A few weeks ago we talked about how to increase professional referrals to your practice. Developing this referral source is essentially a networking exercise, but the point of the post was to provide a framework in which to do it without feeling weird, creepy, or uncomfortable.

I know there are a lot of alternative and complementary practitioners who are involved with networking groups like BNI. While I don’t generally promote those groups a great deal, I read a fantastic tidbit from Ivan Misener, the founder and CEO of BNI, in a piece on Entrepreneur.com:

3. Word-of-mouth is more about farming than it is about hunting.

Building your business through word-of-mouth is about cultivating relationships with people who get to know you and trust you. People do business with people they have confidence in. One of the most important things I’ve learned in the past two decades is this: It’s not what you know, or who you know, it’s how well you know them that counts. [emphasis mine]

It’s a great metaphor for the development of your professional referral base. The approach we recommend - of slowly gathering background and connections before you approach someone - is aboutchoosing to farm relationships. Nurture them gradually in the form of inquiry, research and contemplation. Plant them, water them, and watch them grow, but don’t harvest them until they’re ready.

And whatever you do, don’t hunt them. That’s what everyone else is doing because they haven’t yet realized that you can only eat prey once, but you can harvest a garden forever.

Related posts:

1. New Patient Referrals: The 5 P’s

The European Union does not believe in its citizens' ability to choose nutrients wisely. This very paternalistic view finds expression in a series of restrictive laws that aim at regulating what can be sold as a healthy food to supplement our daily menu with vitamins, minerals, herbs or vegetable concentrates.

The European Food Supplements Directive, which was approved in 2002, provides a "framework" for regulating the nutrients we may add to our meals. The details on coming restrictions for vitamins and minerals that the directive envisions have been delayed for years. Neither the lists of "nutrient sources" nor the dosages to be allowed in pills and capsules have been agreed, six years after the directive was first issued.

Yet the Commission is already busy on its next step. According to the Alliance for Natural Health, herbs and vegetable extracts are now in line for restrictive assessment. The alliance which represents consumers, doctors, shopkeepers and some producers is concerned that large numbers of plant-derived products or botanicals, which pose no risk to human health, and have numerous benefits, will be forced through an onerous risk assessment procedure. The proposed procedure is likely to be cost-prohibitive for smaller companies that have been the main pioneers and innovators within the natural health industry.

Dr Robert Verkerk, executive director of the Alliance for Natural Health says that since our western diet more and more lacks the needed variety and we are not eating enough of the recommended vegetables and fruits, at least we should be able to supplement what we eat with more concentrated foods of high nutritional value. According to Verkerk, "botanical supplementation is an important tool for the enhancement of people’s diets. It makes no sense to limit freedom of choice for those who choose to take responsibility for their health.”

Some widely used natural essences such as eucalyptus, tea tree, thyme and citronella can no longer be used in natural insect repellents and personal deodorants, as a result of another European directive that regulates what are called "biocidal products". So the fear that many of the herbs and vegetable extracts we find today in food supplements are in jeopardy of being removed by heavy handed intervention is not just idle speculation.

If the Industry does not work to achieve a fairer regulatory regime, which accepts those botanical products that have been safely used for a long time, says Verkerk, a fate similar to these natural essences could befall many of the vegetable extracts that are used in food supplements today.

I might add that industry can do little without the backing of consumers. People who rely on these supplements to better the nutrient density of their foods better wake up as well and make their views known. The politicians seem so far removed from the reality of life today that they could make any law, as long as it helps Big Pharma, which they see as an important industry, and doesn't concern their own families directly. So wives, friends and children, clue in your politician husbands, friends and fathers ... (hint, hint)!

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Onerous EU laws for botanicals threaten consumer choice

The aim of the EU Food Supplements Directive (FSD), being a framework directive, is to harmonise the food/food supplements industry across the European bloc, one small bite at a time. They’re doing it gradually over a protracted period, under the guise of consumer safety, in the hopes that it’ll all happen so slowly we won’t notice the slow but steady decimation of the natural health industry that many of us are reliant on for our health. The gameplan is to see natural health being swallowed up by the big food and pharma corporations. Compare any large natural health industry trade show today with one from 5 or 10 years back and you’ll see that the process is already well underway. Consumers, more than any other group, have the power to reverse this trend.

Vitamins and minerals were first off the starting blocks and, in Europe, we’ve witnessed the imposition of the draconian, restrictive ‘positive list’, the ANH legal challenge in the European Court of Justice (ruled on in 2005) which helped in particular to save natural sources of vitamins and minerals, the once extensive ‘derogation list’ (which is rapidly being whittled down) and now the ham-fisted and quasi-scientific way in which Maximum Permitted Levels (MPLs) are being handled.

We continue to challenge the proposed European approach to MPLs, which is set to otherwise become the blueprint for what will be done globally through the Codex Alimentarius Commission. The risk assessment approach being used was initially heralded as one that would be much fairer and less restrictive than a ‘multiples-of-RDA’ approach favoured by many European countries like Germany, France and Denmark. But we can now see the levels, using these new methods, are no better than the RDA approach – and in some cases may be even worse (more restrictive)! The authorities would have us believe that consumers are in danger of exceeding their maximum safe dose if they consume the beta-carotene present in just one and a half carrots or the selenium in more than two brazil nuts. These are just two examples amongst a number of other travesties to essential nutrients. Watch that shopping trolley, loading up at the fruit and veg section could put you at risk of vitamin and mineral overdose! We don’t think so…

However, next up for harmonisation in Europe are the all-important group of phytonutrients or ‘botanicals’. This category encompasses a large section comprising non-vitamin and mineral, plant-derived nutrients. Many companies selling herbal products are reliant on the FSD to bring their products to your shelves and now these products are potentially at risk. The high cost, exclusion of polyherbal and combination products, and the medicinal regime offered by the Traditional Herbal Medicinal Products Directive has meant that this is not an amenable route for smaller companies or companies selling poly-herbal products. It is therefore imperative to keep the FSD open as the legal framework for the huge variety of botanical products that increasing numbers of consumers are choosing to take to supplement their diets, as a means of boosting antioxidants, resolving certain ailments and optimising their health.

In December 2007 the European Food Safety Authority (EFSA) released a draft guidance document on how botanicals and botanical preparations in food supplements should be classified and invited comment from stakeholders across the EU through an electronic consultation that closed on 15th February 2008 (ANH news 6/12/07). The guidance document hinges on safety and risk assessment and categorises some 860 herbs between two lists. Between both lists you’ll find everything from alfalfa to artichokes, clove to castor oil and pineapple to patchouli – nestled among herbs that are known to have safety issues if consumed over prolonged periods, especially at high dosages (e.g. Aristolochia).

The original of the ANH (Alliance for Natural Health) communication and more information about the planned restrictive assessment of healthy vegetable and herb based ingredients in food supplements can be found on the ANH's website:

Onerous EU laws for botanicals threaten consumer choice

Health Supreme's NewsGrabs - a selection of contrary and underprivileged news in health and (mostly) related sectors. Find what you may have missed - watch out for my NewsGrabs.

Here is this week's selection:

Book:In Defense of Food: An Eater's Manifesto
"Eat food. Not too much. Mostly plants."
Humans used to know how to eat well, Pollan argues. But the balanced dietary lessons that were once passed down through generations have been confused, complicated, and distorted by food industry marketers, nutritional scientists, and journalists - all of whom have much to gain from our dietary confusion. As a result, we face today a complex culinary landscape dense with bad advice and foods that are not "real." These "edible foodlike substances" are often packaged with labels bearing health claims that are typically false or misleading. Indeed, real food is fast disappearing from the marketplace, to be replaced by "nutrients," and plain old eating by an obsession with nutrition that is, paradoxically, ruining our health, not to mention our meals.

People missing five-a-day target
Many people still do not manage to eat the recommended five portions of fruit and vegetables a day, but they now have more than before, a survey suggests.

The Food Standards Agency survey suggests diets are slowly improving but people from poorer backgrounds struggle to achieve the five-a-day target. The survey found 58% of 2,627 people surveyed last year had eaten at least five portions the day beforehand.

Yet here we have the European Commission getting ready to slam on the brakes on what they consider "excessive doses" of nutrients in food supplements. Go figure.

Vitamin deficiency may cause modern ills
A chronic shortage of vitamins and other "micronutrients" in the diet may be responsible for triggering many of the ills of modern life such as cancer, obesity and the degenerative diseases of ageing.

