Lettuce gets a healthy suntan

Ultraviolet LEDs create darker, redder lettuce richer in antioxidants
WASHINGTON, May 18-- Salad dressing aside, a pile of spinach has more nutritional value than a wedge of iceberg lettuce.
That's because darker colors in leafy vegetables are often signs of antioxidants that are thought to have a variety of health benefits. Now a team of plant physiologists has developed a way to make lettuce darker and redder—and therefore healthier—using ultraviolet light-emitting diodes (LEDs).

Steven Britz of the U.S. Department of Agriculture in Beltsville, Md., and colleagues will present the research at the 2009 Conference on Lasers and Electro Optics/International Quantum Electronics Conference (CLEO/IQEC), which takes place May 31 to June 5 at the Baltimore Convention Center.


The dark red tinges on a leaf of red leaf lettuce are the plant kingdom's equivalent of suntan lotion. When bombarded with ultraviolet rays from the sun, the lettuce leaf creates UV-absorbing polyphenolic compounds in its outer layer of cells. Some of these compounds are red and belong to the same family that gives color to berries and apple skin. They help block ultraviolet radiation, which can mutate plant DNA and damage the photosynthesis that allows a plant to make its food.

Polyphenolic compounds,which include flavonoids like quercetin and cyanidin, are also powerful antioxidants. Diets rich in antioxidants are thought to provide a variety of health benefits to human beings, from improving brain function to slowing the wear and tear of aging.

To create red leaf lettuce plants enriched with these compounds, Britz purchased low-power LEDs that shine with UVB light, a component of natural sunlight. In small quantities, this ultraviolet light allows humans to produce vitamin D, which has been cited for its health benefits. Britz exposed the plants to levels of UVB light comparable to those that a beach goer would feel on a sunny day, approximately 10 milliwatts per square meter.

After 43 hours of exposure to UVB light, the growing lettuce plants were noticeably redder than other plants that only saw white light. Though the team has yet to quantify this effect, it appears to increase as the intensity of the light increases. The effect also seems to be particularly sensitive to the wavelength used – peaking at 282 and 296 nanometers, and absent for longer wavelength UV. "We've been pleasantly surprised to see how effective the LEDs are, and are now testing how much exposure is required, and whether the light should be pulsed or continuous," says Britz.

To cut transportation costs and feed the market in the wintertime, more produce is grown in greenhouses. Crops grown in the winter in northern climes receive very little UVB to begin with, and plants in greenhouses are further shielded from UVB by the glass walls. Ultraviolet LEDs could provide a way to replace and enhance this part of the electromagnetic spectrum to produce darker, more colorful lettuces.

Britz also discussed the potential for using UV LEDs to preserve nutrients in vegetables that have already been harvested. Previous experiments have shown that the peel of a picked apple stays redder for a longer period of time when exposed to ultraviolet light. UVB LEDs are a promising technology for irradiating vegetables stored at low temperatures to maintain or even boost the amount of phytonutrients they contain.


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Presentation PTuA3, "Shedding light on nutrition," Steven Britz, 10:30 a.m., Tuesday, June 2.

Derivative Of Red Sea Coral May Fight Skin Cancer

ScienceDaily (May 17, 2009) — Scientists at South Dakota State University are exploring the mechanisms by which a substance derived ultimately from Red Sea coral could help treat skin cancer.


The study built on earlier work by SDSU distinguished professor Chandradhar Dwivedi’s lab looking at the chemopreventive effects of sarcophine-diol, made from a substance called sarcophine that can be isolated from soft coral found in the Red Sea. The new study carried the work beyond looking at sarcophine-diol’s possible use in prevention of skin cancer to consider its potential as a tool in therapies to actually treat skin cancer.

“We are finding that sarcophine-diol could be used both for chemoprevention and as a chemotherapeutic agent,” Dwivedi said.

Specifically, the new SDSU research explored sarcophine-diol’s potential to inhibit cell growth of cancers, and also its potential to induce orderly, programmed cell death of skin cancer cells.

The scientists published their research findings in March 2009 in the academic journal Translational Oncology.

Dwivedi, head of SDSU’s Department of Pharmaceutical Sciences, directed the study by departmental graduate student researcher Xiaoying Zhang. Other researchers involved included Ajay Bommareddy of the University of Pittsburgh Cancer Institute, a former graduate student in Dwivedi’s laboratory; SDSU graduate student Wei Chen of the Department of Pharmaceutical Sciences; Sherief Khalifa of Misr International University in Cairo, Egypt; assistant professor Radhey Kaushik, who has a joint appointment in SDSU’s Department of Veterinary Sciences and the Department of Biology and Microbiology; and associate professor Hesham Fahmy of the SDSU Department of Pharmaceutical Sciences.

SDSU researchers found that treating human skin cancer cells with different concentrations of sarcophine-diol for different lengths of time reduced the viability of cancer cells in each case. Related work showed that sarcophine-diol also inhibited the proliferation or uncontrolled growth of cancer cells.

The SDSU study also showed that sarcophine-diol induced apoptosis, or programmed cell death, in cancer cells. The extent of apoptosis observed in different treatments in the study was correlated to the level of sarcophine-diol used, Dwivedi said.

However, sarcophine-diol did not induce what scientists call necrosis, or the premature death of healthy cells. Dwivedi said that is an important finding because it suggests sarcophine-diol could be used in treatments that specifically target cancer cells without damaging nearby healthy cells.

The SDSU experiment also looked at whether sarcophine-diol treatments could increase what is called DNA fragmentation, considered a biochemical hallmark of apoptosis — an indication that the cell is committed to die, in other words. At lower concentrations, sarcophine-diol didn’t significantly induce DNA fragmentation in skin tumor cells, but higher levels of sarcophine-diol did.

Finally, the SDSU study found that treatments with higher concentrations of sarcophine-diol induced higher level of so-called “executioner” proteins that have a role in apoptosis, or programmed cell death compared to a control group.

Importantly, the SDSU research found that sarcophine-diol did not significantly increase the level of the “executioner” proteins in normal cells. Sarcophine-diol had some effect on viability of healthy cells, but the results suggest sarcophine-diol is considerably more toxic to skin tumor cells than to healthy cells.

“Further investigations of sarcophine-diol in experimental models and in cell culture studies are needed to explore its mechanisms of action,” Dwivedi said. “Sarcophine-diol has excellent potential to be a potent chemotherapeutic agent that can be further investigated for use against nonmelanoma skin cancer development.”


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Adapted from materials provided by South Dakota State University, via Newswise.

Charred Meat May Increase Risk Of Pancreatic Cancer

Kristin Anderson, Ph.D., associate professor at the University of Minnesota School of Public Health, said the finding was linked to consumption of well and very well done meats cooked by frying, grilling or barbecuing. Cooking in this way can form carcinogens, which do not form when meat is baked or stewed.

Anderson and colleagues conducted a prospective analysis that included 62,581 participants. "My research has been focused on pancreatic cancer for some time, and we want to identify ways to prevent this cancer because treatments are very limited and the cancer is often rapidly fatal," she said.
Anderson and colleagues used information from surveys that were a part of the PLCO (Prostate, Lung, Colorectal and Ovarian) Multi-center Screening Trial. Participants provided information about their meat intake, preferred cooking methods and doneness preferences.
Over the course of nine years, researchers identified 208 cases of pancreatic cancer. Preferences for high temperature cooked meat were generally linked with an increased risk; subjects who preferred very well done steak were almost 60 percent as likely to get pancreatic cancer as compared to those who ate steak less well done or did not eat steak. When overall consumption and doneness preferences were used to estimate the meat-derived carcinogen intake for subjects, those with highest intake had 70 percent higher risk than those with the lowest intake.
"We cannot say with absolute certainty that the risk is increased due to carcinogens formed in burned meat," said Anderson. "However, those who enjoy either fried or barbecued meat should consider turning down the heat or cutting off burned portions when it's finished; cook meat sufficiently to kill bacteria without excess charring. In addition, the precursors of cancer-causing compounds can be reduced by microwaving the meat for a few minutes and pouring off the juices before cooking it on the grill."
Adapted from materials provided by American Association for Cancer Research.

African Tea Offers Promising Treatment For Type-2 Diabetes

Researchers are attempting, with the help of a special African tea, to develop a new treatment for type-2 diabetics. The tea is used as a treatment in traditional Nigerian medicine and is produced from the extract of Rauvolfia Vomitoria leaves and the fruit of Citrus aurantium. The scientists have recently tested the tea on patients with type-2 diabetes and the results are promising.

