Once again the supreme court takes care of business while leaving we the people in the dust. Learn why and how with this article below by
Jon Smith.
The U.S. Supreme Court ruled unanimously yesterday that a California law requiring “downer” livestock to be euthanized—intended to both promote animal welfare and keep sick animals out of the food supply—had overstepped the state’s constitutional authority.
Food Safety News explains the law:
In 2009, California enacted a ban on selling or slaughtering downer, or lame animals unable to walk, in response to undercover footage showing animal handlers abusing cows — forcefully dragging and forklifting non-ambulatory animals — in a San Bernadino County slaughterhouse. The video, released by the Humane Society, sparked consumer outrage and led to the nation’s largest-ever meat recall.
Non-ambulatory cows are at a higher risk for BSE, or mad cow disease. The packer caught prodding downed animals into slaughter had also been supplying the National School Lunch Program.
The California law, which the pork industry took to the Supreme Court, required meat processors to euthanize downed animals immediately and applied to pigs, goats, and sheep—unlike federal law, which prevents only downed cows from being slaughtered.
But there’s no reason Michael Pollan’s words about downed cows—”Whatever the risk, do you want to be eating meat from sick cows?”—do not extend to other animals.
A piece in The Los Angeles Times puts the law into context:
The questions of possibly tainted meat from potentially ailing animals -– pigs, cows, goats — getting into the food chain was one of the confluent forces in the California law; the other was about animal cruelty. The public was horrified at a humane group’s video of cows that couldn’t walk being prodded and forced into the slaughterhouse to feed the American appetite for cheap and plentiful meat.
Federal Issue
The Federal Meat Inspection Act prohibits states from enacting laws that differ or are stricter than the federal law. But the Supreme Court ruling highlights the sad state of farming in the U.S. The one state that moved toward minimally reducing animal cruelty and promoting food safety is legally prevented from doing so.
Now no one, whether in California or the Midwest, can take assurances about the state of the animals that enter the food supply, that none of them were not so sick prior to slaughter that they physically could not walk.
Food Safety News explains more about the decision:
“The Supreme Court’s ruling affirms the supremacy of the Federal Meat Inspection Act and USDA’s role in regulating meat process plants,” said NPPC President Doug Wolf, a hog farmer from Lancaster, WI. “It also recognized that non-ambulatory hogs with proper recovery time and veterinary oversight do not need to be condemned immediately in all cases.”
Animal rights advocates argue that the California law would promote humane treatment and keep sick, weak animals out of the food supply. According to NMA, around 3 percent of pigs are non-ambulatory, or unable to walk, when they show up to the slaughterhouse.
As you know I am a great proponent of Enerfood. In addition to taking that every day consider eating more cherries. The article below by Mike Adams will tell you more about this great food.
Did you know that cherries can lower levels of inflammation in the body drastically enough to actually alleviate arthritis symptoms and reduce your risk of cardiovascular disease and diabetes? It doesn’t even take a super-powerful extract to feel the effect; powdered cherries alone have produced dramatic results. In at least one study, powdered cherry consumption actually led to a change in the functioning of inflammation-regulating genes in mice.
Cherries are also well known to help reverse gout — a condition caused by too much uric acid circulating in the blood.
Like all dark-skinned fruits, cherries are high in antioxidants and other phytochemicals that promote human health in numerous ways. While sweet cherries may be more fun to eat, the most potent inflammation-fighting cherries are the tart variety. In addition to fighting inflammation and arthritis, cherries have also been found to fight gout, reduce body fat and lower levels of cholesterol.
I personally recommend cherry products from Brownwood Acres (www.brownwoodacres.com), including their “CherryFlex” softgels (which are so delicious, you can actually chew on ‘em if you want).
Think it can’t get any better? Some tart cherries contain high enough levels of the hormone melatonin that they can actually help you fall asleep. Cherries are truly a miracle healing food!
Where trees are prolific and part of the human consciousness, as far as the understanding of how they contribute to our long term survival, communities tend to thrive. If you add to that mindset the adoption of techniques that incorporate sustainable food production such as food forests and perennial vegetables, then you come to understand how important forests are. Trees have long been the poster child of those who support environmental protection and conservation. But there is real truth behind their plea to “save the trees.” A new social network called The Grove makes it easy to engage in sustainable living behaviors and protect the nation’s dwindling urban tree canopy.
Based on a local model that was extremely successful in the Southeastern U.S., The Grove provides a national community for citizens engaged in preserving and positively contributing to the United States’ urban forest. The site enables members to share their interests, knowledge and experiences in planting trees with other like-minded nature enthusiasts and to document and commemorate life moments online with family, friends and their communities.
Trees are one of our most valuable natural resources, with the ability to reduce air pollution, fight the greenhouse effect, conserve water, save energy, reduce soil erosion, increase economic stability, and create wildlife and plant diversity–all without moving an inch!
“On The Grove, forestry discussions are open to everyone, from state foresters and non-profits, to corporations and landscape architects, to hobbyists and everyday nature lovers. The Grove fosters communication among these different groups and encourages collaboration under the shared goal of greater environmental awareness and sustainable action,” said Ed Macie, the Southern Region Urban Forestry Program Manager for the USDA Forest Service.
Members on The Grove community can join their state group and connect with foresters, arborists and other environmentally conscious citizens in their area. Similar to other social networking sites, members on The Grove can upload pictures, videos and captions of their tree planting experiences, discuss tree-related issues and get updates on local planting events.
The Grove also offers a tree match tool to assist members in choosing the right tree to plant their legacy or to commemorate a special event, such as an anniversary, birth, wedding or other life moment. The site also provides general planting information and care tips for those new to planting.
In the great article by Kristina Chew we learn how some principled athletes are helping their fans wake up to the fact that water is so very important and how we should shun caffeine laden, sugar filled, health depleting beverages for this oh so natural, body essential fluid. Read it below!
Sports drinks, soda (diet and not, caffeinated and not), iced tea (diet and not), juice, juice drinks, pure spring water, mineral water, vitamin water: It’s fair to say there are so many things to drink that one forgets the most basic drink of them all:
Water.
Two professional snowboarders, Bryan Fox and Austin Smith, have started a campaign with the to-the-point name Drink Water to encourage people to do just that. Drinking good old-fashioned, plane Jane water is, better, writes Christopher Mims on Grist, than gulping down “$20-a-gallon sugar-juice” — that is, sports drinks that contain “caffeine, sodium, sugar, high fructose corn syrup, and even some mystery chemicals about which little is known,” says the Drink Water site. Both Fox and Smith are sponsored by sports drinks companies so their campaign is all the more notable (though perhaps they might nudge those sponsors in the direction of cutting down on some of the “mystery chemicals” and such in their products?).
