Dr. MERCOLA --> alternative health and fitness

Alternative/natural solution-based discussions of topics like health, medicine, science, food, etc.
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BroJones
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Re: Dr. MERCOLA --> alternative health and fitness

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Why Coconut Oil KILLS Belly Fat
(Research Update)


FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE

January 30, 2015

Jake Carney, Founder
The Alternative Daily
I've run across some VERY interesting studies recently on the relationship between coconut oil (or any type of coconut fat, including coconut milk and cream) and how it can affect your body fat...

It may sound too good to be true, food manufacturers don't want you to know about, but we promise you and research proves coconut oil can do wonders for your health!

Millions of people across America (not to mention worldwide) struggle with stubborn abdominal fat, which can be difficult to shed even when a healthy lifestyle is adopted. Not only is abdominal fat, also called visceral fat or ‘belly fat,’ unsightly, it can lead to an increased risk of a number of health conditions.

Some of the risks associated with carrying excess fat around your middle are a greater susceptibility to type 2 diabetes and heart disease. Additionally, as this fat tends to coat vital organs, it can cause system-wide inflammation that can trigger an array of other chronic illnesses.


But according to the ground-breaking studies below, the effects of coconut oil on abdominal fat will surprise you! Read on...


cholesterol
A 2009 study published in the Journal of Lipids consisted of testing the effects of either 2 tablespoons of coconut oil or 2 tablespoons of soybean on a group of 40 women over the span of 28 days.

Results showed that the group that ate the coconut oil had a decrease in abdominal fat, while the soybean oil group actually showed a slight increase in belly fat.

Additionally, the group that ate the coconut oil showed increased HDL ‘good’ cholesterol levels, while the soybean oil group had decreased HDL cholesterol and increased LDL ‘ bad’ cholesterol.


coconut
The Journal of Nutrition published a study where researchers investigated all studies relative to medium chain fatty acids (MCFAs) that are abundant in coconut fat and weight management.

The studies showed that diets rich in fats such as those found in coconut oil prompted a boost in metabolism, increase in energy, decrease in food consumption, reduced body weight and lower body fat mass.

The study authors highly recommend using oils that contain MCFAs, such as coconut oil, as a tool to drop extra abdominal fat, manage a healthy weight, and even as a way to treat obesity.



Yet another study that assessed body belly fatweight and fat storage relative to three different types of diets including a low-fat diet, high-fat diet with long chain fatty acids (LCFAs) and a high fat diet with MCFAs. In order to bring about weight gain, caloric intakes were adjusted for the diets.

At the end of the research period (which lasted 44 days), the low-fat diet group stored an average of 0.47 grams of fat per day, the LCFA group stored 0.48 grams of fat per day, and the MCFA group only stored a mere 0.19 grams per day (despite purposely increasing calories).

Those in the MCFA group (coconut fat) had a 60 percent reduction in body fat stored compared to the other diets.

Additional benefits...
Another added bonus of consuming organic coconut oil (and coconut cream or milk) is that it tends to make us feel fuller for longer. Studies indicate that MCFAs help increase feelings of fullness and lead to a reduction in calorie intake when compared to the same amount of calories from other fats. When MCFAs are metabolized, ketone bodies are created in the liver – these have been shown to have a strong appetite reducing effect helping you to lose fat faster.

If you thought from reading about how using coconut oil daily for helping to reduce abdominal fat is pretty incredible, you're going to be blown away by the powerful health benefits of coconut oil. Here's why...


The REAL Truth About Coconut Oil
Plus, Four “Common Yet Dangerous” Oils You Should Never
Eat... If You Want to Heal, Beautify and Restore Your Body!
Here's a newsflash I'm sure won't surprise you... nothing concocted in a laboratory can ever replace the value of what is found in nature!

Mother Nature is incredibly generous in the way she provides - offering a bounty of fruits and vegetables rich in vitamins, minerals and nutrients to nourish your body so you can enjoy a long healthy life.

One fruit in particular - the coconut - is so abundant in its healing properties it's referred to as "the tree of life." And before World War II, people living in island countries, like the Philippines, consumed a diet that consisted mainly of rice, root crops, vegetables and an abundance of the ultra-healing superfood, the coconut.

The coconut is a "functional food" rich in vitamins, minerals and fiber - the essential nutritional building blocks for perfect health.

For generations, island people considered it "The Cure for All Illness" and consumed the meat, milk and coconut oil daily. Although this diet was high in saturated fat, Western conditions like diabetes, cancer and heart disease were virtually unheard of.

Filipinos and islanders were instead rewarded with a lovely youthful complexion, soft wrinkle-free skin, almost no skin cancer - even with excessive exposure to year round sun - and abundant good health.

Coconut oil in particular has been shown to protect you from viruses, bacteria, infection, cancer, thyroid, brain and heart problems... plus beautifies your skin - and even burns fat!

Coconut oil - a saturated fat - is chock-full of health-promoting properties - and is in no way responsible for high cholesterol, obesity, heart disease and the bad effects you've been led to believe.

Finally, modern medicine and science are starting to realize this fundamental truth... and it's been a long time coming. But sadly not before heart disease, cancer, diabetes, obesity and a whole host of other catastrophic diseases have reached epidemic proportions!

The Saturated-Fat Myth That Robbed
You of Your Good Health!
Before World War II, the miracle-healing coconut had been used to help alleviate:

Coughs
Constipation
Malnutrition
Skin infections
Toothaches
Earaches
Flus
And more!

But that all changed when the war ended and the United States proclaimed hydrogenated oils to be the "healthier oils." By the 1960s, a weak scientific theory claimed that saturated fats-like those found in butter, eggs, milk, red meat and coconuts - increased "bad" LDL cholesterol and were dangerous to consume.

Nothing was further from the truth! But this “health scare” was enough to push the public away from saturated fats and instead to refined vegetable oils. This was perfect for food manufacturers because they were far cheaper to produce.

It wasn’t long before Western-style diets made their way to the islands and the old ways were forgotten.

Cheaper, mass-produced hydrogenated foods replaced traditional foods, like the versatile and all-healing coconut oil that had kept the islanders healthy for generations.

And for the first time ever, diseases that had become prevalent among Americans… heart disease, diabetes, cancer and obesity started to plague the island nations...

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Re: Dr. MERCOLA --> alternative health and fitness

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I'm trying coconut oil (see above) - and will begin walking for exercise and joy.

This to motivate us to get going on those home gardens! wherever legal, of course:
By Dr. Mercola

There’s no question your health is directly related to the quality of the food you eat, and that the quality of the food in turn is dependent on the health of the soil in which it is grown.

In her book, The Soil Will Save Us, Kristin Ohlson describes the complex relationship between the soil and the food we eat.

Kristin grew up in a small town in Sacramento Valley, California. Her grandparents were farmers, growing field crops and fruit trees, and raising cattle. Her parents were also avid gardeners, maintaining an olive orchard, a large garden, and sheep.

“One of the strongest memories of my childhood was being with my parents, looking at the way things were growing, evaluating the crops, and being out with them in their garden – pulling things up, snipping things off, and eating them,” she says.

Carbon Farming

While she’d developed an interest in sustainable agriculture, the real impetus for the book came from a chef in Cleveland named Parker Bosley, who’s a staunch advocate for locally grown foods.

He had started a restaurant in the ‘80s and wanted to source as many of his ingredients as he could from local sources. In so doing, he helped build the pipeline of local foods going to local consumers frequenting restaurants.

“He was very aware of soil health. He was one of these chefs – I think probably the only chef – who was calling up legislators and saying, “You know that bill that you’re working on? That really could be damaging for soil health,” Kristin says.

“I had written this profile of Parker Bosley for Gourmet magazine and I stayed in touch with him because he was such an interesting thinker about the connection between agriculture and food.

One day, I called him up and I said, ‘What’s interesting going on in agriculture and food? What should I be paying attention to?’

He said, ‘Carbon farming... It’s farmers planning their activities in a very different way... They’re looking at what’s happening with the microbes in the soil and how those microbes are helping to build up carbon in the soil, thus the term carbon farming.’

I immediately thought, ’Well, if they’re building up carbon in the soil through these farming practices, wouldn’t that then decrease carbon in the atmosphere?’ I was really interested in this from a variety of perspectives. That was what prompted me to write the book.”

Most conventional farmers and gardeners use commercial fertilizers such as nitrogen, phosphorus, and potassium (NPK). But very little is done to address the need for carbon.

Increasing the carbon content or the organic content of your soil is actually a key component of soil fertility, as the carbon will feed microbes and help retain moisture, allowing everything to grow much better, and provide far more nutrient-dense foods.

Microbes Are an Integral Part of the Ecosystem

In recent years, we’ve learned a lot about microbes. We’re now starting to get an understanding of just how important they are—both inside (and on) your body—as part of your microbiome—and in soil. According to soil scientists, there are about six billion microorganisms thriving in each teaspoon of healthy soil.

“People have known ever since microscopes were invented that there were these things in the soil that we couldn’t see with the naked eye... But people did not understand, for decades, what role those things in the soil were playing,” Kristin says.

“When we talk about ecosystems, we typically think about everything that’s above the soil line. We think of plants and animals, and humans... But we haven’t thought about this vast kingdom of life that’s underneath the ground.

To really understand our world, we have to understand this ancient partnership between plants and soil microorganisms....”

For starters, consider this: through their leaves, plants use sunlight (photosynthesis) and remove carbon dioxide from the air, converting it into a carbon fuel that they use to stimulate and promote their own growth. But that’s not all.

Up to 40 percent of that carbon fuel actually goes to the roots of the plant, where it’s leaked out into the soil. There, it becomes food for soil microorganisms. So the plant nourishes the soil as much as the soil nourishes the plant...

Soil microorganisms use the carbon to sustain themselves. In other words, it’s used both as nourishment and for creating a suitable habitat, with the appropriate amounts of water and air.

In exchange, the soil microbes bring the plants micronutrients from the soil. There are about 98 naturally occurring elements in healthy soils, and these micronutrients are liberated from particles of rocks, sand, silt, and clay by the enzymatic activity of soil microbes.

A complex and sophisticated communications system also exists between plants and the soil microorganisms, whereby the plants can signal their nutritional needs to the microbes.

Conventional Farming Causes Enormous Environmental Damage

The toll our modern, chemical-based farming practices takes on the environment is significant. Conventional farming is a factor that is speeding up the depletion of water reservoirs, for example. Farmers are using more water than nature can replenish, and by digging ever deeper wells, water tables are being exhausted.

Most conventional farmers also tend to leave much of the soil bare, which allows water to evaporate, and hastens soil erosion. A simple answer is to use cover crops and mulch, to provide, as Gabe Brown would say, an “armor” over the soil.