The researchers have harvested the ingredients for the tea in Africa, totalling approximately fifty kilos of leaves and three hundred kilos of fruit from the wild nature of Nigeria. Afterwards the tea has been produced exactly as local healers would do so. The recipe is quite simple: boil the leaves, young stalks and fruit and filter the liquid.
First mice, then humans
Associate professor Per Mølgaard and postdoc Joan Campbell-Tofte from the Department of Medicinal Chemistry have previously tested the tea on genetically diabetic mice. The results of the tests showed that after six weeks of daily treatment with the African tea, combined with a low-fat diet, resulted in changes in the combination and amount of fat in the animals' eyes and protection of the fragile pancreas of the mice.
The researchers have recently completed a four month long clinical test on 23 patients with type-2 diabetes and are more than satisfied with the result.
"The research subjects drank 750ml of tea each day. The [tea] appears to differentiate itself from other current type-2 diabetes treatments because the tea does not initially affect the sugar content of the blood. But after four months of treatment with tea we can, however, see a significant increase in glucose tolerance," said postdoc Joan Campbell-Tofte from the University of Copenhagen.
Changes in fatty acid composition
The clinical tests show another pattern in the changes in fatty acid composition with the patients treated in comparison with the placebo group.
"In the patient group who drank the tea, the number of polyunsaturated fatty acids increased. That is good for the body's cells because the polyunsaturated fat causes the cell membranes to be more permeable, which results in the cells absorbing glucose better from the blood," said Joan Campbell-Tofte.
The researchers hope that new clinical tests and scientific experiments in the future will result in a new treatment for type-2 diabetics.

Fatty foods 'offer memory boost'

Eating fatty foods can help boost memory, a US study suggests.
A team at the University of California, Irvine discovered oleic acids from fats are converted into a memory-enhancing agent in the gut.

They hope their work, published in Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, could offer a new way to treat memory-related problems.
Drugs to mimic the action of the compound are in trials for controlling the dangerous fat triglyceride.
Evidence shows high levels of oleoylethanolamide or OEA can reduce appetite, produce weight loss and lower blood cholesterol as well as triglyceride levels, making it an attractive candidate as a diet pill too.
Memory maker
Dr Daniele Piomelli and his team discovered that OEA also causes memories to be laid down by activating memory-enhancing signals in the amygdala - the part of the brain involved with memories of emotional events.
When they gave OEA to rats, it improved their memory retention in two different tests - running in a maze and avoiding an unpleasant experience.
And when they blocked OEA with a drug, their performance on the tasks declined.

Better understanding of how memories are formed could lead to new treatments that help the brain when it becomes affected by Alzheimer's
Rebecca Wood, chief executive of the Alzheimer's Research Trust
Dr Piomelli said there was an evolutionary explanation for this role of OEA.
He said: "By helping mammals remember where and when they have eaten a fatty meal, OEA's memory-enhancing activity seems to have been an important evolutionary tool for early humans and other animals.
"Remembering the location and context of a fatty meal was probably an important survival mechanism for early humans."
But he said this might not always be helpful. While OEA contributes to feelings of fullness after a meal, it could also engender long-term cravings for fatty foods that, when eaten in excess, can cause obesity.
Rebecca Wood, chief executive of the Alzheimer's Research Trust, said: "This is fascinating research and advances our understanding of the impact that diet can have on brain activity.
"When thinking about what constitutes a healthy diet, usually what's good for the heart is also good for the head.
"While this research suggests that fatty foods could help in the formation of longer term memories, a healthy balanced diet is still the best advice for reducing the risk of developing dementia.
"Better understanding of how memories are formed could lead to new treatments that help the brain when it becomes affected by Alzheimer's."
Professor Harald Hansen, of The Danish University of Pharmaceutical Sciences, in Copenhagen, has been studying OEA's anti-obesity properties.
He said: "Clariyfing the role of OEA in human food consumption will add to our understanding of the development of the obesity epidemic. Such knowledge may possibly also help us develop drug candidates for treating morbid obesity."
But he pointed out that OEA was not commercial available for human consumption and it has not yet been documented that it will have the same effects in humans as is seen in rats.

Vitamin B3 may reduce acrylamide formation: Study

Vitamin B3 may inhibit the formation of acrylamide in French fries by over 50 per cent, according to a new study from China.
In a model system, both vitamins B3 and B6 in the pyridoxine form were able to inhibit over 70 per cent of the formation of the carcinogen, suggest findings published in the journal Food Chemistry.

“The effectiveness of vitamin B3 was eventually corroborated in fried potato strips, thus suggesting its great potential for application in food processing to decrease acrylamide formation,” wrote the authors, led by Xiaohui Zeng from the University of Hong Kong.


The study potentially adds another option to formulators seeking to reduce the acrylamide content of their fried or baked foods.

Approaches already used by the food industry to help reduce acrylamide levels include converting asparagine into an impotent form using an enzyme, binding asparagine to make it inaccessible, adding amino acids, changing the pH to alter the reaction products, cutting heating temperatures and times, and removing compounds from the recipe that may promote acrylamide formation.

Enzymes such as DSM’s Preventase and Novozyme's Acrylaway, work by converting asparagine into aspartic acid, thereby preventing it from being converted into acrylamide. The effect is a reduction in acrylamide in the final product by as much as 90 per cent.

While the new study reports acrylamide reduction of only 51 per cent in the final product for vitamin B3, there may exist room for improvement.

Study details

Zeng and co-workers tested the effects of 15 vitamins, both water- and fat-soluble, on the formation of acrylamide in a model chemical system containing asparagines and glucose (the precursors for acrylamide), and in a model food system (fried potato strips).

According to their findings, only vitamins B3 (nicotinic acid) and B6 (pyridoxine) inhibited acrylamide by over 70 per cent in the chemical model. Several other water-soluble vitamins, including biotin (vitamin B7), B6 in the pyridoxamine form, and vitamin C, also produced acrylamide reduction of over 50 per cent.

When tested in the model food system, several of the vitamins, including thiamin (B1), B3, B6, biotin, and vitamin C, reduced acrylamide formation by at least 40 per cent, report the researchers.

The best performance was observed for B3, with a 51 per cent inhibition of acrylamide formation in fried potato strips. No unpleasant odours were recorded when B3 was used, they added.

“Further studies are needed to characterise the action mechanism of the vitamins that showed strong inhibitory activity against the formation of acrylamide,” concluded the researchers.

Acrylamide story

Acrylamide is a suspected carcinogen that is formed during by heat-induced reaction between sugar and an amino acid called asparagine. Known as the Maillard reaction, this process is responsible for the brown colour and tasty flavour of baked, fried and toasted foods.

Despite being a carcinogen in the laboratory, many epidemiological studies have reported that everyday exposure to acrylamide in food is too low to be of concern.

The compound first hit the headlines in 2002, when scientists at the Swedish Food Administration first reported unexpectedly high levels of acrylamide, found to cause cancer in laboratory rats, in carbohydrate-rich foods.

Since the Swedish discovery a global effort has been underway to amass data about this chemical. More than 200 research projects have been initiated around the world and their findings co-ordinated by national governments, the EU and the United Nations.

Source: Food Chemistry
Volume 116, Issue 1, Pages 34-39
“Inhibition of acrylamide formation by vitamins in model reactions and fried potato strips”
Authors: X. Zeng, K.-W. Cheng, Y. Jiang, Z.-X. Lin, J.-J. Shi, S.-Y. Ou, F. Chen, M. Wang

Low magnesium levels may increase stroke risk

Low blood levels of magnesium may increase the risk of stroke by 25 per cent, suggest findings from the Atherosclerosis Risk in Communities Study.
According to findings published in the American Journal of Epidemiology, increasing levels of the mineral could decrease the risk of ischemic stroke, with the effects related to magnesium’s benefits on blood pressure and for diabetics.

Diet is known to have an impact on a person's risk of having a stroke, and in particular a connection has been made between intake of sodium and hypertension. Conversely, more magnesium, potassium and calcium has been inversely linked to hypertension in some observational studies.

The new study supports the potential of magnesium to reduce the risk of stroke possibly via an anti-hypertensive mechanism, suggest the researchers, led by Aaron Folsom from the University of Minnesota’s School of Public Health.

