines have side effects.
In many instance those side effects lead to further conditions
requiring still more drugs with more side effects in a never ending
cycle. Millions of serious adverse reactions are reported each year and
over 140,000 deaths in hospitals and homes happen each year even when
the drugs have been properly prescribed and administered.
We are
told that there is always risk versus reward to be considered. But it
appears that often a great deal of the "reward" is drug company profits
regardless of risks. Such was the case when the makers of Vioxx (Merck)
reaped billions of dollars of profit while the body count piled up even
higher than all the lives we lost in the Vietnam War. The same thing
appears to be happening now with Paxil:
http://www.naturalnews.com/027962_P...
Meanwhile, major side effects caused by natural herbs are rare and deaths almost non-existent.
Often
we see the supporters of mainstream medicine refer to natural healing
as "woo" and sometimes they liken belief in natural herbs as more akin
to some kind of religion instead of "real science". Yet, true science
is based on observation and mankind has observed nature to work and has
used nature for healing for thousands of years. Most of the people
around the world continue to rely on such observation and history of us
to make herbal and natural healing their top choices for addressing
health issues. Among those countries are several countries ranked above
the U.S. (the world`s most medicated country) in health rankings,
including two of the top three ranked countries. Our life expectancy
ranks below 40 plus other countries and is closer to that of Mexico
than it is the top 10 countries.
To claim that nature, from
whence life itself came, is "woo" is patently absurd. Of course most of
us would like to see scientific proof that anything we take is safe and
effective, but when medical science has been sold off to the highest
bidder far too often, choosing what others have observed to work time
and again through the ages often appears to be a safer bet than taking
the word of what medical science tells us will work and is safe.
History
has taught us over and over that the science of today has but a
fraction of the answers and is often overturned tomorrow. When you
combine the record of safety and effectiveness of approved drugs with
the lessons of history, one might well conclude that blind belief in
mainstream medicine is much more of a religion than belief in nature.
Granted,
just because something is natural does not mean that it will work or
even that it is safe, but the fact that something has been approved by
medical science provides no assurances either. According to Doctor
Allen Roses, worldwide vice-president of genetics at GlaxoSmithKline
and academic geneticist from Duke University, "The vast majority of
drugs - more than 90 per cent - only work in 30 or 50 per cent of the
people."
Despite the conflicting and incomplete studies on
herbs, natural remedies, vitamins and minerals, studies largely agree
on one thing: a great many of our health problems can be traced to
vitamin and mineral deficiencies. On the other hand, no one ever became
ill due to a deficiency in pharmaceuticals.
Sources included:
http://news.blogs.nytimes.com/2007/...
http://www.naturalnews.com/027962_P...
The JOURNAL of the AMERICAN MEDICAL ASSOCIATION (JAMA) Vol 284, No 4, July 26th 2000
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_o...
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Antibiotic Resistant Germs Threaten while Colloidal Silver is Banned in EU
Here's breaking news that's a double barrel blast. A November 2009
Henry Ford hospital report claims dangerous Methicillin-Resistant
Staphylococcus Aureus (MRSA) bacteria are approaching epidemic status,
and so are other antibiotic resistant microbes. And now: As of January
1, 2009, the EU (European Union) has effectively banned a well known
natural antibiotic, colloidal silver.
These two events could
seriously affect global health if the antibiotic resistant strains
continue and if the American continent mimics the EU's colloidal silver
ban.
A Bit on MRSAs and Other Bad Bugs
There are
numerous ways that bacteria become antibiotic resistant. When several
are being killed off by a particular antibiotic, others are genetically
working out survival strategies. It's a war, and the survivors find
ways to defend, hide, and even neutralize that antibiotic. They can
also find other genes to adopt and enhance their survival.
MRSAs
were first announced as hospital infections that left you worse off
than when you entered. According to Professor Keith Scott-Mumby, MD,
PhD, author of How to Survive in a World Without Antibiotics, a
lot of this was due to sloppy and lazy hospital hygiene, especially
among surgeons and anesthesiologists. The reliance of antibiotics for
infections replaced the importance of proper precautionary hygiene.
But MRSAs are not only from hospitals anymore.
Community MRSAs, which originate outside of hospitals, are on the rise.