This armor can virtually eliminate the need for irrigation when done right. The standard practice of plowing is also inadvisable, as it not only disturbs the microorganisms, it also releases valuable carbon from the soil. Then there’s the chemical assaults of pesticides, herbicides, and synthetic fertilizers, which are not only killing soil microbes, they’re also killing off bees, butterflies, and other flora and fauna. More than one billion pounds of pesticides are used in the US each year, an amount that has quintupled since 1945. As with antibiotic overuse, the onslaught of pesticides and herbicide to combat pests has led to the development of weeds and bugs that are now resistant to the chemicals.

The answer to increasing resistance has been to apply greater amounts of chemicals just to keep up. Now we’re also facing the next-generation of genetically engineered (GE) plants designed to withstand even more toxic chemicals, including 2,4-D (an Agent Orange ingredient), and dicamba. Add to all of this the destruction of diversity through the practice of monocropping, and what you end up with is a recipe for all-around destruction—everything within the ecosystem is detrimentally affected: soil microbes (and hence the soil), plant life, air, water, animals, and ultimately mankind itself, through our food.

Strategies to Regenerate Top Soil

The good news is that we now know how to help regenerate soil, and actually create new fertile topsoil. It basically comes down to mimicking what goes on in nature. In nature, the surface of the soil is not cleared away. It’s never bare, or very rarely so, and the ground is not turned over as is done when plowing. You also never see a monocrop. In one square foot of pristine prairie land, you’ll find about 140 different plants!

There’s an incredible diversity of plant and insect life going on. In nature there’s also the impact of animals. “You can’t really separate out the plant life from the animal and insect life, and expect that piece of land to flourish,” Kristin notes. Gabe Brown and other regenerative farmers are basically just mimicking nature, to the best of their ability. They use no-till and try to minimize the disturbance of the soil as much as possible. They also pay great attention to diversity. That’s when cover crops come in.

“If you realize that there’s this community of soil microorganisms underground that are depending upon plants to bring it varied sources of food, varied sources of exudates, you know that you have to have not just one plant growing there; you need a lot of plants bringing all those different nutrients that community of soil microorganisms need,” Kristin explains. “Gabe Brown could have 25 to 30 different cover crops growing on a piece of land that he’s not planting for harvest, just to improve the soil.”

The key is to not have any bare soil, ever, if at all possible. Native grasses and pastured products are the best way to support this regenerative and sustainable form of agriculture.

“I don’t really like the word ‘organic’ anymore even though it’s still in use because it has a legal meaning now. A lot of people think of it as a word that just reflects what you can’t do. You can’t use this spray. You can’t use this chemical. I think ‘regenerative’ is a much more valuable word. It’s even a better word than sustainable agriculture.

As one of the people who I interviewed in my book said, ‘Why would we want to sustain this degraded landscape we have now? No, we want to regenerate it. We want agriculture that makes the land healthier.’ That’s what a lot of these small farmers that are at our farmers markets are doing. They’re really focused on making their soil healthier, because they know that that is what is going to ultimately make their land and their business succeed.”

The Heirloom Seed Movement

Another factor many fail to consider these days is where our seeds come from, and which seeds will be most helpful for regenerative agriculture. “Most of us think a lot about the question of GMO seeds but the issue is even bigger than that,” Kristin says. Most of the seeds that American farmers have access to are produced by a handful of companies.

These are seeds from plants that were specifically bred to flourish in industrial agriculture—plants that no longer have the capacity to develop strong roots that forage for nutrients, as they’ve been bred to flourish among chemical nutrients. They also lack the natural resilience against insects, pests, and disease, because they’re bred to flourish in a system where pesticides, herbicides, and fungicides are applied. So the heirloom seed movement is really part and parcel of the regenerative agriculture movement.

“I think we’re living in a really exciting time,” Kristin says. “We’re often told that we have a choice between having enough food and having good food. The supporters of industrial agriculture say they’re the only ones who can provide us with enough food... More and more we’re seeing that that is just not true, that we can have both enough food and we can have really good food...

By changing our agriculture, we can have a huge impact on other things that we haven’t even considered as being related—climate, water quality, air quality... All these things are so connected. I think we’re in a very powerful time right now, where we’re seeing those connections and acting upon them. ”

Take Control of Your Health by Planning a Spring Garden

Ultimately, you cannot be healthy unless you eat good, nutritious food. Growing it yourself is in many cases the simplest and least expensive option. What makes organic gardening so effective is the focus on soil health. And your health truly begins in the soil. By optimizing the soil microbiology, your plants will be healthier and more nutritious, and these benefits translate into health benefits when you eat them. Optimizing soil biology also strengthens plants against pest infestations without having to resort to chemical warfare that kills far more than the insects they're designed to destroy.

To learn more and get inspired for spring, I highly recommend picking up a copy of Kristin’s book, The Soil Will Save Us. You can easily apply all of these regenerative principles to your own home garden—no matter how small it is. And urban, small-scale gardening is undoubtedly an important step toward building a more sustainable food system
.

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Re: Dr. MERCOLA --> alternative health and fitness

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I like this article in LDS Living on-line:
How I Lost 40 Pounds Living the Word of Wisdom
JENNY SPENCER - AUGUST 27, 2014


I know what you’re thinking. That title must be wrong. No way could someone lose 40 pounds simply by following the Word of Wisdom. Well, I’m here to tell you that the Word of Wisdom proved to be the best way for my body to get in shape—in my entire life.

How I Lost 40 Pounds Living the Word of Wisdom

Jenny Spencer, before her mission and after.

Allow me to introduce myself. My name is Jenny. And I’m a choco-holic. I come from a very long line of Mormon choco-holics. What can I say? It’s in my blood. Ever since I was about 12 years old, I was overweight. Fatty food was always a vice for me. And I never really enjoyed exercise. Put those two facts together, and you’ve got a recipe for bad health.

I embarked on my mission as a fairly heavy-set sister missionary. And my three weeks in the MTC only made matters worse (thanks, MTC cafeteria!). But when I arrived on the tiny island of La Réunion, 400 miles off the coast of Madagascar, I quickly found that it would be all too easy to stay overweight. This beautiful French island is inundated with amazing French cuisine and chocolate, Indian food, and all sorts of other fatty goodness.

I’d been there for about 6 months when I was studying the Word of Wisdom to teach to an investigator. And it dawned on me: I didn’t live the Word of Wisdom very well. It was like a lightning bolt had hit me. I didn’t eat the healthiest food, I detested the half-hour between 6:30 and 7 a.m. when I was supposed to be exercising, and simply put—I felt weak.

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I honestly felt like I didn’t have the Lord’s blessing to “run and not be weary, and walk and not faint” (which I actually did once—passed right out).

But luckily I had a companion who was completely different from me. She had to go running every morning or evening just to stay sane, so running we went. We decided to live the Word of Wisdom better. Our tropical island might have been full of rice and chocolate, but it was also overrun with tropical fruits and vegetables. And I fell in love with all of them! I even learned to like tomatoes—a miracle my parents never thought would happen. So we upped our intake of vegetables, protein, and fruit. We laid off the chocolate and baguettes. And we went running every day in the church parking lot next door.

And since all of these healthy habits that the Word of Wisdom encourages were totally foreign to my body, the pounds just fell off. I was finally learning how to treat my body like the instrument and the temple that it is. I found that I had more energy from eating “every fruit in the season thereof” with “prudence and thanksgiving.” Finally, I could hike up those dang hills without feeling like I was going to die at the top!

Now I’m not saying that just by living the Word of Wisdom, you’ll lose a ton of weight. Everyone is unique. All I know is that I seriously needed that lightning bolt to help me realize that my body could be more of a blessing than a burden. And that I could feel good about how I felt inside my own skin.

But I know that none of it would have been possible had I not studied and prayed about the Word of Wisdom—a lot. Most of the time we think of it as a list of don’t’s, but it’s also a great list of do’s!

I finally understood the vital connection of a strong body to a strong mind. Many people forget that one of the greatest blessings of living the Word of Wisdom isn’t just good health. It’s the ability to receive “wisdom and great treasures of knowledge, even hidden treasures”—spiritual gems of revelation, if you will.

By the end of my mission, I had found “hidden treasures” of spiritual goodness and revelation, partly, I know, on account of my dedication to living the Word of Wisdom more fully. Now I’m not saying that living the Word of Wisdom will instantly transform you into a body builder, but it will revitalize your body and your spirit. I can tell you that. And the 40 pounds that I don’t have to carry around anymore can tell you that too.

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Re: Dr. MERCOLA --> alternative health and fitness

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She's right - who wants to join in the WoW plan?
We decided to live the Word of Wisdom better. Our tropical island might have been full of rice and chocolate, but it was also overrun with tropical fruits and vegetables. And I fell in love with all of them! I even learned to like tomatoes—a miracle my parents never thought would happen. So we upped our intake of vegetables, protein, and fruit. We laid off the chocolate and baguettes. And we went running every day in the church parking lot next door.

And since all of these healthy habits that the Word of Wisdom encourages were totally foreign to my body, the pounds just fell off.
I finally understood the vital connection of a strong body to a strong mind. Many people forget that one of the greatest blessings of living the Word of Wisdom isn’t just good health. It’s the ability to receive “wisdom and great treasures of knowledge, even hidden treasures”—spiritual gems of revelation, if you will.

By the end of my mission, I had found “hidden treasures” of spiritual goodness and revelation, partly, I know, on account of my dedication to living the Word of Wisdom more fully.

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Re: Dr. MERCOLA --> alternative health and fitness

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I'm still working with the "Word of Wisdom plan" for weight-loss, and seems to be working.
"Walk and not faint" seems to be a key - keep moving throughout the day. Don't SIT for long periods.

Here's some good-tasting advice from Dr M - re - dark chocolate! Yum...
By Dr. Mercola

In the US and other parts of the world (including Canada, Mexico, Japan, Denmark, and Australia), February 14 is a day for celebrating loved ones. The tradition dates back to ancient Roman times, when it’s said a Saint Valentine would help people escape from Roman prisons, where they were often tortured.

One legend has it that Valentine was imprisoned himself and sent a letter professing his love for the jailor’s daughter before his death – and signed it “From your Valentine,” an expression still widely used today.1 This is but one theory of the origins of Valentine’s Day.

In Middle-Age France and England, for instance, birds’ mating season was said to begin February 14, strengthening its connections to romance. In the 1800s, handwritten notes were commonly exchanged between friends and loved ones to celebrate Valentine’s Day – a tradition that continues to this day.

An estimated 1 billion Valentine’s Day cards are sent every year,2 often alongside other Valentine’s Day staples like flowers and candy. This year, if you want to have a healthy Valentine’s Day, you might be surprised to learn that sending dark chocolate is a far better choice than flowers.

