When Mike Meyers and Dana Carvey sang the Wayne's World theme song, "Party time....excellent," they probably didn't have swine flu parties in mind. Who could even imagine such a thing? But sure enough, that's the newest craze sweeping the world, with Mom's across the globe discussing the benefits of bringing their kids to just such a shindig. And why? Because they hope that exposing their children to the bug will build immunity against future exposures, when more virulent strains might possibly appear.]]>
The idea seems to have been hatched (all puns intended) from the "chickenpox party" model, in which parents bring an infected kid into contact with their healthy kids. The main advocates of this approach tend to be folks who don't believe in vaccination, and so hope to build immunity a more natural way -- by getting the disease. They want to be sure that the kids contract the illness when young, because the older the age of onset, the greater the likelihood of complications.
According to Justine Roberts, who runs the parenting website Mumsnet, "What's being discussed is the principle of whether it might be a good idea, based on the notion that it's better to catch swine flu now than to get it in the winter when Tamiflu's running out, there's a virulent strain around and we're all under the weather. A lot of people see the rationale behind that."
With maternal concern running in that direction, it's easy to see why Freud concluded that all mental illness can be blamed on Mum -- not to mention the importance of trains going into tunnels. The authorities, however, are in agreement that attending parties in hopes of getting sick with H1N1 may not be quite the most brilliant of ideas.
"This is a new, emerging infection, and we're learning more about it each day," said Richard Besser, acting head of the Centers for Disease Control. "But how an individual person will be impacted by the infection is not something that we know. It's a big mistake putting individuals and children at risk, and the CDC does not recommend that people follow that course."
Dr. Anne Moscana, a flu expert at Cornell University, was more emphatic. "I think it's totally nuts," she said. "I can't believe people are really thinking of doing it. I understand the thinking, but I just fear we don't know enough about how this virus would react in every individual. This is like the Middle Ages, when people deliberately infected themselves with smallpox [yes, they really did that, Virginia]. It's vigilante vaccination -- you know, taking immunity into your own hands."
Meanwhile, the online debate over the party plan centers over details. Should you wait until season's end to expose yourself, or try to get sick right away? After getting infected, should you take Tamiflu immediately, or give the bug a chance to settle in? By the way, there's a perverse brilliance here. Expose yourself "naturally" so that you can then take a pharmaceutical drug that is only marginally effective and comes with some troubling side effects!!!???
So who is right -- the party parents, or the experts? Certainly trying to get sick with something potentially deadly doesn't appear to be logical, but consider the options that the average citizen sees. With the news blaring out constant warnings about the coming pandemic, and then about the looming more-deadly-than-deadly second wave, people are running scared. They're trying to take healthcare into their own hands because they have no confidence in the medical establishment's ability to protect them. After all, the news makes clear that the only defenses available to combat swine flu are two antiviral drugs, Tamiflu and Relenza, which may or may not work given the fact that flus have long histories of mutating around pharmaceuticals. As I've written recently, Tamiflu and Relenza basically are the same drug and already, H1N1 has started showing resistance to them.
While there are no guarantees and no surefire cures when dealing with any disease, certainly there are options beyond these teetering antiviral pharmaceuticals for fighting swine flu. I've written before about a natural protocol you can use to both build immunity and fight the flu virus to make sure your viral load stays down. But the establishment certainly wants no part of an alternative approach, as evidenced by a statement released on May 1st by the FDA announcing that "[The only] antiviral drugs approved by the FDA for treatment and prophylaxis of the 2009 H1N1 influenza virus are Tamiflu (oseltamivir phosphate) and Relenza (zanamivir)." (I guess the FDA is unaware of the virus' growing resistance to Tamiflu.)
Again, considering how barely effective we know these drugs to be against the flu, it's no wonder people want to inoculate themselves. The fact is that if the healthcare establishment would emerge from the Middle Ages, so might the thinking of the populace it serves.
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]]>Here's a shocker to mull over the next time you sip your glass of heart-healthy cabernet: alcohol consumption causes one in 25 deaths worldwide, according to new research. The study, published in The Lancet, found that the mortality rate in Europe and particularly in Eastern Europe, was actually far higher, with one out of every 10 deaths directly related to alcohol. Alcohol also causes up to six percent of all disability worldwide.]]>
According to study director Jürgen Rehm of the University of Toronto, alcohol-related mortality rates have risen dramatically even since 2000, and most of the spike comes as a result of more women drinking. He says that, "Alcohol consumption, particularly among women, is linked to economic growth. In countries like the U.K. and Norway, you have women drinking over 30% of [all the alcohol consumed]. In India, on the other extreme, women consume less than 5%. The higher the wealth of a country, the higher the percentage of women drinking alcohol."
The study found that alcohol consumption surpasses smoking as a mortality risk factor in 27 emerging countries worldwide, and in fact, is the number one risk factor in these nations. The alcohol-related deaths come about as the result of accidents, toxicity, and alcohol-related health conditions including certain cancers, cardiovascular problems, and liver disease. Cirrhosis and other liver conditions are the most common single cause of death, followed by car accidents, which may explain why alcohol-related disease and death strikes young people more often than old.
While worldwide, most people don't drink at all, in the US, the average adult consumes 11 drinks weekly; in Europe, that figure jumps to 13. Remember -- that's an average, meaning it also includes those who don't drink at all. Looked at another way, in the US, the average adult drinks 2.5 gallons of pure Ethanol annually, and in Europe, that number is 3.1 gallons, with many people consuming a whole lot more.
While the antioxidant benefit of red wine still gets airplay, worldwide alcohol is now considered the threat that tobacco was considered a decade ago. And also, some holes have started appearing in the antioxidant hype. I wrote recently about the fact that along with all those antioxidants, the typical glass of wine may contain up to 200 times the amount of heavy metals considered safe, plus a heaping dose of pesticides. I've also written recently about the suspected links between drinking and cancer. In fact, a recent study found that women who drink just a glass of wine daily (considerably less than the US average) have a 12 percent increase in breast cancer, a 22 percent rise in laryngeal cancer, and significant increases in cancers of the rectum, liver, and mouth.
But again, in the US, the problem pales next to the alcohol-mortality issue in places like Russia, where, according to a concomitant study, alcohol claimed 52 percent of all deaths of those aged 15-54. That study examined records of 49,000 deaths between 1990 and 2001. While the authorities blame adulterated liquor and industrial alcohol for the bulk of the deaths, the statistics show that the average Russian drinks twice as much as the citizens of any other country in the world, and the drink of choice typically is pure vodka. Professor David Zaridze, lead author of the study, noted that given the three million Russians who have died alcohol-related deaths since 1987, "This loss is similar to that of a war."
Despite these gloomy reports, the authorities remain upbeat. "Today, we know more than ever about which strategies can effectively and cost-effectively control alcohol-related harms," Dr. Rehm said. "Provided that our public policy makers act on these practical strategies expeditiously, we could see an enormous impact in reducing damage."
Topmost among those strategies, according to Dr. Rehm, is raising the price of alcohol. He points out that Italy now has the lowest rate of alcohol consumption in Europe, a reflection of escalating wine prices and a teetering economy. He isn't a huge fan of alcohol-treatment programs as a solution, because they only help those suffering from severe alcohol-abuse, but don't help people with alcohol-related breast cancer or other diseases indirectly resulting from drinking. "The solution can only be to reduce the overall amount of drinking," he says, and again, he notes that the price-tag may be key.
On the other hand, it should be noted that if the pricing gets too high because of extraordinary taxes, you would probably be looking at a repeat of the prohibition era, with bathtub gin flourishing as tax-free, illegal alcohol, substantially undercutting the legal variety. Can you say, "Smirnoff Cartel?"