U.K. Government Moves to Hide GM Crop Trials From Public
Genetically modified crops may be grown in hidden locations in Britain amid fears that anti-GM campaigners are winning the battle over the controversial technology.

Officials at the Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs (Defra) confirmed they are looking at a range of options to clamp down on vandalism to GM crop trials, after intense lobbying by big crop biotech companies. The firms have warned that trials of GM crops are becoming too expensive to conduct in Britain because of the additional costs of protecting fields from activists.

Hmmmm - government by the people ... for the people. They're not even pretending any more, it seems.

BASF's Genetically Engineered "Frankenpotato' Faces Strong Opposition in EU
The potato contains an antibiotic resistance marker gene (ARMG)(1) known as nptII, which conveys resistance to antibiotics and which should already have been phased out under EU law since 2004(2). Despite this and despite a number of legal concerns, the European Food Safety Authority gave a positive opinion on the BASF potato, paving the way for Monday's vote.

"This potato is blighted by too many inconsistencies for the Council to legally approve it. The EFSA opinion upon which the Commission proposal is based contradicts the scientific opinions of other international institutions and also EFSA's own previous opinions on the same issue. Therefore, the Commission proposal is unlawful," said Marco Contiero, Greenpeace EU GMO policy director.

Monsanto Continues Battle to Deny Consumers' Right to Know Whether Their Milk is Tainted by Growth Hormone
ALL these efforts are attempting to take away the consumers' right to know what's in their foods and how they're produced. I'm not going to sugar-coat this. Although we've enjoyed a remarkable level of success in fighting Monsanto's attempts, this is one of the most serious challenges we've ever faced. This is nothing short of censorship, suppressing the freedom of speech of dairies and farmers and their ability to simply tell the truth on their labels.

Germany to Introduce Non-GMO Labels on Foods
"The new labeling will give consumers the choice to buy dairy products from animals that have not been fed with genetically modified plants," said Gerd Billen from the Federation of German Consumer Organizations in Süddeutsche Zeitung newspaper.

Some oppose the new label because food containing GM ingredients such as additives, vitamins, and amino acids can also be labeled non-GM. They say such labeling is misleading.

WiFi and EM Radiation - The Rest of the Autism Story
Carlo developed a theory that low frequency cell phone signals are harmful to cell function. This results in cells protecting themselves by stopping movement of nutrients and waste products through the cellular membrane. Inability to move wastes outside cells results in a buildup of toxins. This led him to suspect a connection with the enormous increase in autism. His hypothesis suggests that autistic children are less able to process heavy metals, so they remain in their bodies (primarily the brain) and cause neurological damage, including autism.

Hawaii Aspartame Bill: Lobbyists closing in for the kill
"Consumer Protection efforts to ban Aspartame/Methanol/Formaldehyde as an artificial sweetener in Hawaii have run into curious tactics by lobbyists compounded by indifference and inertia on the part of the key legislators," says Stephen Fox, the promoter of a previous effort to ban the controversial sweetener in New Mexico.

Hawaii Ban Aspartame Bill Ends in Political Paralysis
Paralysis is one of the 92 disabilities the Food & Drug Administration named in their 1995 list of aspartame reactions (PDF) which they now deny ever existed. FDA derived these from over 10,000 complaints volunteered by American consumers; more than those reported to FDA for any other additive. FDA slammed the complaint window shut in 1996 and have ignored all testimony and research, including over 100 damning scientific peer reviewed studies on the devastating consequences of consuming aspartame. Seizures, sexual dysfunction, birth defects, blindness, paranoia, diabetes, migraines, obesity, and its a multi-potential carcinogen concluded an award winning 3-year study on 1,800 rats by Dr. M. Soffritti of the Ramazzini Institute. The 2005 study was peer reviewed by 7 world experts. His second study showed it only takes a small amount to cause cancer and if pregnant women use it and their baby survives, the offspring can get cancer.

Update: Hearing on aspartame bill scheduled for Monday 25 February
THIS AFTERNOON, Thursday, I am happy to report that Sen. David Ige, Majority Floor Leader and Chairman Hawaii Senate Health Committee, came to realize the merit in scheduling a hearing for Senate Bill 2506, to ban aspartame in Hawaii. This was against all odds, because Rep. Josh Green, M.D., Chairman of the House Health Committee, "deferred" hearing the bill, thus killing the House Bill, carried by Rep. Mele Carroll.

Anyone interested in testifying about experience they had with aspartame, please contact
Stephen Fox
Managing Editor, Santa Fe Sun News
stephen@santafefineart.com

Excess in the pharmaceutical industry
(Marcia Angell)
Although the pharmaceutical industry claims to be a high-risk business, year after year drug companies enjoy higher profits than any other industry. In 2002, for example, the top 10 drug companies in the United States had a median profit margin of 17%, compared with only 3.1% for all the other industries on the Fortune 500 list.

Excess profits are, of course, the result of excess prices — and prices are excessive principally in the United States, the only advanced country that does not limit pharmaceutical price increases in some way.

Drug Wholesale Prices Rose 7.82 Percent In ‘07
Drugmakers increased wholesale prices for the 50 top-selling branded drugs by an average of 7.82 percent last year, after increases of 6.73 percent and 6.22 percent in the previous two years, according to Delta Marketing Dynamics. The most recent increase is almost double the overall US economy’s 4.1 percent annual inflation rate last year, The Wall Street Journal reports.

Some individual drugs had double-digit price increases over three years. Glaxo, for instance, raised the price of its Wellbutrin XL antidepressant by 44.5 percent from 2005 to 2007. Sanofi-Aventis boosted the price of its Ambien sleeping pill by 70.1 percent. Shire hiked the price of its Adderall XR ADD drug by 33.5 percent. And Pfizer increased Lipitor’s price by 16 percent.

Can you say price gouging? I knew you could.

Pharma Spent $22M To Lobby Washington In ‘07
The industry trade group, that is. And that amounts to a 25 percent increase from the previous year. But while proposals aimed at lowering drug prices and restricting industry advertising fell by the wayside in Congress, lobbying experts say the road ahead for the industry looks increasingly bumpy.

Big Pharma Money Spent on Marketing Exceeds Drug Development Costs
There is quite a bit of difference between the money spent on R&D and marketing. If we exclude direct-to-consumer marketing, of the U.S. $57.5 billion, CAM estimates that 80% of this money is spent on physicians. This means that, with 700,000 practicing physicians in the U.S., the pharmaceutical industry spent nearly U.S. $61,000 in promotion per physician! It is interesting to note that according to the U.S. census the real median household income (2003) was $43,318.

FDA Proposes Lack-of-Evidence Based Medicine Policy
The Food and Drug Administration today proposed giving drug industry detailers the right to hand physicians reprints of journal articles touting the off-label use of prescription drugs. The proposed guidance was immediately blasted by Rep. Henry Waxman (D-CA), chairman of the House Oversight and Reform Committee, who called it "terrible for the public health. It caters to the industry’s desire to market their products without adequate testing or review."

SCIENCE-US: Top Scientists Want Research Free From Politics
"The next president and Congress must cultivate an environment where reliable scientific advice flows freely," said Susan Wood, a former director of women's research at the U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA). Wood resigned her post in 2005 in protest over the FDA’s delay in getting emergency, over-the-counter birth control onto the market.

"Serious consequences can result when drug safety decisions are not based on the best available scientific advice from staff scientists and experts," she said.

One might add that drug safety decisions should also be free from overriding financial interests of the companies that have a great interest in maintaining an extremely lucrative bottom line...

Drug company Pfizer attacks integrity of journal review process
The drug company Pfizer is being sued in various jurisdictions on product liability grounds. Plaintiffs are claiming that its products Celebrex and Bextra cause cardiovascular and other injuries. Pfizer asserts that in some cases plaintiffs are making use of published papers from the New England Journal of Medicine (NEJM). So it wants to dig though the confidential reviews of those papers in search of something to strengthen its defense. The company served NEJM with a series of subpoenas to which the journal replied, claiming several privileges in support of its refusal to comply.

From free software to the free drugs movement
Like people who decide to share online, they choose to do so, because they can, because nothing, no one, stands in their way. The production of drugs could follow the example of Free Software, be created in a more collaborative way, publishing recipes and allowing it to be freely produced, by anyone, for any purpose.