Choose Chocolate, Not Flowers, on Valentine’s Day

Americans spend $1.6 billion a year on candy for Valentine’s Day, surpassed just slightly by spending on flowers ($1.9 billion). Roses make up the largest share, with an estimated 224 million grown in the US just for Valentine’s Day alone.3

The rose (and particularly the red rose) is a worldwide symbol for love and romance, so why not surprise your sweetheart with a dozen this year? Despite their beauty, cut flowers have a dirty secret. About 70 percent of the cut flowers sold in the US come from Colombia, an area with inexpensive labor, plenty of sunshine … and heavy use of pesticides.4

Colombia is the second-largest exporter of cut flowers worldwide (second only to the Netherlands) and the industry employs more than 100,000 people (many of them single mothers).5

Unfortunately, the opportunity for steady income comes at the expense of the workers’ health, as more than 200 pounds of pesticides are applied to every 2.4 acres of flowers each year. The World Health Organization classified 36 percent of such chemicals used by one Colombian flower farm as “extremely” or “highly” toxic.6

Part of the impetus for the heavy pesticide use are US regulations that allow a shipment of flowers to be turned back from whence it came should the US Department of Agriculture's Animal and Plant Health Inspection Service happen to find so much as a single pest in the shipment. They do not test imported flowers for pesticide residues, however.

As reported by NBC News:7

“The U.S. requires imported flowers to be bug-free, although not necessarily void of chemical residues, as required for edible fruits and vegetables. But the reliable highland tropical climate that drew U.S. flower growers to Colombia and Ecuador is a haven for pests.

This encourages growers to apply a wide range of fertilizers, pesticides and fungicides, some of which have been linked to elevated rates of cancer and neurological disorders and other problems.

Causal links between these chemicals and individual illnesses are hard to prove because chronic pesticide exposure has not been studied in enough detail.”

Pesticide Exposure from Cut Flowers Poses Serious Health Risks

A 1990 study looking at the prevalence of reproductive problems in Colombian workers exposed to pesticides while growing flowers found that workers in the floriculture industry were exposed to 127 different types of pesticides.8

According to the study:

"The prevalence rates for abortion, prematurity, stillbirths, and malformations were estimated for pregnancies occurring among the female workers and the wives of the male workers before and after they started working in floriculture, and these rates were related to various degrees of exposure.

A moderate increase in the prevalence of abortion, prematurity, and congenital malformations was detected for pregnancies occurring after the start of work in floriculture."

Years later, a study published in the International Journal of Environmental Health Research again assessed the risk factors associated with pesticide exposure among farmers of cut flowers—this time in the Philippines.9

Thirty-two percent of the workers reported pesticide-related illnesses since starting work in the flower business, which typically centered around their eyes, ears, nose, and throat. The most commonly reported symptoms were weakness and fatigue, muscle pain, chills and fever, blurred vision, dizziness, and headache.

In a flower-growing region in Northern Ecuador, where female employment in the industry is high, researchers found that “prenatal exposure to pesticides -- at levels not producing adverse health outcomes in the mother -- can cause lasting adverse effects on brain development in children.” They conclude that pesticide exposure may contribute to a "silent pandemic" of developmental neurotoxicity in school-age children.10

Even US-Grown Flowers Are Doused in Pesticides

Choosing US-grown flowers is not likely to prove much better than choosing those from Colombia. When the Environmental Working Group (EWG) tested rose samples purchased from US retailers, their tests showed the presence of a dozen different pesticides, including two “probable carcinogens.”

One of those was present at a level 50 times higher than permitted in food. Richard Wiles, co-founder of EWG, said:11

"There's a fair amount of pesticides on roses, whether they come from Colombia or California … We don´t want to be alarmist. But some children and people with chemical sensitivities could experience mild symptoms--sneezing or headaches, for example--that they might assume were simply an allergic reaction."

Cut flowers have sailed under the radar for decades, but they can be a major source of pesticide exposure, especially if you buy cut flowers on a more regular basis or work in the cut-flower industry.

Wiles' recommendation for avoiding this kind of pesticide exposure is to grow your own flowers using non-treated organic seeds, and not using pesticides known to be toxic to pollinators, animals, or humans, in your garden.

If you’re interested, the book The Flower Farmer by Lynn Byczynski has advice on how to start your own small business by growing and selling organic cut flowers – even right in your own backyard.

Alternatively, you can sometimes find organic cut flowers for sale at farmer’s markets, flower shops and health food stores, and they’re also available to order online. In the absence of organic certification, you can also look for fair trade certification, as fair trade programs pay greater attention to protecting worker's health and wellbeing, and typically use fewer or less pesticides.

Dark Chocolate for Your Valentine: The Healthy Alternative

Avoiding conventionally grown cut flowers doesn’t mean you can’t enjoy a special Valentine’s Day. In lieu of flowers, I’d suggest getting your sweetheart a box of high-quality dark chocolate. What better way to say “I love you” than with a gift that is actually good for your heart …

Chocolate – specifically the dark unprocessed raw cacao kinds – actually reduces the risk of cardiometabolic disorders, such as coronary heart disease, stroke, diabetes, and metabolic syndrome -- along with related problems like hypertension, elevated fasting glucose and triglycerides, high cholesterol, and abdominal obesity.12

In one study, the highest levels of chocolate consumption were associated with a 37 percent reduction in cardiovascular disease and a 29 percent reduction in stroke compared with the lowest levels!13 Other research has also shown that the antioxidant and anti-inflammatory compounds in chocolate may lower your risk of heart attack and stroke considerably.

Small amounts of dark chocolate can cut your risk of heart attack because, like aspirin, chocolate has a biochemical effect that reduces the clumping of platelets, which cause blood to clot.14 Platelet clumping can be fatal if a clot forms and blocks a blood vessel, causing a heart attack.
Specially formulated raw cocoa powder has the potential to prevent cardiovascular disease in diabetics. When diabetic patients were given a special high-flavonol cocoa drink for one month it brought their blood vessel function from severely impaired to normal. The improvement was actually as large as has been observed with exercise and many common diabetic medications.15
Researchers also discovered that a compound in dark chocolate, called epicatechin (a flavonoid), may protect your brain after a stroke by increasing cellular signals that shield nerve cells from damage.16 A stroke is similar to a heart attack, but occurs when the blood supply to your brain becomes blocked or reduced, as opposed to blocking the blood supply to your heart.
Say 'I Love You' with 40+ Health Benefits

A wide range of accumulating scientific research has linked high-quality dark chocolate, cacao, and cocoa powder consumption to over 40 distinct health benefits.17 Antioxidant polyphenols in chocolate are so valuable because they have the ability to stop free-radical-mediated oxidation. This helps to decrease your risk of those and other diseases by directly interfering with one of the major preventable causes of chronic degenerative diseases.

Chocolate also contains other potent plant “chemicals,” including anandamide, named after the Sanskrit word for “bliss,” which is a neurotransmitter in the brain that temporarily blocks feelings of pain and anxiety. The caffeine and theobromine in chocolate have been shown to produce higher levels of physical energy and mental alertness, and there are likely many more healthy chocolate compounds that have yet to be discovered. The following table highlights just some of the benefits conferred by the cocoa bean.18

Anti-inflammatory Anti-carcinogenic Anti-thrombotic, including improving endothelial function Lowers Alzheimer's risk
Anti-diabetic and anti-obesity Reduction in C-reactive protein Cardioprotective, including lowering blood pressure, improving lipid profile, and helping prevent atrial fibrillation Improved liver function for those with cirrhosis
Neuroprotective Improves gastrointestinal flora Reduces stress hormones Reduces symptoms of glaucoma and cataracts
Slows progression of periodontitis Improves exercise endurance May help extend lifespan Protects against preeclampsia in pregnant women
What Type of Chocolate Is Best for Your Health?



Download Interview Transcript

In the video above, Dr. Beatrice Golomb discusses the health benefits of chocolate, including how to identify a high-quality chocolate and how to determine your optimal chocolate “dose.” Although raw cacao is the most nutritious form, most of the health studies to date involve consumption of cocoa or chocolate, not raw cacao. And the results are STILL significantly positive. This fact suggests a good portion of the nutritional benefit of chocolate is retained after processing. Your goal then is to find a chocolate that's as minimally processed as possible, but still palatable.

If you can tolerate the flavor of raw cacao (including unsweetened cacao nibs, raw cacao powder or unsweetened (not alkalized) cocoa powder), then that's the absolute best option. Choosing chocolate with a cocoa/cacao percentage of about 70 or higher is a healthy alternative. Milk chocolate is not a good choice as it contains both pasteurized milk and large quantities of sugar, which will significantly dampen its health benefits. White chocolate is also high in sugar and contains none of the phytonutrients, so it is not a good choice either. Dark chocolate – as high in cacao and as bitter as you can stand -- is your best option.

Finally, look for chocolate with only a few ingredients and splurge on the organic varieties. Like cut flowers, cocoa beans carry a heavy pesticide load. Many of the countries that produce cacao beans also have weak pesticide regulations, which means even pesticides banned in the US may be used in conventional cocoa farming.19 So how much dark chocolate can you reasonably eat? According to Dr. Golomb, studies show daily consumption in divided doses (two to three times per day) is probably beneficial, as long as you aren't going overboard in quantity and as long as you're eating high-quality chocolate.

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Re: Dr. MERCOLA --> alternative health and fitness

Post by Phoenixstar117 »

While serving a mission in Brazil, I got to participate first hand in helping one of our branch members harvest cacao. It was a lot of fun and we made a few gallons of juice from the fruity part of it. She gave us quite a few of the fruits to take home as well which after we ate the fruit, saved the seeds/nuts and sun dried them on our balcony in the missionary apartment. Afterword we roasted them ourselves and basically had what were the preprocessed nibs.

Nowadays I've bought some nibs and I keep them in a bag in my freezer, they make a great topping for icecream just by themselves, but I wonder if that kinda defeats the purpose :-$

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Re: Dr. MERCOLA --> alternative health and fitness

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Turmeric.
If the natural health world had any impact on you during 2014, it was probably the simple incorporation of health-boosting foods and spices. One of those foods everyone should have stockpiled is turmeric – a spice largely studied for its healing properties. But in case past research didn’t stick, a newly released study is here to show once again how turmeric and its active compound curcumin can inhibit what is considered a leading factor for the development of disease – inflammation.

Inflammation has actually been referred to as the ‘mother of most major chronic disease.’ It is a silent epidemic effecting millions of people, causing a wide range of ailments. To test for it, doctors use indirect methods by measuring blood levels of C-reactive protein, a pro-inflammatory marker, and homocysteine levels.

Dr. Barry Sears, author of The Anti-Inflammation Zone: Reversing the Silent Epidemic That’s Destroying Our Health states:


“Silent inflammation attacks the heart, arteries, and even the brain, and you will not even know it. Obesity is the primary cause of silent inflammation and excess body fat is causing today’s epidemic rise in countless health threats.”

Read: 4 Must-Have Foods for Reducing Inflammation Naturally
How Turmeric can Help

Turmeric is quickly becoming a well known potent anti-inflammatory spice. It has been shown to aid in ailments such as rheumatoid arthritis, Crohn’s disease, kidney inflammation, eye inflammation, ulcerative colitis, and much more.