Dr. Scott-Mumby mentions a new strain that is respiratory contagious
and more virulent than the skin contagious MRSAs. If they work their
way into vital organs, those staph infections can be lethal.
This
is the result of over prescribing antibiotics and using an enormous
amount of antibiotics on livestock in the food chain. Not only do
livestock antibiotics get passed on to health unconscious consumers,
but the livestock breed antibiotic resistant bacterial mutations that
enter the food chain. Antibiotics are even appearing in some water
supplies. As more antibiotics get consumed, more antibiotic resistant
bacteria will appear.
What Does This Have to Do With Colloidal Silver?
Pharmaceutical
antibiotics have side effects, including the death of much of one's
necessary gastrointestinal (GI) friendly bacteria. According to many
health experts, a correctly synthesized colloidal silver liquid is a
potent antibiotic for pathogenic bacteria only. The good guys remain
intact!
As the EU goes with its supplement bans, so eventually
will the Americas go. This is what Big Pharma wants. They know good
colloidal silver works, and they don't want the competition. Not all
colloidal silver products are equally efficacious, but they are all
expensive! So why not make your own colloidal silver for a lifetime
supply on demand with quality control no matter what happens?
There
are battery or wall current generators with silver electrodes available
from under $100 to slightly over $200. But when you consider paying $20
or more for a small bottle over and over (if these MRSAs and other
bacterial pathogens become epidemic because they can no longer be
restrained by antibiotics), it's quite cost effective. Besides, you can
use it for any infection, epidemic or not.
These kits produce
colloidal silver by running a small current through electrodes in
distilled water. Nano-particles and ions electrically discharged from
the silver electrodes go into the solution. The lower the current, the
smaller the particles are. Smaller is better with colloidal silver.
Larger particles won't penetrate tissues and cells where the bad bugs
are causing damage.
Considering the possibilities of a bacterial
epidemic in a world without antibiotics, it seems worthwhile to look
into having a perpetual silver colloidal manufacturing apparatus that
creates a comprehensive antibiotic while not destroying your beneficial
bacteria.
Sources for more information:
Colloidal Silver generation
http://www.colloidalsilversecrets.b...
Professor Keith Scott-Mumby MD, PhD lecture on antibiotic resistant bacteria's rise
http://www.mrsahotline.com/
More on colloidal silver generation
http://www.silverlungs.com/
How Stuff Works "how bacteria become resistant"
http://health.howstuffworks.com/que...
MRSA (staph infections) information
http://www.aboutinfections.com/stap...
Dr. Rebecca Carley
http://drcarley.com/updates
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Magnesium found to boost learning and memory
Magnesium, as NaturalNews has reported through the years, is an
essential nutrient that benefits health in many important ways. For
example, research has shown it helps to prevent heart disease (http://www.naturalnews.com/027392_m...), slashes the risk of cerebral palsy (http://www.naturalnews.com/025350_m...), and can even treat age-related hearing loss (http://www.naturalnews.com/026834_h...). Now a study by Chinese scientists, published in the in the January 28th issue of the journal Neuron, shows magnesium could have a powerful impact on the brain, too -- and boost learning and memory.
In
a statement to the media, the researchers noted that diet can affect
cognitive capacity. Because learning and memory tend to decline with
age and disease, they decided to search for dietary factors that could
prevent these changes by having a positive influence on the sites of
communication between brain cells (neurons) called synapses. Professor
Guosong Liu, Director of the Center for Learning and Memory at Tsinghua
University in Beijing, China, led the new study to see whether
supplementing the diet with magnesium could boost brain power in this
way.
The results suggest increasing magnesium intake could be
a successful, drug-free way to improve brain function. It also supports
the idea that too-low levels of magnesium could result in increased
deterioration of memory in aging humans.
"Magnesium is essential
for the proper functioning of many tissues in the body, including the
brain and, in an earlier study, we demonstrated that magnesium promoted
synaptic plasticity in cultured brain cells," Dr. Liu explained in the
press statement. "Therefore it was tempting to take our studies a step
further and investigate whether an increase in brain magnesium levels
enhanced cognitive function in animals."