To fuel their campaign, the Drink Water website does sell logo-branded gear. 10 percent of every purchase will go to Water.org, whose mission is to provide people in the developing world with drinking water. Some facts from Water.org:
* 3.575 million people die every year from a water-related disease according to a World Health Organization report from 2008
* “An American taking a five-minute shower uses more water than a typical person in a developing country slum uses in a whole day,” the 2006 United Nations Human Development Report points out
* Approximately 1 in 8 people lack access to a safe supply of water
Lest you’re concerned about drinking water straight from the tap, Mims writes that the environmental impact of drinking such water is actually “miniscule” when compared to the amount of “energy and resources required to package and transport the average sports drink, not to mention all the industrial ag that went into making the high fructose corn syrup it contains.”
So many of us take water, and certainly what comes out of the tap, for granted. The Drink Water campaign is a reminder that the very best drink is as close as the kitchen sink, or should be. At a time when fracking has been going on in more and more locales, we need to do everything we can to ensure that our drinking water is safe. The Safe Drinking Water Act (SDWA) was envisioned as ensuring the quality of drinking water in the US. With research studies linking fracking to flammable drinking water and the contamination of drinking water in the Marcellus Shale, Wyoming and elsewhere, we need to make sure that our drinking water is indeed safe to drink because, in the words of the ancient Greek poet Pindar, “water is best.”
AS we strive to be healthier it would be nice to know that the government were supporting our conscientious efforts, rather than subsidizing the very foods that lead to poor health. In this Activist Post article by Mike Barrett learn more about the truth behind the scenes. With the New Year here, it has never been a better time to make health your reality. Watch the video below for some more factual information. Ignore the short ad before the video starts.
http://youtu.be/cXH331pz6OM
With rates of obesity, diabetes, and nearly every other major health problem rising each year, why has the United States decided to heavily subsidize junk food? Farmers around the country choosing to grow healthy crops like chard, broccoli, and spinach simply do not have the government funding that those growing massive amounts of corn and soy beans (of which above 90% of each are genetically modified) do. Does the U.S. government really think that fruits and vegetables are not as important as grains which are used mostly for processing harmful food items? It may be time for a policy change.
Unhealthy Food Subsidization is Ruining Our Health
Between 1995 and 2010 over $260 billion was spent by American taxpayers in agricultural subsidies. Most of that money is put into commodity crops such as corn and soybeans, but the money is far less than well spent. While corn alone took in a whopping $77.1 billion from the government between 1995 and 2010, taxpayers spent $262 million subsidizing apples during the same time period. It just so happens that apples are really the only significant federal subsidy of fresh fruits and vegetables. In fact, if these agricultural subsidies went directly to consumers for the purchase of food, America’s 144 million taxpayers would each be given $7.36 to spend on junk food and only 11 cents to buy apples each year. This equates to about 19 Twinkies but less than a quarter of one healthy apple.
The U.S. government continues to be a major player in the national food business, with subsidies continuing to grow. The worst part is that the crops being subsidized are almost always genetically modified and pose a health risk to the environment and humankind.
Corn may be the crop utilized most poorly in the country. The corn being produced is actually specifically created for purposes of adding certain ingredients (many of which are toxic) into the food supply. One such ingredient is high fructose corn syrup, which has been found to contain mercury and cause cancer, and resides in many products such as ketchup, cereals, and beverages. Shockingly, it has nearly replaced sugar in all sodas and soft drinks.
Then there is corn starch, corn gluten meal, hydrolyzed corn protein, and corn syrup which can all be found in snacks like cookies. Lastly, corn is used to feed conventionally fed animals to prompt weight gain and hasten their slaughter weight. Unfortunately, these animals’ digestive systems are not meant to digest corn, causing the animals to be fed antibiotics.
In addition to corn lies soybeans, another crop heavily subsidized by the U.S. government. Today, the U.S. produces at least 75% of all soybeans grown worldwide, with an increase of about 10 million acres produced between 2007 and 2011. Total subsidies for soybeans between 1995 and 2010 totaled $24.3 billion, making it 3rd on the list of top products subsidized. Unfortunately this heavily subsidized crop is no less genetically modified than corn, with nearly 93% of US soybeans being genetically modified in order to resist powerful weed-killers.
These genetically modified crops pushed by the government are said to reduce pesticide usage and be completely safe according to U.S. government agencies. But more than enough evidence has shown these touted benefits to be false claims, and the heavily subsidized, genetically modified junk food pushed on the population has only been shown to be a threat to your health.
I encourage you to read and view this man very attentively. Perhaps more than anyone else he understands the health implications of GMO’s. This is a Mercola interview.
Dr. Don Huber is an expert in an area of science that relates to the toxicity of genetically engineered (GE) foods. (Alternative terms for GE foods include genetically modified (GM), or “GMO” for genetically modified organism.) His specific areas of training include soil-borne diseases, microbial ecology, and host-parasite relationships. Dr. Huber also taught plant pathology, soil microbiology, and micro-ecological interactions as they relate to plant disease as a staff Professor at Purdue University for 35 years.
GE Crops are Breaking the Agricultural System…
Agriculture is a complete ’system’ based on inter-related factors, and in order to maintain ecological balance and health, you must understand how that system works as a whole.
Any time you change one part of that system, you change the interaction of all the other components, because they work together.
It is simply impossible to change just one minor aspect without altering the entire system….
Dr. Huber’s research, which spans over 55 years, has been devoted to looking at how the agricultural system can be managed for more effective crop production, better disease control, improved nutrition, and safety. The introduction of genetically engineered crops has dramatically affected and changed all agricultural components:
The plants
The physical environment
The dynamics of the biological environment, and
Pests and diseases (plant-, animal-, and human diseases)
In this interview, Dr. Huber reveals a number of shocking facts that need to become common knowledge in order to stop this catastrophic alteration and destruction of our environment, our food supply, and ultimately, our own biology.
I urge you to listen to the interview in its entirety, or read through the transcript to understand fully appreciate the importance of this development.
Herbicides and Pesticides Immobilize Specific Nutrients
One of the major modifications done to genetically engineered food crops is the introduction of herbicide resistance. Monsanto is the leader in this field, with their patented Roundup Ready corn, cotton, soybean and sugar beets, which can survive otherwise lethal doses of glyphosate—the active ingredient in Roundup.