This recent study, published in the journal Clinical Nutrition, concluded:

“Short-term supplementation with curcuminoid-piperine combination significantly improves oxidative and inflammatory status in patients with MetS. Curcuminoids could be regarded as natural, safe and effective CRP-lowering agents.”

The study’s senior author and researcher at the Mashhad University of Medical Sciences in Iran, Amirhossein Sahebkar, had this to say:

“Two key effects of curcumin that account for most of the therapeutic effects of this compound are its strong antioxidant and anti-inflammatory properties. The findings of our studies, along with clinical findings reported by other groups, indicate the usefulness of daily use of curcumin supplement for the prevention and treatment of several diseases.”

Noting that turmeric is safe, but should be generally avoided by pregnant or lactating women, Sahebkar continued:

“Curcumin is a very safe natural supplement, and there is no severe adverse event associated with its use, even at high doses.

“In addition, patients with malabsorption syndrome, gall bladder problems, gastric ulcer, bleeding problems as well as those who are undergoing surgery, and those who have a history of hypersensitivity to herbal products should be cautious and consult with their physician before taking this supplement.”


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Re: Dr. MERCOLA --> alternative health and fitness

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Hmmmm... might try this: exercise (like walking vigorously) BEFORE breakfast...
By Ori Hofmekler

I'd like to set the record straight regarding pre-workout nutrition. This is a tricky topic that requires a short biological and science overview, so bear with me.

A growing body of research indicates that nature selects underfed species for extended life-span and vice versa – it shortens the life expectancy of overfed species. Humans are no exception. The human body evolved to thrive under nutritional stress.

It is hard to accept the harsh reality of this phenomenon, when so many people are overfed (and overweight) and everything around seems so routinely normal. Regardless, you need to be aware of the life-extending benefits of underfeeding and fasting versus the life-shortening risk associated with overfeeding and lack of fasting. But there is more to it than that.

The Surprising Benefits of Extreme Energy Depletion

Recent research at the University of Southern California reveals that extreme intermittent fasting induces even stronger rejuvenating effects on cells and tissues than those coming from mild fasting or underfeeding; apparently due to one factor – extreme energy depletion.

Energy depletion is indeed a critical biological factor. It is one of the key reasons why calorie restriction and intermittent fasting extend animals' life span. It also explains why exercise is so essential to your health.

According to the researchers, "cycles of extreme dietary interventions (intermittent fasting) represent powerful means to modulate key regulators of cellular protection and tissue regeneration…"

Under conditions of energy depletion, organisms seem supercharged for survival. Science has been recognizing that as a fact. Nonetheless, it is the level of energy depletion that apparently determines how far organisms can manage to adapt, improve and better survive.

What does it mean to you? This means that you can literally transform your body to better survive and resist age-related deterioration by depleting your energy reserves.

Why Intermittent Fasting and Exercise Produce Such Great Results

What you need is to deplete your glycogen stores and signal your body that it's under energy deficit. To grant maximum depletion of energy, you have to apply both nutritional and physical stress. Meaning: you need to intermittently fast and you need to exercise while fasting (intermittent fasting means one main meal per day).

Your body will perceive the energy deficit as a life threat that must be dealt with and it will compensate accordingly. This is how that works: as you intermittently fast and exercise, your glycogen stores are depleted in a rate which is substantially more rapid than fasting alone.

A short intense 30 minutes drill of exercise while intermittently fasting, for instance, can potentially yield an energy depleting impact equivalent to that of a whole day fast.

Though this hasn't been tested yet, empirical evidence indicates that exercise while fasting is notably more effective than fasting alone (or exercise alone) in depleting glycogen.

The reason: intense exercise while fasting depletes glycogen faster than the body can replenish; whereas fasting alone allows the body some replenishment by converting fat and protein into glycogen.

Depletion of glycogen is not an easy process. It requires discipline and tolerance of hardship. Your body will try to hold on to its energy reserves and you'll certainly feel that resistance.

Once you reach a point of physical paralysis (as you exercise while fasting), when the burn and fatigue take over your muscle and you become lightheaded, that's when you know that your glycogen reserves are practically gone.

Pushing Your Body Into Survival Mode Triggers Massive Metabolic Transformation

It is the utter depletion of glycogen stores in your muscle and liver which triggers your stress response to swiftly kick in and put your body in a survival mode. It is that extreme energy deficit which turns on metabolic pathways to compensate your body with robust improvements in energy utilization efficiency, repair activities, and resistance to stress.

Under such condition, your body switches from carbohydrate to fat fueling; and energy is shifted from storage to expenditure. It is now known that that shift towards fatty acid oxidation creates an ideal metabolic environment for stem cells regeneration and tissue repair. And while fat oxidation increases and fat synthesis is inhibited, your body goes through massive transformation.

The result: decreased body fat, reduced inflammation, increased insulin sensitivity, enhanced repair, and improved immune functions. This is what happens to your body when you intermittently fast and exercise.

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Re: Dr. MERCOLA --> alternative health and fitness

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Exercising in the morning, moving (vs sitting so much) throughout the day, cut out the potato chips -- I've lost 5 lbs, and still going...

Now - re truckers and farmers:
By Dr. Mercola

Using data from the Census Bureau, NPR made a map of the most common job in each state.1 The award for top job goes, overwhelmingly, to truck drivers… who knew? Truck driver was the most common job in 29 out of 50 states.

Part of the commonality has to do with the way the jobs are categorized by the government. The truck driver category includes all delivery people, which is an understandably large category.

Still, truck driving is resistant to both globalization and automation, which has protected it from much of the declines seen in other industries. As NPR pointed out, “A worker in China can't drive a truck in Ohio, and machines can't drive cars (yet).”2

It is beyond clear that technology will radically change this in the future, as self-driving cars and trucks will start to appear in the next five years, and in ten years most of these truck-driving jobs will no longer exist.

Other industries have not been so fortunate, like farming. In 1978, farmers (owners and tenants) and farm workers were the most common job in eight states. In 2014, that had dropped to two states… but the term “farmer” is no longer used… now we have “farm managers,” which reflects the growing trend of “farms” turning into corporations.

Farmers, Once the Most Popular ‘Job’ in America, Now Make Up Less Than 1 Percent of the Population

The number of farmers in the US has been on the decline for a century. NPR explained this by saying that farming technology “keeps getting better, which means fewer and fewer people can grow more and more food.” As the Worldwatch Institute put it:3

“For most of the past two centuries, the shift toward fewer farmers has generally been assumed to be a kind of progress. The substitution of high-powered diesel tractors for slow-moving women and men with hoes, or of large mechanized industrial farms for clusters of small ‘old fashioned’ farms, is typically seen as the way to a more abundant and affordable food supply.

Our urban-centered society has even come to view rural life, especially in the form of small family-owned businesses, as backwards or boring, fit only for people who wear overalls and go to bed early-far from the sophistication and dynamism of the city.”

But is this really a form of progress? As the number of farmers is dwindling, demands for food have only increased – demands that are being met by the proliferation of industrial concentrated animal feeding operations (CAFOs) and, ostensibly, genetically modified (GM) foods. This isn’t a problem unique to the US, either.

Agricultural jobs have declined in all industrial nations in the last five decades, in some cases by more than 80 percent.4 In the US, farmers were once the backbone of the country. Now they are more like a big toe. According to Worldwatch:5

“Look at the numbers, and you might think farmers are being singled out by some kind of virus:

In Japan, more than half of all farmers are over 65 years old; in the United States, farmers over 65 outnumber those under 35 by three to one. (Upon retirement or death, many will pass the farm on to children who live in the city and have no interest in farming themselves.)
In New Zealand, officials estimate that up to 6,000 dairy farms will disappear during the next 10 to 15 years--dropping the total number by nearly 40 percent.
In Sweden, the number of farms going out of business in the next decade is expected to reach about 50 percent.
In the United States, where the vast majority of people were farmers at the time of the American Revolution, fewer people are now full-time farmers (less than 1 percent of the population) than are full-time prisoners.
In the U.S. states of Nebraska and Iowa, between a fifth and a third of farmers are expected to be out of business within two years.”
Most US Farms Don’t Make Enough Income to Cover Expenses

The most recent US Census states there are 2.2 million farms in the US. This sounds like a large number until you realize that in 1935, when the US had a population of just 127 million people, there were 6.8 million farms.

Further, the definition of a “farm” is “any establishment which produced and sold, or normally would have produced and sold, $1,000 or more of agricultural products during the year.”

So it’s a pretty lenient definition. Moreover, it’s estimated that farm production expenses average just over $109,000 per year per farm. But fewer than one in four US farms produce gross revenues in excess of $50,000. As noted by the US Environmental Protection Agency (EPA):6

“Clearly, many farms that meet the U.S. Census' definition would not produce sufficient income to meet farm family living expenses.”

This explains why, by 2007, fewer than 188,000 of the 2.2 million farms accounted for more than half (63 percent) of sales of agricultural products.7 It is clear that most foods are produced on factory farms.

Even with major retailers, like Walmart, making claims of supporting “local” farms, small local farmers simply can’t grow enough produce to meet Walmart’s year-round demands. So much of its local produce may actually be coming from very large farms.

In some cases, already giant industrial meatpackers, dairy companies, and food processors actually merged simply to become large enough to supply Walmart. This consolidation has actually been blamed as one of the factors driving food prices up. Ironically, however, as food prices rise, farmers are getting paid less while the retailers… aka Walmart… are getting more:8

“Grocery prices have been rising faster than inflation and, while there are multiple factors driving up consumer costs, some economic research points to concentration in both food manufacturing and retailing as a leading culprit.

Farmers, meanwhile, are getting paid less and less. Take pork, for example. Between 1990 and 2009, the farmers’ share of each dollar consumers spent on pork fell from 45 to 25 cents, according to the USDA Economic Research Service.

Pork processors picked up some of the difference, but the bulk of the gains went to Walmart and other supermarket chains, which are now pocketing 61 cents of each pork dollar, up from 45 cents in 1990.

Another USDA analysis found that big retailers have used their market power to shortchange farmers who grow apples, lettuce, and other types of produce, paying them less than what they would get in a competitive market, while also charging consumers inflated prices. In this way, Walmart has actually helped drive overall food prices up,” Grist reported.

We Now Have More Prisoners Than Farmers…

It should be noted that in the US there are more prisoners than farmers. And where small family farms once dotted the rural countryside, most new prisons are now built in rural, and now often economically depressed, areas.

The prisons are heralded by economic development professionals as “economic engines,” which have become a leading source of proposed economic growth in rural America.9 This, along with gambling casinos and CAFOs, are now keeping many rural communities going, but at what expense?

As Prison Policy pointed out, “Hundreds of small rural towns and several whole regions have become dependent on an industry which itself is dependent on the continuation of crime-producing conditions.”10

CAFOs, meanwhile, are one of the largest sources of pollution in the US. Massive rivers of waste that pollute surrounding waterways with toxic bacteria and release noxious gasses into the air commonly stem from CAFOs’ “waste lagoons.”