In the meantime, the existing drug cartels (Wyeth Pfizer, GlaxoSmithKline, Johnson and Johnson, etc.) are trying to cash in by cooking up pharmaceutical interventions to kill the drinking bug. A drug called Topiramate got rave reviews for curbing alcohol addiction after clinical trials last year and is currently pending FDA approval. A number of other drugs also are under development. The pharmaceutical community, it seems, would like to get its hands on a piece of that alcohol pie. Let's just hope the side effects of whatever they come up with aren't as toxic as the drinking itself.
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]]>While the medical establishment has been patting itself on the back because colon cancer rates in the US have declined in the past 20 years, an insidious trend has been brewing. A new study shows that young people under the age of 50 have experienced rising rates of colon cancer in every age category; it's only the older folks who are getting it less. ]]>
One rather creepy outcome of the study, published in Cancer Epidemiology Biomarkers and Prevention, is that the biggest spike appears among the youngest adults. Those men aged 20 to 29 had a five percent annual jump in colon cancer rates between 1992 and 2005, with women in that age group nearly at six percent! Overall, the rate jumped 1.5 percent annually in men ages 20 to 49 and 1.6 percent a year for women in the under-50 age category, contrasted with a 2.8 percent annual decline in men over 50.
The study's lead author, Rebecca L. Siegal of the American Cancer Society, said, "In recent years, we've been thinking we've been doing pretty well because colorectal cancer incidence has been declining overall. But we found that when you look at young adults, the rates are increasing fairly rapidly -- in great contrast to what's going on in the older population."
While the researchers don't see any clear reason for the rise in rates among the young, they point to the fact that routine screening for colon cancer starts at 50, and also, to rising rates of obesity and type 2 diabetes. Dr. Siegel says they need more research to figure out what's going on. Then again, if they start screening for colon cancer at a younger age, that can only make the incidence in those age groups go up, not down. It's not like screening can "unfind" cancer. So in truth, what we're looking at now in terms of numbers is a "best case scenario."
In spite of the reluctance on the part of study authors to name a culprit in the youthful rise in this disease, the researchers do note that most of the tumors in this age group appear on the left side of the colon and rectum, where tumors associated with red-meat consumption typically grow.
Dr. Siegel concedes, "Clearly, I think the increased rates among younger adults, while low, are substantial and need some attention. For now we can say that there is obviously an obesity epidemic going on in the U.S., and so that probably has something to do with it. Also, there has been a change in dietary patterns over the past couple of decades, reflected in an increase in fast-food consumption and red meat consumption among young people."
Dr. Warren Enckler of Beth Israel Hospital in New York, agreed. "A dietary cause makes sense," he said. "If you take kids who are in an environment where the general caloric intake is higher, a sedentary lifestyle is more prevalent than it was 30 years ago and the type of food they're eating -- as regards red meat -- is higher, and then you put all of those things together, then there is no surprise that you have a rising incidence of colon cancer among younger people relative to others."
It's undoubtedly no coincidence that colon cancer rates also have been rising worldwide. A study just out by the American Cancer Society found that of the 51 countries on five continents looked at, 27 showed rising rates for both men and women in the past 20 years. The greatest increases were in Asia and Eastern Europe, places where the traditional diet has given way to American favorites. In fact, in Miyagi, Japan, colon cancer rates rose by 92 percent for men and 47 percent for women. In Slovenia, men showed a 70- percent increase and women 28 percent. In fact, only in America did rates decline. Or did they?
Earlier this month, the American Cancer Society published statistics claiming that many lives had been saved in the last decade thanks to better medical care -- primarily in lung cancer and colon cancer. In my newsletter on the subject, Cancer -- 650,000 Lives Miscalculated, I questioned the validity of the report's statistics. But this latest study goes beyond even my challenge. Quite simply, it calls into the question the report's fundamental premise -- that we were seeing the beginning of the end in the war on cancer. In truth, if this new study is true, the American Cancer Society may be citing a mere temporary blip in an inexorable climb in cancer deaths in the United States and throughout the world. A frightening prospect!
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Back in 2003, depressed people had something other than bad parenting to blame for their mental malaise. At that time, a well-publicized study announced that a link had been found between a gene called 5-HTTLPR and depressive illness. The research postulated that people with a variant of that gene didn't carry serotonin to their brain cells effectively. Since serotonin seems to allay depression, the scientists suspected that those with the gene variant would get depressed when life became difficult. And sure enough, the study found that those subjects who had the gene did get more profoundly depressed after traumatic life events than the subjects lacking the gene. ]]>
The mental health industry was all abuzz at the news, which seemingly explained why some people fall apart under stress while others just keep truckin'. As might be expected, the pharmaceutical companies, too, latched onto the results to use in concocting anti-depressant formulations. But now a new study punches big holes in the "genes-cause-depression" theory.
The study involved researchers from the National Institutes of Mental Health (NIMH) and six universities, who reviewed the original research plus 13 subsequent studies involving 12,500 people. While they found a strong link between the number of stressful life events subjects endured and risk of depression, they found no significant link between depression and that HTTLPR gene. In fact, divorce or a similar event raised depression risk by 40 percent, compared to the zero percent conferred by the gene.
"Even though our re-analysis did not confirm an association between the serotonin gene and depression, the finding that the environmental factor was strongly associated with depression in several studies reminds us that environmental factors are also involved in the complex pathways leading to mental disorders," said study director Kathleen Merikangas.
It would seem time to score one for nurture versus nature, except that the scientists still think nature plays a big role. They believe that they just haven't found the right gene yet -- or combination of genes. "Knowing whether or not you have this gene is irrelevant," said Dr. Merikangas, but she suggests that future studies should look at the interaction of many genes instead of focusing on just one.
But since it's easier to study one gene than to study many genes interacting, the search for the magic-bullet genetic saboteur continues. As co-author, Dr. Neil Risch of the University of California, San Francisco, says, "Identifying gene-environment interactions is most successful when studies can focus on a single gene with a major effect..." Meanwhile, the author of the original study, Dr. Avshalom Caspi, insists that the HTTLPR gene is being maligned and it really does cause depression. "The article ignores the complete body of scientific evidence," says Caspi, at the same time ignoring all of the new evidence himself.
Even though the scientists can't agree, it hasn't stopped the original findings implicating the suspected malfeasant gene from having a walloping impact. As Dr. Risch says, "A more serious concern ... is that the findings of this [earlier 2003 study] and other non-replicated genetic associations are now being translated to a range of clinical, legal, research, and social settings such as forensics, diagnostic testing, study participants, and the general public." There's also the fact that if antidepressant formulations attempt to address the genetic issue based on that study, it's no wonder that they so often don't work.
Already, at least several genetic-testing companies evaluate patient samples for the errant gene in order to recommend a particular antidepressant drug. Also, companies have been working on home tests for the depression gene, to be marketed to the public. [Isn't the allure of money wonderful?]
But why would people want to test for the depression gene? So that potential partners could screen each other to see if they might have depressed kids before committing to marriage? So that employers might start testing applicants to see who will show up in the morning chipper and fun, versus who just might be a daily drag? So that insurance companies might know who will require a regimen of pharmaceutical antidepressants for decades on end, and thus should be excluded from coverage?
Already psychiatrists have a blood test to diagnose depression in patients -- which again brings up the question of why? Are shrinks really not capable of diagnosing depression without a blood test? I mean, aren't they learning anything useful during all those years of schooling and hands-on training? The dark underside of all this genetic testing for depression is that it certainly will be used and has been used to justify dispensing drugs that often don't work and that often have nasty side effects.
Instead of waiting for science to discover the gene that makes you feel morose or popping some very dangerous pharmaceutical drugs to get you through the day, you might want to explore some alternatives as detailed in my newsletters and blogs on depression. Or you might want to check out my podcast on "depression trends."