The working premise is that by making the plants resistant to the herbicide, farmers can increase yield by cutting down on weed growth. This premise has been found to be severely flawed however, as farmers around the world are now losing acreage to glyphosate-resistant super-weeds at an alarming rate. According to the British Institute of Science in Society, the US has fared the worst, now combating 13 different glyphosate-resistant weed species in 73 different locations.
But the introduction of glyphosate-resistance has also had a direct impact on soil microbes.
While the link between an herbicide (which is directed toward plants) and soil microbes may not be immediately apparent, this ripple effect occurs because, again, it’s an inter-related system. In a nutshell, herbicides are chelators that form a barrier around specific nutrients, preventing whatever life form is seeking to utilize that element from utilizing it properly. That applies both to plants and soil microbes—as well as animals and humans.
This may actually be one of the primary reasons why genetically engineered foods appear to be able to cause such profound health problems in those who consume them. Any organism that has the same physiological pathways for these nutrients will be impacted in the same manner.
Dr. Huber explains:
You have to realize what an herbicide, or a pesticide, is. They are metal chelators. In other words, they immobilize specific nutrients… [I]t’s a compound that can grab onto another element and change either its solubility or its availability for the critical function it has physiologically. We have herbicides and pesticides that are quite specific just for a particular essential micronutrient like copper, zinc, iron, or manganese.
Glyphosate is very unique and was first patented as a chelator by Stauffer Chemical Co. in 1964, because it could bind with any positively charged ion. If you look at the essential minerals for plants, you see calcium, magnesium, potassium, copper, iron, manganese, zinc, and all of those other critical transition elements, as well as structural components for some of them… They all have an ion associated with them. It’s the micronutrient that is an ion—that is a transition element, or that element that is really critical for a particular enzyme function.
If you can chelate and, in that chelation process, essentially immobilize that essential nutrient, you have provided an opportunity to either kill a weed or damage and kill an organism—any organism… that have that particular requirement for that physiologic pathway with glyphosate or the shikimate pathway…
You have to realize that this mode of action immobilizes a critical essential nutrient. Those nutrients aren’t just required by the weed, but they’re required by microorganisms. They’re required by us for our own physiologic functions. So if it’s immobilized, it may be present if we do a regular test. But it’s not necessarily physiologically available in the same efficiency that it would have been if it wasn’t chelated with glyphosate…
The Dangers of Glyphosate that Most People Have NO Idea Of
Glyphosate, even in plants genetically engineered to withstand it, affects about 25 different enzymes in the process of chelating, or immobilizing, critical micronutrients, because those ions (the micronutrients) are required in order to “drive” the physiological engines that make the plant or organism function properly.
“It is well documented that… having that foreign gene inserted reduces the capability of that plant to take up nutrients and to translocate nutrients,” Dr. Huber says. “Then, when you apply the chemical [glyphosate], you have a further compounding effect in reducing the efficiency of the plants at rates as low as 12 grams per acre.”
According to Dr. Huber, the nutritional efficiency of genetically engineered (GE) plants is profoundly compromised. Micronutrients such as iron, manganese and zinc can be reduced by as much as 80-90 percent in GE plants!
Many staunch defenders of genetically engineered foods are under the misconception that GE foods are “better” or have improved nutrition when the exact opposite is true. They also don’t understand that the glyphosate residue cannot be removed or washed off—it actually becomes part of the plant. It cannot be washed off because it’s systemic within the plant itself.
“It’s going to be in your root tips, your shoot tips, your legume nodules, and in the food that you eat,” Dr. Huber warns.
Furthermore, about 20 percent of the glyphosate migrates out of the plant’s roots and into the surrounding soil. Once in the soil, the glyphosate affects beneficial soil microorganisms in the same way that it affects weeds, because they have the same critical metabolic pathway. With each new Roundup Ready crop approved, the glyphosate residues in the soil increases, and the tolerance levels in the crop increases as well.
This is explosive information that should make warning bells go off in most people’s heads! Personally, I firmly believe we must all become activists to eliminate this threat to our food supply as soon as possible.
Food Quality is Related to Soil Quality
The quality of the food is almost always related to the quality of the soil. The most foundational and critical components of the soil are the microorganisms that thrive there—more so than the necessary nutrients, because it’s the microorganisms that allow the plants to utilize those nutrients.
According to Dr. Huber:
The plant can only utilize certain [reduced] forms of all the nutrients… The way that it becomes reduced in the soil is through those beneficial microorganisms. We also have microorganisms for legumes like soybeans, alfalfa, peas, or any of the other legumes that can fix up to 75 percent of their actual nitrogen for protein in amino acid synthesis that actually comes from the air through the microorganisms in the soil.
Glyphosate is extremely toxic to all of those organisms.
What we see with our continued use and abuse of this powerful weed killer is that it is also totally eliminating many of those organisms from the soil. We no longer have the same balance that we used to have. Consequently, we see an increase of over 40 new plant diseases, and diseases we used to have under fairly effective control, which now all of a sudden is another serious problem.
GE Foods Fueling Deadly Botulism in Cattle
The normal biological control organisms—the beneficial gut bacteria—in animals and humans are also very sensitive to residual glyphosate levels.
For example, toxic botulism is now becoming a more common cause of death in dairy cows whereas such deaths used to be extremely rare. The reason it didn’t occur before was because beneficial organisms served as natural controls to keep the Clostridium botulinum in check. Without them, the Clostridium botulinum is allowed to proliferate in the animal’s intestines and produce lethal amounts of toxins.
“Again, the agricultural system, as well as our own ecology, is really a balance,” Dr. Huber says. “It’s a system, not just a bunch of silver bullets that are stacked in a chamber of a revolver. It’s how that ecological system is modified and changed that brings us a new level of diseases and problems with sustainability of our agriculture, our own health, and well-being.”
MOST Major US Food Crops are Now Genetically Engineered!
Many still don’t realize just how much of our food supply has been genetically engineered (GE). As of this year, 93 percent of soybeans grown in the US are genetically engineered, as are:
86 percent of all corn
93 percent of canola
93 percent of cottonseed oil
Between 2008 and 2009, a full 95 percent of all sugarbeets planted were also Roundup Ready.
This means that virtually every processed food you encounter at your local supermarket that does not bear the “100% USDA Organic” label is likely to contain at least one GE component! Earlier this year, the US Department of Agriculture (USDA) also deregulated genetically engineered alfalfa, which is a perennial crop commonly used in cattle feed.