CAFOs also serve as ideal breeding grounds for diseases ranging from influenza viruses to antibiotic-resistant superbugs, which can infect the animals, farm workers, and the general public. CAFO waste also contributes to air pollution, and CAFO workers and neighboring residents alike report higher incidence of asthma, headaches, eye irritation, and nausea. According to the EPA, US states with high concentrations of CAFOs report 20-30 serious water-quality problems annually.11

One of the reasons so few Americans are aware of these issues is because of “ag-gag” laws, which legally prevents people from filming or photographing conditions on factory farms. Ag-gag laws are being heavily promoted by lobbyists for the meat, egg, and dairy industries to essentially prevent anyone from exposing animal cruelty and food-safety issues at CAFOs.

Not surprisingly, the US government has a history of supporting these industrial CAFO operations, both by looking the other way when abuse or contamination occurs, and by directly subsidizing cheaply produced beef, and corn and soy used for feed. As it stands, 2 percent of US livestock facilities produce 40 percent of farm animals,12 and these large, corporate-owned CAFOs have been highly promoted as the best way to produce food for the masses.

The primary reason CAFOs are able to remain so "efficient," bringing in massive profits while selling their food for bottom-barrel prices, is because they substitute subsidized crops for pasture grazing. Factory farms use massive quantities of corn, soy and grain in their animal feed, all crops that they are often able to purchase at below cost because of government subsidies. Because of these subsidies, US farmers produce massive amounts of GM soy, GM corn, wheat, etc. -- rather than vegetables -- leading to a monoculture of foods that create a disease-promoting fast-food diet.

A New Generation of Farmers Are Paving the Way for Regenerative Agriculture

Our current food system is driven by policy and corporate control. And while those who promote it claim that it's the only way to feed an ever-growing population, it is in fact a highly unsustainable system. It may be financially profitable for a few large corporations, but it's driving the rest of us, including the last “real” farmers, into the poor-house. The film The Greenhorns demonstrates how we can collectively transform the current industrial monoculture, chemical-based agricultural paradigm into a healthier, more sustainable way of feeding ourselves and our neighbors, while restoring the health of our ailing planet.

"The Greenhorns documentary film... explores the lives of America's young farming community – its spirit, practices, and needs. It is the filmmaker's hope that by broadcasting the stories and voices of these young farmers, we can build the case for those considering a career in agriculture – to embolden them, to entice them, and to recruit them into farming.

The production of The Greenhorns is part of our grassroots nonprofit's larger campaign for agricultural reform... Today's young farmers are dynamic entrepreneurs, stewards of place. They are involved in local politics, partnering with others, inventing new social institutions, working with mentors, starting their careers as apprentices, borrowing money from the bank, putting in long hours, taking risks, innovating, experimenting... These young farmers have vision: a prosperous, satisfying, sustainable food system."

You can take part in the revolution in a number of ways. If you’re a young person deciding on a career, consider organic sustainable farming. You may even consider it if you’re looking for a mid-life change. At the very least, you can get personally involved in growing food for your own family. I have personally embraced this concept. So far, I've converted about 75 percent of the quarter-acre ornamental landscape around my home to an edible landscape.

I have put in about 300,000 pounds of woodchips as a large carbon input that will create magnificent topsoil, mycorrhizal fungi, and earthworms. I have 40 fruit trees including, bananas, papayas, figs, olives, loquats, oranges, limes, cherries, plums, peaches, mangos, tangerines, and kiwis. And once you integrate biological farming principles, you can get plant performances that are 200-400 percent greater than what you would typically get from a plant! All in a totally sustainable and environmentally friendly way.

Even apartment-dwellers or college dorm students can join the revolution by sprouting. You can also grow a wide variety of herbs, fruits, berries, and vegetables in pots. Hanging baskets are ideal for a wide variety of foods, such as strawberries, leafy greens, runner beans, pea shoots, tomatoes, and a variety of herbs. And instead of flowers, window boxes can hold herbs, greens, radishes, scallions, bush beans, strawberries, chard, and chilies, for example.

If you’re not inclined to grow your own food, sourcing your foods from a local farmer is one of your best bets to ensure you're getting something wholesome. And, you’ll be supporting the small farms – not the CAFOs -- in your area. Every state has a sustainable agriculture organization or biological farming organization that is the nucleus of the farmers in that state. You can also find an ever-increasing number of "eat local" and "buy local" directories in which local farms will be listed. The following organizations can also help you locate farm-fresh foods from real farmers in your local area:

Local Harvest-- This Web site will help you find farmers' markets, family farms, and other sources of sustainably grown food in your area where you can buy produce, grass-fed meats, and many other goodies.
Alternative Farming Systems Information Center, Community Supported Agriculture (CSA)
Farmers' Markets-- A national listing of farmers' markets.
Eat Well Guide: Wholesome Food from Healthy Animals -- The Eat Well Guide is a free online directory of sustainably raised meat, poultry, dairy, and eggs from farms, stores, restaurants, inns, and hotels, and online outlets in the United States and Canada.
FoodRoutes -- The FoodRoutes "Find Good Food" map can help you connect with local farmers to find the freshest, tastiest food possible. On their interactive map, you can find a listing for local farmers, CSA's, and markets near you.
Weston A. Price Foundation has local chapters around the US where you can find organic, grass-fed milk and other organic foods.

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Re: Dr. MERCOLA --> alternative health and fitness

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From Dr. Douglass, MD
SUPERBUG NIGHTMARE! Dirty endoscopes lead to major outbreak

You read it here first: Just 10 days ago, I wrote that dirty endoscopes were a superbug outbreak waiting to happen.

And now, it's happened.

At least two people are dead, five others are battling for their lives and nearly 180 others are at risk after being exposed to deadly drug-resistant CRE germs from those very same endoscopes I warned you about.

Believe me, this is just the beginning. These things are being used across the country, and they're getting filthier by the day thanks to penny-pinching hospitals that won't pay for the right tools to clean them.

The FDA has the power to step in. They have the power to FORCE hospitals to take action. But instead of stepping in, they've stepped in you-know-what, issuing the weakest bit of inaction I've ever seen from spineless D.C. bureaucrats.

Instead of ORDERING hospitals to take the steps proven to clean these devices and kill those superbug germs, the agency offered only a handful weak-kneed "recommendations" such as this little gem:

"Consider taking a duodenoscope out of service until it has been verified to be free of pathogens if a patient develops an infection with a multidrug-resistant organism."


Consider? CONSIDER? Hospitals can wait until patients start dropping like flies, and even then they only have to "CONSIDER" taking action against the cause?

Talk about too little, too late!

So since the feds won't solve this emerging crisis, allow me -- assuming they're listening (and since I was one of the first to sound the alarm, they darned well better be).

They should REQUIRE that every single duodenoscope is taken out of service after every procedure until it's free of pathogens, period, whether there's an outbreak or not.

Keep them out of service until they are cleaned with either EtO sterilization or hydrogen peroxide gas. As I wrote to you nearly two weeks ago, either one will do the trick -- and now, even the experts are calling on hospitals to use EtO, according to a Reuters news agency report.

Maybe those experts are Daily Dose readers!

Hospitals hate EtO because it costs money and takes time. But with so many lives on the line, this shouldn't be about time or money.

It should be about SAFETY.

If you're going in for an endoscope procedure, call ahead -- call ahead and ask how the thing is cleaned. And if it's anything other than EtO or hydrogen peroxide gas plasma, cancel your appointment and get your procedure done elsewhere.

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Re: Dr. MERCOLA --> alternative health and fitness

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The petition regarding freedom of choice re: vaccines has surpassed 100,000, so the O-admin is obliged to respond. See:

https://petitions.whitehouse.gov/petiti ... d/HW1B3YKz

It will be interesting to see how/if the WH responds

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Sugar - specifically problems to the human body with fructose (converted to fat in the liver):
Think that all sugars are the same? They may all taste sweet to the tongue, but it turns out your body can tell the difference between glucose, fructose and sucrose, and that one of these sugars is worse for your health than the others.

In the first detailed analysis comparing how our systems respond to glucose (which is made when the body breaks down starches such as carbohydrates) and fructose, (the type of sugar found naturally in fruits), researchers at the University of California Davis report in the Journal of Clinical Investigation that consuming too much fructose can actually put you at greater risk of developing heart disease and diabetes than ingesting similar amounts of glucose. In the study, 32 overweight or obese men and women were randomly assigned to drink 25% of their daily energy requirements in either fructose- or glucose-sweetened drinks. The researchers took pains to eliminate as many intruding factors as possible by asking the volunteers to commit to a 12-week program; for the first and last two weeks of the study, each subject lived at UCD's Clinical and Translational Science Center, where they underwent rigorous blood tests to determine their insulin and lipid levels, among other metabolic measures. (Take a quiz on eating smart.)

Both groups gained similar amounts of weight by the end of the 12 weeks, but only the people drinking fructose-sweetened beverages with each meal showed signs of unhealthy changes in their liver function and fat deposits. In this group, the liver churned out more fat, while the subjects consuming similar amounts of glucose-sweetened drinks showed no such change. The fructose-drinking volunteers also were not as sensitive to insulin, the hormone released by the pancreas to capture and break down glucose in the blood and store it as fat. Insulin insensitivity is one of the first signs of diabetes. These subjects also gained more visceral fat, the dangerous kind that embeds itself between tissues in organs such as the heart and liver and secretes hormones and other chemicals that throw off the body's normal metabolism, setting the stage for atherosclerosis and heart attack. "This suggests that in the same way that not all fats are the same, not all dietary carbohydrates are the same either," says Peter Havel, professor of nutrition at the University of California Davis and lead author of the study.

But don't expect to be able to exercise your new sugar-smarts at the grocery store quite yet. Most of the sugar we encounter in products and in restaurants isn't glucose, but rather high fructose corn syrup or sucrose, each a combination of glucose and fructose (sucrose is an even 50-50 split between the two, while high fructose corn syrup comes in either 55%-45% fructose-glucose or 42%-58% pairings). It's difficult to find anything that's mostly glucose, which means our sweeteners are setting us up for weight gain, and more insidiously, metabolic changes that can make us more prone to heart disease and diabetes.

Dr. Walter Willett, chair of the department of nutrition at the Harvard School of Public Health, notes that studies have shown that long-term consumption of sugared drinks can double the risk of diabetes, with half of that risk due to the excess weight brought on by the calories, and the other half due to the beverages' high sugar content — mostly fructose. "This study provides the best argument yet that we should either decide to consume less sugar-sweetened beverages in general, or that we should conduct more research into the possibility of using other sweeteners that may be more glucose-based," says Matthias Tschoep, an obesity researcher at the Obesity Research Center in the University of Cincinnati, and author of a commentary accompanying the study. "It's an unbelievable piece of work." (See the top 10 scientific discoveries of 2008.)