Dietary sources of magnesium include green, leafy vegetables, meats, starches, grains and nuts, and milk. Earlier dietary surveys show that a large portion of adults does not meet the RDA for magnesium (320 mg per day for women and 420 mg per day for men).

Study details

Over 14,000 men and women aged between 45 and 64 took part in the study, and during the course of 15 years of follow-up the researchers documented 577 cases of ischemic stroke. The incidence of stroke was highest amongst diabetics and people with hypertension, added the researchers.

Blood levels of magnesium were negatively associated with the risk of stroke, they said, with levels of 1.6, 1.7, and 1.8 mEq/L linked to a 22, 30, and 25 per cent reduction in stroke, respectively, compared to 1.5 mEq/L.

After the results were adjusted for hypertension and diabetes, the researchers found that the links became non-significant.

"Dietary magnesium intake was marginally inversely associated with the incidence of ischemic stroke," wrote Folsom and his co-workers.

"Low serum magnesium levels could be associated with increased risk of ischemic stroke, in part, via effects on hypertension and diabetes," they concluded.

Magnesium and diabetes

A meta-analysis of prospective cohort studies by researchers at Stockholm's Karolinska Institutet, reported that for every 100 milligram increase in magnesium intake, the risk of developing type-2 diabetes decreased by 15 per cent.

Writing in the Journal of Internal Medicine Susanna Larsson and Alicia Wolk concluded that while it is too early to recommend magnesium supplements for type-2 diabetes prevention, increased consumption of magnesium-rich food "seems prudent."

Source: American Journal of Epidemiology
Published online ahead of print, 16 April 2009, doi:10.1093/aje/kwp071
"Serum and Dietary Magnesium and Risk of Ischemic Stroke - The Atherosclerosis Risk in Communities Study"
Authors: T. Ohira, J.M. Peacock, H. Iso, L.E. Chambless, W.D. Rosamond, A.R. Folsom

Too much or too little sleep increases risk of diabetes

Quebec City, April 21, 2009—Researchers at Université Laval's Faculty of Medicine have found that people who sleep too much or not enough are at greater risk of developing type 2 diabetes or impaired glucose tolerance. The risk is 2½ times higher for people who sleep less than 7 hours or more than 8 hours a night. The findings were published recently on the website of the journal Sleep Medicine.
The researchers arrived at this conclusion after analyzing the life habits of 276 subjects over a 6-year period. They determined that over this timespan, approximately 20% of those with long and short sleep duration developed type 2 diabetes or impaired glucose tolerance versus only 7% among subjects who were average duration sleepers. Even after taking into account the effect attributable to differences in body mass among the subjects, the risk of diabetes and insulin resistance was still twice as high among those with longer and shorter sleep duration than average sleepers.

The researchers also point out that diabetes is not the only risk associated with sleep duration. A growing number of studies have shed light on a similar relationship between sleep and obesity, cardiovascular disease, and overall mortality. The authors observe that among adults, between 7 and 8 hours of nighttime sleep appears to be the optimum duration to protect against common diseases and premature death.

However, it seems that fewer and fewer people sleep the optimum number of hours. A survey conducted in 1960 showed that American adults slept an average of 8 to 8.9 hours a night. By 1995, that average had dropped to 7 hours. A study conducted in 2004 by the National Center for Health Statistics found that one-third of adults aged 30 to 64 slept less than 6 hours a night.

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The authors of the study are Jean-Philippe Chaput, Angelo Tremblay, and Jean-Pierre Després of Université Laval, Claude Bouchard of the Pennington Biomedical Research Center in Baton-Rouge, and Arne Astrup from the University of Copenhagen.

Information:
Angelo Tremblay
Faculty of Medicine
Université Laval
Tel.: (418) 656-7294
Angelo.Tremblay@kin.msp.ulaval.ca

Your Tuna Is Getting More Toxic

If you eat tuna, read this.

The rate of mercury contamination in tuna and other Pacific fish has increased 30% since about 1990, and is expected to increase another 50% if China continues to build more coal-fired power plants to fuel its industrial revolution.
The data comes from a new federal study by the U.S. Geologic Survey that was published in the peer-reviewed scientific journal Global Biogeochemical Cycles.

Mercury levels in the Northern Pacific have already increased a staggering 30% in about 15 years, and are expected to rise another 50% by 2050. This stunning increase is a direct result of China's rapid industrialization, which has included the construction of as many as one new coal-fired power plant a week, by some estimates.

About 40% of all U.S. exposure to mercury comes from eating contaminated tuna from the Pacific, and roughly 75% of all human exposure to mercury comes from eating fish, according to U.S. officials. Mercury poisoning, even very small amounts, early in life can lead to permanent developmental effects. That's why the government has warned since 2004 that women who are pregnant, and young children, should not eat many species of fish. That's why the Environmental Protection Agency has been fighting to retain those strong public cautions against efforts by the fishing industry and the Food and Drug Administration to weaken or confuse them.

Mercury becomes toxic when it is converted by bacteria into a form called methylmercury. Scientists have long known how this conversion takes place in freshwater lakes, reservoirs and rivers. Health advisories caution people -- particularly young children and pregnant or nursing women -- against eating many fish caught recreationally in many U.S. waters. But this study is the first to document how that conversion takes place in the ocean, according to the authors:

"This study documents for the first time the formation of methylmercury in the North Pacific Ocean. It shows that methylmercury is produced in mid-depth ocean waters by processes linked to the “ocean rain.” Algae, which are produced in sunlit waters near the surface, die quickly and “rain” downward to greater water depths. At depth, the settling algae are decomposed by bacteria and the interaction of this decomposition process in the presence of mercury results in the formation of methylmercury. Many steps up the food chain later, predators like tuna receive methylmercury from the fish they consume."

Asia is an important source of mercury in the Pacific not only because prevailing winds carry air pollution over the ocean, where it rains down, but also because ocean currents carry the pollution throughout the basin, according to the study.

The U.S., more than 100 years into its industrial revolution, has only begun to crack down on mercury pollution from coal-fired power plants. The Bush Administration enacted the first-ever mercury control limits on coal-fired power plants, but they were struck down in court because they would have allowed local pollution levels around some plants to increase; many states have enacted their own regulations in the meantime. After years of delay under the Bush Administration, the EPA has also recently announced plans to regulate mercury emissions from another major source: cement plants.

Chinese coal-fired power plants have been a growing concern not because of mercury, but because of carbon dioxide emissions, which have helped China catapult ahead of the U.S. as the world's top emitter of the greenhouse gases that fuel global warming. For that reason, Secretary of State Hillary Clinton recently told China that it . The Obama Administration has also strongly supported an international treaty on mercury -- but the bottom line is that China will need technological help to achieve a low-mercury/low-carbon industrialization. Which means we'll need renewable energy breakthroughs as well as pollution control breakthroughs that make coal either clean or obsolete...Which means solving the American tuna problem will probably mean solving the global warming problem.


About Mercury Pollution
Mercury is a naturally occurring element, but it's a food supply contaminant because of industry. Mercury is spewed from the smokestacks of coal-fired power plants (coal has trace amounts of mercury), cement kilns (which burn coal, and use limestone, both of which can contain mercury) and certain types of mining (gold mining uses mercury to process the rock). Mercury has been used to make a variety of manufactured goods, from compact fluorescent light bulbs to thermostats.

When mercury enters the air, it eventually rains down and is incorporated into aquatic food chains. Larger predatory fish like tuna, swordfish and shark, can accumulate potentially unhealthy doses because they spend a lifetime eating smaller fish and aquatic creatures. Women who are pregnant or nursing, and young children, are most at risk of mercury poisoning, because it can lead to permanent brain damage.

You can still eat fish if you are careful. The Environmental Defense Fund's Seafood Selector is the best one-stop source for information about eating only fish that are low in contaminants and harvested sustainably. It's been helping people abide by the "Piven Principle" since before Piven's sushi habits made news. The Seafood Selector is among The Daily Green's 10 Food Visionaries Nominated for a 2009 Heart of Green Award.

The Daily Green has compiled several recipes for uncontaminated, sustainable fish, and tips for greening your diet, including how to decipher labels at the fish counter.

Map of mercury advisories in game fish at right is courtesy Earthjustice, which is currently running a fish naming contest for some of the most contaminated species.

Low vitamin D causes problems for acutely ill patients

A group of endocrinologists in Sydney have observed that very sick patients tend to have very low levels of Vitamin D. The sicker they are, the lower the levels.