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]]>No matter the side effects and the fact that it's illegal: an article on the British Medical Journal website advocates the use of Ritalin to help adults think more clearly. Using the "if Johnny can do it, why not me" argument, the author, Dr. John Harris of the University of Manchester, says that Ritalin has been deemed safe enough for hyperactive kids, so it must also be safe enough for adults. Even better, he believes they should have free access to the stuff. In fact, he asserts that it is "unethical" to stop healthy people from taking the drug and that it's relatively safe. "Safe always means safe enough," he says, "and since no drugs are free of side effects, that always means the consumer has judged the risks of adverse effects worth taking, given the probable benefits." ]]>
Those "probable benefits" include heightened mental ability and concentration, which Dr. Harris likens to synthetic sunshine. Really! No kidding! That's what he calls it! "With the advent of synthetic sunshine, work and social life could continue into and through the night, creating competitive pressures and incentives for those able or willing to use it to their advantage," he says. But apparently, the UK authorities don't deem those advantages quite as significant as does Dr. Harris. In fact, possession of Ritalin without a prescription carries a five-year prison sentence in the UK, and dealing can lead to 14 years in jail.
It's no surprise that such an article would appear in the leading British medical journal, given the fact that so many scientists and doctors already enjoy Ritalin recreationally -- legality be damned. As I wrote several months ago, over 20 percent of scientists admit to using prescription drugs illegally to sharpen their mental acumen, with the highly addictive Ritalin by far the frontrunner, preferred by 62 percent of the users. Plus, 80 percent of the respondents, who came from 60 countries, agreed that there should not be restrictions on access to Ritalin and other performance boosting drugs. Another study by the Nature Journal found that up to one-fifth of all respondents from the general public had used either Ritalin, Provigil (modafinil), or beta-blockers to improve focus, concentration, or memory.
It might appear in this case that too much Ritalin has made Dr. Johnny not mentally sharper, but rather, a bit deluded, given that Ritalin carries a black box warning issued by the FDA because of its highly addictive properties and potential for causing sudden death and serious cardiovascular damage. In fact, Ritalin's side effect list includes an astonishing array of potential problems, ranging from the development of Tourette's Syndrome, to insomnia, psychosis, hypertension, hair loss, anemia, tachycardia and so on. Plus, studies show that kids given Ritalin have a reduced ability to experience pleasure later in life and an increased tendency to become depressed to the point of despair. Now, if that doesn't sound like "synthetic sunshine," I don't know what does.
In fact, a recent study by the National Institute on Drug Abuse (NIDA) confirmed that Ritalin acts on the brain very much like cocaine does, altering neurons in the same area of the brain. Further, the lead researcher in that study, Yong Kim, explains, "Methylphenidate [Ritalin], which is thought to be a fairly innocuous compound, can have structural and biochemical effects in some regions of the brain that can be even greater than those of cocaine."
And that brings up several issues. First, why not just advocate legalizing cocaine? The stuff was good enough for Dr. Freud, and he sure had prolific output. And let's not forget Sherlock Holmes, who was a noted devotee of the stimulant while still maintaining his status as the greatest fictional detective in history. Then again, unlike Dr. Harris, Dr. Watson did not approve. Nor did he desire to join Holmes in his addiction.
Next, if normal people need a mental boost from drugs just to "keep up," perhaps a lifestyle change is called for. Why kick a tired horse (the brain) to get it to perform, instead of just giving it the rest or supplemental nourishment it needs?
Finally, perhaps Dr. John Harris does actually have a point, in a twisted sort of way. After all, the medical establishment has been freely dispensing Ritalin to kids for many years (in 2005, doctors wrote 29 million prescriptions for Ritalin in the United States alone, mostly for kids) as if it's a good thing. It isn't. A University of Michigan study found that by the mid 90's, there were more U.S. high-school seniors who abused Ritalin than there were seniors who were legally prescribed the drug. Even worse, a 1999 survey found that 6.8 percent of ninth-grade students were abusing Ritalin without a prescription. So, despite the absurdity of Dr. Harris' premise, his editorial does indeed call attention to the fact that the medical establishment has been treating this dangerous drug like a safe substance just perfect for kids, when maybe it isn't such a great thing after all.
If you want to sharpen your brain but don't want to take street drugs or abuse prescription drugs, you might try getting off of sugar, getting more rest and exercise, and perhaps trying some natural, safe, and non-addictive alternatives like gingko, Gotu Kola Leaf, Calamus Root, Bacopa, vincamine, and green tea.
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]]>One sure sign that you're cresting the hill is the appearance of wrinkles on your face. A recent survey of 1200 baby boomers found that 58 percent of the respondents agreed that wrinkles are the surest way to determine a person's age. And since few people want to look old, the business of eradicating wrinkles remains a huge industry, with anti-wrinkle cream sales soaring even as the economy tanks. ]]>
Now two new laser-based products have just cleared the FDA, and both make claims bound to attract a horde of aging consumers. The first offers a do-it-yourself laser device that you can buy over the counter and use at home. Marketed by Palomar Technologies, this laser uses a light-based LED to erase lines around eyes. Although the product hasn't yet been released, its appearance on store shelves is imminent and the company said it would sell in "the hundreds."
According to a Fox News piece, the dermatologists interviewed agreed that the device is "probably" safe and "unlikely" to damage the eyes, but they also doubted its practicality and usefulness. They agreed that it would likely require daily treatment of up to half an hour, twice a day, over a long period of time before erasing even the tiniest wrinkle.
"You're looking at devices that can only produce a single digit fraction of results as compared to what you can get in a dermatologist's office." said Dr. Paul Frank, a dermatologist. He does admit that the home treatment most likely will be far cheaper than a trip to the doctor's office and also, safer, although he cautions that, "...when the consumer gets overexcited about something, there's a tendency to over-abuse and overuse." Naturally, dermatologists have a vested interest in keeping technology that does what they do out of the hands of consumers, and since the product isn't yet out, it's unclear if their criticisms have any merit.
Again, the medical community has little positive to say about home wrinkle treatments. Dr. Marc Siegel of the NYU School of Medicine, for example, writes on the Fox News health blog: "If you are serious about your wrinkles...see your dermatologist. Do-it-yourself lasers that are now being marketed for home use may be used for attacking the tiniest wrinkles, but should not be a primary treatment. The FDA needs to crack down on the devices they approve. This one is okay, except that it is expensive (several hundred dollars) and largely placebo."
Which brings us to the second new product hitting the market, the fractionated carbon dioxide laser. While doctors have been resurfacing skin using lasers for some time now, and although the techniques supposedly work well, those procedures have incurred plenty of complications and a year later the wrinkles return in force. This new laser treatment, in contrast, takes about an hour to 90 minutes in the doctor's office, the side effects "supposedly" are minimal, and the claim goes that the results last years. The cost runs about $5000 or more -- 15 to 20 times the cost of the "expensive" home technique Dr. Siegel complained about, but, say the dermatologists, the treatment works better than a face lift, better than botox, better than just about anything else.
Unlike earlier laser treatments that directed powerful beams at the skin, often causing wounding, this new process "fractionalizes" the beam, sending lots of microscopically tiny beams that cause less damage. As the laser destroys old, damaged skin, the underlying layers tighten and trigger the production of collagen for building new skin.
"The little micro-beams essentially vaporize small columns of tissue that take about two to three days to seal back up," explains Dr. Jeffrey Orringer, director of the University of Michigan Dermatology Center. "During that time, as the skin heals back together, the lost volume essentially creates a tightening of the skin. In addition, around those columns of skin where the beam delivers heat, a very reproducible wound healing mechanism is created, which leads in part to the formation of new collagen in the skin."
The results, theoretically, should last about 15 years. Typical side effects include redness, swelling, and oozing that can last for days or weeks. "Concerns like infection and scarring or discoloration of the skin are certainly theoretical possibilities" says Dr. Orringer.