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Re: Dr. MERCOLA --> alternative health and fitness

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I just wanted to respond to ktg's earlier post when he mentioned he bumped his pregnant wife's vitamin D levels up to 8400 units a day. I agree that its important for pregnant women to get extra Vitamin D. But you also need to remember that higher Vit D levels can raise calcium (which is also a good thing) BUt it inevitable LOWERS potassium. So when a person takes a high dose of Vit D, they should also include a healthy dose of potassium with it. Low potassium can cause a whole host of problems.

Our bodies are chemical, electrical and hormonal universes. When we add a variety of things to our bodies on a daily basis i.e. by eating and taking supplements, its important to understand the chemical reactions that take place after wards.

A reference on this can be found in the very last paragraph in Dr. Lawrence Wilson's article here: http://drlwilson.com/Articles/POTASSIUM.htm" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;

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Thanks for that.
"BOUGHT--The Truth Behind Vaccines, Big Pharma, and Your Food"
The FREE viewing period for "BOUGHT" has been extended until March 15th for this extremely important documentary film. It is my hope that MANY parents, expectant parents, grandparents, teachers, child-care providers, health-care providers, and others will carve out the time to view this film with an opened mind, and will not dismiss watching it out of "contempt prior to investigation."

ABOUT THE 'BOUGHT' FILM:
"You're about to see how Wall Street has literally "BOUGHT" your and your family's health. The food, vaccine, drug, insurance and health industry are a multi-BILLION dollar enterprise... focused more on profits than human lives. The BOUGHT documentary takes viewers deep "inside the guts" of this despicable conspiracy..."
~Featuring exclusive interviews with some of the world's most acclaimed experts in research, medicine, holistic care and natural health... BOUGHT exposes the hidden (and deadly) story behind it all.
View free at THIS LINK:

http://www.boughtmovie.net/free-viewing/" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;

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Facts behind GMO foods
By Dr. Mercola

Genetically manipulated foods may be one of the most serious threats not only to our environment but to the health and very survival of future generations. Typically, the blame for the promulgation of genetic engineering of our food is placed on chemical companies.

But there's actually a hidden back story to how genetically engineered foods were able to reach millions of dinner tables.

Steven Druker, who you may not be aware of, is the attorney who filed a lawsuit in the late '90s challenging the most important action the U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA) has taken in this area: its presumption that genetically engineered (GE) foods are Generally Recognized as Safe (GRAS) and can enter the market without a shred of safety testing.

However, the evidence clearly reveals that the FDA's GRAS presumption was fraudulent when first announced in 1992 and that it remains fraudulent today. Nonetheless, it has played the central role in allowing inadequately tested GE foods to permeate the American market. There are many components to this story, and Steven is just the man to set the story straight.

He's written a landmark and historic book Altered Genes, Twisted Truth, with the revealing subtitle: How the Venture to Genetically Engineer Our Food Has Subverted Science, Corrupted Government, and Systematically Deceived the Public.

If you have even the remotest interest in this topic, I would strongly encourage you to get a copy of this book. It is, without a doubt, the best book on the topic and provides a treasure trove of facts that will help you decimate anyone who believes that GMOs are safe.

Steven was aware of this issue 10 years before I was, and he's really a pioneer and a champion in warning the public and protecting us from the negligence and irresponsible action of the US Food and Drug Administration (FDA).

Genetically Engineered Food Blindsided Everyone

Most people are only superficially aware—if at all—of the background that led up to the FDA's landmark policy statement of 1992 that granted genetically engineered foods GRAS status.

I myself was unaware of the academic and scientific discussion that was going on some 15 to 20 years prior to the historic and crucial FDA 1992 action that made the commercialization of GE foods possible.

Steven's book goes into that in great depth, and provides an accurate historical record of the irresponsible behavior of many eminent scientists and scientific institutions in the earlier decades of the genetic engineering revolution, long before Monsanto's lackey Michael Taylor and the hordes of revolving door cronies came into the picture.

"It was probably not until about late '94 or '95 that I became aware of genetic engineering, and that it was being used by that point to reconfigure the genetic core of many of our foods.

The goal is, ultimately, to reconfigure the genetic core of almost every edible fruit, vegetable, and grain. That's the grand vision.

I became very concerned as I learned about this. I've had a long-term interest in eating healthy nutritious food myself, and in protecting the purity of the food. I was involved back in the late 1980s in the campaign to better regulate food irradiation.

But I too was behind the curve on understanding what was going on with genetically engineered foods, which I think puts things in perspective. So you can see why people still, up to a few years ago, didn't even know that they had been eating genetically engineered food for all these years, and feeding them unknowingly to their kids. It really has blindsided many of us."

Blatant Misrepresentation of US Food Law

Steven began researching the matter around 1996, and quickly realized that there is a great gap—both then and now—between the claims made by the proponents of GE foods and the actual facts.

One major concern was the fact that while the US had the strictest and the most rigorous food safety laws in the world in regard to new additives, the FDA had not enforced those laws when it comes to GMOs. Instead, the FDA gave GE foods a free ticket to circumvent the law.

In May 1992, the FDA made a blanket presumption that GE foods qualified to be categorized "Generally Recognized as Safe" (GRAS). They then said that this meant these foods could be marketed without any safety testing at all.

"That actually is a blatant misrepresentation of US food law, but that was the FDA claim," Steven says. "[They claim] there's an overwhelming 'scientific consensus' they're safe, and so safe that they don't need to be tested. Therefore, the FDA let these foods into our market without the requirement of a smidgen of testing.

Moreover, they didn't even require these foods be labeled, so the consumers at least would be informed about the major genetic reconfiguration that had occurred. This struck me as not only being unscientific but irresponsible and unethical. At the time, I had a hunch it was also illegal."

As he continued researching the matter, that hunch was confirmed. Not only is the policy governing GMO's at odds with the science, it violates US law. At first, Steven did not think he was sufficiently qualified to launch a lawsuit to contest the FDA's ruling. But as time went on, it became clear that no one else was willing to stick their neck out to do it.

FDA Scientists Warned of Grave Risks

Steven decided to launch a lawsuit on his own, and founded a non-profit organization called the Alliance for Bio-Integrity. Fortunately, as word got around, he was contacted by a public interest group in Washington D.C., the International Center for Technology Assessment (ICTA).

"They had a very good legal team and they were very interested in taking this on," he says. "The lawsuit was filed in May 1998, and it quickly accomplished something very major... It forced the FDA, through the discovery process, to hand over more than 44,000 pages of its internal files relevant to the policy that it made on genetically engineered foods."

It turned out to be a real treasure trove of hidden "gems" the FDA had undoubtedly hoped would remain hidden for all time. For starters, there were damning memos from FDA scientists assigned to the biotechnology task force, whose job it was to actually analyze and assess genetically engineered foods in terms of both the law and the science, and to do a risk assessment.

"This is probably one of the first scientific risk assessments performed by independent scientists," he notes, adding: "The memos that I was reading were astounding, because...they recognized that there were unusual risks in these foods. I already knew that genetic engineering had the potential to create unexpected and unpredictable new toxins and allergens in these foods.

These toxins would be very difficult to detect unless each food was subjected to very rigorous long-term toxicological testing, the likes of which the biotech industry has routinely avoided performing and has been given a pass on by various governments. The surprising thing was not just that they understood these risks, but that they were warning about them in no uncertain terms to their superiors."

FDA Supports Biotechnology Industry as Matter of Policy

According to the FDA's own admission, the agency has been operating for years under a policy to promote the US biotechnology industry. They decided it was more important to promote the industry and uphold the fragile image of GE foods rather than tell the truth and acknowledge the scientist warnings. So they covered up these warnings. Had Steven not sued, the warnings of the FDA's own scientists still would be unknown to this day.

"We wouldn't know the extent to which the FDA has been lying all these years. But fortunately, we do know now," he says. "And what we know is that although the FDA scientists overwhelmingly concluded and warned their superiors that these foods entail unique risks, that they cannot be presumed safe, and that each one of them should be subjected to long-term rigorous toxicological testing, what the public heard from the FDA was that "The agency is not aware of any information showing that foods developed by these methods differ from other foods in any meaningful or uniform way."

Now, it's impossible, I think, for any rational man or woman to read just the sampling of memos from the FDA scientists that are posted on the website of the Alliance for Bio-Integrity... and feel that the FDA's assertion is anything other than a blatant fraud meant to mislead the public, mislead the world, and allow genetically engineered food a free pass to enter the market. It's just an astounding fraud."

For close to 20 years, the American public has been exposed to these largely experimental, untested foods, which its own scientists said entail unique risks and could not be presumed safe. The FDA claimed GMO's could be presumed safe, and that there was an overwhelming scientific consensus backing up their decision, yet the evidence shows that is a bold-faced lie. One document (document #8), is a letter from the FDA's biotechnology coordinator to an official of Health Canada, written in the fall of 1991, just six months before the FDA's ruling on GE foods.

Dr. James Maryanski's letter acknowledges that there is no consensus about the safety of these foods within the scientific community. That admission is in the FDA's own files. "Even if we didn't have the memos from the scientists, we would have that admission, and yet, what happened? The FDA basically just buries that and lies about it all," Steven says. What's worse, because the FDA is so widely respected, and because the US—which is known to have strong food safety laws—said GMO's were GRAS, it paved the way for easy approval in Canada as well. Europe also relaxed their stance on GMO's as a result of the FDA's lie.

How and Why the Scientific Discussion Was Shifted from Cautious to Confident in Favor of GMO's Safety

Steven delved into the early history of genetic engineering that took place long before the technology was capable of producing a genetically engineered plant that could be eaten. It took a long time from developing genetically engineered bacteria before scientists could actually genetically engineer any viable edible crops.

Genetic engineering first became a reality back in the early 1970s, and at the time, it was a radical breakthrough. According to Nobel-laureate biologist George Wald, it was the biggest and most radical human intervention into the natural order that had ever occurred. Even the scientists who were doing it were mindful of how radical it was and how important it was to be careful. Initially, the scientists themselves warned of the dangers of this new technology and how it had to be used with extreme prudence and caution.

"But they then realized there was negative feedback from the public... So over time they began to change their story. It became clear that they had to project a united front of confidence about this [technology]. What we began to see was a progressive misrepresentation campaign... to convince the public and the government that genetic engineering is something that is essentially not very different from processes that have been occurring in nature all along anyway... They got away with that."

The scientific establishment mounted a huge lobbying campaign in the summer of 1977, orchestrated to convince the congressmen in Washington that there was no need for legislation. At that time, several bills to regulate genetic engineering had already been introduced in Congress. This concerted effort also relied on misinformation, which Steven details in his book, including making claims of having evidence that in reality did not exist.

Shifting the Burden of Proof

These lobbying efforts were not backed by the biotechnology industry, mind you. There was no biotechnology industry at that time. This is a key theme of Steven's book, because it's easy to forget that there was a time before the biotechnology industry, and very few know who the leaders of the genetic engineering establishment were, or why the technology was invented in the first place. As much as most of us despise Monsanto for their reprehensible behavior, they could never have implemented their strategy if it weren't for the prior misbehavior of the molecular biologists.