According to Dr. Huber:
Alfalfa is our fourth most important economic crop, by far the most nutritional feed for our herbivores. They, all of a sudden, can definitely be threatened—not only because of the direct effect of glyphosate on microorganisms, but also because it predisposes and can make that plant very susceptible to some common dise ases…
We see this on corn… where we have the sister organism with the Goss’s wilt, a bacterial disease. In that situation, we find that when we put glyphosate on, it nullifies all the genetic resistance that, in the past, made that disease of almost no consequence…Now we find it from coast to coast, East to West, from Mexico to Canada. For four years now, we have a major epidemic in a major food production area in the Midwest, just from that disease.
That is a direct result of our genetic engineering process, which reduces the genetic resistance, and the application of the herbicide that it was designed to tolerate.
Important Questions Still Unanswered…
According to Dr. Huber, there’s currently enough residual glyphosate in animal feed and food to make an otherwise benign organism lethal…
Unfortunately, research is still lacking to ascertain exactly how great the risk to human health is. It’s possible that those who do not consume an all-organic diet, which is the majority of Americans, to some extent or another, are destroying their gut flora with every bite of food they eat. According to Dr. Huber, the reduction in mineral content through chelation by glyphosate residues in GE plants would certainly make you far more susceptible to potentially dangerous pathogens.
Studies have already confirmed that glyphosate alters and destroys beneficial gut flora in animals, as evidenced by the increasing instances of lethal botulism in cattle.
I’ve written extensively about the importance of your gut flora on your health. You NEED beneficial bacteria in your gut, or health problems are virtually guaranteed. Optimizing your gut flora may be one of the single most important things you can do to maintain good physical and mental health, so the fact that GE foods may be adversely impacting your intestinal balance is of extreme importance and needs to be understood.
Another important question that does not at present have an answer is whether or not glyphosate accumulates in animal- and human tissues once consumed. We don’t even know if glyphosate is fat-soluble, which would definitely make it accumulate in fat tissues.
GE Foods Brings Brand New Threat
Earlier this year, Dr. Huber wrote a letter to USDA Secretary Tom Vilsack, informing him of the issues discussed above, as well as another groundbreaking new finding that could spell absolute disaster for our entire food supply. It’s a brand new micro-fungal organism associated with something called Sudden Death Syndrome (SDS) in soy. It’s also found in a large variety of livestock given GE feed who experience both spontaneous abortions and infertility.
Dr. Huber urged the USDA to investigate the matter and suspend approval of GE alfalfa until proper studies have been completed. His warnings have so far been largely ignored, and GE alfalfa was deregulated earlier this year…
“When you look at the tremendous increase in human diseases that can have a potential tie directly back to either the chemical or the engineering process, it’s critical for that research to be done as quickly as possible. We need resources to do it. The private funds, again, aren’t going to do everything because there’s just too much to be done.”
The organism was initially identified by veterinarians around 1998—about two years after the introduction of Roundup Ready soybeans, which is one of the staple feeds. The vets were puzzled by sudden high reproductive failure in animals. While sporadic at first, the phenomenon has continued to increase in severity.
“We [recently] received a call from a county extension educator, indicating that he has a dairy that has a 70 percent abortion rate. You put that on top of 10 to 15 percent of infertility to start with, and you’re not going to have a dairy very long. In fact, a lot of our veterinarians are now becoming very concerned about the prospects for being able to have replacement animals,” Dr. Huber says.
The cause-effect relationship between high reproductive failure and this new microbial entity has been established, but the research has not yet been published. The reason for the delay is because they really do not know what the organism is…
It’s not a fungus. It’s not bacteria. It’s not a mycoplasma or a virus — it’s about the same size of a small virus; you have to magnify it from 38 to 40,000 times. They have pictures of it… You can see the interactions with it. They can now culture it. It’s self-replicating and cultured. It doesn’t grow very well by itself.
Like most of our very fastidious organisms, it tends to die out after three or four sub-culturing, but grows very well with other organisms. If you have yeast, bacteria, or a fungus in the culture, this entity grows very well.
We’re waiting on getting enough material, pure material, for DNA analysis, but also looking at some other possibilities… Until you can put a name on it, all it does is create a great deal of speculations.
What is known is that it’s an entirely new entity, previously unknown to science, and it’s definitely found in genetically engineered corn and soybeans. It’s also been established that it causes infertility and miscarriage in cattle, horses, pigs, sheep, and poultry.
“We can anticipate with that broad spectrum of animal species, which is extremely unusual, that it will also be with humans,” Dr. Huber says. “We’ve seen an increasing frequency of miscarriage and a dramatic increase in infertility in human populations in just the last eight to 10 years.”
Why is the USDA Ignoring Such Urgent Warnings?
Dr. Huber received a response from Dr. Parham, head of the USDA-APHIS, assuring him that “all of the decisions that the USDA makes are based on peer-reviewed science.” Dr. Huber responded with another letter, pointing out 130 published peer-reviewed articles documenting all of his concerns.
“I asked if they could provide me a peer-reviewed scientific study that would justify the regulation of those products,” he says. “I’m still waiting for that. I haven’t found anyone that can produce that type of document.
“… I did receive a call from Risk Management about two weeks after writing the letter, asking if I could provide details, because there wasn’t anything in the letter. The letter was written to a politician. I didn’t want to disclose names of scientists or details because of the retaliatory effect that we see with anyone researching this area — they can be either fired from their job or their program shut down. That’s a real fact.”
The Red-Tape Nightmare of GE Safety Research
Crazy as it sounds, researchers cannot perform whatever safety studies on GE foods they see fit because the way the red tape has been put in place, they could easily be found guilty of breaking the law by performing research on a patented product.
If you read the technology agreement that the farmer has to sign, he can’t even do research on his own farm to compare whether this crop or this product is better than another one without violating the terms of that technology agreement. It’s essentially a closed system to guarantee success.
… A group of us that are working together on the new entity causing reproductive failure… have obtained private funding, and have taken it to experts in the areas of specific diseases and tried to encourage them to work on it. In the past year, they have been prohibited from working on it by their universities or department heads…
That’s one of the reasons why we needed that contact with the USDA officials, in hopes that we could share the problems that concern them, that they would recognize the serious nature of this, and that we could obtain their support and use their resources for funding of individuals and specialists, so that we could overcome that barrier that seems to be there for anyone working on genetically engineered crops that might indicate that they’re not quite everything they were cut out to be.
It’s almost as though you have to belong to that religion, if you’re going to do any research or publish your research.
Obviously, such as setup will produce highly biased and prejudiced results, and can easily obfuscate the truth….
GE Food and Premature Aging
Another astonishing effect of this brand new mystery organism associated with GE crops is profound premature aging. Research done in Iowa three years ago showed that prime beef from a two-year old cow had to be downgraded to that from a 10-year old cow!