Dr Paul Lee, Professor John Eisman and Associate Professor Jackie Center, researchers at Sydney's Garvan Institute of Medical Research, examined a cohort of 42 Intensive Care Unit (ICU) patients. Forty-five percent turned out to be Vitamin D deficient.

These findings will be published as a letter in the April 30, 2009 issue of the New England Journal of Medicine.

"Until now, the medical community has thought of Vitamin D deficiency as a chronic condition," said Dr Lee. "Little is known about its acute complications."

"Last year, we published several cases showing that Vitamin D deficiency can cause acute complications in the intensive care unit."

"Recently, Vitamin D has been recognised for its many roles beyond the musculoskeletal system. It has been implicated in diabetes, in the immune system, in cancers, in heart disease and in metabolic syndrome."

"Recently, Vitamin D has been recognised for its many roles beyond the musculoskeletal system. It has been implicated in diabetes, in the immune system, in cancers, in heart disease and in metabolic syndrome."

"Vitamin D appears to have roles in controlling sugar, calcium, heart function, gut integrity, immunity and defence against infection. Patients in ICU suffer from different degrees of inflammation, infection, heart dysfunction, diarrhoea and metabolic dysregulation – so vitamin D deficiency may play a role in each of these common ICU conditions."

"So we did a preliminary study and found that 45% of people in our ICU were Vitamin D deficient. There may be a bias, in that all patients were referred to endocrinology, so the numbers may not reflect the prevalence in a standard ICU cohort. However 45% is still a significant proportion.

When the team correlated the Vitamin D levels with a disease severity score, there was a direct correspondence between sickness and Vitamin D deficiency. In other words, the sicker someone was, the lower the levels of Vitamin D. Out of the 42 patients studied, there were 3 deaths. The 3 patients who died all had the lowest level of Vitamin D in the cohort.

"Perhaps when we are well, we have ways to compensate for organ dysfunction if we run low on Vitamin D," said Lee.

"But when we are very sick, the "sick organs" draw upon any vitamin D available to function properly, therefore we may need extra Vitamin D to maintain organ function during critical illness. However, at this stage, we don't know whether Vitamin D deficiency is just a marker of ill health, or whether it contributes to disease severity."

Lee believes that the study, while preliminary, is important because it highlights the fact that Vitamin D deficiency is common in intensive care units and is associated with disease severity.

The next step will be a randomised control study to investigate whether Vitamin D has benefits in critically ill patients. In simple terms, two groups of patients (who are evenly matched) will be treated, with Vitamin D added to the treatment of one group, but not the other. The outcomes will then be compared.

So should doctors be trying to raise the Vitamin D levels of their patients in the meantime?

Dr Lee hopes the randomised study may provide a more definitive answer to the question. "However, Vitamin D is very safe. It's inexpensive and has a very large safety window, making toxicity unlikely, unless there are underlying diseases causing high calcium. Giving vitamin D to severely deficient patients is very unlikely to cause harm. In addition, ICU patients are lying in bed for a long time, and are at risk of bone loss and osteoporosis. So if nothing else, Vitamin D will help protect their bones."

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ABOUT GARVAN

The Garvan Institute of Medical Research was founded in 1963. Initially a research department of St Vincent's Hospital in Sydney, it is now one of Australia's largest medical research institutions with nearly 500 scientists, students and support staff. Garvan's main research programs are: Cancer, Diabetes & Obesity, Immunology and Inflammation, Osteoporosis and Bone Biology, and Neuroscience. The Garvan's mission is to make significant contributions to medical science that will change the directions of science and medicine and have major impacts on human health. The outcome of Garvan's discoveries is the development of better methods of diagnosis, treatment, and ultimately, prevention of disease.

All media enquiries should be directed to: Alison Heather 0434 071 326

Certain foods may thwart age-related vision loss

NEW YORK (Reuters Health) - A new study suggests that older adults who eat diets rich in citrus fruits, leafy greens and fish oil, but low in "glycemic index," may have a lower risk of age-related macular degeneration -- the leading cause of vision loss among older U.S. adults.

AMD, also known as "age-related macular degeneration" refers to gradual damage to the macula, a structure in the retina that allows for seeing fine detail. The condition affects more than 1 million Americans, usually after the age of 65.

A number of studies have suggested that individual nutrients, including the antioxidants lutein, vitamin C and vitamin E, can help protect against AMD. This latest study, published in the journal Ophthalmology, looked at the overall diet patterns of 4,000 older adults and the links to AMD risk.

Researchers found that participants who tended to eat fish rich in

omega-3 fatty acids, or foods high in vitamin C, vitamin E, zinc, lutein and zeaxanthin, had a relatively lower risk of AMD. Lutein and zeaxanthin are plant pigments that act as antioxidants; the nutrients are found in broccoli, spinach and other leafy green vegetables, as well as egg yolks.

The study also found that diets containing foods with a low glycemic index, also appeared protective against AMD.

Not surprisingly, older adults who combined all three dietary patterns showed a decreased AMD risk as well.

Glycemic index (GI) refers to how rapidly a food causes blood sugar to rise. High-GI foods, like white bread and potatoes, tend to spur a quick elevation in blood sugar, while low-GI foods, such as lentils, soybeans, yogurt and many high-fiber grains, create a more gradual increase in blood sugar.

The blood-sugar surges associated with high-GI diets may eventually damage the macula, explained lead researcher Dr. Chung-Jung Chiu, an assistant professor at Tufts University School of Medicine in Boston.

That's because excess blood sugar interacts with other molecules, like fats and proteins, to form what are called glycated molecules, he told Reuters Health. This process, in turn, can put the body under more oxidative stress, which over time damages cells and may lead to various diseases, including

AMD.

Foods rich in nutrients that may ward off AMD -- including citrus fruits, leafy greens, oily fish like salmon and mackerel, and vegetable oils -- are also seen as beneficial for overall health. So it's a good idea to try to eat more of them, Chiu said.

This is especially true for older adults, the researcher noted, since the body's "self-defense systems" generally decline with age.

SOURCE: Ophthalmology, May 2009.

Fruit and veg may slash colorectal cancer risk: Study

Increased intakes of fruit and vegetables may reduce the risk of colorectal cancer by 25 per cent, says a large European study.
Data from 452,755 participants in the European Prospective Investigation into Cancer and Nutrition (EPIC) revealed that the highest average intakes of fruit and vegetables was associated with a 14 per cent reduction in colorectal cancer risk, and a 24 per cent reduction in the risk of colon cancer.

Over 8.8 years of follow-up the researchers documented 2,819 incident cases of colorectal cancer.

The researchers, led by Franzel van Duijnhoven from the Dutch National Institute for Public Health and the Environment, report their findings in the American Journal of Clinical Nutrition.

Source: American Journal of Clinical Nutrition
Volume 89, Pages 1441-1452; doi:10.3945/ajcn.2008.27120
“Fruit, vegetables, and colorectal cancer risk: the European Prospective Investigation into Cancer and Nutrition”
Authors: F.J.B. van Duijnhoven, H.B. Bueno-De-Mesquita, P. Ferrari, M. Jenab, et

Ginger Really Does Ease Nausea

Grandma was right when she recommended ginger for an upset stomach — at least for cancer patients.

A randomized clinical trial has confirmed what many people suspect — that ginger can decrease nausea caused by chemotherapy. The effect goes beyond that provided by standard anti-vomiting drugs.

The results will be presented at the annual meeting of the American Society of Clinical Oncology, which begins May 29 in Orlando, Fla. Abstracts of most of the studies to be presented at the conference were made public Thursday.

The trial, financed by the National Cancer Institute, involved 644 patients, mostly women with breast cancer, who were undergoing chemotherapy at 23 oncology practices in the United States.

All patients took a standard anti-vomiting drug on each day of chemotherapy. They also took specially made capsules containing either extracts of ginger root or a placebo for six days, starting three days before each round of chemotherapy.

They then rated the severity of their nausea four times a day. Those taking the ginger had a reduction of about 45 percent in severity compared with a previous round of chemotherapy in which they did not take the ginger. Those on the placebo had almost no change, said Julie L. Ryan of the University of Rochester, the lead author of the study.

Previous studies have yielded inconsistent results. Dr. Ryan said the new study might have succeeded because the ginger was given before chemotherapy.

The best results corresponded to a quarter to a half teaspoon of ground ginger, she said. She added that either the ginger that comes in spice bottles or the ginger capsules sold in health food stores would probably work.