... in Europe, the vast majority of drug research money already comes from taxes. Hence, a Free Software model for generic drugs might not be such a remote proposal. Instead of pushing through a neo-liberal constitution, Europe could, and should do the opposite act, create an institutional Free Drugs scientific movement, based on the Free Software hackers model, following the logic of Copyleft , patented for free production and reuse of all documentation, as a gift of its citizens to the world.

Interesting thought ... I mean, it is of course completely preposterous that drug production and the research to discover new remedies for what ails our bodies could be "free" - or is it?

India: 'Open source drug discovery will lower costs'
The Council of Scientific and Industrial Research (CSIR) links 37 constituent laboratories with diverse research portfolios as varied as drug discovery to oceanography. It is a part of the Global Research Alliance (GRA) — a nine-member alliance of knowledge-intensive technology organisations from around the world — that explores ways of exploiting their cumulative knowledge and expertise for the larger good in the context of globalisation. The latest initiative of CSIR has been the launch of an Open Source Drug Discovery (OSDD) Programme aimed at providing affordable health to all, especially to the underprivileged.

Open Source Pharma
How likely is it that pharmaceutical companies would go open source?

Scientist fears statins link to Parkinson's
About 2.7 million people in England take statins such as pravastatin, atorvastatin and simvastatin, to reduce their risks of heart attacks and strokes. The drugs work by lowering levels of low-density lipoprotein (LDL), or so called "bad cholesterol". But American researchers have found that patients with low levels of LDL are more than three times more likely to have Parkinson's than those with high levels. Dr Xue Mei Huang, an assistant professor of neurology at the University of North Carolina's School of Medicine, was "very concerned" by her study's findings and plans a 16,000-patient survey to examine the possible role of statins.

Anti-smoking drug is linked to 37 suicides
The FDA began investigating Champix in November after a number of patients reported possible side-effects ranging from depression and agitation to headaches and nausea. On top of the 37 suicides, it has recorded more than 400 cases of suicidal behaviour.

Manufacturer Pfizer has insisted a direct link between Champix and psychiatric problems has not been officially established and that nicotine withdrawal can lead to mood swings and behavioural changes. But the FDA said it had found evidence that people taking Champix developed problems even if they were still smoking.

French Pharma Companies Investigated for Manslaughter Relating to Anti-Hepatitis B Vaccine
A formal investigation has been launched by French authorities against two managers from drug companies GlaxoSmithKline and Sanofi Pasteur. A second investigation for manslaughter has also been opened against Sanofi Pasteur MSD. The investigations are in response to allegations that the companies failed to fully disclose side effects from an anti-hepatitis B drug used between 1994 and 1998.

During this time, close to two-thirds of the French population, and almost all newborn babies, received a hepatitis B vaccine. The vaccination campaign was halted after concerns rose over the shot’s side effects.

Private Study Links Vaccinations to Neurological Disorders
More dramatic, though, is a virtual smoking gun - a study showing a clear connection between neurological disorders and vaccinations. The results are dramatic, showing that more than twice the number of vaccinated children had autism than those who had not been vaccinated. Worse, the rates of vaccinated children with other neurological problems are even higher.

Researcher: FDA Was Too Slow On Trasylol
A renowned researcher calculates that 22,000 patients could have been saved if the Food and Drug Administration removed the heart surgery drug Trasylol two years ago, when his study revealed widespread death associated with it. The researcher, Dr. Dennis Mangano, also tells 60 Minutes correspondent Scott Pelley that Bayer, the drug's maker, failed to tell the FDA about negative results of their own Trasylol study and that the company's failure placed the drug's success before patient well-being.

Bayer, one drug, 1,000 deaths per month
CBS-60 Minutes expose (Feb. 17) of the marketing of a lethal drug (Trasylol) underscored the need for Congressional action. The evidence presented clearly showed that the FDA fails to protect the public health: "A renowned researcher estimates that 22,000 patients could have been saved if the Food and Drug Administration removed the heart surgery drug Trasylol two years ago."

Northern Illinois Shooting: Anti-Depressants And Violence
"I couldn't agree with Sara more - these incidents and the histories of the perps need to be closely examined. We've simply had too many of these shootings and random violent acts where anti-depressants are connected to not do a thorough look-see. I congratulate Bostock and the others at ssristories.com for keeping this issue alive. I think that this whole question really ought to be looked into by the Institute of Medicine."

"Do we as a society have the right or even the need to force folks like that to take medications that do nothing for them, that don't stop their hallucinations and such, that rip their bodies and minds apart, just because we think they ought to work? If someone has a track record of violence, maybe. But absent that, I'd say we have little interest in it as a society. We ought to have a lot of interest in trying other solutions with these folks. I stress the "trying" piece of that."

Illinois Shooter was Treated with Psych Meds Prior to Shooting Rampage
It comes as no surprise to anyone who's been following school shootings all the way back to the Colombine High massacre in Colorado: Every young, male shooter that has gone on a killing spree in the United States also has a history of treatment with psychotropic drugs -- typically SSRI antidepressants. These shootings have three things in common: 1) The shooters are young males. 2) The shooters exhibit a mind-numbed disconnect with reality. 3) The shooters have a history of taking psychiatric medications.

SSRI Side-Effects: Violence and Suicide
Two articles in today's New York Times, "Reports of Gunman's Use of Antidepressant Renew Debate Over Side Effects," and "Midlife Suicide Rises Nearly 20%, Puzzle Researchers," represent a watershed for the Times. Implicit in these reports are two evidence-based acknowledgments. Antidepressants, which had been touted as an effective treatment in reducing suicides, have been proven to increase the risk of suicide. What's more these drugs have been implicated in deadly violence.

Tarnished View of Wonder Drugs
When they were first introduced in the early 1990s, new anti-psychotic medications for severe mental illness were seen as wonder drugs that were safer and more effective than their predecessors. Sales soared as doctors tried them on new conditions, including dementia, aggression and other behavioral problems. Children and the elderly were among the biggest users. But now, several studies questioning some of the drugs' benefits have led many doctors to talk of using them for shorter periods and with tighter monitoring, because of side effects that include sedation, obesity and diabetes.

Do Statins Make You Stupid?
The Wall Street Journal highlights one interesting example:
A San Diego woman, Jane Brunzie, was so forgetful that her daughter was investigating Alzheimer’s care for her and refused to let her babysit for her 9-year-old granddaughter. Then the mother stopped taking a statin. “Literally, within eight days, I was back to normal — it was that dramatic,” says Mrs. Brunzie, 69 years old.

Doctors put her on different statins three more times. “They’d say, ‘Here, try these samples.’ Doctors don’t want to give up on it,” she says. “Within a few days of starting another one, I’d start losing my words again,” says Mrs. Brunzie.

UK: Side-effects 'should be reported'
A campaign has been launched in the UK, to get members of the public to report any side-effects they experience after taking medicines.

While drugs are heavily tested prior to release, some "adverse effects" may not be spotted, or the medicine may interact with other drugs or even foods in an unexpected way.

I wonder what would happen if people started reporting side effects of such things as the sweetener Aspartame. Would they filter up through the system or be stopped by some twist such as "well, that can't be ... everybody knows that Aspartame is safe".

FDA ties pneumonia deaths to infant vaccine
GlaxoSmithKline Plc's rotavirus vaccine is associated with increased pneumonia-related deaths and other adverse reactions, U.S. regulatory staff said in documents posted on Friday. FDA staff said its analysis of 11 studies revealed that in the largest trial, there was a statistically significant increase in deaths related to pneumonia compared with placebo.

Pregnant women's rights disregarded: New Jersey compulsory "HIV" tests
Despite the fact that only two infants tested positive in 2006 in New Jersey, and none in 2007, the State opted to blast personal liberty and violate civil rights with a law that is both unncessary and cruel. Women who are pregnant have a high "false positive" rate, and when specificity and accuracy are evaluated in the general population, all HIV tests are of questionable value.

Video:African Holocaust - Killing with kindness
Is there really an AIDS epidemic in Africa? Or is the cause of Africa's very real health crisis something ... else? Do we help Africa by sending them container loads of anti-AIDS "medicine?" (16 minute video)

WHAT REALLY CAUSED AIDS: SLICING THROUGH THE GORDIAN KNOT
After my book was published, I learned a great deal more from people who got in touch with me, and yet more after I began writing this blog. The most striking discussion that was new to me, something that gave me a “Eureka” moment, came from Tony Lance, whose explanations offer satisfactory answers to all four of those central questions. What we now know as “AIDS” had been described at first as “GRID”: Gay-Related Immune Deficiency. It turns out that it should have been named Gay-Related Intestinal Dysbiosis...