So what effect will eating this GE-fed beef have on you? No one knows. But I would bet it won’t make you any healthier… And if animals are any indication, it could spell disaster for your overall health and fertility.
When the veterinarians wanted to find the source for this [brand new] entity, they went to the feed. The first place where they found high concentrations was in the soybean mill. Since then we’ve found it in the corn. We find it in silage. Primarily in high concentrations only where we have a genetically engineered crop that has glyphosate applied to it. Those are the crops that we also see high Goss’s wilt, high SDS. They are all correlated together in that relationship.
The other place you see it, though, is where they have used the manure that has a high glyphosate residue level in it. The manure also has very high concentrations, if the chickens or the animals that have been fed these feeds with high concentrations. When that manure is applied to pastures and cattle graze on it, we also see high infertility rates there.
It occurs in the placenta, in the fetus, in the sperm and inseminators.
Stating that it takes twice as much semen now to get a conception and as many as four to eight inseminations rather than the typical 1.2 to 1.5 for a dairy because of that reduced fertility… I was on a plane with a bull breeder who commented that 40 percent of his bulls had to be pulled out of service, because they can’t get conception anymore.
But that’s not all. Glyphosate can also disrupt a number of other biological systems aside from your reproductive system.
… When you have a very potent chelator, it disrupts all kinds of systems, not just the EPSPs system that we find in certain microorganisms and plants, but also all of the other systems involved in liver function, blood function, and hormonal function. They all go right back to that basic nutrient process that keeps all systems functional.
Glyphosate is actually a very potent endocrine disruptor that can affect your:
Endocrine system
Thyroid function
Pituitary function
Important Summary
As Dr. Huber said:
When future historians come to write about our era they are not going to write about the tons of chemicals we did or didn’t apply. When it comes to glyphosate they are going to write about our willingness to sacrifice our children and to jeopardize our very existence by risking the sustainability of our agriculture; all based upon failed promises and flawed science.
The only benefit is that it affects the bottom-line of a few companies. There’s no nutritional value.
What You Can Do To Get Involved
There’s no doubt in my mind that genetically engineered foods are one of the absolute gravest dangers we fact today as a species. I urge you to educate yourself on this issue and become an active participant in getting GE foods out of our food supply.
If you don’t already have a copy of the Non-GMO Shopping Guide, please print one out and refer to it often. It can help you identify and avoid foods with GMOs. You can also download the free iPhone application that is available in the iTunes store. You can find it by searching for ShopNoGMO in the applications.
Also don’t let Secretary Vilsack ignore this new problem of a micro-fungal pathogen that may be responsible for killing plants, animals and possibly humans!
To quote Dr. Huber’s letter to Secretary Vilsack:
Based on a review of the data, [this dangerous new pathogen] is widespread, very serious, and is in much higher concentrations in Roundup Ready (RR) soybeans and corn — suggesting a link with the RR gene or more likely the presence of Roundup. This organism appears new to science! … I believe the threat we are facing from this pathogen is unique and of a high-risk status. In layman’s terms, it should be treated as an emergency.
Do your part to protect your health and the health of your family by avoiding processed foods loaded with GM components and eating whole, live foods that contain the nutrients your body needs to thrive.
Always buy USDA Organic products when possible, or buy your fresh produce and meat from local farmers, and especially avoid food products containing anything related to corn or soy that are not organic, as any foods containing these two non-organic ingredients now are virtually guaranteed to be genetically engineered.
If you live in California, volunteer to gather petition signatures to help support the California GMO Labeling Ballot Initiative. If you live outside of California, please donate to help support this Initiative.
In this post below from one of my teachers Dr Brownstein you will learn more about why good salt intake is actually important for us.
For years, I have been lecturing and writing about the nonsensical argument the conventional powers-that-be claim that lowering salt in the diet will reduce your risk of cardiovascular disease. The data has never been shown that lowering salt intake to ridiculously low levels of 1,500mg/day will reduce your risk of heart disease. In fact, many studies show that lowering your salt intake to these levels will cause more heart attacks and mortality. Furthermore, low salt diets will lead to elevated insulin levels. Finally, low salt diets do not significantly lower blood pressure. More information about this can be found in my book, Salt Your Way To Health.
A recent study in JAMA (November 23/30, 2011-Vol. 306, No. 20) looked at the association between sodium excretion and cardiovascular events in patients with established cardiovascular events or diabetes. The authors studied nearly 29,000 adults and found cardiovascular death was increased among those with the lowest and the highest sodium excretion.
Sodium excretion is tied to how much sodium (or salt) is ingested. The more salt that is ingested the more sodium that is excreted in the urine. The reverse is true also; the less sodium ingested, the less sodium excreted. A crude estimate can be made that the amount of sodium ingested is equal to the amount of sodium excreted (as long as someone is not sodium deficient).
We have been told we are ingesting too much salt. The Institute of Medicine (IOM) states, “Americans consume unhealthy amounts of sodium in their food, far exceeding public health recommendations. Consuming too much sodium is a concern for all individuals, as it increases the risk for high blood pressure, a serious health condition that is avoidable and can lead to a variety of diseases. Analysts estimate that population-wide reductions in sodium could prevent more than 100,000 deaths annually.”
The IOM claims that Americans ingest more than 3,400mg of sodium per day which is about 1.5 tsp of salt per day. They claim that we should ingest no more than 1 tsp/day or 2,300mg/day. For those with hypertension, experts recommend less—about 1,500mg/day of sodium.
The recent JAMA (November 23/30, 2011) study found the lowest rate of cardiovascular disease, cardiovascular death, heart attack, stroke, congestive heart failure and non- cardiovascular death occurred when the sodium intake was 4-6,000mg/day. Lower and higher intakes were found to increase a compositd of all the outcomes studied (in a near linear fashion). You read that right; lower and higher salt intakes were all associated with worse outcomes.
In my book, I wrote about the dangers of a low-salt diet. Salt is a vitally important nutrient for the human body. We cannot live without adequate amounts of salt. Don’t believe the low-salt nonsense. However, you should educate yourself about which type of salt is a healthy salt.
The healthiest salt is unrefined salt with its full complement of minerals. Celtic Brand Sea Salt, Redmond’s Real Salt and Himalayan salt are all good brands of unrefined salt.
There are medical conditions where the body does not tolerate large amounts of salt. This can occur with those suffering from kidney failure or congestive heart failure. If you have these illnesses, please discuss your salt intake with your doctor.
Taking a good greens formula such as Enerfood. Taking Daily immune support during a time when your immune system is low or you are surrounded by folks that are coming down with something is a great strategy. The article below gives more tips and addresses why the flu shot is a waste of time. Ignore WHO and CDC recommendations for the flu shot if you want to stay well. Read this article by Dr. Mercola below for more in depth info on the vaccine reality.