One chief difference between the home laser and the fractionalized beam centers around the strength of the laser. Doctors say that if the beams aren't strong enough or extensive enough, they won't have the power to do much. For instance, a competitive home product called RejuvaWand, which costs $200, supposedly stimulates collagen production via infrared red and red light directed at the skin in four-minute treatments. That means four minutes for each little area you want tightened up. The manufacturer claims that 67 percent of the women tested reported a 13 percent improvement in wrinkle reduction -- not exactly earth-shattering results for those seriously trying to look younger, especially considering that the results didn't appear until after 60 consecutive days of use.
If the results are out on just how effective the in-office fractionalized treatments are, they sure aren't readily available on the web, other than anecdotal reports from doctors and a few patients. There are reports attesting to the relative safety of the procedure, but nothing saying that 1000 women looked 18 years younger or anything to that effect.
If you want to tighten your skin and recapture your youthful glow, you might start by cleaning up your act -- quit smoking, back off on your drinking, drink more water to rehydrate your skin, and correct the ratio of Omega-6 to Omega-3 fatty acids in your diet. Then, if you have money to play with, try the home laser treatment. At least there's little safety risk. Finally, if you're an adventurous sort willing to spend plenty of money and risk infection-- and desperate to look as young as the Seventeen cover girl, you can make the dermatologists happy and try their new fractionated carbon laser -- but be sure to report in on the results so that others seeking the fountain of youth will know if the claims are pure hype.
Or you can just check out my four part series on aging and see how the smart people do it.
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]]>Back in the 1100's, gonorrhea became so prevalent that British Parliament enacted a law to control the epidemic. One hundred years later, Louis IX of France decreed that those with the disease needed to leave the country. The disease continued to be a scourge through the centuries. In the 1700s, healers favored mercury injections as the treatment of choice -- which perhaps destroyed gonorrhea -- but only in the process of also destroying the brain, lungs, kidneys, and other organs (a medical model still in favor today). So the introduction of antibiotics in the 20th Century was an historic miracle, finally cutting rates of new infections dramatically. Between 1975 and 1996 alone, rates of infection fell by 72 percent. ]]>
Alas, antibiotics are hitting the wall as the magic healing modality for gonorrhea, as increasing numbers of cases turn up drug resistant. According to Dr. Henry Masur, president of the Infectious Disease Society of America, "Gonorrhea has now joined the list of other superbugs for which treatment options have become dangerously few."
In spite of the decline of new gonorrhea infections, at least 800,000 people in the US get gonorrhea annually, with 200 million cases each year worldwide, and with annual costs running over $1 billion. In addition to causing infertility and pain in both sexes, the disease can spread to the blood and joints and potentially cause fatal conditions such as meningitis and endocarditis. Also, gonorrhea makes victims more vulnerable to HIV infection.
Gonorrhea has a long history of developing resistance to drug treatments. In the 1940s, the disease grew resistant to sulfa drugs, then the treatment of choice. Then, by 1990, the disease found its way around penicillin and tetracycline, making those drugs obsolete for treatment. Now it looks like the fluoroquinolones, a class of antibiotics including Cipro, are going down the same path.
At least seven percent of new cases in the US have proven drug resistant, but in some regions, that figure is much higher -- with Philadelphia showing 27 percent of new cases resistant to antibiotics, and San Francisco at 22.5 percent, or one in every four cases. The rate of drug-resistant cases has been escalating faster than the national debt, doubling in two years in San Francisco and increasing fivefold in Atlanta during that same time period. Overall, the number of resistant cases has increased 11 fold since 2000. In some Asian countries, resistance already tops 40 percent. In other words, it looks like the efficacy of the existing treatment of choice is not long for this world, and in fact, doctors now are recommending against using it.
There is one other class of antibiotics still effective against gonorrhea, the cephalosporins, but doctors worry that this cure too will also stop working as the virus develops resistance to it, leaving no options.
The director of STD prevention for the Centers for Disease Control (CDC), Dr. John Douglas, says, "That leaves us with a single class of highly effective antibiotics. We are running out of options to treat this disease...and there are no new drugs for gonorrhea in the drug development pipeline."
So are there any other mechanisms for containing gonorrhea, save abstinence and condoms, before the disease again catapults to epidemic proportions? The World Health Organization has urged the CDC to invest more in research and development for new treatments, but those treatments center around finding yet one more antibiotic. And the problem with that approach is the antibiotics have such a limited useful life. Sooner or later, bacteria will develop resistance to any antibiotic, as I've covered extensively in the past. If the medical establishment would consider the reality that antibiotics will always fail eventually because they are too simple in structure, too easy for bacteria and viruses to mutate around, as opposed to complex natural compounds that are virtually resistance-proof, they might actually come up with a powerful and lasting solution that would stop the explosion of SuperBugs like the antibiotic-resistant gonorrhea now threatening international health.
In the meantime, if you are at risk, the best natural options are grapefruit seed extract, olive leaf extract, garlic, and oil of oregano. But keep in mind, there are no guarantees. Reports of success are not consistent, but they do exist.
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]]>If any industry should know the statistics verifying the deadly impact of smoking, that industry would be the life insurance industry. Insurers know that smokers have double to triple the mortality rate compared to non-smokers -- which is why companies like Prudential won't even grant life insurance to those who smoke, or else they charge smokers exorbitant premiums. And yet, demonstrating an extraordinary degree of cynicism, some of the world's largest life insurance companies invest heavily in tobacco. In fact, insurance company investments in tobacco industry stocks amount to $4.5 billion.]]>
According to a report out of Harvard University and just published in the New England Journal of Medicine, life and disability insurance companies own billions of dollars in tobacco stock. The American Medical Association and other organizations have put pressure on these companies to divest these holdings, but to no avail. The message, it would seem, is that the bottom line counts far more than saving lives.
As Dr. David Himmelstein, one of the study authors said, "It's the combined taxidermist and veterinarian approach: either way you get your dog back."
The tobacco-friendly insurance companies named in the report include Prudential, which owns $1.5 billion in tobacco stock (including US and British divisions), and Sun Life Financial, with over one billion dollars in tobacco investments. Both of these companies also sell health insurance. The study also named Northwestern Mutual and MassMutual, attributed to hold over $200 million and $500 million, respectively, in tobacco company shares, although both of those companies contest those figures and claim that their investments amount to far less. Sun Life also contests the figures, plus defends its tobacco investments by pointing to the company's socially conscious investments -- $1.2 billion in renewable energy and another billion to renovate hospitals -- as if doing some good things buys the license to do some very wrong things. Or to put it another way, they wish to be accounted good guys because they're only responsible for contributing to the deaths of 250,000 people a year, not 500,000. Perhaps, we could call it the "Sun Life Defense" as an updated homage to the Nuremberg Defense.
Perhaps the most startling numbers apply to TIAA-CREF, the retirement fund for teachers in the United States. TIAA-CREF owns over a billion dollars in tobacco investments. Although plan participants can elect to avoid supporting tobacco stock and instead buy only socially responsible investments. Still, it seems unconscionable that a company that supports the educational system, albeit indirectly, would simultaneously support tobacco interests.
Incidentally, Northwestern Mutual, Mass Mutual, and TIAA-CREF are consistently ranked in the top-5 of America's Most Admired insurance companies. But that doesn't seem to stop Jean Towell, spokesperson for Northwestern Mutual, from stating, "We ultimately have a fiduciary responsibility to our clients." Apparently, Ms. Towell hasn't twigged that supporting interests that kill might actually not be that admirable. This is not hyberbole. Tobacco products are instrumental in the death of 5.4 million people worldwide each year, and as I've written before, tobacco companies have done a great job of pushing their products in underdeveloped and poor nations.