AIDS AS INTESTINAL DYSBIOSIS
Dissenters from orthodox HIV/AIDS theory differ among themselves over what really caused AIDS. John Scythes, for example, believes that undiagnosed syphilis played and perhaps continues to play a significant role. But Scythes doesn’t claim to have all the answers, and he was an outstandingly objective and helpful reader of drafts of my book. He has met a number of people in various parts of the world who are involved in HIV/AIDS in one way or another, and recently he mentioned to me Dr. Juliane Sacher in Germany as someone who has successfully treated “AIDS” patients without resort to antiretrovirals. I asked Dr. Sacher for published accounts of her work, and she sent me 3 articles published in 2006 in the German periodical Raum & Zeit (141: 34-38: AIDS—Chronology of the mistakes; 142: 18-23: II. AIDS—The virus that doesn’t exist; III. 143: 60-62: “AIDS”—How alternative therapies can help [titles translated by Henry Bauer]). It turns out that Dr. Sacher’s practical clinical experience with AIDS patients and with HIV-positive people affords convincing support for Tony Lance’s hypothesis of intestinal dysbiosis.

Sacher’s “alternative” approach to treatment of AIDS patients is informed by the views of Dr. Heinrich Kremer; his 2005 book, “Die stille Revolution von Krebs- und AIDS-Medizin” (The quiet revolution in cancer and AIDS medicine), Ehlers Verlag, Wolfratshausen, is to appear in English translation in the near future. The key is recognition that glutathione is a most important antioxidant which also regulates the Th1/Th2 balance: deficiency of glutathione shifts the balance in the direction of Th2. HIV-positive patients invariably have a glutathione deficiency, and their health improves when this is rectified. In addition, Dr. Sacher monitors carefully and corrects deficiencies in vitamins and minerals; she encourages a healthy lifestyle—exercise, minimizing stress—and uses a number of dietary supplements as indicated in individual cases.

Transparency censored - Swiss bank attempt to shut down WikiLeaks
On Monday [Stephen Soldz] wrote about the unprecedented attempt by Bank Julius Baer to censor the Wikileaks.org web site by having a San Francisco judge issue a restraining order telling the web site’s domain name registrar to stop Wikileak.org from pointing to its actual IP address, 88.80.13.160. This was the first known instance of a court shutting down an entire web site. One Kafkaesque feature of this omnibus order is that the court order and other materials were ordered to be emailed to Wikileaks. But with the domain name Wikileaks.org abolished, no mail sent to them could get to anyone.

Wikileaks has made a discovery potentially shedding light upon the bank’s motives in the case. Bank Julius Baer was about to launch a $1 billion IPO, and that the press attention and increased regulatory scrutiny flowing from it may well scuttle this deal. After all, it’s hard to launch an IPO when there are suggestions in the press and the blogosphere that your profts may be due to money laundering. It may turn out that this restraining order was an act of self destruction by Bank Julius Baer with few parallels.

Meanwhile, the struggle against this censorship and prior restraint has suddenly become a central front in the battle to preserve freedom of speech for those without the millions to pay for it. We should all stand prepared to assist in any ways requested.

And remember that, while Wikileaks.org no longer points to it, Wikileaks still exists. Just paste its IP address, 88.80.13.160, into your web browser, or go to http://www.wikileaks.cx/, or any of dozens of other cover names. Let the leaks continue!

Pirate Bay team helps Wikileaks
Two founders of The Pirate Bay are lending their secure web hosting skills to Wikileaks, a controversial website dedicated to publishing confidential information on the internet.

The lawsuit filed by Cayman Islands-based Julius Baer Bank and Trust requesting the domain name be shut down came after Wikileaks published documents which the site says “allegedly reveal secret Julius Baer trust structures used for asset hiding, money laundering and tax evasion.”

PRQ’s Svartholm felt the ruling had little significance in practice, saying that file sharing sites and other tactics employed by supporters of Wikileaks make it impossible to shut down the site.

Private Race to the Moon Takes Off
Google and X PRIZE officials unveiled nine new privately funded teams today that will compete for $30 million in the Google Lunar X PRIZE challenge, a race to the moon.

"It's not just a new mission," said Peter Diamandis, Chairman and CEO of the X PRIZE Foundation, during the announcement here at Google's headquarters. "It's a new way of doing business." The new teams join the Isle of Man-based Odyssey Moon team that was the first group to take up the challenge.

Space Arms Race Heats Up Overnight
The U.S. Navy's successful missile hit and apparent destruction of a defunct spy satellite represents a major step forward in the space arms race in the eyes of some analysts. Others are not so sure.

"It was an unfortunate choice by the United States that seems to have been unnecessary. The fact is that satellites fall from space all the time and the risk of it was fairly minimal," said Stephen Young, the senior analyst in Washington, D.C., for the Union of Concerned Scientist's Global Security Program. "But the implications of the satellite shootdown could be very severe. We're talking about a potential arms race in space."

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More information out there...

There is much I cannot cover but other sources for this kind of information exist and are active.

Dr Mercola's health blog and Mike Adams' Natural News have great health information.

The Alternative Medicine Yahoo Group is a place where you can discuss and exchange information on what is happening in the world of natural health.

For the influence of electromagnetic waves from radio, mobile phones and other radio emitting devices, check out the emfrefugee group on Yahoo.

If you are interested in a different take on the news that isn't health centered but is certainly fun, check out Robin Good TV News.

Some more sites to keep up to date with the other side of world affairs, the stuff you won't necessarily find on your tv or in the papers:

http://www.whatreallyhappened.com
http://www.commondreams.org
http://www.vialls.com/
http://www.globalresearch.ca/
http://rawstory.com/
http://www.truthout.org/

... and remember:

"The individual is supreme and finds its way through intuition."

Healthcare is a business - one of the major productive enterprises in the industrialized world. How much of this business is really 'taking in our own laundry' is hard to tell at a glance.

Some say that the business with disease is largely responsible for keeping us sick, as there is no financial reward in having a healthy population. On the other hand, much money is to be made from selling remedies that do not cure but merely alleviate our symptoms.

Doctor yourself - take responsibility for your own health - is the motto of Andrew W. Saul, one of the major proponents of orthomolecular medicine, a system of health care based on supplying the nutritional elements we are often missing in our diet.

We are moving into a third healthcare revolution says Kathryn Alexander, one of the leading experts in detoxification and dietary healing who lives in Queensland, Australia and who has lectured on the dietary approach to health in the USA, Europe and Australia.

Dietary Healing - by Kathryn Alexander

Kathryn has traced the forces for change in our medical system. She says that the internet-driven knowledge revolution and the new tendency to electronically record patient data in electronic health records may be helping to overcome the current, profit-centered approach to health. By analyzing the collected data we will discover what actually works and start to rearrange healthcare to be more efficient.

The fact that our personal health records are actively being collected and will in the future be coveted objects of trade, according to Kathryn will actually catalyze patients, the real owners of these personal data, to band together. Patients will become a force in their own right with policy forming and decision making powers and together, they might just be able to tip the balance in favor of real prevention...

- - -

Expert Patients and the New Healthcare Paradigm

by Kathryn Alexander

(First published in Nexus Magazine - December 2007/January 2008)

A rapid escalation of the ongoing global power struggle in the US$3 trillion health sector (1) is challenging the status quo between global pharmcos, pharmacy industries and guilds, the all powerful fiefdoms of clinicians, government agencies, politicians and the health insurance industry.

This perfect storm is due to a unique combination of interconnecting drivers that collectively offer the winner, in this high stakes game, to take all. This would be achieved by acquiring control of the supply and cost of all medications and complementary products, as well as controlling the knowledge of what actually works for each and every patient according to their own genetic profile.

This contest of strength is showing all the characteristics of a dirty war as all sides start to realise the ramifications of winning and ramp up their efforts to grab the high ground and the knowledge asset acquired via the new electronic health records (EHR), by harvesting information from the data provided by the support services associated with it.