U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) recommends a yearly flu vaccine as “the first and most important step in protecting against flu viruses.”
This advice applies to everyone 6 months of age and older, and the CDC stresses that you “should get a flu vaccine as soon as [they] are available.”
With a promotion this strong, you might assume that getting a flu shot is a “sure thing” to protect you from all flu-like illness this year, but actually it’s not.
Not even close.
Most Flu-Like Illness is NOT Influenza
During the “flu season,” doctors and patients alike often attribute respiratory illness to “the flu” or influenza viruses when they most of the time flu-like symtpoms are actually associated with other types of viruses and bacteria.
The only way to know for sure what type of virus or bacteria is causing flu-ike symptoms is to have it lab confirmed.
The seasonal influenza vaccine only contains three strains of type A or type B influenza, which U.S. and WHO health officials select each year as the most likely influenza strains that will circulate around the world.
There are many influenza strains and most cases of flu-like illness that occur in the U.S. during a typical flu season are not associated with type A or type B influenza strains.
So, it is important to remember that, when you feel like you have the “flu,” you can’t automatically assume that your flu symptoms are caused by type A or type B influenza strains included in the seasonal flu vaccine. Also, people who do get a flu shot every year cannot automatically assume they will not get sick with either type A or type B influenza or another respiratory iillness that looks and feels like influenza.
Flu Vaccines Prevent the Flu in Only 1.5% of Adults
A new study in The Lancet Infectious Diseases reveals that the flu vaccine prevents lab confirmed type A or type B influenza in only 1.5 out of every 100 vaccinated adults … but the media is reporting this to mean “60 percent effective.”
It is estimated that, annually, only about 2.7% of adults get type A or type B influenza in the first place. The study showed that the use of flu vaccines appear to drop this down to about 1.2%. This is a roughly 60% drop, but that ignores the fact that the vaccine has no protective health benefit for 97.5% of adults.
The researchers’ own conclusions are also somewhat more lackluster in their tone than the media would have you believe:
“Influenza vaccines can provide moderate protection against virologically confirmed influenza, but such protection is greatly reduced or absent in some seasons. Evidence for protection in adults aged 65 years or older is lacking.”
So where is the 60% effectiveness claim coming from? This number is based on relative risk, and it does not mean that 59 out of 100 people who get the flu shot will be protected against the flu … allow me to explain.
Why You Need to Understand Basic Statistics Before Getting a Flu Shot
Some clinical trials are only able to show a meaningful benefit because they focus on relative risk reduction rather than absolute risk reduction. What’s the difference? You can find a very simple explanation of relative risk vs. absolute risk at the Annie Appleseed Project web site, but let me sum it up here.
* Relative risk reduction is calculated by dividing the absolute risk reduction by the control event rate
* Absolute risk reduction is the decrease in risk of a treatment in relation to a control treatment
In plain English, here’s what that means: let’s say you have a study of 200 women, half of whom take a drug and half take a placebo, to examine the effect on breast cancer risk. After five years, two women in the drug group develop breast cancer, compared to four who took the placebo. This data could lead to either of the following headlines, and both would be correct:
“New Miracle Drug Cuts Breast Cancer Risk by 50%!”
“New Drug Results in 2% Drop in Breast Cancer Risk!”
How can this be?
The Annie Appleseed Project explains:
“The headlines represent two different ways to express the same data. The first headline expresses the relative risk reduction — the two women who took the drug (subjects) and developed breast cancer equal half the number (50%) of the four women who took the placebo (controls) and developed breast cancer.
The second headline expresses the absolute risk reduction — 2% of the subjects (2 out of 100) who took the drug developed breast cancer and 4% of the controls (4 out of 100) who took the placebo developed breast cancer — an absolute difference of 2% (4% minus 2%).”
You can now see why clinical trials, especially those funded by drug companies, will cite relative risk reductions rather than absolute risk reductions, and as a patient you need to be aware that statistics can be easily manipulated.
As STATS at George Mason University explains:
“An important feature of relative risk is that it tells you nothing about the actual risk.”
Flu Shot Protects Against Only Three Flu Viruses …
As stated previsously, each year the flu shot contains three influenza viruses — one influenza A (H3N2) virus, one seasonal influenza A (H1N1) virus, and one influenza B virus. It only has a chance of preventing you from getting a flu-like respiratory illness during the flu season IF you so happen to be infected with one of these three specific influenza viruses.
In the United States, federal health officials at the Food and Drug Administration (FDA) are in charge of selecting which viruses to include in seasonal flu vaccine, a process that is based on international “surveillance-based forecasts about what viruses are most likely to cause illness in the coming season.” U.S. health officials works with World Health Organization (WHO) health officials to come up with projectons about which three type A or type B infuenza viruses should be included in seasonal influenza vaccine each year.
In other words, it’s an educated guess.
As you might suspect, getting a “good match” between the chosen vaccine virus strains and the actual influenza viruses that do end up circulating and causing most of the type A or type B influenza in the U.S. and around the world is challenging.
As the CDC notes:
“There are a number of factors that can make getting a good vaccine virus strain for vaccine production challenging, including both scientific issues and issues of timing. Currently, only viruses grown in eggs can be used as vaccine virus strains. If specimens have been grown in other cell lines, they cannot be used for vaccine strains.
However, more and more laboratories do not use eggs to grow influenza viruses, making it difficult to obtain potential vaccine strains. In addition, some influenza viruses, like H3N2 viruses, grow poorly in eggs, making it even more difficult to obtain possible vaccine strains.
In terms of timing, in some years certain influenza viruses may not circulate until later in the influenza season, or a virus can change late in the season or from one season to the next. This can make it difficult to forecast which viruses will predominate the following season, but it can also make it difficult to identify a vaccine virus strain in time for the production process to begin.”
When you add to this gamble, the little-known fact that, according to the CDC, only about 20 percent of flu-like illnesses are actually caused by influenza type A or B, you realize how limited an effect the flu vaccine has on keeping people well during the flu season. Too many people assume that all flu-like illness is caused by influenza viruses when the truth is that about 80 percent of flu-like illness is NOT caused by type A or type B influenza. Most flu-like symptoms are actually associated with more than 200 other bugs that can make you feel just as sick — respiratory syncytial virus, bocavirus, coronavirus, and rhinovirus, to name a few.
What this means is that if you think you have the flu, odds are five to one that you actually don’t have the flu but a flu-like virus, against which the flu shot is absolutely worthless!