It should be noted that when pressure in the developed world caused tobacco companies to cut back on advertising, the tobacco industry launched relentless campaigns in places where the word wasn't yet out about just how deadly smoking is -- places like Russia, China, Africa, and India. The results were a 75 percent increase in smoking rates in Africa, a 100 percent increase in Russia since the collapse of the Soviet Union, a 91 percent increase in tobacco exports to China, and so on. Currently, about 12 percent of cancer cases in less developed countries result from smoking, but experts anticipate a momentous rise in that figure since major health ramifications from smoking can take three to four decades to hit -- and already, lung cancer is the leading cause of cancer deaths worldwide.
But tobacco stocks are considered among the most reliable investments in this shaky economy, with Altria Group (formerly Phillip Morris) stock yielding over seven percent and Reynolds American at 8.6 percent. Apparently, it's a golden ring too alluring to resist for the money hungry investors, no matter the consequences. So insurance companies downplay the evil wrought because tobacco is only part of their portfolio in order to bet both sides of the equation. In this way they can profit whether subscribers live or die (if a customer dies from smoking and thus stops paying premiums, the company at least continues to make profit from all the other people in the world who nevertheless continue to smoke). Meanwhile tobacco continues to kill increasing numbers of people.
But that's not the truly dark side of the situation. We haven't discussed that yet!
Dr. Himmelstein notes that the impact of the insurance investment in tobacco extends beyond the obvious. "If you own a billion dollars [of tobacco stock], then you don't want to see it go down. You are less likely to join anti-tobacco coalitions, endorse anti-tobacco legislation, basically, anything most health companies would want to participate in."
In other words, investment in tobacco is not merely a passive activity. It gives you a financial incentive to support efforts to induce ever larger numbers of people to smoke and die -- particularly if you can outsource most of those numbers to "foreign" countries. The bottom line is that if you invest in big tobacco, it's not just about money; it's about actively participating in global murder. And just like the Nuremberg defense did not hold up in the court of public opinion, neither does the Sun Life defense.
In any event, if you want to invest in companies that avoid unethical practices, check out the social investment forum.
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]]>As of 2006, United States citizens spent $27 billion annually on alternative and complementary treatments. According to a New York Times survey, 48% of adults in the United States used at least one alternative or complementary treatment in 2004 -- and that percentage has probably climbed in the intervening years. And most insurance companies now reimburse alternative practitioners. But despite the popularity of alternative medicine, the press persists in trying to persuade readers to avoid alternatives at all costs.]]>
Take, for example, the article cited above that appeared this week on RedOrbit.com entitled, "Alternative Herbs and Medicines Grow in Popularity." The article begins by acknowledging that alternatives have become increasingly mainstream, musing that the public seems to distrust drug companies. (I wonder why.) But quickly, it changes tone, using the familiar scare tactics: "Dietary supplements do not have to pass any safety tests before being sold. Some contain lead and arsenic, and some obstruct other medicines from working, like birth control pills," it warns. The article then complains that within the past 15 years, the Feds spent $2.5 billion researching the health effects of alternatives, but "nothing monumental has been discovered, aside from the use of acupuncture and ginger for chemotherapy-associated nausea."
Although it does admit about halfway down that few supplements cause any health problems, it reiterates the warning about lead content and then mentions the scary "tainted" possibility. Finally, it admits that pharmaceuticals like Vioxx can have problems, too, but says that, "The difference is that at least these medicines have rules, guidelines and watchdog groups that follow their usage." In other words, go to the doctor and get a prescription. Oh, and die!
Unfortunately, no author took credit for this article, and it's no wonder. Who would want to take credit for such a marvel of distortion? Because the facts make clear these things:
Obviously, in spite of the "rules, guidelines and watchdog groups" that regulate and oversee prescription drug -- pharmaceuticals are among the most dangerous substances on the planet. While drugs sometimes can heal or ease symptoms, they often do no better than alternatives, and very, very often, they do far worse. There is a reason so many people turn to alternatives, and in spite of what articles like the one in RedOrbit imply, that reason is NOT that people are stupid.
And as for the "nothing monumental" having been discovered about the healing power of alternatives, the author seems to not read the health news. Review my blog entries for the past six months and you'll see articles citing studies showing that green tea extract blocks AIDS, probiotics prevent and heal heart disease, green pea protein lowers blood pressure and intervenes against kidney disease, a homeopathic approach to peanut allergies seems to work a cure, the enzyme nattokinase reduces Alzheimer's risk, magnets work better than antidepressants, and so on. These studies were reported in the major health media, which, I realize, is not necessarily testimony to their accuracy. But at least they match the standards established by the medical community.
But it isn't only the folks at RedOrbit trying to debunk natural care. Such articles pop up constantly like pimples on a teenager. One notable article a few years ago appeared in the New York Times and then was widely distributed. It complained that U.S. residents "do not appear to care that there is little, if any, evidence that many complementary therapies work"; and that "alternative therapy practitioners do not have a fraction of the training mainstream doctors do." But if those NYT authors had bothered to consider the fact that the training those mainstream doctors received results in 98,000 deadly errors annually, to say nothing about the disability and suffering caused by their millions of non-fatal errors annually; if they had recognized that there's little if any evidence that plenty of mainstream treatments work (flu vaccines, hormone replacement therapy, and angioplasties for example), they might not have made the statement.
Of course not every alternative therapy works, not every herb affects a cure, and a few people here and there have allergic reactions to herbs; but the track record sure is a lot cleaner for alternative medicine than it is for the mainstream. Plus, the record speaks for itself: a plethora of studies show that natural substances and approaches often beat out mainstream medicine in effectiveness, safety, patient satisfaction, and cost.
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]]>If you've seen the movie Supersize Me, you might think you know all there is to know about the evil effects of gorging on fast-foods -- but here's yet another factor to consider. Researchers at the University of Toronto found potentially carcinogenic chemicals from food wrappers -- the type of wrappers that burgers and subs come in, for instance -- at high concentrations in the blood of all the subjects they tested. ]]>
Actually, what they discovered were chemicals called diPAPs (polyfluoroalkyl phosphoric acid diesters), and though scientists don't know if diPAPs themselves are problematic, they do know that they quickly break down into PFOAs, which are the same chemicals used in Teflon and non-stain carpet and upholstery. Studies have linked PFOAs to liver cancer, pancreatic cancer, testicular cancer, neonatal death, hormonal disruption, infertility, and genetic mutations. And while PFOAs have been found at significant levels in the blood of 98 percent of all human subjects ever tested, as well as in the blood of animals at the farthest reaches of the earth (polar bears show high concentrations), this is the first study to isolate the presence of diPAPs in humans. The scientists believe that diPAPs may be responsible for at least 10 percent of the PFOA in human blood. So in addition to whatever unknown toxic impact diPAPs impart before degrading, the chemical certainly does impart toxicity once it breaks down into PFOA.
Industry uses the diPAP to grease-proof food wrappers, pizza boxes, microwave popcorn bags, candy wrappers, take-home doggie containers, fast-food bags and commercial food wrappers. It sticks to the surface of paper products, but apparently not permanently, given that the researchers found it not only in human blood, but also in sewage sludge, vegetables, and paper pulp, meaning that it's undoubtedly getting out into the environment. Again, research doesn't yet exist on the health effects of diPAPs on humans, but it doesn't look good based on the fact that diPAPs belong to the same class of chemicals -- perfluorochemicals -- as PFOA and PFOS (another extremely toxic chemical).
One of the researchers, Scott Mabury, commented, "The take-home message is that some chemicals that make our lives easier, better, and more satisfying end up in our bloodstream with unknown toxicological consequences." In other words, diPAP works well for its intended purpose, but while it keeps food juices from leaking onto your lap, it simultaneously leaks toxins into your blood.
Perhaps the most alarming concern is that, according to the scientists, when the diPAP breaks down, it produces molecules 10,000 times more toxic than the PFOA it becomes. As Dr. Madbury says, "In going from diPAPs to PFOA, you go through things that have been entirely ignored by essentially all of the academic research community. This is not something you want to be a common contaminant in humans. Certainly not at the concentrations it's at."