The primary driver for this power shift is the inability by Western governments to meet the direct costs of escalating health bills due to an explosion of modern day non-contagious epidemics with associated rising costs of products and services, plus the indirect costs to the economy due to loss of income from decreased productivity (days off work) and future income lost by premature death. For example, the annual cost of obesity (and its related conditions, diabetes, heart disease and stroke) contributes US$93 billion to the nation’s yearly medical bill, (2) while in Britain, the financial impact of obesity is estimated to reach £45.5 billion per year by 2050. (3)

When the indirect costs of welfare and income tax reduction are factored into the equation, along with meeting the costs of a rapidly increasing ageing population (the over 65s are set to comprise 20% of the population in the USA by 2030), it becomes apparent that all Western governments, whether welfare or private healthcare orientated, will need to implement dramatic cost saving strategies if they are to survive the projected rate of increase in chronic disease and stay abreast of the next wave in “predictive and preventive medicine” – the new designer drugs tailored for genetically distinct groups that will tackle disease before you get it, ripening the market for long-term drug dependency.

Navigating the third healthcare revolution

According to Sir Muir Gray, Director of Clinical Knowledge of the UK’s National Health Service (NHS), we’re moving into a 3rd healthcare revolution which will be knowledge-based, where the “knowledge [of what works] will become the enemy of disease”. (4)

The first revolution was the discovery that dirty water produced disease; the second revolution was the discovery that chemicals could influence the course of disease, and this third revolution will be driven the new-found ability of knowing what actually works (of today’s medications and procedures) for each and every individual and, more importantly, which emerging medical breakthroughs could work. Governments and insurers will take the lead of Sir Muir Gray, who says “the application of the knowledge we already possess will have a bigger impact on health and disease than any drug or technology likely to be introduced in the next decade”. (5)

In a bid to control the knowledge, governments, insurance companies, clinicians and pharmaceuticals are building their own electronic health databases to plug in everyone’s medical records (and eventually every genome) in order to harvest the knowledge of which clinical procedures deliver the best outcome, the risks and benefits of drugs within given populations, environmental factors and geographic variations in disease and, most importantly, the cost-saving benefits or revenue generating capacity that this knowledge will bring.

The capacity to enter information into a database in real-time has far-reaching implications for all involved. The sharing of data across multiple parties, including general practitioners, specialists, clinics, hospitals and support services (pathology, radiology), not only provides the clinician with all the information relating to the medical events of the patient, but the benefits and risks of any new drug, product or procedure will be realized in a comparatively short time which will release those that pay and those that prescribe from the bondage of the pharmcos and manufacturers of new technology and enable more cost-effective treatments that achieve better outcome for patients. The UK government’s expected cost of running the NHS’s new IT systems could cost £40 billion by 2014, a huge increase on the budgeted cost in 2002 of £6.2 billion.(6) Where are the tangible benefits for patients?
 
To date most of these repository projects have run into problems due to the resistance of clinicians, who traditionally collect and effectively “own” patient information, to enter this data and share it with the owners of the new repository systems or, in many cases, even the patients themselves.  However, this is not hindering the funding of these systems by governments as without access to this type of knowledge they have nothing to combat spiralling healthcare costs.
 
The insurance industry is also taking a keen interest in accessing the knowledge from these harvested repositories. In the US, health insurer Kaiser Permanente, which has 8.7 million members, employs over 13,700 physicians and runs more than 30 medical centres,(7) has already established its own repository and through the harvesting of data can now offer treatment to members whose data indicate that they may be heading towards an adverse event, such as a heart attack, so producing large savings for the organization.
 
With the pharmaceuticals taking a keen interest in acquiring the harvested knowledge from these massive data repositories, the battle for control is also touching on a range of issues regarding ownership of individual and collective data. 
 
Each country seems to be tackling the issue of identity verification along similar lines using either national identity cards, welfare or tax numbers, whilst, at the same time, arguing for a national ID card or exchanges that can link multiple existing ID systems together for health and welfare. Much confusion exists around ownership and privacy where most governments and corporations seem to use privacy legislation as a reason not to provide information to citizens.

In order to avoid this tricky issue of ownership, a common approach is to allow personal information within a health record (including the DNA profile) to be sold without permission so long as the person’s name is not included. This "de-identified" rationale falls down on two points: firstly, it is possible to reconstruct identities from these databases using new probability software; and secondly, current practices allow de-identified information to be sold by a third party, without the owner’s permission, to multinational insurance companies, which, in effect, challenges the whole principle of ownership and legalises theft by corporate bodies.
 
Unless ownership of individual data and the range of issues surrounding the rights of access and use of aggregated data are established for the citizen and the common good, then the likely default position will be a few powerful multinationals controlling the knowledge in collaboration with governments.

In order to put the endpoint of this power game into context it is necessary to recognize not only the US$3 trillion industry that’s up for grabs, but also the value of this new knowledge-based commercial asset. Although no reliable figures have been published of this knowledge asset, it’s easy to estimate what the asset-value would be, and therefore the share value of a small group of multinationals controlling the very heart of this knowledge-based revolution.

This asset would contain the majority of individual medical records (including the knowledge of their DNA profile) within the Western world and, in particular, those individuals who either have the ability to pay for extended treatment or who can access the appropriate insurance.

The real asset value increases dramatically as it becomes possible to then match these findings with emerging genomic products. This provides the owner with the ability to offer personalized treatment for the existing chronic population of the Western world and the targeted market referred to as the “worried well” that would effectively become drug-dependent for the rest of their lives in the belief that they are taking preventive medicine.

Power Bloc Dynamics

To gain an understanding of these forces and to work out the implications of what happens if any particular party wins the high ground we need to understand the politics of power. Only then do the tactics and strategies of the dirty war become apparent and the darker implications for us all become blatantly obvious.

The three power blocks who currently vie for control are those who control the manufacture and dispensing of drug-related products, those who are authorised to diagnose and prescribe product-based treatments and those who pay which, in most western countries, tend to be government and/or insurance companies rather than consumers.

The fourth emerging force represents the communities of common interest whose interest is the knowledge of what actually clinically works for them in their specific condition. As the aggregation of this eco-group occurs it will gain the consumer power to counter the pharmaceutical industries, it will accrue the knowledge to challenge the diagnostic powers of healthcare providers and it will exert political power to either dictate policy change or even remove governments.

Most commentators are aware of the general dynamics between the three power blocks, but few have factored in the destabilising fourth power. Aside from any obvious outcomes of shift in power, such as a rise in prescription costs and insurance or a tightening of restrictions on the products we buy or the services we are granted access to, very little is said about the true ramifications for us, and even less thought is given to the not so passive emerging fourth power. Let’s examine the potential for each group.

Manufacturers and dispensers

The stated goal of these players is absolute control of product supply and, if possible, the extended use of drug products for all which would include the chronic (33 per cent of Western populations)(8) and the “worried well”. The most worrying aspect is that a strategy of dependency usually ends up as being multi-product based, often using pills to counter the effects of the original treatment.

All’s fair in a corporate orientated world, some may say, where share value is king, but a “sickness” industry singularly profits from increased drug-dependency and targets large markets with blockbuster drugs that generate 40%-45% of their revenue. Traditionally pharmcos ignore any innovative research into drugs that prevent, treat or cure, instead ploughing funds into a small range of blockbuster drugs which can generate revenues of over US$20 billion during the life-spans of their patents. (9)

As the bubble bursts, it is finally acknowledged by the pharmcos that beneficial outcomes are limited to only 33 per cent of users, and up to 50 per cent may not respond. They focus the blame for this failure on the variations in genetic make-up of individuals, where some people, for example, may metabolise the drug before it has time to act. However, the real cause of failure is that the clinical trials, funded by the drug companies themselves, use only carefully selected individuals that do not reflect the population for whom these drugs are aimed, such as those suffering from one or more chronic degenerative diseases, or the elderly. In addition, the studies may inaccurately reflect the true results of findings due to the vested interests of the authors or to a failure of reporting negative findings. (10)

Because scientific proof of effectiveness and safety in the broad community is not required for drug approval, the testing only truly begins when these drugs enter the market place and are foisted onto a trusting public. With a meaningless reporting regime of adverse reactions in real-time, which provides absolutely no contribution to any evidence-based research that can be accessed by other clinicians, the consequences of adverse reactions have time to reap many casualties as was seen in the cases of both Thalidomide and Vioxx.

Also under the spotlight is the effectiveness of older, generic drugs (whose patents have expired) against newer drugs. Approval for a new drug is dependent upon achieving superior results than the drug it is replacing, or improved clinical outcomes when added to an accepted protocol. Pressure to replenish revenue streams with new patents as the old patents expire has led to inflated claims, and with no requirement to test the added-value of a drug in a real-life setting, it is difficult to prove these claims.