Is the Small Purported Flu Shot Benefit Actually due to the “Healthy User” Effect?
Lisa Jackson, a physician and senior investigator with the Group Health Research Center in Seattle, found that healthy people tend to choose flu vaccination, while the “frail elderly” didn’t or couldn’t. Her research suggested that flu vaccine itself does not reduce mortality at all.
Healthy (and health-conscious) people tend to get the vaccine AND come down with influenza less often, not because of the vaccine itself but because they are healthier to start with.
Jackson concluded:
“The reductions in risk before influenza season indicate preferential receipt of vaccine by relatively healthy seniors… the magnitude of the bias demonstrated by the associations before the influenza season was sufficient to account entirely for the associations observed during influenza season.”
Unfortunately, Jackson’s papers were turned down for publication in the leading medical journals, even though her hypothesis makes perfect sense.
Every day you’re around viruses and bacteria and, when you’re healthy, you usually don’t get sick. But even if you do get sick, most healthy adults and children will not have serious problems moving through and recovering from influenza or other flu-like illnesses. If you do come down with influenza and have a good immune response, you will likely recover quickly without serious complications, as well as obtain natural immunity to that strain of influenza and to similar ones.
As an aside, this is one more health benefit to achieving immunity naturally by experiencing and recovering from normal infectious diseases, such as influenza.
Vaccine-acquired immunity is temporary, which is why even though the viruses in this season’s flu vaccine are the same viruses that were selected for the 2010-2011 influenza vaccine, the CDC is still recommending you get vaccinated again, even if you got the vaccine last year. The immunity that healthy individuals get by recovering from influenza naturally is usually much longer lasting.
Why Are Vaccinated Kids Getting the Measles?
Vaccine effectiveness simply cannot be taken at face value, and this applies not only to the flu vaccine but also to other diseases, like measles. Measles cases have greatly increased in parts of Canada and the United States this year. Although unvaccinated children and teens are often blamed for driving the high numbers, a recent investigation into a measles outbreak in a high school found that about half of the cases were in teens who had received the recommended two doses of vaccine in childhood.
In other words, many of the cases were among those whom health authorities would have expected to have been protected from the measles virus. Conventional medical wisdom states that the measles vaccine should protect against measles infection about 99 percent of the time.
CBC News reported:
“So the discovery that 52 of the 98 teens who caught measles were fully vaccinated came as a shock to the researchers who conducted the investigation … If other groups confirm what the Quebec investigation found, it could mean there is a lot more susceptibility to measles in the vaccinated population than is currently being assumed.”
In the United States, the minimum age for the first dose of measles vaccine is recommended as 12 months, but this may actually render the vaccine ineffective. If a breastfed child is given a measles vaccine too early, their mother’s antibodies transferred to the baby via breast milk (which also protect the baby from measles disease naturally), canl interfere with the baby obtaining measles vaccine strain virus induced antibodies. It was, in fact, due to a high rate of measles vaccine failure that a second dose of MMR (measles, mumps and rubella) vaccine was introduced in the United States in 1991.
As noted by the National Vaccine Information Center (NVIC):
“An MMR vaccine manufacturer states that in a study of 279 children 11 months to 7 years of age, MMR vaccine was shown to be 95 to 99 percent effective. Protection is estimated to persist for up to 11 years. In a measles outbreak in the U.S. in the late 1980′s and early 1990′s, it was found that there were a significant number of vaccine failures in older children, teenagers and adults, when the disease can be more severe. The government proceeded to recommend that a second MMR shot be given to boost immunity either before entrance to kindergarten or before entrance to junior high school.
In the national outbreak of measles during the late 1980′s and early 1990′s, it also became apparent that children who had been vaccinated before 15 months of age were also at risk for vaccine failure, especially if their mothers had recovered naturally from measles disease as children.
An MMR vaccine manufacturer states “Infants who are less than 15 months of age may fail to respond to the measles component of the vaccine due to presence in the circulation of residual measles antibody of maternal origin, the younger the infant, the lower the likelihood of seroconversion.” The manufacturer goes on to advise that infants vaccinated at less than 12 months of age will have to be revaccinated after 15 months of age even though “there is some evidence to suggest that infants immunized at less than one year of age may not develop sustained antibody levels when later immunized.”"
Quite simply, vaccines do not confer the same type of immunity that exposure to the actual disease does …
Why the Herd Immunity Concept is Flawed
Download Interview Transcript
Typically, vaccine promoters will stress the importance of compliance with the vaccine schedule that requires multiple doses of a vaccine in order to create and maintain vaccine induced “herd immunity,” because a vaccine is never 100 percent effective. However, they never quite seem to be able to explain why the majority of outbreaks occur in areas that are thought to HAVE herd immunity status, i.e. where the majority of people are vaccinated and “should” therefore never get the disease.
The problem is that there is, in fact, such a thing as natural herd immunity. But what has happened is that public health officials have taken this natural phenomenon and assumed that vaccine induced herd immunity is the same as disease induced herd immunity and it is not the same. The science clearly shows that there’s a big difference between naturally developed herd immunity and vaccine-induced herd immunity in a population.
To learn more, I urge you to listen to the video above, in which Barbara Loe Fisher and I discuss the concept of herd immunity.
“The original concept of herd immunity is that when a population experiences the natural disease… natural immunity would be achieved – a robust, qualitatively superior natural herd immunity within the population, which would then protect other people from getting the disease in other age groups. It’s the way infectious diseases work…” Barbara explains. “But the vaccinologists have adopted this idea of vaccine induced herd immunity.
The problem with it is that all vaccines only confer temporary protection… Pertussis vaccine is one the best examples… Pertussis vaccines have been used for about 50 to 60 years, and the organism has started to evolve to become vaccine resistant. I think this is not something that’s really understood generally by the public: Vaccines do not confer the same type of immunity that natural exposure to the disease does.”
Vaccine professionals would like you to believe they are the same, but they’re qualitatively two entirely different types of immune responses.
“In most cases natural exposure to disease would give you a longer lasting, more robust, qualitatively superior immunity because it gives you both cell mediated immunity and humoral immunity,” Barbara explains. “Humoral is the antibody production. The way you measure vaccine-induced immunity is by how high the antibody titers are. (How many antibodies you have, basically.)
But the problem is that cell mediated immunity is very important as well. Most vaccines evade cell mediated immunity and go straight for the antibodies, which is only one part of immunity. That’s been the big problem with the production of vaccines.”
Are You Willing to Accept the Risks for a 1.5% Benefit?
The latest study showing the incredibly minimal benefit of the flu vaccine is in line with past research that has also concluded that flu vaccines appear to have very limited measurable benefits for children, adults or seniors.