She was less sure about ginger cookies, ginger tea or ginger ale, though they might if they contained real ginger in the proper amount. “It’s a higher dose than you would get in one cookie,” she said.

Another study showed that a new type of treatment that helps the immune system “see” a tumor helped children with neuroblastoma, a rare but deadly cancer of the nervous system that strikes mainly toddlers.

After two years, about 66 percent of the children who received the new treatment were alive without a relapse of their cancer, compared with 46 percent of those who got only the standard treatment only, according to Dr. Alice Yu of the University of California, San Diego, the lead author. And 86 percent of the children who got the new treatment were alive after two years, compared with 75 percent of those getting the conventional treatment.

However, side effects like pain and fluid accumulation in the body were more severe with the new treatment.

The new therapy is an antibody that blocks the functioning of a molecule called GD2 on the surface of neuroblastoma cells. GD2 is thought to help conceal the tumor from the patient’s immune system, so blocking it with the antibody opens the cancer to attack. In the trial, which was sponsored by the National Cancer Institute and involved 226 children, the antibody was given along with two proteins that stimulated the immune system.

The antibody is being manufactured by the National Cancer Institute, which is looking for company to turn it into a commercial product, Dr. Yu said.

In another study, researchers developed a test that may allow some patients with early-stage colon cancer to forgo chemotherapy.

Nearly 80 percent of patients with Stage 2 colon cancer do not suffer a relapse after surgery, said Dr. David J. Kerr of the University of Oxford, the lead investigator. But doctors cannot identify those patients, so many needlessly undergo chemotherapy, with its costs and side effects, in hopes of keeping the cancer from coming back.

The test measures the activity levels of various genes in the tumor and computes a score showing the risk of recurrence. In the study, the test was performed on tumor samples from a trial that took place some years ago, so it was already known which patients suffered relapses.

About 10 percent of the patients with the lowest scores had a recurrence in three years, Dr. Kerr said, compared with 25 percent for those with the highest scores. He said those at the low risk might not want chemotherapy.

But a separate score aimed at predicting which patients would actually benefit from chemotherapy did not succeed. That could limit usefulness of the test, some analysts have said. So could the fact that the recurrence risk for a high score was not much greater than for a low score.

“Perhaps it is not as good as we might like in predicting who is at very high risk,” said Dr. Richard L. Schilsky, a professor at the University of Chicago who is president of the oncology society.

The test was developed by Genomic Health, a California biotechnology company that sells a similar test called Oncotype Dx for women with breast cancer. The company said it planned to start selling the colon cancer test next year. The price has not been set; the breast cancer test sells for nearly $4,000

Vitamins 'undo exercise efforts'

Taking vitamins after exercise may undo some of the beneficial effects of the workout, research suggests.
Some advocate taking antioxidants like vitamin C and E to help protect the body from harmful chemical by-products it creates in breaking into a sweat.
But German scientists now believe these "free radicals" may actually be good for us and even buffer against diabetes, PNAS reports.
And mopping them up with antioxidants may do more harm than good

It is thought that antioxidant vitamins may be able to prevent damage to the body's tissues called "oxidative stress" by eliminating the free radicals which are said to cause it.
This damage has been implicated in several major diseases including cancer and heart disease as well as normal ageing.
But Dr Michael Ristow, of the University of Jena, and his team have shown free radicals may have a positive effect on the body by increasing its sensitivity to insulin - something that is lost in type 2 diabetes.
And this effect is blocked by antioxidant vitamins.
Too much of a good thing
Men who took vitamin C and E supplements showed no changes in their free radical levels, whereas those who did not take these antioxidants showed increased levels of free radical oxidative stress.
After four weeks of intensive exercise training, insulin sensitivity was restored only in the group of men who did not take antioxidant supplements.
The men who took the vitamin supplements fared worse, metabolically.
Dr Sarah Aldred, a lecturer in exercise biochemistry at the School of Sport and Exercise Sciences at the University of Birmingham, said: "It doesn't mean that antioxidants like vitamin C and vitamin E are bad for us, it just means that sometimes we need to consider whether taking supplements is actually beneficial.
"As this study shows it is not actually always the case."
Dr Elisabeth Weichselbaum of the British Nutrition Foundation said: "Antioxidants protect the cells in your body from damage and therefore help to reduce the risk of certain diseases such as cancer.
"But you should not consume high doses on a regular basis as this can have negative effects on your body.
"If you stick to a healthy and varied diet, you generally get enough of the nutrients you need and you don't run the risk of consuming large amounts that may be harmful for you."

Probiotics may help women regain their figures after pregnancy

By Stephen Daniells, 07-May-2009
Probiotic supplements during the first trimester of pregnancy may help women lose weight after the infant’s birth, say new findings presented today at the European Congress on Obesity.
Finnish researchers report that supplements containing Lactobacillus and Bifidobacterium were associated with less central obesity, defined as a body mass index (BMI) of 30 or more or a waist circumference over 80 centimetres.

“The results of our study, the first to demonstrate the impact of probiotics-supplemented dietary counselling on adiposity, were encouraging,” said researcher Kirsi Laitinen from the University of Turku in Finland. “The women who got the probiotics fared best. One year after childbirth, they had the lowest levels of central obesity as well as the lowest body fat percentage.”

“Central obesity, where overall obesity is combined with a particularly fat belly, is considered especially unhealthy,” added Laitinen. “We found it in 25 per cent of the women who had received the probiotics along with dietary counselling, compared with 43 per cent in the women who received diet advice alone.”

According the FAO/WHO, probiotics are defined as "live microorganisms which when administered in adequate amounts confer a health benefit on the host".

The researchers used Lactobacillus LGG (provided by Valio) and Bifidobacterium lactis (provided by Chr Hansen). Neither company provided funds for the study, with financial support coming from the Social Insurance Institution of Finland, the Academy of Finland and the Sigrid Juselius Foundation, a Finnish medical research charity.

Study details

Laitinen told attendees that 256 women were randomly divided into three groups during the first trimester of pregnancy. Two of the groups received dietary counselling consistent with current recommendations. One of those groups also received the daily probiotic capsules, while the other group received dummy capsules. The third group received placebo capsules and no dietary counselling. Supplementation continued until the women stopped exclusive breastfeeding, up to 6 months.

At the end of the study, central obesity was recorded in 18 per cent fewer women in the probiotic group than in women who received placebo plus dietary counselling, and 15 per cent fewer women in the control group.

Average body fat percentage was 28 per cent in the probiotic group, compared to 29 and 30 per cent in the diet advice only group and the control group, respectively.

Laitinen told NutraIngredients.com that future research will follow the women and their babies to see whether giving probiotics during pregnancy has any influence on health outcomes in the children.

“Based on previous experiments, we hypothesise that the maternal diet may influence both glucose metabolism and weight in the children,” she said.

Gut health and body weight

A breakthrough paper published in Nature in December 2006 reported that microbial populations in the gut are different between obese and lean people, and that when the obese people lost weight their microflora reverted back to that observed in a lean person, suggesting that obesity may have a microbial component.

At a scientific symposium organised by the Beneo Group last year, Dr. Kieran Touhy from the University of Reading noted that obese animals have significantly lower bifidobacteria levels than their lean counterparts, which suggests potential for prebiotic fibres since the growth of these bacteria is selectively promoted by inulin and fructooligosaccharides.

Dr. Nathalie Delzenne from the Catholic University of Louvain in Belgium and Dr. Robert Welch from the University of Ulster presented results from animal and human studies, respectively, which indicated the potential of prebiotic supplementation to regulated food intake.

A study involving scientists from Nestle, the Catholic University of Louvain, and the Institute of Molecular Medicine Rangueil in Toulouse, reported last year that direct modulation of the gut microflora using could directly affect metabolism, as well as influencing the maintenance of whole body glucose equilibrium, independent of food intake or obesity (FASEB Journal, doi:10.1096/fj.07-102723).

“The advantage of studying pregnant women to investigate the potential link between probiotics and obesity is that it allows us to see the effects not only in the women, but also in their children,” said Laitinen. “Particularly during pregnancy, the impacts of obesity can be immense, with the effects seen both in the mother and the child.

“Bacteria are passed from mother to child through the birth canal, as well as through breast milk and research indicates that early nutrition may influence the risk of obesity later in life. There is growing evidence that this approach might open a new angle on the fight against obesity, either through prevention or treatment.”

Source: European Congress on Obesity
Thursday, 7 May 2009
Kirsi Laitinen et al.