However, in 2002 when ALLHAT (Antihypertensive and Lipid Lowering treatment to prevent Heart Attack Trial) published its findings from a five-year trial involving 30,000 patients, no difference was found in the clinical outcome between using cheaper diuretics (thiazides) over the more expensive angiotensin converting enzyme inhibitors (ACEIs) and calcium channel blockers (CCBs). There was no difference in mortality but a greater incidence of adverse events was seen with the ACEIs and increased occurrence of heart failure with the CCBs, while the thiazides reduced the incidence of stroke and had better effects on lowering blood pressure. In spite of the negatives for the thiazides, such as reduced potassium and increased glucose and cholesterol levels, these did not lead to any difference in clinical outcomes and they appeared to modestly improve the outcome for most. As with most generic drugs, the cost for thiazides was only US$0.05 - $0.30 daily, while the other medications ranged from $1.15 - $1.50 daily.(11)

Although future negotiations between health care payers and the pharmcos will likely be based on clinical outcome, the pharmcos are looking to the emerging market of “predictive and preventive” medicine – the industry’s definition of the “wellness industry” - where they will be able to predict predisposition through genetic screening and then prevent the disease with drugs before we become sick (this will also include mandatory vaccination programs). (12) Steve Burrill (of Burrill & Co, biotechnology company), predicts that when everyone’s genome and medical records are plugged into the system that “in the future babies could be given a smart card when they are born and we’ll add to that as they go through life.”(13)

With new technology that can decode the human genome and identify the key signalling molecules (targets) linked with disease, and the capacity to make, test and screen thousands of new chemical compounds day in, day out, through building a library of millions of chemicals, it will be possible to match a drug with each new target as it is identified. By linking genetic variance to drug response, scientists will be able to determine which drugs will work best with each genetically distinct group. Peter Goodfellow of GlaxoSmithKline (GSK) says “We’d like to create a drug for every target in the human genome, so you could start with drugs, not the target.”(14)

However, supporting a strategy in the absence of research to understand the full implications of altering gene expression, that leads us down a route of greater drug-dependency is hardly intelligent, particularly as the WHO has stated that 80per cent of heart, stroke and diabetes and 40 per cent of cancer is preventable and that it is cheaper to prevent disease among healthy populations than to treat sick populations. Currently only 3 per cent of health care spending is used for prevention. (15)

Global pharmcos are also looking to capture the lucrative alternative health industry to annihilate competition and control product supply and consumer choice. Dirty tactics have so far involved government regulatory bodies and the Codex Alimentarius Commission, an international organisation that sets international standards and codes for foods, establishes upper limits for over the counter (OTC) vitamin and mineral supplement dosages, and reclassifies all products that have therapeutic action as medicines regulated under the various drugs acts.

The next stage will involve the patenting of new products based on natural products. Natural products cannot be patented, but what can be patented is the technology that isolates and measures the bioactivity of each discovered active compound of a natural health product and then replicates this in a laboratory. Hence we see the emergence of pharmaceutical versions of herbs (PharmaPrinting), nutritional products (Nutraceuticals) and functional foods based on a person’s genetic make-up (Nutrigenomics). For investors to invest, market exclusivity must be assured. We are already beginning to witness the banning of natural health products under the guise of consumer protection, and there are already indications that we are heading towards a situation where it would be illegal to grow herbs in your own back yard on the basis that they are dangerous. The endpoint for the pharmcos is to capture all the indigenous markets (Chinese, Ayurvedic, South American, African etc.) who have used traditional herbs for centuries and convert them to patented products that have passed all the testing, standardization and scientific proof required for all drugs. (16)

Clinicians and prescribers

Often referred to as the priesthood, this is a highly fragmented group. Clinicians seek to control the ownership of the relationship with the patient, the prescribing of drugs, the procedures that are used and the acquired knowledge of their application. Their collective stance of non-collaboration (although not shared by all clinicians) in government health initiatives to establish an electronic health record or EHR not only reflects this desire to control the ownership or copyright of patient records, but also an unwillingness to be accountable for decisions made on the patient’s behalf. EHRs will enable the auditing of all decisions and trace major mistakes in general practice and hospital management.

Additional pressure will come from patients who will expect to have access to, or be advised on, the latest clinical evidence when making choices in treatment. Sir Muir Gray states that whereas “the clinician was the driving force in the 20th century, the patient will be the driving force in the 21st century.”(17)

At this turning point, clinicians can either submit and become glorified pill dispensers (as described by the then British Prime minister, Mrs Thatcher) or they can take up the challenge and use what’s left of their credibility and trust to help patients as advocates and assist them in harvesting the knowledge of what works. As attitudes to the profession change, the intimidating paternalistic stance that was once their hallmark will no longer be acceptable as patients demand the respect they deserve when making critical health decisions.

Governments and insurers

With health insurance costs set to rise by 6.5 per cent annually (an estimated US$1.00 of every US$5.00 spent in the US is already spent on healthcare), with statistics indicating that more people in the USA per annum are dying from medical errors (approx. 195,000 in 2000-2002)(18) than from breast cancer, AIDS or motor vehicle accidents, (19) and with the predicted rise in chronic disease set to affect 50 per cent of populations in developed countries,(20) governments and insurance companies are looking to drive the costs down, increase their profits and get better patient outcome.

Reducing costs means extricating the industry from the stranglehold of those that control prescribing - the pharmocs and clinicians. A rapid deviation from the scientifically-based model of healthcare to one that is clinically-based will demote the “scientific evidence” mantra that governed healthcare policy in favour of what actually works, whether scientifically proven or not. With the EHR initiative, governments and insurers will be able to accelerate the diffusion of clinical research information to sponsors, researchers, regulatory bodies and the medical community at large, systemise healthcare by defining and controlling procedures including the rules on what can be prescribed for any condition, and control what products can be used accordingly. They will then be able to aggregate the demand and negotiate cheaper prices.

The UK government has also tapped into the frequent flyer market of patients with chronic conditions who make the most visits to GPs and hospitals. The Expert Patient Programme(21), an NHS health initiative where a certificate of competence is issued after a 6-week course of 2.5 hours per week, simply replicates the self-management advice that self-help or support groups have been offering for decades, but through the formalisation and adoption of the program (20,000 people have already taken part) has been able to show measurable benefits both on improved quality of life and cost-savings for the health budget. Tangible results demonstrate a reduction in visits to GPs and other health professionals by 44-80 per cent by various groups, and a 31 per cent reduction in hospitalisation for asthma sufferers. (22)

The expert patient - Pandora’s Box

Although there are short-term benefits of shifting management of chronic conditions back to the consumer, the long-term implications of endorsing groups of highly motivated people have not been factored into the health equation.

Under the government and pharmco model, the “expert patient” is drug-compliant and therefore more cost effective and profitable. However, virtual community groups in increasing numbers are communicating their views and their own knowledge of what works for them over the Internet, and with the availability of the new, free, open source software and tools, these groups will be able to gather, store, harvest and share knowledge themselves, and become better informed and more responsible for their health – a threat to the system, indeed. With the new emphasis on clinical outcome, as opposed to scientific evidence, comparison studies between mainstream and complementary medicine may be published and present new challenges to conventional healthcare.

The driver for this wave in consumer power is the cost of treatment, the reduction of disposable income, a loss of confidence and trust in the medical industry and, more importantly, the realisation that health is spiralling downwards and not a cent is being spent on addressing the causes. This group does not want to be drug-dependent, does not want to see their children suffering chronic conditions: they want to own the right to be healthy and any move by governments or pharmcos to inhibit access to natural food and health products or therapies that have proven benefit will be met with fierce and co-ordinated opposition. Likewise, this group will strongly resist and fight for the power to deny consent to any group – government, pharmco or clinician - or even any IT company such as Microsoft or Google which stores health records to data-mine or de-identify these records for the on-selling to corporations who seek to control and influence the market.

With a growing consensus that failure to address the key causes of our decline - environmental pollution and nutritional depletion - will drive us deeper into a cul-de-sac, this fourth consumer power will succeed in destabilising the current balance of power. When the core message from the three power blocks – “We think we can help you manage and take responsibility for your condition that we created and, if able, to have you pay for it” - finally dawns on the majority then the wave towards true preventive medicine, to manage your own health before you become sick, will become the new mantra.