Even if you don't care about diPAP and PFOA affecting you personally (or polar bears), here's something to consider. A 2007 study found packaging PFOA in the blood of newborns -- in fact, in every single one of the 299 samples analyzed. PFOA also has been found in crops, meaning that it's likely in soil, and since it apparently doesn't decompose in the environment, newborns for the foreseeable future also will come into the world full of the stuff. Oh yes, that also means that even if you don't eat fast foods, avoid Teflon cookware, and live a very clean lifestyle, your body is still likely to be highly contaminated because of environmental contamination...which hardly seems fair.
Although the US Environment Protection Agency labeled PFOA a "likely" human carcinogen in January 2006, and while the EPA made an agreement with DuPont at the time to phase out all PFOA in products by 2015 -- PFOA still is present in plenty of products. Plus, it sure looks like DuPont has been dragging its corporate feet in implementing the withdrawal of PFOA. Just a few months ago, the company somehow convinced the EPA that it needs a three-year extension on testing PFOA-related products before it can gear up the phase-out.
Richard Wiles, Executive Director of the Environmental Working Group, commented, "As long as [Dupont] can delay development of this data, that basically means that they don't have to comply with the phase-out agreement."
The way the so-called PFOA ban has been handled most likely foreshadows what will happen with diPAPs. After all, it was 2005 when the EPA first hit DuPont with the PFOA phase-out agreement, giving the company a 10-year implementation window. Way back in 2001, residents living near a Dupont plant in West Virginia sued the company for PFOA contamination, and the dangers of PFOA had been suspected long before that. In other words, talk of the dangers of PFOA has been bandied about for many years now and a ban still hasn't been implemented. The scenario with diPAP will most likely be the same, with many years of expensive research and testing to be completed to find out if it's really harmful before even talk of a ban dawns.
The message here is to avoid food in grease-proof wrappers as much as possible. But since toxic chemicals are virtually inescapable in the environment no matter where you live and no matter what you eat, you also need to detoxify your body regularly. As I wrote in my newsletter, "Inescapable Toxins," exposure to toxins has indeed become inescapable. Now more than ever we must recognize that regular and continual detoxing has become a mandatory health protocol for everyone -- not just an esoteric exercise for health fanatics."
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]]>It's fun to imagine the conversation that led to the discovery that applying green tea to the vagina blocks the transmission of AIDS. ("Sweetheart, are you going to drink your Sencha or use it vaginally?") But in fact, the research that found that an antioxidant in green tea neutralizes a protein in sperm that can carry the HIV virus took place in the lab, not at high tea. In fact, back in 2003, an article in the Journal of Allergy and Clinical Immunology reported that Epigallocatechin Gallate (EGCG), found in green tea, prevents HIV from binding to T-cells. EGCG is the same component that confers the various other health benefits derived from green tea, such as cancer prevention. Although the researchers knew back then that EGCG inhibited HIV in test tubes, they didn't yet have a formulation that could be used in real life.
]]> But now it looks like researchers at the University of Heidelberg in Germany have developed a practical way to use EGCG to fend off AIDS. After finding that sperm contains a peptide that essentially escorts the HIV virus to the entry point in healthy cells so that it can infect them, they ran tests in the lab and verified that when HIV-infected semen was exposed to healthy cells in the presence of ECCG, the EGCG blocked the HIV-enhancing peptide. The researchers believe that topical vaginal creams containing EGCG could be developed and used as a "simple and affordable prevention method.""EGCG, a natural ingredient of green tea, may be a valuable and cost-efficient inhibitor of semen-mediated enhancement of virus infection, and hence of sexual transmission of HIV," the scientists wrote in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences.
Scientists have been experimenting with the derivatives of many natural substances as HIV inhibitors, but most fail when moved from the lab to living subjects, or else they only work at toxic doses. In lab tests, it appears that low doses of EGCG are effective, and that EGCG is non-toxic even at very high doses, and so human tests are on the horizon. Plus, scientists hope that because EGCG derives from a natural substance, it will remain effective even if the virus undergoes changes.
Like all viruses, the HIV virus has the capacity to mutate. This means that synthetic drugs, which typically contain just one active ingredient, eventually fail when the virus finds a way around that ingredient. And so, researchers have been investigating a host of natural substances -- not just EGCG -- as HIV solutions. Bevirimat, found in birch-tree bark, currently is being looked at as a possible AIDS intervention, and raltegravir, an existing AIDS medication, derives from green coffee beans.
But researchers may be missing the point. Natural substances such as green tea or birch bark "each" contain multiple active ingredients and so they stand up to viral mutations -- including HIV mutations -- far better than single bullet approaches. However, it should be pointed out that if the cream is based on an extract of pure EGCG, rather than the full polyphenol complex as found in green tea, the chances of the HIV virus being able to mutate around it increase exponentially. The value of natural substances lies in the diversity of biochemicals they each contain. When natural extracts are purified down to a single bio-chemical, they have been effectively turned into one dimensional drugs and lost much of their value. Doing this for multiple natural substances does not change the fundamental underlying equation.
Meanwhile, researchers are looking to EGCG for applications beyond AIDS prevention. In a study published this week in the Journal of Clinical Oncology, a team from the Mayo Clinic in Rochester, Minnesota announced that in clinical tests, leukemia patients given high doses of EGCG experienced significant improvements, including a 50-percent reduction in the size of swollen lymph nodes and a lowered lymphocyte count.
A 2008 study out of the University of Mississippi found that EGCG reduced the growth of breast tumors in mice by more than 65 percent. In that study, the EGCG simply was infused into water that the mice drank. Earlier studies have found EGCG effective against Alzheimer's disease, prostate tumor growth, obesity, clogged arteries, diabetes, arthritis, and more.
Scientists caution that drinking green tea by the bucketful won't necessarily cure cancer nor prevent AIDS, although they do note that two cups of tea contain enough EGCG to cut the binding action of HIV by 40 percent. But, they warn, to prevent AIDS, the EGCG needs to be delivered to the HIV-binding cells and not dispersed throughout the system, and so a more targeted approach is necessary -- thus the vaginal crème methodology. The same principal applies to using EGCG to shrink tumors, according to the scientific community.
But you don't need a vaginal cream (particularly if you're male), or a pharmaceutical derivative to reap the benefits of EGCG. Plenty of studies have shown that those who drink lots of green tea or who take the full complex in supplement form do experience powerful health benefits. How nice that I've included it in my ultimate antioxidant formulas for nigh on two decades.
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]]>Along with the many complaints that may come with old age, insomnia ranks high on the list. Older people complain that they can't get a good night's sleep anymore, that they can't sleep the way they did when younger -- but their complaints may, in fact, be based on the faulty notion that they still require as much sleep as they did decades earlier. New research indicates that in fact, people over the age of 60 naturally sleep less than younger folks do. Naturally, of course, being the interpretive word here.
]]> The study, out of Brigham and Women's Hospital in Boston, analyzed the sleep patterns of elderly subjects aged 60 to 75, and compared the results with a group aged 18 to 32. All the subjects were healthy and not on any medications that could disturb sleep. The subjects were instructed to stay in bed in a darkened room for 16 hours daily, including day and night to adjust for circadian rhythms. It turned out that the younger subjects easily slept for an average of nine hours (considerably less than their usual nighttime sleep), while the older subjects on average couldn't sleep beyond 7.5 hours.According to study director Elizabeth Klerman, "The most parsimonious explanation for our results is that older people need less sleep." The results don't necessarily mean that older people thrive on less sleep, or even that they have experienced changes in their sleep "set point." Although Klerman admits, "It's also possible that [older people] sleep less even when given the opportunity for more sleep because of age-related changes in the ability to fall asleep and remain asleep," she asserts that these age-related changes are normal and not cause for alarm, nor cause for taking sleeping pills.