Critical Alert: The Swine Flu Pandemic – Fact or Fiction?

American health officials declared a public health emergency as cases of swine flu were confirmed in the U.S. Health officials across the world fear this could be the leading edge of a global pandemic emerging from Mexico, where seven people are confirmed dead as a result of the new virus.

On Wednesday April 29th, the World Health Organization (WHO) raised its pandemic alert level to five on its six-level threat scale,1 which means they've determined that the virus is capable of human-to-human transmission. The initial outbreaks across North America reveal an infection already traveling at higher velocity than did the last official pandemic strain, the 1968 Hong Kong flu.


Phase 5 had never been declared since the warning system was introduced in 2005 in response to the avian influenza crisis. Phase 6 means a pandemic is under way.

Several nations have imposed travel bans, or made plans to quarantine air travelers2 that present symptoms of the swine flu despite the fact that WHO now openly states it is not possible to contain the spread of this infection and recommends mitigation measures, not restricting travel or closing borders.

Just What is a Pandemic Anyway?

A pandemic does not necessarily mean what you think it does, it is NOT black-plague carts being hauled through the streets piled high with dead bodies. Nor does it mean flesh eating zombies wandering the streets feeding on the living. All a pandemic means is that a new infectious disease is spreading throughout the world.

By definition, a "pandemic" is an epidemic that is geographically widespread. Fear-mongers are always careful to add the innuendo that millions of people could and probably will die, as in the Spanish Flu pandemic of 1918 that killed about 20 million people worldwide.

How does the death of even a few hundred equate to 20 million?swine flu

Much Fear Mongering Being Promoted

I suspect you have likely been alarmed by the media's coverage of the swine flu scare. It has a noticeable subplot - preparing you for draconian measures to combat a future pandemic as well as forcing you to accept the idea of mandatory vaccinations.

On April 27, Time magazine published an article which discusses how dozens died and hundreds were injured from vaccines as a result of the 1976 swine flu fiasco, when the Ford administration attempted to use the infection of soldiers at Fort Dix as a pretext for a mass vaccination of the entire country.

Despite acknowledging that the 1976 farce was an example of “how not to handle a flu outbreak”, the article still introduces the notion that officials “may soon have to consider whether to institute draconian measures to combat the disease”.

Fear has become so widespread that Egypt has ordered the slaughter of the country's 300,000 pigs, even though no cases have been reported there. At least this threatened epidemic has provided a source of amusement as it has generated even more ludicrous behavior.

Fortunately some respectable journalists recognize this and are seeking to spread a voice of reason to the fear that is being promoted in the majority of the media.



This is NOT the First Swine Flu Panic

My guess is that you can expect to see a lot of panic over this issue in the near future. But the key is to remain calm -- this isn't the first time the public has been warned about swine flu. The last time was in 1976, right before I entered medical school and I remember it very clearly. It resulted in the massive swine flu vaccine campaign.

Do you happen to recall the result of this massive campaign?

Within a few months, claims totaling $1.3 billion had been filed by victims who had suffered paralysis from the vaccine. The vaccine was also blamed for 25 deaths.

However, several hundred people developed crippling Guillain-Barré Syndrome after they were injected with the swine flu vaccine. Even healthy 20-year-olds ended up as paraplegics.

And the swine flu pandemic itself? It never materialized.

More People Died From the Swine Flu Vaccine than Swine Flu!

It is very difficult to forecast a pandemic, and a rash response can be extremely damaging.

To put things into perspective, malaria kills 3,000 people EVERY DAY, and it's considered "a health problem"... But of course, there are no fancy vaccines for malaria that can rake in billions of dollars in a short amount of time.

One Australian news source,3 for example, states that even a mild swine flu epidemic could lead to the deaths of 1.4 million people and would reduce economic growth by nearly $5 trillion dollars.

Give me a break, if this doesn't sound like the outlandish cries of the pandemic bird-flu I don't know what does. Do you remember when President Bush said two million Americans would die as a result of the bird flu?

In 2005, in 2006, 2007, and again in 2008, those fears were exposed as little more than a cruel hoax, designed to instill fear, and line the pocketbooks of various individuals and industry. I became so convinced by the evidence AGAINST the possibility of a bird flu pandemic that I wrote a New York Times bestselling book, The Bird Flu Hoax, all about the massive fraud involved with the epidemic that never happened.

swine fluWhat is the Swine Flu?

Regular swine flu is a contagious respiratory disease, caused by a type-A influenza virus that affects pigs. The current strain, A(H1N1), is a new variation of an H1N1 virus -- which causes seasonal flu outbreaks in humans -- that also contains genetic material of bird and pig versions of the flu.

Symptoms include:

* Fever of more than 100
* Coughing
* Runny nose and/or sore throat
* Joint aches
* Severe headache
* Vomiting and/or diarrhea
* Lethargy
* Lack of appetite

Interestingly enough, this version has never before been seen in neither human nor animal, which I will discuss a bit later.

This does sound bad. But not so fast. There are a few reasons to not rush to conclusions that this is the deadly pandemic we've been told would occur in the near future (as if anyone could predict it without having some sort of inside knowledge).

Current State of Swine Flu Spread

As of May 16, 2009, 34 countries have officially reported 8,451 cases of influenza A(H1N1) infection and only 65 deaths in the ENTIRE world from this illness. At this time 70 of the deaths are from people born in Mexico.

Why Mexico? Well overcrowding, poor nutrition and overall poor immunity, all of which are indigenous to Mexico will radically increase your risk of death from almost any infection.

Interestingly there are no official reports of just who these people are that died. Are they elderly or infirm people, are they already chronically ill? Are they under 5 years old? Or perhaps someone who could just as easily be killed by the common cold or a slip and fall? These are important questions that have not been answered.

The number of fatalities, and suspected and confirmed cases across the world change depending on the source, so your best bet -- if you want the latest numbers -- is to use Google Maps' Swine Flu Tracker. There is also an experimental version for Mexico.

But "officially" the most recent numbers according to the World Health Organization's Epidemic and Pandemic Alert and Response site are:

Country
Cases Deaths
USA
4714 3*
Mexico 2895 66
Canada 496 1
Spain 100 0
UK 78 0
Panama 43 0
France 14 0
Germany 14 0
Colombia 10 0
Italy 9
0
Brazil 8 0
Costa Rica
9 1
Israel 7 0
New Zealand
7
0
China 4 0
El Salvador
4 0
Japan 4 0
Cuba 3 0
Guatemala 3 0
Korea 3 0
Netherlands 3 0
Finland 2 0
Norway 2 0
Sweden 2 0
Thailand 2 0
Additionally, the following countries each have 1 reported case of swine flu and no deaths.

* Argentina
* Australia
* Austria
* Belgium
* Denmark
* Ireland
* Poland
* Portugal
* Switzerland


*The United States has had 4,714 confirmed cases, and three deaths. On April 29th CNN reported the first swine fatality in the US, however this was actually a toddler whose family had recently crossed from Mexico into Texas. The second US swine flu death was a Texas woman, from Cameron County in the extreme southern tip of the state, was in her 30s. Health authorities said she had "chronic underlying health conditions that put her at high risk of flu complications". They did not elaborate or provide any other details on the woman and this woman could have been from Mexico also.

Swine Flu is a WEAK Virus

It is important to note that nearly all suspected new cases have been reported as mild. Preliminary scientific evidence is also pointing out that this virus is NOT as potent as initially thought.

Wired Magazine reported on May 4 that Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory computer scientists did not find similarities between swine flu and historical strains that spread widely, with catastrophic effect. Their findings are based on just one complete sample and several fragmentary samples of swine flu, but fit with two other early analyses.

Personally, I am highly skeptical. It simply doesn't add up to a real pandemic.

But it does raise serious questions about where this brand new, never before seen virus came from, especially since it cannot be contracted from eating pork products, and has never before been seen in pigs, and contains traits from the bird flu -- and which, so far, only seems to respond to Tamiflu. Are we just that lucky, or... what?

Your Fear Will Make Some People VERY Rich in Today's Crumbling Economy

Tamiflu (oseltamivir phosphate) is approved for treatment of uncomplicated influenza A and B in children 1 year of age or older. It is also approved for prevention of influenza in people 13 years or older. It’s part of a group of anti-influenza drugs called neuraminidase inhibitors, which work by blocking a viral enzyme that helps the influenza virus to invade cells in your respiratory tract.