1. Transparency International: Corruption and Health

2. IT Facts Employment; Obesity Costs US Companies $13 billion a Year

3. UK Government Office for Science; Foresight Tackling obesities: Future Choices – Summary of Key Messages

4. Brice, A. and Gray, M., Knowledge is the enemy of disease, Update, March 2003.

5. ibid.

6. Carvel, John Confusion in Whitehall as IT budget for NHS balloons, The Guardian, 14 October 2004,

7. Kaiser Permanente

8. Department of Health, UK; The expert patient: a new approach to chronic disease management for the 21st century.

9. Coghlan, A.; New Scientist: Blockbuster Challenge; June 2004

10. Etheredge, L.M., A Rapid-Learning Health System Health Affairs 2007; 26(2)

11. The Answer: Thiazides First-line for Hypertension; Therapeutics Letter, Issue 47; January - March 2003

12. PriceWaterhouseCoopers: Pharma 2020: The Vision - Which Path Will You Take? June 2007

13. Coghlan, op. cit

14. ibid

15. PriceWaterhouseCoopers, op. cit

16. Alexander, K., Natural Health Products: Guilty until Proven Innocent?

17. Muir Gray - Presentation

18. In Hospital Deaths from Medical Errors at 195,000 per Year USA

19. Kolodner, K., MD., (National Coordinator for Health Information Technology, USA) The United States National Health Information Technology Agenda: MEDINFO conference; Brisbane, Australia, August 2007

20. Conversation with Stephen Alexander, e-health strategist, August 2007

21. http://www.expertpatients.co.uk/

22. UK Department of Health, op. cit.

Here is a PDF version of this article.

Health Supreme's NewsGrabs - a selection of contrary and underprivileged news in health and related sectors. Find what you may have missed - watch out for NewsGrabs.

Here is this week's selection:

New Way to Kill Viruses: Shake Them to Death
Scientists may one day be able to destroy viruses in the same way that opera singers presumably shatter wine glasses. New research mathematically determined the frequencies at which simple viruses could be shaken to death.

"The capsid of a virus is something like the shell of a turtle," said physicist Otto Sankey of Arizona State University. "If the shell can be compromised [by mechanical vibrations], the virus can be inactivated."

Recent experimental evidence has shown that laser pulses tuned to the right frequency can kill certain viruses. However, locating these so-called resonant frequencies is a bit of trial and error.

Where have I heard this before? Oh yes, there was Royal Raymond Rife, who developed a technology that could make any virus visible by using certain frequency light and he also developed the technology to destroy these microorganisms by tuning to a frequency that was deadly for them. His work was sabotaged, publications refused his papers, as happened to many others.

"Rife ignored the debate, preferring to concentrate on refining his method of destroying these tiny killer viruses. He used the same principle to kill them, which made them visible: resonance.

This principle can be illustrated by using an intense musical note to shatter a wine glass: the molecules of the glass are already oscillating at some harmonic (multiple) of that musical note; they are in resonance with it. Because everything else has a different resonant frequency, nothing but the glass is destroyed. There are literally hundreds of trillions of different resonant frequencies, and every species and molecule has its very own.

It took Rife many years, working 48 hours at a time, until he discovered the frequencies which specifically destroyed herpes, polio, spinal meningitis, tetanus, influenza, and an immense number of other dangerous disease organisms."

From: Royal Raymond Rife (by Jeff Rense)

So what's new?

EU stakeholder group aims for ‘syncing’ of nutrient levels
The European Commission has established a group called EURRECA (which stands for European micronutrient recommendations Aligned) to set standards and procedures on how to determine nutrient intake recommendations. The goal is to align the divergent recommendations for consumption of vitamins and minerals that exist in the different EU member states. Website: www.eurreca.org

Fatigue may be caused by calcium leak
A Columbia University team found fatigue following exercise is caused by calcium leaking inside muscle cells.

This is interesting in that it may be applicable to fatigue that is not connected with exercise, such as increasingly common 'chronic fatigue'. Finding what causes a leak of calcium from the cells in those cases might lead to an effective preventive strategy.

Mitochondrial DNA mutations can cause degenerative heart and muscle disease
A single change in the DNA of mitochondria – the cellular power plants that generate energy in all human cells – has been found to cause degenerative heart and muscle disease, according to University of California, Irvine researchers.

“While these diseases traditionally have been assumed to result from mutations in the genes encoded by DNA in the cell’s nucleus,” he said, “most common degenerative diseases frequently do not exhibit inheritance patterns wholly consistent with our understanding of these nuclear DNA genetics. Our demonstration that mutations in the mitochondrial DNA can also cause the same diseases means that both nuclear and mitochondrial DNA genes that affect mitochondrial function can contribute to disease risk.”

As the mitochondrial DNA of our cells accumulates damage with age, the blueprints required to sustain energy production are lost, the body’s equivalent of a brownout. The resulting age-related decline in cellular energy production ultimately leads to tissue and organ failure and the development of clinical disease or illness. Thus the accumulation of mtDNA damage may explain aging and the delayed-onset and progressive course of age-related diseases and aging.

This is another piece of corroborating evidence for the emerging view, advanced by Heinrich Kremer, that cancer is connected with a functional breakdown of ATP synthesis in the mitochondria of our cells.

Natural Hormone Group Protests FDA Crackdown
Last week, the HOME (Hands Off My Estrogens!) Coalition, a group based in Edinburg, Va., placed a full-page ad in five newspapers, including USA Today and the Wall Street Journal, accusing the agency of being hostile to “natural” hormonal medicines made according to a doctor’s prescription by a compounding pharmacy. The ads urge women and their physicians to e-mail the White House and members of Congress asking them to protect patient access to meds they claim are “bio-identical” to those found in the body, the Post reports.

Hot Flash? Wyeth And A Vexing HRT Ingredient
The FDA explained that the drugs made by the compounding pharmacies contain hormones such as estrogen, progesterone and estriol, which the agency made a point of noting isn’t a component of any approved drug and hasn’t been proven safe and effective for any use. And this makes for a little bit of irony. In its petition, Wyeth harps on the presence of estriol in these BHRTs as a prime reason the FDA ought to yank the compounded drugs from the market.

At the same time the petition was filed, however, Wyeth was selling Cyclo-Menorette, a menopausal drug in four European countries - Estonia, Germany, Latvia and Poland - that contained, yes, estriol.

Legislators consider aspartame ban
Proponents of the bill were told after a public hearing last week that a ban would be hard to push through. Those who want aspartame taken out of Hawai'i's food supply call it a neurotoxin, a carcinogen and the source of headaches, heart spasms and a host of other ills.

Artificial Sweeteners Increase Weight Gain Odds
A Purdue University study released Sunday in the journal Behavioral Neuroscience reported that rats on diets containing the artificial sweetener saccharin gained more weight than rats given sugary food, casting doubt on the benefits of low-calorie sweeteners. "There's something about diet foods that changes your metabolic limit, your brain chemistry," said ABC News' medical contributor Dr. Marie Savard.

Prenatal Exposure to Household Pesticides May Increase Cancer Risk in Children
Researchers conducted the study in France in 2004 and 2005. They found that when mothers and fathers used pesticides during the mother’s pregnancy, children were at significantly greater risk of developing acute leukemia, non-Hodgkin’s lymphoma, and certain types of Hodgkin’s lymphoma. The association was especially strong with household insecticides.

ACLU Launches Campaign to Decriminalize Marijuana
Travel writer Rick Steves and the American Civil Liberties Union of Washington have formed a partnership to tackle a topic they call the equivalent of the prohibition of alcohol in the 1920s: the criminalization of marijuana. Steves, the Edmonds-based travel guru who five years ago openly acknowledged that he uses marijuana while visiting Europe, says he's not "pro-marijuana," but in favor of discussing the laws that affect the 830,000 Americans who are arrested annually under existing marijuana laws.

Legal drugs aren't necessarily safe drugs
"Heath Ledger had six prescriptions, but no illegal drugs" proclaimed the Appeal (1/14/2008) reporting on the death of the young actor. When are people going to wake up to the "other" drug problem washing over America, that of prescription drugs? Because they are legal, they are believed to be safe. Nothing could be further from the truth.

Time To End Profit Driven Mandatory Vaccination Racket
The push to keep adding more vaccines to the mandatory schedules comes directly from a purely profit motivated industry and a recent investor report estimates that the world-wide market will quadruple from about $4.3 billion in 2006 to more than $16 billion in 2016, with the biggest boost coming from kids in the US.