"The biotechnology industry—as irresponsible as they have been by and large—the main guilt lays at the feet of the mainstream molecular biology establishment; the scientists who were doing the research, getting the grants, and wanting to develop this technology. Most of them had altruistic goals. They thought this was going to be used to cure so many ills in the field of medicine... I think they eventually developed an 'end justifies the means' psychology...

But when you have so many highly influential, powerful scientists who are working together to convince the world that genetic engineering is inherently safe, and that the research they're pursuing is safe, that can be somewhat dangerous. And it turned out being very dangerous for the world, I think.

One of the points made in the book very clearly, is that the burden of proof that was placed on new technologies and new products, which ordinarily requires the developer to substantiate the safety of the new technology and its products, got shifted. It got shifted because of the subterfuge and the fraud, and it was put on the shoulders of the critics, the people who had concerns. There were many good scientists who had concerns, but they were all of a sudden put into the position of, You've got to prove they're dangerous," and the burden of proving safety was removed."

Molecular Biologists Pushed for Genetic Engineering Without Safeguards

The forerunners of the biotechnology industry were the molecular biology establishment. James Watson, the co-discoverer of the DNA structure, was a member of that establishment and, for obvious reasons, one of the big proponents of genetic engineering. He was one of the scientists who became very vocal, claiming that genetic engineering was safe and that earlier concerns had been exaggerated. And the molecular biologists who were strongly in favor of pushing ahead with genetic engineering without adequate safeguards wielded a great amount of power within the National Academy of Sciences (NAS), which is one of the premier scientific organizations in the US.

"My book goes into the behind-the-scene story showing that the National Academy of Sciences—because their agenda was so strongly influenced by powerful molecular biologists—were afraid of allowing a full and fair review of the possible ecological problems of releasing genetically engineered organisms," Steven says.

In contrast, one of the scientists who strove to uphold the integrity of science was Dr. Philip Regal, an eminent white hat biologist, who became the point man for attempting to get the genetic engineering venture aligned with sound science during the first 15 to 20 years of its existence. He was also a great resource for Steven's book, giving him the set of personal recollections he had written that described what he had experienced in pursuing this endeavor.

"It was a gold mine. It allowed me to interweave his fascinating story with the story I was telling and make it a much more exciting and compelling narrative. He made a major contribution... Not too many people know about him yet. Hopefully through my book, he will get all of the respect and gratitude from the public and the world that he deserves."

Fraudulent Groundwork Set the Framework for Massive GMO Fraud

Dr. Regal and some of his collaborators managed to put together two major conferences, and were shocked to learn just how many high-risk projects the genetic engineers had in the pipeline, slated for imminent release. Many of these high-risk projects were stopped because of Dr. Regal's efforts. Still, his voice was eventually outweighed by all the others, which resulted in the technological elite we're dealing with today.

"The media tended to present all of the statements about how good these foods were and how safe they were in the mouths of the scientific experts. Anytime concerns were raised, they would put that in the mouth of non-scientists; activists who were presented as not knowing very much about science but were just concerned."

That same tactic is used today, to great effect. Rarely if ever does a concerned scientist get any kind of airtime in the conventional media. Scientists are also crippled by the threat of losing grant money, or their career.

"It's really kind of the comedy of the absurd. The elite who had the power and ability to manipulate the press prevailed. They were successful in promulgating the impression that there were no real problems with genetic engineering; that there was an overwhelming scientific consensus this was so; and that regulation wasn't really needed. They imparted the impression that they could be trusted – that they were regulating it very well and regulation was unnecessary. They essentially kept regulation at a bare minimum."

The Spin-Doctors of the '70s

It's important to understand this, because the fact that regulations on genetic engineering were kept to a bare minimum from the very start is the foundation that set up the framework for the FDA's 1992 ruling. If safety regulations for the industry had been stricter, it's unlikely that they would have been able to pull it off.

"If that fraudulent groundwork hadn't been laid by the mainstream scientific establishment, especially the molecular biology establishment, the FDA could not have done what it did. It wouldn't have had the aura of scientific respectability, nor could Monsanto and the biotech industry have later been able to do what they've done."

The primary blame, the primary guilt goes back to the early 1970s, to the molecular biologists who were, little by little, fudging things, fudging facts, and spin-doctoring. As my book says, eventually, spin-doctoring will cross the line to downright misrepresentation... As Dr. Philip Regal mentioned: "Within the scientific community, gossip became as good as truth; as good as fact." And people just parroted what they heard other people saying."

Major GMO Disaster Used as Leverage to Attack Natural Supplements

While there's no proof that a whole food developed through GE has killed anyone after just a few meals, we do know that a genetically engineered food supplement was acutely toxic – and did take lives. In the 1980's, a supplement of the essential amino acid L-tryptophan, which was produced through genetic engineering, was the first major GMO catastrophe, killing dozens of people who took it. Thousands were seriously sickened, many of whom were permanently disabled. The novel disorder that afflicted these unfortunate people was named eosinophilia–myalgia syndrome (EMS). I was witness to this outbreak while I was a practicing physician.

In the 1980s I used to prescribe L-tryptophan for my patients as a sleeping aid and for the treatment of depression. So did numerous other doctors. However, the supplements we prescribed were manufactured conventionally. But when one of the manufacturers started to use genetic engineering, a deadly epidemic ensued and the FDA took all the brands of L-tryptophan off the market. Thus, the agency used this disaster as a tool and leverage to attack natural supplements with a pristine safety record. Prior to the release of the GE version of L-tryptophan, that supplement had never created a problem in anyone.

"The scientific evidence is very clear: tryptophan supplements were not a problem. To our knowledge, the only tryptophan supplement that ever created a problem was the one that was created through genetically engineered bacteria. As my book demonstrates, when one gathers all of the evidence that we have and puts it all together, then the finger gets pointed pretty strongly at the genetic engineering technology itself as having been the cause for the toxic contamination that caused the major epidemic in 1989 and 1990."

People died because they consumed a product of genetic engineering. And it's important to understand how this tragic event was spun to serve the industry's agenda even further. Rather than raise questions about genetic engineering of supplements, the tragedy was used to raise questions about the safety of natural supplements. Undoubtedly, a lethal mishap like this is bound to occur again, and when it does, the industry will use the L-tryptophan incident as a template for how to address and divert attention again, seeing how it worked so well the first time.

"If we don't get the knowledge out there, they will be able to continue the same game plan. It's very important to get the truth out there, so that it cannot continue into the future and so that changes are made. Dramatic changes have to be made."

The GMO Supplement That Killed Dozens and Injured Thousands

How was L-tryptophan re-engineered? In the mid-1980s, one of the main developers of L-tryptophan supplements, Showa Denko Corporation in Japan, decided they could turn out more L-tryptophan in the same amount of time if they endowed the bacteria they were using with extra genes. The bacteria naturally have the genetic components to synthesize L-tryptophan. By giving the bacteria an extra copy of those genes, they reasoned that more L-tryptophan would be produced more quickly.

Alas, they discovered that in order to achieve maximum production rates, they also had to boost one of those genes with a promoter from a virus. This created a very unnatural situation. As Steven notes, "They were messing around in very radical, unprecedented ways with the metabolism of bacteria that have been safely used for many, many years." There were early reports of the supplement giving people trouble, and as production was increased, the product appears to have become increasingly toxic.

"The final version [of this genetically engineered bacteria], which was the most souped-up of them all and the most disruptive to their metabolism, cranked out not only a lot of L-tryptophan but some unusual contaminants. The profile of that toxic tryptophan was highly unusual. It contained many more contaminants than most products do. They were very low level though. It was still pure according to pharmacological standards. It tested pure. Generally, most chemicals are not dangerous at that extremely low concentration, but at least one of those [contaminants] was, and it created a major epidemic.

Now, one of the points, which is very sobering, is that this epidemic... was only determined because the symptoms were highly unusual and unique... It was fortuitous in a sense that it was such a strange disease, otherwise, it would not have been even recognized, and those tryptophan supplements would still be marketed and still be killing and maiming people. It's a very important thing to know."

'Disappearing a GMO Disaster'

Powerful, persistent, and successful misinformation was dispensed to disassociate genetic engineering from the toxic contamination of this L-tryptophan supplement. Consequently, most people—including many scientists—do not know that this lethal epidemic was caused by a genetically engineered food supplement.

According to Steven, claims that the toxic contamination was caused by some defect in the manufacturing process, independent of genetic engineering, simply are not true. In his book, Steven details the scientific evidence that strongly suggests the toxin was most likely produced by bacterial enzymes, probably within the bacteria themselves, or in the broth before it was put through the purification system, which would place the blame squarely on the genetic tampering itself; not on some flawed manufacturing process.

"It's just so gross that you will hear from both governments around the world who are promoting this and from scientists a claim that no genetic engineered food has ever been associated with a human health problem. One government official has stated that not so much as a sneeze or a sniffle has ever been associated with the product of genetic engineering. What? There was a major epidemic!"

GMOs Infiltrate Agriculture

In the early 1980s, some large corporations started to become interested in the potential applications of genetic engineering to agriculture. Remember, if that preliminary groundwork by the molecular biologists (discussed earlier) had not been laid and the burden of proof had not already been shifted, Monsanto, Dow, and others would not have gone ahead to invest in genetically engineered seeds as they would have never been able to get these dangerous products presumed to be GRAS by the FDA.

But the groundwork was laid and the path forward was opened wide. That's why it's so important to understand that early history. Then, enter Michael Taylor, a partner at a major Washington, D.C. law firm that represented Monsanto. After serving as Monsanto's legal counsel, Taylor was then installed as Deputy Commissioner on Food Policy at the FDA—a position that didn't even exist before Taylor got the job.

"It was because, I think, as I looked through the records, there were FDA scientists who were objecting to the drafts of the policy statement, saying, "Wait, what's happening to all the scientific elements in this?" ... I believe, this is my belief, that Michael Taylor was brought in at that critical junction to start getting things moving in the direction that the Bush White House and the people directing the FDA wanted. But certainly, we can see within the memos... where the clout was. It was coming from the White House and the Office of Management and Budget. The economic and political considerations were trumping the scientific considerations. And the poor FDA scientists were spending their time trying to do their job as scientists, and it turned out it didn't come to anything."

Steven's book also shows how former President Ronald Reagan's deregulation agenda dovetailed with that of the molecular biology establishment, giving the industry a major breakthrough. There's a 1958 law requiring that novel additives to food must be demonstrated safe. They cannot be presumed safe ahead of time. Each and every one should, by law, have to undergo stringent safety testing. This is the law the FDA broke, pretending as if it did not even exist, when it claimed that genetically engineered foods don't need to be tested.