According to the Associated Press at least one financial analyst estimates up to $388 million worth of Tamiflu sales in the near future10 -- and that's without a pandemic outbreak.

More than half a dozen pharmaceutical companies, including Gilead Sciences Inc., Roche, GlaxoSmithKline and other companies with a stake in flu treatments and detection, have seen a rise in their shares in a matter of days, and will likely see revenue boosts if the swine flu outbreak continues to spread.

Swine flue is extremely convenient for governments that would have very soon have to dispose of billions of dollars of Tamiflu stock, which they bought to counter avian flu, or H5N1. The US government ordered 20 million doses, costing $2 billion, in October, 2005, and around that time the UK government ordered 14.6 million doses. Tamiflu’s manufacturer, Roche, has confirmed that the shelf life of its anti-viral is three years.

As soon as Homeland Security declared a health emergency, 25 percent -- about 12 million doses -- of Tamiflu and Relenza treatment courses were released from the nation's stockpile. However, beware that the declaration also allows unapproved tests and drugs to be administered to children. Many health- and government officials are more than willing to take that chance with your life, and the life of your child. But are you?



Tamiflu Loaded With Side Effects, Including Death and Can Only Reduce Symptoms by 36 Hours at BEST

Please realize that Tamiflu is NOT a safe drug Serious side effects include convulsions, delirium or delusions, and 14 deaths in children and teens as a result of neuropsychiatric problems and brain infections Japan actually banned Tamiflu for children in 2007.

Remember, Tamiflu went through some rough times not too long ago, as the dangers of this drug came to light when, in 2007, the FDA finally began investigating some 1,800 adverse event reports related to the drug.

Additionally common side effects of Tamiflu include:

* Nausea
* Vomiting
* Diarrhea
* Headache
* Dizziness
* Fatigue
* Cough

All in all, the very symptoms you're trying to avoid.

Additionally, Tamiflu has been reported to be ineffective against seasonal flu outbreaks, and may not be sufficient to combat an epidemic or pandemic.

But making matters worse, some patients with influenza are at HIGHER risk for secondary bacterial infections when on Tamiflu. And secondary bacterial infections, as I mentioned earlier, was likely the REAL cause of the mass fatalities during the 1918 pandemic!

But here’s the real kicker.

When Tamiflu is used as directed (twice daily for 5 days) it can ONLY reduce the duration of your influenza symptoms by 1 to 1 ½ days, according to the official data.

Why on earth would anyone want to take a drug that has a chance of killing you, was banned in Japan, is loaded with side effects that mimic the flu itself, costs over $100, and AT BEST can only provide 36 hours of SYMPTOM relief. Just doesn't make any sense.

Please recognize that there is serious revenue in Tamiflu. The Financial Times reports that governments around the world have previously stockpiled 220 million doses in preparation for a pandemic that has yet to appear. The cost of this preparation is $7 billion dollars.

Should You Accept a Flu Vaccine -- Just to be Safe?

Watch the video above to see ridiculous 1976 commercials promoting Swine Flu shots.

As stated in the New York Times14 and elsewhere, flu experts have no idea whether the current seasonal flu vaccine would offer any protection whatsoever against this exotic mutant, and it will take months to create a new one.

Despite this lack of effectiveness governments around the world have ordered 90 million doses of swine flu vaccine that has NO proven effectiveness and a history of causing crippling neurologic disease

But let me tell you, getting vaccinated now would not only offer no protection and potentially cause great harm, it would most likely be loaded with toxic mercury which is used as a preservative in most flu vaccines..

I've written extensively about the numerous dangers (and ineffectiveness) of flu vaccines, and why I do not recommend them to anyone. So no matter what you hear -- even if it comes from your doctor -- don't get a regular flu shot. They rarely work against seasonal flu...and certainly can't offer protection against a never-before- seen strain.

Currently, the antiviral drugs Tamiflu and Relenza are the only drugs that appear effective against the (human flu) H1N1 virus, and I strongly believe taking Tamiflu to protect yourself against this new virus could be a serious mistake -- for all the reasons I already mentioned above.

But in addition to the dangerous side effects of Tamiflu, there is also growing evidence of resistance against the drug. In February, the pre-publication and preliminary findings journal called Nature Precedings published a paper on this concern, stating15:

The dramatic rise of oseltamivir [Tamiflu] resistance in the H1N1 serotype in the 2007/2008 season and the fixing of H274Y in the 2008/2009 season has raised concerns regarding individuals at risk for seasonal influenza, as well as development of similar resistance in the H5N1 serotype [bird flu].

Previously, oseltamivir resistance produced changes in H1N1 and H3N2 at multiple positions in treated patients. In contrast, the recently reported resistance involved patients who had not recently taken oseltamivir.

It's one more reason not to bother with this potentially dangerous drug.

And, once a specific swine flu drug is created, you can be sure that it has not had the time to be tested in clinical trials to determine safety and effectiveness, which puts us right back where I started this article -- with a potential repeat of the last dangerous swine flu vaccine, which destroyed the lives of hundreds of people.

Topping the whole mess off, of course, is the fact that if the new vaccine turns out to be a killer, the pharmaceutical companies responsible are immune from lawsuits -- something I've also warned about before on numerous occasions.

Unfortunately, those prospects won't stop the governments of the world from mandating the vaccine -- a scenario I hope we can all avoid.

How to Protect Yourself Without Dangerous Drugs and Vaccinations

For now, my point is that there are always going to be threats of flu pandemics, real or created, and there will always be potentially toxic vaccines that are peddled as the solution. But you can break free of that whole drug-solution trap by following some natural health principles.

I have not caught a flu in over two decades, and you can avoid it too, without getting vaccinated, by following these simple guidelines, which will keep your immune system in optimal working order so that you're far less likely to acquire the infection to begin with.

* Optimize your vitamin D levels. As I've previously reported, optimizing your vitamin D levels is one of the absolute best strategies for avoiding infections of ALL kinds, and vitamin D deficiency is likely the TRUE culprit behind the seasonality of the flu -- not the flu virus itself.

This is probably the single most important and least expensive action you can take. I would STRONGLY urge you to have your vitamin D level monitored to confirm your levels are therapeutic at 50-70 ng.ml and done by a reliable vitamin D lab like Lab Corp.

For those of you in the US we hope to launch a vitamin D testing service through Lab Corp that allows you to have your vitamin D levels checked at your local blood drawing facility, and relatively inexpensively. We hope to offer this service by June 2009.

If you are coming down with flu like symptoms and have not been on vitamin D you can take doses of 50,000 units a day for three days to treat the acute infection. Some researchers like Dr. Cannell, believe the dose could even be as high as 1000 units per pound of body weight for three days.

However, most of Dr. Cannell's work was with seasonal and not pandemic flu. If your body has never been exposed to the antigens there is chance that the vitamin D might not work. However the best bet is to maintain healthy levels of vitamin D around 60 ng/ml.

BUT to keep this in perspective the regular flu, not the swine flu, has killed 13,000 in the US since January. But there is strong support that these types of figures are grossly exaggerated to increase vaccine sales. However, the fact remains that the regular flu at this point in time is FAR more dangerous than the swine flu and were you worried about the regular flu before the media started talking this up?

*

Avoid Sugar and Processed Foods. Sugar decreases the function of your immune system almost immediately, and as you likely know, a strong immune system is key to fighting off viruses and other illness. Be aware that sugar is present in foods you may not suspect, like ketchup and fruit juice.
*

Get Enough Rest. Just like it becomes harder for you to get your daily tasks done if you're tired, if your body is overly fatigued it will be harder for it to fight the flu. Be sure to check out my article Guide to a Good Night's Sleep for some great tips to help you get quality rest.
*

Have Effective Tools to Address Stress . We all face some stress every day, but if stress becomes overwhelming then your body will be less able to fight off the flu and other illness.