"If older people believe that they need more sleep than they can achieve even when they spend extra time in bed, then they may complain of insomnia: being awake when wanting to be asleep," she says. "They may start using medications needlessly. If they are tired during the day, they should consider evaluation for a sleep disorder that may be interfering with their ability to obtain good sleep at night."
In fact, another study indicates that snagging extra sleep (at least too much of it) may work to the detriment of older adults. The March 2009 study published in the Journal of the American Geriatrics Society found that elderly women who napped more than three hours weekly had a 44 percent greater risk of dying from any cause and a 58 percent increased risk of dying from cardiovascular causes. The study also found that subjects who slept between nine and ten hours a night had a higher rate of mortality compared to women who slept eight to nine hours.
The researchers determined that napping and sleeping long weren't causing death, but rather that those who took naps and slept 10 hours daily probably had underlying health problems that kept them from sleeping well at night, and so they craved more mattress time.
"Since excessive sleep suggests that night time sleep is disrupted, interventions to treat sleep disorders and improve sleep quality in older women may reduce mortality risk," said Katie L. Stone, co-author of that study. Sounds like the beginnings of a case for dishing out medications designed to improve sleep, which is exactly what Dr. Klerman's study recommends against.
By the way, naps amounting to less than three hours weekly had no detrimental effect in the study. It should also be noted that other studies have found that afternoon naps boost mental performance in the elderly and have no correlation to increased mortality, while the case for longer sleep at night linking to increased risk of death is nearly unanimous.
For instance, one huge study published in The Archives of General Psychiatry in 2002 looked at sleep patterns of over a million adults aged 30 to 102. Those who slept more than eight hours a night had a 12-percent increased mortality rate, and that risk escalated with each additional hour of sleep. The risk also applied to those getting four or fewer hours nightly, with six to seven hours proving optimal.
Another study in 2007 out of the University of Warwick and University College in London confirmed those findings, determining that both too little and too much sleep led to higher mortality. Those subjects who reduced sleep from seven to five hours nearly doubled their mortality risk, while those who increased sleep from seven to eight hours also had twice the risk of death. Again, seven hours of sleep per night emerged as the magic number.
But the one thing all of these studies avoid talking about is the quality of sleep. Yes, quantity matters, but quality matters more -- particularly as we age. Older people don't just sleep less; the quality of their sleep is diminished too. The problem is that the average percentage of time spent in deep, slow-wave sleep decreases dramatically as we age. By the time most people are 60, they spend most of their time in stage 1 and 2 sleep and almost none in delta. This has a profound effect on both on how alert you feel during the day and on your overall health. The bottom line is that 7.5 hours of surface sleep and 7.5 hours of deep delta sleep are not the same thing.
For a more detailed discussion of sleep and how to get better at it, check out my newsletter -- To Sleep, Perchance to Dream.
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]]>We've all heard the cancer prevention advice: eat plenty of fruits and vegetables, avoid grilled meat, lose weight, don't smoke. But then again, we've also heard opposing voices telling us that fruits won't ward off the "big C"; meat is just fine, a few extra pounds won't hurt, and so on. No wonder a recent study in Great Britain found that a huge segment of the population simply ignores cancer-prevention advice, finding it too fickle.
]]> The study, sponsored by the World Cancer Research Fund (WCRF) determined that more than half of the 2,400 subjects believed that scientists always change their minds. More than a quarter said they don't pay one bit of attention to recommendations regarding cancer prevention because of the ever-changing nature of those recommendations. The respondents over age 55 were the most cynical, with more than 60-percent concurring that scientific opinion shifts continually. Apparently, many people believe that the movie Sleeper is a documentary portraying how Woody Allen, the owner of the Happy Carrot Health Food Store, wakes up 200 years in the future only to find that cigarettes and fatty foods are now considered healthy.According to Richard Evans, director of research for the WCRF, "The fact is that WCRF and other cancer charities agree on the best ways of reducing cancer risk and this advice has stayed broadly the same for quite a long time. A decade ago, we were recommending that people eat a plant-based diet, be physically active, and maintain a healthy weight and this is still the case today."
He blames the lack of public faith in cancer-prevention advice on information overload. "With the large number of new studies being published, it is perhaps not surprising that people get the impression cancer prevention advice is always changing," Evan says. "But these single studies are usually only a single piece in a jigsaw and on their own are not strong enough evidence to make conclusions." As Evans and others point out, this creates a dangerous situation, where people make unhealthy choices based on an aberrant study that happens to make a media splash.
While it is true that the majority of stories in the news do emphasize the importance of eating fresh vegetables and fruits, avoiding meat, and exercising, plenty of contradictory tidbits do make it to prime-time media. (Ahh! That old media splash.) For instance, an Associated Press article from July 17, 2007, announced that a low-fat diet rich in vegetables and fruits won't prevent the recurrence of breast cancer. The average harried reader might skim the article and assume, without digging deeper, that vegetables and fruits don't help prevent any type of cancer -- a broad leap to be sure, but one readers might make. Adding to the confusion would be a study published a few months later in the Journal of the National Cancer Institute finding that consuming fruits and vegetables has very little value in preventing colon cancer. Based on those two studies, you can pretty much write off fruits and vegetables. But wait -- by December of 2008, another study in The Journal of Oncology completely turned around the results of the first study, finding that eating lots of fruits and veggies cuts the recurrence rate of breast cancer by one-third.
Now let's also look at the contradictory news reporting on meat and cancer. In 2005, a European study involving half a million people got lots of press when it found that eating meat led to a 35-percent increased chance of getting colon cancer. But then two years later, in 2007, a study in Japan found no link at all between meat eating and colon cancer -- and any story letting beef off the hook gets press because of the lobbying power of the meat industry. Meanwhile, a 2007 well-publicized study found that women who consumed lots of meat had a 60-percent increased risk of breast cancer, while Reuters just carried splashy news of a large study that found no link at all between meat intake and breast cancer. Even as I write this, I'm getting confused, and this is my field. What chance does the casual reader have?
The thing is that few people have the time or inclination to do the research necessary to find out where the weight of evidence lies -- and the evidence is that an overwhelming majority of the research supports the idea that fruits, vegetables, and low-meat intake (at least cut back on grilled and processed meats) is essential for cancer prevention. People don't have the resources to analyze the studies to see who sponsored them, how they were structured, or what the variables were based on (for instance, local organic vegetables versus pesticide-laden produce imported from Mexico -- or organic grass-fed beef versus hormone injected, antibiotic laced, corn fattened beef). And so the isolated juicy stories featured on the news promoting contradictory findings may seem of equal weight to the general audience as the many, many studies that simply confirm earlier findings and so don't get airplay.
As Dr. Jeff Niederdeppe of the University of Wisconsin says, "Cancer is a difficult thing to talk about in the space of a single news story. Science values repetition, while the media values novelty. Those two concepts naturally butt heads, which can confuse people."
Dr. Niederdeppe knows: he headed a study of 6000 Americans analyzing attitudes towards cancer prevention. He found that 71 percent of the subjects felt confused about which recommendations to follow regarding cancer prevention. Nearly half believed that "everything causes cancer," and more than a quarter felt that there really wasn't anything they could do to lower their chances of getting cancer. Unfortunately, those with fatalistic views were less likely to follow healthy diets or lifestyle regimens, and therefore, more likely to get cancer.
Bottom line? There's an avalanche of proof that minimizing meat (and grilled and processed meat in particular) and maximizing your intake of fresh, organic foods rich in antioxidants helps lower cancer risk, as does keeping weight down, quitting smoking, exercising, and so on. If you come across studies that take a different view, do your research and consider all the evidence -- including what your own body tells you and what natural practitioners have been saying for centuries.