Using a new magnesium compound dubbed magnesium-L-threonate (MgT)
that can significantly increase magnesium in the brain when used as a
dietary supplement, the research team gave magnesium to lab rats of
different ages along with their regular diet. Then the scientists
checked the animals for behavioral and cellular changes associated with
memory.
"We found that increased brain magnesium enhanced many
different forms of learning and memory in both young and aged rats,"
stated Dr. Liu. In fact, the research revealed an increase in the
number of functional synapses and enhancement of a host of processes in
the brain that are necessary for learning and memory.
"Our
findings suggest that elevating brain magnesium content via increasing
magnesium intake might be a useful new strategy to enhance cognitive
abilities," Dr. Liu concluded in the media statement. "Moreover, half
the population of industrialized countries has a magnesium deficit,
which increases with aging. This may very well contribute to
age-dependent memory decline; increasing magnesium intake might prevent
or reduce such decline."
Editor's note: NaturalNews is
opposed to the use of animals in medical experiments that expose them
to harm. We present these findings in protest of the way in which they
were acquired.
For more information:
http://www.cell.com/neuron/fulltext...
http://www.naturalnews.com/magnesiu...
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New study: mango prevents and halts growth of colon and breast cancer cells
Take a bite of a juicy, sweet mango and you are experiencing a
delicious taste enjoyed by countless people from ancient times until
today. According to the Orlando-based National Mango Board (NMG), a
mango industry-sponsored research, promotion and consumer information
program, mangos are known to be rich in vitamins C and A, as well as
fiber. However, because little has been documented about any specific
health benefits of eating the fruit, NMB has commissioned a variety of
scientific studies to investigate these issues.
So far, this research initiative has turned up an unexpected and groundbreaking discovery: in laboratory experiments in Texas A&M University's AgriLife Research department mango fruit prevented or stopped cancer growth in certain breast and colon cell lines.
Food
scientists Dr. Susanne Talcott and her co-researcher husband, Dr. Steve
Talcott, used the five varieties of mangos (Kent, Francine, Ataulfo,
Tommy/Atkins and Haden) most common in the US and specifically tested
polyphenol extracts from the fruit on colon, breast, lung, leukemia and
prostate cancer cells.
Polyphenols are natural substances in plants that are antioxidants with
the potential to protect the body from disease. The Talcotts zeroed in
on evaluating polyphenolic compounds in mangos known as gallotannins, a class of natural bioactive compounds believed to help prevent or block the growth of cancer cells.
The
results? The Talcotts' experiments showed that the mango extract
demonstrated some cancer fighting ability when tested on lung, leukemia
and prostate cancer cells. But when tested on the most common breast
and colon cancers, mango compounds were found to have even stronger
anticancer abilities. In fact, the mango extract caused the breast and colon cancer cells to undergo apoptosis -- programmed cell death.
"Additionally,
we found that when we tested normal colon cells side by side with the
colon cancer cells, the mango polyphenolics did not harm the normal
cells," Dr. Susanne Talcott said in a statement to the press. "That is
a general observation for any natural agent, that they target cancer
cells and leave the healthy cells alone, in reasonable concentrations
at least."
The researchers documented that the cancer cell cycle
(the division process cells go through) was interrupted by mango
extract. This is crucial information, Suzanne Talcott said in a press
statement, because it could explain a possible mechanism for how the
cancer cells are prevented or stopped by phytochemicals in mangos. "For
cells that may be on the verge of mutating or being damaged, mango
polyphenolics prevent this kind of damage," she explained.
The
scientists have conducted additional research on the colon cancer cell
lines because mangos contain small molecules that are readily absorbed
in the colon as well as larger molecules that are not absorbed and
remain present longer in the colon. Those facts could potentially make
eating mangos a potent way to help prevent colon cancer. In fact, the
Talcotts are hoping to next conduct a small clinical trial to see if
mangos can prevent colon cancer in people at high risk for a malignancy
because they have increased inflammation in their intestines.
For more information:
http://agnews.tamu.edu/showstory.ph...
http://www.mango.org/en/nutrition.aspx
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Medical Disclaimer:
The information contained within does not take the place of medical diagnosis or
prescription. See your health care provider in case of sickness.
Editorial Disclaimer: Publication of these articles are to promote food for thought. The opinions expressed in these articles may not be the opinion of editors.
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