The crucial factor for success in the pediatric market, the report notes, is the introduction of a product into national vaccination schedules. "Along with reimbursement, this virtually guarantees the rapid uptake and continuously high coverage rates in the target population..."

Datamonitor sees a huge commercial opportunity in HPV vaccines, with annual sales of $1.4 billion in teenage girls for the seven major markets by 2016 and a cumulative catch-up opportunity in women aged 13-26 that could add up to over $17 billion until 2016.

Paxil Suicide Data: The Glenmullen Report
The New Scientist reports that unsealed court documents - including an expert report by Harvard psychiatrist, Joseph Glenmullen, MD - reveal that GlaxoSmithKline knew as early as 1989 that there was an 8-fold increased risk of suicide for patients taking Paxil. Yet, the company did not acknowledge the risk to the public until 2006.

Did GSK trial data mask Paxil suicide risk?
An inappropriate analysis of clinical trial data by researchers at GlaxoSmithKline obscured suicide risks associated with paroxetine, a profitable antidepressant, for 15 years, suggest court documents released last month. Not until 2006 did GSK alert people to raised suicide risks associated with the drug, marketed as Paxil and Seroxat.

Lawmakers Catch Glaxo Hiding Paxil Suicide Risks - Again
Apparently, GlaxoSmithKline is still trying to hide damaging information about Paxil, because 9 pages of a report released from under a court order last month, are not available to the public. However, Senator Charles Grassley has instructed Glaxo to provide him with the full report by February 14, 2008.

THE FAILURE OF CARDIOVASCULAR MEDICATION
On February 7, 2008 the government halted an arm of its ACCORD trial (Action to Control Cardiovascular Risk in Diabetes) because drug treatments in type II diabetics to aggressively lower blood sugar, combined with drugs to lower blood pressure and cholesterol, resulted in a 20% increased risk of death. The ACCORD trial represents all that is wrong with medicine in America today...

British Politician Calls For End To "Prozac Nation"
"Clegg, who is putting mental health at the top of his party's public services agenda, said it was time that the issue was put at the centre of the political debate. He said: 'It is time to break the silence - we must take the issues around mental health out of the shadows.'

He accused the Labour government of under investment in mental health services and failing to provide alternatives to drug therapies, branding Britain as the 'Prozac nation' after revealing that 31 million prescriptions were issued for anti-depressants in 2006, including 631,000 for children."

CONDOMS AND HIV: WHAT EVERYONE KNOWS IS ONCE AGAIN WRONG
The latter, a meta-analysis (quantitative assessment) of a dozen studies had concluded, “Among those who reported never using condoms, the summary estimate of HIV/AIDS incidence from the seven studies was 6.7 seroconversions per 100 person years”. Now: if there are 67 acts of intercourse per year, that corresponds to a transmission rate of a mere 1 per 1000 unprotected acts; at more than 67 acts per year, it corresponds to an even lower rate of apparent transmission. As often pointed out, such rates are far too low to bring about an epidemic.

HIV-POSITIVE BABIES ARE NOT VIRUS-INFECTED
One can hardly ask for better grounded reasons for recognizing that “HIV-positive” does not signify permanent infection; and that consequently all the claims of mother-to-child transmission of a virus — be it perinatally or as a result of breastfeeding — cannot be taken as valid, based as they are on the most dubious grounds. Given these facts, how could anyone recommend the administering of toxic anti-retroviral drugs to pregnant women and babies?

Hiv Testing - Know your rights
Liam Scheff has compiled a series of articles, linked from this page, that discuss the nature of HIV tests. Anyone considering to take a test should document themselves before doing so. Informed consent should really be promoted by the medical authorities, but it is not. Here is the information all in one place to study.

HIV vaccine research hits impasse
"I believe that HIV has found ways to totally fool the immune system," he said. "So we have to do one better than nature."

What if, rather than ascribing supernatural powers to a simple virus that isn't even present in many Aids patients, we started to look into the original hypotheses of Aids as a viral disease? Perhaps we could discover what really causes Aids and could start supplying the nutrients these people are so deficient in.

Heavy cell phone use tied to poor sperm quality
In a study of 361 men seen at their infertility clinic, researchers at the Cleveland Clinic found an association between the patients’ cell phone use and their sperm quality. On average, the more hours the men spent on their cell phones each day, the lower their sperm count and the greater their percentage of abnormal sperm.

Neurological effects of radiofrequency electromagnetic radiation
by Henry Lai
This paper is not new but it summarizes much research into the effects that radiofrequency radiation has on biological function, even at very low intensities. The conclusion: "At this point, little is known about the biological effects of mobile telephone use, but since there are indications that the radiation from these phones can cause biological effects that could be detrimental to health, prudent usage should be taken as a logical guideline."

New Crop of Ranchers Buck Cattle Industry to Go Green
Nitschke, 31, who makes his living herding heifers through pastures near Yosemite National Park, would never call himself an environmental activist, though he's planting saplings to protect nearby streams and runs a light herd to let his pastures breathe. Unlike some of his conservative counterparts in traditional livestock production, he and a new crop of cattlemen are quietly working to minimize their industry's ecological footprint, and are forging unlikely alliances with environmental groups.

Monsanto's False Advertising in India: Aggressive, Unscrupulous, & False
Posters appeared in many places in Madhya Pradesh before sowing time, featuring a person who claimed to have gained great benefits from using Bt Cotton seed. These advertisements urged other farmers to benefit similarly from the use of Bt Cotton. Investigations revealed that this "farmer" was actually a paan dabbahwala (the owner of a little shop selling betel leaves and cigarettes) who is not even a farmer, let alone a Bt Cotton farmer!!!

Corporations Given ‘Human Rights,’ Humans Are Denied Them
In evaluating allegations that U.S. military forces deprived four British men of human rights during two years they were held captive in Guantanamo Bay prison, a U.S. appeals court found an innovative way to let the Bush administration off the hook. Two of three judges ruled the men — because they are not U.S. citizens and, technically, were not imprisoned in the U.S. — were not legally “persons” and, therefore, had no rights to violate...

Recommended Video of the Week: Zeitgeist
The film has 3 segments: Part I is about the origin of Judeo-Christian Religions; Part II is about 9/11; and Part III is about the history of the Federal Reserve Bank. The theories and facts presented may be distasteful to some ... or mind-blowing and eye-opening to others ... as it was for me. It's certainly not for those do not want to subject themselves to other schools of thought or to those who wish to keep their belief systems in tact ... in fact ... it may destroy your beliefs altogether.

The North American Union and the Larger Plan
A friend sent the link to this article saying it was "interesting and thought provoking". My comment was this:

... they must have learned a great deal from the European experience on how to integrate a whole region.

I like this admission:

in 1995, Brzezinski revealed: "We cannot leap into world government through one quick step....The precondition for eventual and genuine globalization is progressive regionalization because by that we move toward larger, more stable, more cooperative units."

and the piece of the "Amero" as the perfect solution to take over from the (purposely?) weakened dollar is in line with what I have been thinking. Also, looking at the "North America" situation from a purely economic perspective and leaving aside issues of patriotism, a union does make eminent sense.

Of course entirely similar scenarios are playing out at the same time, in the other regions that are preparing for integration, only that we hear less about them.

"Resistance is futile" comes to mind when reading things like this, but then - all we need to do is ride the wave. Globalization is being pushed with a lot of momentum, and rather than resist with all our might, exhausting ourselves in the process, we should be figuring out how to turn that momentum to our advantage ...

Creating Reality - From Consciousness and Free Will to Three Dimensional Networking
An article I posted last week on Health Supreme. Just in case you missed it... here is the link.

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More information out there...

There is much I cannot cover but other sources for this kind of information exist and are active.

You can subscribe to the Zeus Newsletterhere. Appears twice monthly. If you would like to see some samples of Louise's collection of informative links, here are the archives.

The Alternative Medicine Yahoo Group is another great place to get information on what is happening in the world of nutrition and other natural health options.

For the influence of electromagnetic waves from radio, mobile phones and other radio emitting devices, check out the emfrefugee group on Yahoo.

If you are interested in a different take on the news that isn't health centered but is certainly fun, check out Robin Good TV News.

Some more sites to keep up to date with the other side of world affairs, the stuff you won't find on tv:

http://www.whatreallyhappened.com
http://www.commondreams.org
http://www.vialls.com/
http://www.globalresearch.ca/
http://rawstory.com/
http://www.truthout.org/

"The individual is supreme and finds its way through intuition."