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]]>Here's one to add to the growing list of benefits conferred by increasing your intake of Omega-3 fatty acids as epitomized by the Mediterranean diet -- a dramatically lowered risk of age-related macular degeneration (AMD). According to the first of several recently published studies, having just one serving of fish per week lowers your risk of macular degeneration by 31 percent while a serving or two of nuts reduces risk by 35 percent. The research found an even stronger association when subjects consumed lower levels of polyunsaturated vegetable oils. And, in fact, despite what the researchers say, this is actually confirmation once again that the key here is not so much the increase in Omega-3 fatty acids, but in correcting of the ratio of Omega-6 to Omega-3 fatty acids.
]]> Summing up their findings, the researchers wrote, "In conclusion, our findings support the hypothesis that increased intake of omega-three polyunsaturated fatty acids and regular consumption of fish and/or nuts in the diet may protect against the development of early AMD. These findings also suggest that an appropriate balance among various nutrients is essential for maximizing nutritional benefit."Meanwhile, a separate study of 6730 seniors conducted by the Centre for Eye Research (also in Australia) found that the subjects who consumed the highest levels of olive oil (mostly Omega-9 monosaturated fat) had the lowest risk of developing macular degeneration, while those who ate the most trans-fat rich food, especially in baked goods and prepared foods, had the highest rates.
Up until these studies, smoking, genetic factors, and age were identified as the principal contributors to the development of the disease. The researchers suggest that they need additional data to determine whether changing diet or supplementing with Omega-3 might prevent or postpone macular degeneration in those who have a genetic predisposition. (It seems obvious without waiting for the results of those future studies that subjects who eat more Omega-3 rich foods and fewer Omega-6 rich foods and high trans fat foods would have fewer cases of macular degeneration -- or at least, it couldn't hurt. Anyway, there are plenty of other benefits to eschewing trans fats and reestablishing the proper fatty acid balance in your body beyond preserving eyesight. )
The researchers suggest that nuts, fish, and olive oil aid the eyes because of their Omega-3 fatty acid content and/or low Omega-6 content. They believe that Omega-3s reduce inflammation in the retina and prevent plaque buildup in the arteries. They also contend that trans fats have the opposite effect, increasing inflammation and depositing plaque in the retina and blood vessels leading to the eyes. But that's only half the story. The researchers seem to have forgotten the results of their own study that showed that reducing consumption of Omega-6 rich vegetables oils also made a difference. So once again, it's not just the consumption of Omega-3 oils that matters. It's moving the ratio down from the usual 20:1, 30:1, 40:1 Omega-6 to Omega-3 fatty acids typical of the Western diet to a more healthy 2:1 or even 1:1 ratio.
Given that macular degeneration is the primary cause of blindness in older adults and that experts project that as many as three million people will have the disease within the next 12 years, those who value their sight would be wise to pay attention to these studies. If preserving your sight doesn't motivate you, as mentioned above, there are plenty of other reasons to toss the Wesson Oil and stock up on nuts and olive oil. Studies show that the Mediterranean diet dramatically cuts the risk of almost every leading illness -- including cancer and heart disease -- plus it confers longer life. And if even that doesn't inspire you to switch to the diet, here's one more tidbit that might: a related study found a significant link between macular degeneration and cognitive decline.
The director of that study, Tien Yin Wong of the University of Melbourne, summed up his findings: "Our study suggests that there may be common links in the cause and risk factors for both conditions [macular degeneration and cognitive decline]. These links further raise the possibility that preventive and treatment strategies targeted at one condition may be useful for another."
In other words, if you want to keep both your eyes and your memories of what you've seen with them throughout your life, you'd do well to cut out the cupcakes and eat plenty of veggies, krill oil, and nuts.
P.S. Studies have also found that consuming six mg per day of lutein can also lower risk of macular degeneration by a whopping 43%. You can get plenty of the carotenoid antioxidant lutein by eating lots of green leafy vegetables such as kale and chard, particularly raw -- and of course, fresh veggies are key in the Mediterranean diet. Various fruits also contain lutein as well as zeaxanthin, another helpful carotenoid. Lutein/zeaxanthin supplements have been found helpful in increasing macular pigment as well as in preventing cataracts (in combination with vitamin C), which is one reason you'll find these components in the Ultimate Antioxidant.
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]]>The cancer drug Avastin already has a rap sheet as long as a San Quentin inmate; studies say it causes blood clots, stroke, eye inflammation, and heart attack. It also bears a dreaded black box warning because of a "suspected" link to gastrointestinal perforations. Now, a new report out of Stony Brook University in New York has confirmed that the drug does indeed cause potentially lethal holes in the colon, though it's often prescribed for advanced colon cancer.
]]> Avastin belongs to a class of drugs known as anti-angiogenesics, which are used to block the blood supply to tumors. This study, which was published in The Lancet, found that the risk of developing holes in the gut was double for patients taking Avastin compared to those not taking the drug. Don't panic yet; doubling is not quite as bad as it sounds. We're only talking about a one-percent risk -- although earlier studies found that Avastin also doubles the risk of serious and potentially lethal cardiac problems for patients undergoing chemotherapy.In the most recent study, the researchers reviewed case records of 12,300 cancer patients, including 6,490 who took Avastin. Although only one percent of the Avastin patients developed abdominal holes, the 65 who did were at a 22 percent risk of dying from the complication. Even patients who developed colon perforations but who didn't take Avastin had better outcomes, with an 18-percent death rate. Now, to be fair, 65 out of 6,490 doesn't necessarily sound so bad, but there's more to the story.
Avastin gets prescribed for a variety of cancers, especially colon cancer, non-small cell lung cancer, metastatic breast cancer and glioblastoma multiforme -- an incurable brain cancer. It should be noted, though, that although the FDA approved it for use in breast cancer, the FDA's own Oncologic Drugs Advisory Committee recommended against approval of Avastin because the drug doesn't increase survival time and has such a deadly history, though it prolongs the time during which the cancer remains at earlier stages. How the drug gained approval in spite of not making it through committee is a feat that remains shrouded in mystery. As for the other cancers, studies have shown that it can increase survival times in lung cancer by a mere two months and brain cancer by several months. As for colorectal cancer, studies show that it doesn't reduce the risk of recurrence in colon cancer. It merely extends the time by about seven months before the original cancer gets worse. Now let's take a look at the numbers again. When you match a one percent risk of holes in the colon plus double the risk of cardiac events against marginal benefit, the numbers for Avastin suddenly look decidedly worse.
Although regulations call for stopping Avastin if perforations develop, research director Dr. Sanjaykumar Hapani cautions that such an approach may be unwise when so few treatment options exist.
"[Stopping treatment] might reduce the use of an otherwise effective drug in patients with metastatic cancer and very few treatment options," Dr. Hapani says, while calling for another study to see if low doses can safely be administered to patients once their perforations have healed. But what does he mean by "effective." Effective how? A few months extension on the original cancer, a marginal increase in survival time, and no reduction in the recurrence of the cancer!
Which makes clear just how desperate mainstream medicine is to do something, anything to combat "incurable" cancers. The FDA acknowledges that the drug has been the direct cause of death from various causes; its own advisory panel says the drug isn't worth the risk, and yet, the medical establishment apparently feels it's better to prescribe a known killer-drug than to do nothing. In addition to the risk of death, Avastin raises the risk of hypertension by 67 percent, of stomach pain by 61 percent, vomiting by 52 percent, upper respiratory infection by 47 percent, constipation by 40 percent, nosebleeds by 35 percent, and diarrhea by 34 percent (when administered in combo with chemotherapy, as opposed to just receiving chemotherapy).
Meanwhile, annual sales of Avastin remain at about $2.7 billion in the United States alone. (Well, we knew there had to be some positive numbers for Avastin to justify its use.) The bottom line is that a lot of money is being spent on a marginally effective and undeniably dangerous drug. For a more logical and benign approach to treating cancer, listen to this special report.
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