If you feel that stress is taking a toll on your health, consider using an energy psychology tool such as the Emotional Freedom Technique (EFT), which is remarkably effective in relieving stress associated with all kinds of events, from work to family to trauma. You can check out my free, 25-page EFT manual for some guidelines on how to perform EFT.
*

Exercise. When you exercise, you increase your circulation and your blood flow throughout your body. The components of your immune system are also better circulated, which means your immune system has a better chance of finding an illness before it spreads. You can review my exercise guidelines for some great tips on how to get started.
*

Take a good source of animal based omega-3 fats like Krill Oil. Increase your intake of healthy and essential fats like the omega-3 found in krill oil, which is crucial for maintaining health. It is also vitally important to avoid damaged omega-6 oils that are trans fats and in processed foods as it will seriously damage your immune response.
*

Wash Your Hands. Washing your hands will decrease your likelihood of spreading a virus to your nose, mouth or other people. Be sure you don't use antibacterial soap for this -- antibacterial soaps are completely unnecessary, and they cause far more harm than good. Instead, identify a simple chemical-free soap that you can switch your family to.
*

Eat Garlic Regularly. Garlic works like a broad-spectrum antibiotic against bacteria, virus, and protozoa in the body. And unlike with antibiotics, no resistance can be built up so it is an absolutely safe product to use. However, if you are allergic or don't enjoy garlic it would be best to avoid as it will likely cause more harm than good.
* Avoid Hospitals and Vaccines In this particular case, I'd also recommend you stay away from hospitals unless you're having an emergency, as hospitals are prime breeding grounds for infections of all kinds, and could be one of the likeliest places you could be exposed to this new bug. Vaccines will not be available for six months at the minimum but when available they will be ineffective and can lead to crippling paralysis like Guillain-Barré Syndrome just as it did in the 70s.

Factory Farming Maybe Source of Swine Flu

Another theory as to the cause of Swine Flu might be factory farming. In the United States, pigs travel coast to coast. They can be bred in North Carolina, fattened in the corn belt of Iowa, and slaughtered in California.

While this may reduce short-term costs for the pork industry, the highly contagious nature of diseases like influenza (perhaps made further infectious by the stresses of transport) needs to be considered when calculating the true cost of long-distance live animal transport.

The majority of U.S. pig farms now confine more than 5,000 animals each. With a group of 5,000 animals, if a novel virus shows up it will have more opportunity to replicate and potentially spread than in a group of 100 pigs on a small farm.

With massive concentrations of farm animals within which to mutate, these new swine flu viruses in North America seem to be on an evolutionary fast track, jumping and reassorting between species at an unprecedented rate.

Why a True Bird- or Swine Flu Pandemic is HIGHLY Unlikely

While in my opinion it is highly likely factory farming is responsible for producing this viral strain, I believe there is still no cause for concern.

You may not know this, but all H1N1 flu's are descendants of the 1918 pandemic strain. The reason why the flu shot may or may not work, however, from year to year, is due to mutations. Therefore, there's no vaccine available for this current hybrid flu strain, and naturally, this is feeding the fear that millions of people will die before a vaccine can be made.

However, let me remind you of one very important fact here.

Just a couple of months ago, scientists concluded that the 1918 flu pandemic that killed between 50-100 million people worldwide in a matter of 18 months -- which all these worst case scenarios are built upon -- was NOT due to the flu itself!4

Instead, they discovered the real culprit was strep infections.

People with influenza often get what is known as a "superinfection" with a bacterial agent. In 1918 it appears to have been Streptococcus pneumoniae.

Since strep is much easier to treat than the flu using modern medicine, a new pandemic would likely be much less dire than it was in the early 20th century, the researchers concluded.

Others, such as evolutionary biologist Paul Ewald,5 claim that a pandemic of this sort simply cannot happen, because in order for it to occur, the world has to change. Not the virus itself, but the world.

In a previous interview for Esquire magazine, in which he discusses the possibility of a bird flu pandemic, he states:

"They think that if a virus mutates, it's an evolutionary event. Well, the virus is mutating because that is what viruses and other pathogens do. But evolution is not just random mutation. It is random mutation coupled with natural selection; it is a battle for competitive advantage among different strains generated by random mutation.

For bird flu to evolve into a human pandemic, the strain that finds a home in humanity has to be a strain that is both highly virulent and highly transmissible. Deadliness has to translate somehow into popularity; H5N1 has to find a way to kill or immobilize its human hosts, and still find other hosts to infect. Usually that doesn't happen."

Ewald goes on to explain that evolution in general is all about trade-offs, and in the evolution of infections the trade-off is between virulence and transmissibility.

What this means is that in order for a "bird flu" or "swine flu" to turn into a human pandemic, it has to find an environment that favors both deadly virulence and ease of transmission.

People living in squalor on the Western Front at the end of World War I generated such an environment, from which the epidemic of 1918 could arise.

Likewise, crowded chicken farms, slaughterhouses, and jam-packed markets of eastern Asia provide another such environment, and that environment gave rise to the bird flu -- a pathogen that both kills and spreads, in birds, but not in humans.

Says Ewald:

"We know that H5N1 is well adapted to birds. We also know that it has a hard time becoming a virus that can move from person to person. It has a hard time without our doing anything. But we can make it harder. We can make sure it has no human population in which to evolve transmissibility. There is no need to rely on the mass extermination of chickens. There is no need to stockpile vaccines for everyone.

By vaccinating just the people most at risk -- the people who work with chickens and the caregivers -- we can prevent it from becoming transmissible among humans. Then it doesn't matter what it does in chickens."

Please remember that, despite the fantastic headlines and projections of MILLIONS of deaths, the H5N1 bird flu virus killed a mere 257 people worldwide since late 2003. As unfortunate as those deaths are, 257 deaths worldwide from any disease, over the course of five years, simply does not constitute an emergency worthy of much attention, let alone fear!

Honestly, your risk of being killed by a lightning strike in the last five years was about 2,300 percent higher than your risk of contracting and dying from the bird flu.6 I'm not kidding! In just one year (2004), more than 1,170 people died from lighting strikes, worldwide.7

So please, as the numbers of confirmed swine flu cases are released, keep a level head and don't let fear run away with your brains.

Where did This Mysterious New Animal-Human Flu Strain Come From?

Alongside the fear-mongering headlines, I've also seen increasing numbers of reports questioning the true nature of this virus. And rightfully so.

Could a mixed animal-human mutant like this occur naturally? And if not, who made it, and how was it released?

Not one to dabble too deep in conspiracy theories, I don't have to strain very hard to find actual facts to support the notion that this may not be a natural mutation, and that those who stand to gain have the wherewithal to pull off such a stunt.

Just last month I reported on the story that the American pharmaceutical company Baxter was under investigation for distributing the deadly avian flu virus to 18 different countries as part of a seasonal flu vaccine shipment. Czech reporters were probing to see if it may have been part of a deliberate attempt to start a pandemic; as such a "mistake" would be virtually impossible under the security protocols of that virus.

The H5N1 virus on its own is not very airborne. However, when combined with seasonal flu viruses, which are more easily spread, the effect could be a potent, airborne, deadly, biological weapon. If this batch of live bird flu and seasonal flu viruses had reached the public, it could have resulted in dire consequences.

There is a name for this mixing of viruses; it's called "reassortment," and it is one of two ways pandemic viruses are created in the lab. Some scientists say the most recent global outbreak -- the 1977 Russian flu -- was started by a virus created and leaked from a laboratory.

Another example of the less sterling integrity of Big Pharma is the case of Bayer, who sold millions of dollars worth of an injectable blood-clotting medicine to Asian, Latin American, and some European countries in the mid-1980s, even though they knew it was tainted with the AIDS virus.

So while it is morally unthinkable that a drug company would knowingly contaminate flu vaccines with a deadly flu virus such as the bird- or swine flu, it is certainly not impossible. It has already happened more than once.

But there seems to be no repercussions or hard feelings when industry oversteps the boundaries of morality and integrity and enters the arena of obscenity. Because, lo and behold, which company has been chosen to head up efforts, along with WHO, to produce a vaccine against the Mexican swine flu?

Baxter!11 Despite the fact that ink has barely dried on the investigative reports from their should-be-criminal "mistake" against humanity.

According to other sources,12 a top scientist for the United Nations, who has examined the outbreak of the deadly Ebola virus in Africa, as well as HIV/AIDS victims, has concluded that the current swine flu virus possesses certain transmission "vectors" that suggest the new strain has been genetically-manufactured as a military biological warfare weapon.

The UN expert believes that Ebola, HIV/AIDS, and the current A-H1N1 swine flu virus are biological warfare agents.

In addition, Army criminal investigators are looking into the possibility that disease samples are missing from biolabs at Fort Detrick -- the same Army research lab from which the 2001 anthrax strain was released, according to a recent article in the Fredrick News Post.13 In February, the top biodefense lab halted all its research into Ebola, anthrax, plague, and other diseases known as "select agents," after they discovered virus samples that weren't listed in its inventory and might have been switched with something else.