The Cochrane Database Review—which is the gold standard for assessing the scientific evidence for the effectiveness of commonly used medical interventions — published the following telling statistics:
“Over 200 viruses cause influenza and influenza-like illness, which produce the same symptoms (fever, headache, aches and pains, cough and runny noses). Without laboratory tests, doctors cannot tell the two illnesses apart. Both last for days and rarely lead to death or serious illness. At best, vaccines might be effective against only influenza A and B, which represent about 10 percent of all circulating viruses. Each year, the World Health Organization recommends which viral strains should be included in vaccinations for the forthcoming season.
Authors of this review assessed all trials that compared vaccinated people with unvaccinated people. The combined results of these trials showed that under ideal conditions (vaccine completely matching circulating viral configuration) 33 healthy adults need to be vaccinated to avoid one set of influenza symptoms.
In average conditions (partially matching vaccine) 100 people need to be vaccinated to avoid one set of influenza symptoms.
Vaccine use did not affect the number of people hospitalized or working days lost but caused one case of Guillian-Barré syndrome [GBS] (a major neurological condition leading to paralysis) for every one million vaccinations.”
Is it really worth risking the health and well-being of 100 people in order to prevent ONE case of the flu, which may or may not result in serious illness or death in that one individual to begin with?
While infants and young children are at greatest risk, no one is exempt from the potential serious complications of vaccination, one of which is GBS.
In the video profile of vaccine injury above, Barbara Loe Fisher, co-founder and president of NVIC, interviews a Connecticut artist and her mother, a former professor of nursing, who developed Guillaine-Barre syndrome after getting a seasonal flu shot in 2008 and today is permanently disabled with total body paralysis. This family has chosen to share their heartbreaking story to help those who have had the same experience feel less alone, and to educate others about what it means to be vaccine injured.
What happened to this family is a potent reminder of just how important it is to make well-informed decisions about vaccinations.
The Best Way to Prevent the Flu Has Little to do With a Vaccine
Avoiding influenza and flu-like illness during the flu season or any season doesn’t require a flu vaccine. By following the simple guidelines below, you can help keep your immune system in optimal working order so that you’re far less likely to get sick or, if you do get sick, you are better prepared to move through it without complications and soon return to good health.
* 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. Regularly monitor your vitamin D levels to confirm your levels are within the therapeutic range of 50-70 ng/ml.
Ideally, you’ll want to get all your vitamin D from sun exposure or a safe tanning bed, but as a last resort you can take an oral vitamin D3 supplement. According to the latest review by Carole Baggerly (Grassrootshealth.org), adults need about 8,000 IU’s a day.
* Avoid Sugar, Fructose and Processed Foods. Sugar impairs the function of your immune system almost immediately, and as you likely know, a healthy immune system is one of the most important keys 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, which is remarkably effective in relieving stress associated with all kinds of events, from work to family to trauma.
* 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.
* Take a Good Source of Animal-Based Omega-3 Fats. 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 crucial to avoid excessive and/or oxidized omega-6 fatty acids, as well as trans fatty acids commonly found in processed foods, as they 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.
* Use Natural Antibiotics. Examples include colloidal silver, oil of oregano, echinosha, daily immune support and garlic. These work like broad-spectrum antibiotics against bacteria, viruses, and protozoa in your body. And unlike pharmaceutical antibiotics, they do not appear to lead to resistance.
* Avoid Hospitals. I’d recommend you stay away from hospitals unless you’re having an emergency and need expert medical care, as hospitals are prime breeding grounds for infectious microorganisms of all kinds. The best place to get plenty of rest and recover from illness that is not life-threatening is usually in the comfort of your own home.
Change your diet, change your mood? Science says the answer is yes. Food isn’t just fuel for the body; it feeds the mind and changes our moods. Food scientists are still exploring the big picture regarding food and mood, but it’s clear that certain foods have a feel-good factor. Try these five mood-boosting snacks.
Bananas
Bananas offer serious mood-lifting power, with their combination of vitamins B6, A, and C; fiber; tryptophan; potassium; phosphorous; iron; protein; and healthy carbohydrates.
When you eat a banana, you’ll get a quick boost from the fructose as well as sustaining energy from the fiber, which helps prevent a blood sugar spike and ensuing drop in energy and mood. Carbohydrates aid in the absorption of tryptophan in the brain, and vitamin B6 helps convert the tryptophan into mood-lifting serotonin. Bananas are also a great source of potassium. Although potassium isn’t directly related to mood, it’s needed to regulate fluid levels and keep muscles working properly, which is important for feeling energized, a key factor for a sunny outlook. And finally, bananas also offer iron, which is crucial to producing energy and fighting fatigue.
Best of all, bananas are available year-round and are easy to tote — just make sure to pack them on top!
Get even happier:
In this post below by Nikki Jong, she explores why the banana can be such a healthy snack.
Bananas are among the best when it comes to mixing and matching mood-boosting snacks. For a sunny smoothie, blend a banana with one handful of spinach, a tablespoon of ground flaxseed, and half a cup of apple juice. Spinach is one of the richest food sources of folate (vitamin B9) you can find, and flaxseed is full of omega-3s. When combined, these nutrients help maintain stable levels of brain serotonin and may help reduce your risk of depression.
For a sweet treat, try a frozen dark chocolate-covered banana, which you’ll find in the freezer section of many natural foods stores. Or melt your own dark chocolate at home to dip banana slices in for a satisfying, mood-lifting fondue.
Darren’s quick follow up to Nikki’s post is try to buy organic bananas, which are available more and more and which have higher levels of nutrition minus the pesticides. Also if you have a Champion juicer or a vitamix or some other powerful blender device, you can peel bananas, freeze them and then grind them up into a naturally yummy ice cream without all the excess of not so good for you ingredients.
In the field of herbal medicine there are foods and herbs that cleanse the blood and are antibiotic in nature. Pharmaceutical antimicrobials designed to kill harmful bacteria have a major problem in that they kill off both the good and bad bacteria and leave the body depleted of living microflora that support immune function.
Including foods and herbs that contain antibiotic properties in your diet can support your immune system and help to defend you from certain infectious bacteria. This can also be said for organisms such as the Lymes spirochete and Candida Albicans, an overgrowth of yeast. There are many foods and herbs known to have natural antibiotic qualities; and with an increased resistance to pharmaceutical antibiotics in people today, it is wise to eat foods that work in your defense on a daily basis.
Primarily consume a diet rich in greens, vegetables and a moderate amount of fruits, nuts and seeds. preferably organic. These naturally astringent plants help keep you healthy.