When Vice President Dan Quayle announced the FDA's policy, he announced it as regulatory relief for the industry, saying "We're freeing the industry from any new burdens and regulations." What he didn't know was that the industry was also being freed from a law that, ever since 1958, had been one of the major consumer protection laws in this country. It was now being illegally circumvented in the name of deregulation. This illegal activity has allowed the biotech industry to perpetuate and increase their penetration into the market, without ever having to actually prove the safety of any of their products. Remember, the safety of GE foods is merely presumed. It's not proven.

GMO FDA Lawsuit Derailed

So, whatever happened to Steven's lawsuit against the FDA, you might ask? In short, it was stymied. And here's why: As Steven explains, the judge concluded that there was no need for a trial because trials are only necessary when there's a dispute about material facts. Trials are done to clarify the facts. In this case, the critical facts were the very records that the FDA had in its possession as of May 1992, when it released its policy. Since those were the key facts, there was no need for a trial, as everyone agreed on what the records said. After submitting briefs and answers, the judge will ordinarily call for oral arguments, to tease out more information.

"We fully expected that she would, but surprisingly she didn't. When she finally issued her opinion, it was a bit of a stunner. What she stated was that, essentially, in May of 1992 the FDA administrators had some rational basis to presume that genetically engineered foods are generally recognized as safe."

That was the key legal issue. Did the FDA's presumption about GMO's being generally recognized as safe have a rational basis? Steven's team had to demonstrate that there had been "arbitrary and capricious breech of administrative discretion". But as long as the FDA could show some rational basis for their decision, they could be upheld. In this case, Steven's team demonstrated there was no rational basis.

According to the FDA's own regulations, in order to qualify as generally recognized as safe, an additive or supplement must have solid, technical evidence of safety that has been generally known and accepted within the scientific community. That ordinarily means that evidence should have been published in a peer-reviewed scientific journal, so its solidity can be certified. There has to be an overwhelming consensus that the product is safe, and that consensus has to be based on solid technical evidence.

"The FDA's own files show that in the case of genetically engineered foods, neither of those conditions applied. In fact, their files show just the opposite. There was certainly a major dispute about the safety of these foods even within the FDA. Most of their scientific staff said you can't presume they're safe. That right there is a scientific fact. It's a material fact. Also, there was that letter from the FDA's own biotechnology coordinator, admitting that there was no scientific consensus."

By the way, we didn't even have to base it on what was in the record because nine well-credential life scientists took the unprecedented step of signing the complaint as plaintiffs. It was unprecedented for a group of scientists to be suing a federal regulatory agency on the basis that one of its policies being scientifically unsound. Right there, by doing that, we demonstrated there was not a general recognition of safety within the scientific community."

Theatre of the Absurd

In earlier years, the FDA had taken a supplement off the market claiming it was not GRAS on the basis of testimony of only two experts. Here, the judge acknowledged the plaintiffs had shown that significant disagreement existed within the scientific community by bringing in nine scientists. But then she got tricky.

She claimed that the critical issue was not whether these foods could be reasonably presumed safe in 1998 (the year the suit was filed). Most people would think that is a critical issue, because if these products cannot legitimately be presumed safe – and are thus being marketed illegally even though millions of people are eating them -- that's clearly a major problem. But, as Steven explains, the judge wasn't interested in determining whether GE foods were truly GRAS in 1998 and were actually being sold legally at that time. She instead focused solely on whether the FDA administrators had some rational grounds for presuming they were GRAS as of May 1992.

So she ruled that the evidence submitted in May 1998 was irrelevant – despite the fact it clearly demonstrated that GE foods were not GRAS at that point. Moreover, she said that the agency's administrators had a right to overlook the opinions of their own scientific staff – essentially giving them free rein to pretend there was consensus in 1992 when there clearly was not. Moreover, she herself overlooked that letter by the FDA's biotechnology coordinator admitting that there was not a scientific consensus about safety during that period. Nor did she make any mention of a crucial memo by an FDA official admitting that the technical evidence required to support a GRAS presumption was entirely lacking. And she failed to take note of these two critical admissions even though the plaintiffs' briefs had clearly called them to her attention.

As a result, the FDA still clings to its unfounded and thoroughly rebutted presumption that genetically engineered foods are GRAS. However, once you're done listening to Steven's story, or reading his book, you will know the truth of the matter the next time you hear someone talk about 'overwhelming safety' of GMOs... This is a fascinating book and discussion and it is loaded with so much new information that it turned into the longest interview I have ever done. So we needed to break it into two parts. We will post part two on March 15, 2015.

Help Support GMO Labeling

The Grocery Manufacturers Association (GMA)—Monsanto’s Evil Twin—is pulling out all the stops to keep you in the dark about what’s in your food. For nearly two decades, Monsanto and corporate agribusiness have exercised near-dictatorial control over American agriculture.

Finally public opinion around the biotech industry's contamination of our food supply and destruction of our environment has reached the tipping point. We're fighting back.

The insanity has gone far enough, which is why I encourage you to boycott every single product owned by members of the GMA, including natural and organic brands. More than 80 percent of our support comes from individual consumers like you, who understand that real change comes from the grassroots.

Thankfully, we have organizations like the Organic Consumers Association (OCA) to fight back against these corporate giants. So please, fight for your right to know what’s in your food and help support the GMO labeling movement by making a donation today.

Internet Resources Where You Can Learn More

Non-GMO Shopping Guide
GMA Boycott List
GMA Traitor Brands

Together, Let's Help OCA Get The Funding They Deserve

Let’s Help OCA get the funding it deserves. I have found very few organizations who are as effective and efficient as OCA. It’s a public interest organization dedicated to promoting health justice and sustainability. A central focus of the OCA is building a healthy, equitable, and sustainable system of food production and consumption.

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BroJones
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Re: Dr. MERCOLA --> alternative health and fitness

Post by BroJones »

From Natural News; use of cannabis OIL (not smoking!) to treat cancers. Note that the oil does not make one "high".
(NaturalNews) The therapeutic potential of cannabis appears limitless, extending far beyond just relieving nausea or pain in the terminally ill. Christina Sanchez, a molecular biologist from Compultense University in Madrid, Spain, has been studying the molecular activity of cannabinoids for more than 10 years, and during this time she and her colleagues have learned that tetrahydrocannabinol, or THC, the primary psychoactive component of cannabis, induces tumor cell "suicide" while leaving healthy cells alone.

This amazing discovery was somewhat unexpected, as Sanchez and her team had initially been studying brain cancer cells for the purpose of better understanding how they function. But in the process, they observed that, when exposed to THC, tumoral cells not only ceased to multiply and proliferate but also destroyed themselves, both in lab tests and animal trials. Sanchez first reported on this back in 1998, publishing a paper on the anti-cancer effects of THC in the European biochemistry journal FEBS Letters.

"In the early 1960s, Raphael Mechoulam from the Hebrew University in Israel categorized the main compound in marijuana producing the psychoactive effects that we all know," explained Sanchez during an interview with Cannabis Planet. "After the discovery of this compound that is called THC, it was pretty obvious that this compound had to be acting on the cells, on our organism, through a molecular mechanism."

Sanchez expounds upon this and much more in a five-minute video segment available here:
Vimeo.com.

Human body designed to utilize cannabis compounds, research finds

Later research in the 1980s revealed that the human body contains two specific targets for THC: an endogenous framework that processes THC and other cannabinoids, known as the endocannabinoid system, and various cannabinoid receptors throughout the body that utilize them. Together, these two natural systems allow the body to benefit from the cannabinoids found in cannabis, some of which aren't found anywhere else in nature.

"The endocannabinoids, together with the receptors and the enzymes that synthesize, that produce, the endocannabinoids and that degrade the endocannabinoids, are what we call the endocannabinoid system," added Sanchez. "And we now know that the endocannabinoid system regulates a lot of biological functions: appetite, food intake, motor behavior, reproduction, and many, many other functions. And that's why the plant has such a wide therapeutic potential."

"Phoenix Tears" cannabis oil is already curing people of cancer

When inhaled or consumed, cannabis cannabinoids are incorporated into the body's natural endocannabinoid system, binding to cannabinoid receptors in the same way as endogenous cannabinoids. The effects of this in terms of cancer, as demonstrated in animal models of both breast and brain cancers, is that tumor cells are thrust into a state of apoptosis, meaning they self-destruct.

"Cells can die in different ways, and after cannabinoid treatment, they were dying in the clean way -- they were committing suicide," revealed Sanchez. One of the advantages of cannabinoids... is that they target, specifically, the tumor cells. They don't have any toxic effect on normal, non-tumoral cells. And this is an advantage with respect to standard chemotherapy, which targets basically everything."

What Sanchez is describing here sounds a lot like what Canadian researcher and innovator Rick Simpson has been doing with his "Phoenix Tears" cannabis oil, which has reportedly cured many people of cancer over the years without harming them like chemotherapy and radiation do.


You can learn more about Phoenix Tears here:
PhoenixTears.ca.

"I cannot understand why in the U.S. cannabis is under Schedule I, because it is pretty obvious, not only from our work, but from the work of many other researchers, that the plant has very wide therapeutic potential," emphasized Sanchez.

Sources:

http://vimeo.com" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;

http://scholar.qsensei.com" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;

http://phoenixtears.ca" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;

Learn more: http://www.naturalnews.com/048913_canna ... z3U2l5HaM7" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;

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BroJones
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Re: Dr. MERCOLA --> alternative health and fitness

Post by BroJones »

Wow, no comments on the use of cannabis oil to treat cancer...

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Phoenixstar117
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Re: Dr. MERCOLA --> alternative health and fitness

Post by Phoenixstar117 »

Since you want comments, here is a question.

How do you get this treatment, what with the schedule 1 restriction? I know there are places in the US where people can now grow for "recreational use". What about the oil?

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BroJones
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Re: Dr. MERCOLA --> alternative health and fitness

Post by BroJones »

Hmmmm...
says their cannabis oil is legal in the US. They sell it. From hemp sources.
Geo Washington used to grow hemp.

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bobhenstra
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Re: Dr. MERCOLA --> alternative health and fitness

Post by bobhenstra »

High levels of vitamin D is suspected of increasing mortality rates

http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/20 ... 105222.htm" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;

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BroJones
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Re: Dr. MERCOLA --> alternative health and fitness

Post by BroJones »

So I've increased my coconut oil intake dramatically -- I like it... weight continues to drop slowly.
Now about seeds... and GMO...
By Dr. Mercola

Seeds represent the foundation of life. We depend on them for food, for medicine and for our very survival. In many ways, you can trace the underpinnings of any given culture through the heritage of their crops and seeds.

It wasn’t long ago when seeds were mostly the concern of farmers who, as the Worldwatch Institute put it, “were the seed producers and the guardians of societies’ crop heritage.”1 But this is no longer the case.

Once considered to be the property of all, like water or even air, seeds have become largely privatized, such that only a handful of companies now control the global food supply.

Agriculture has been around for 10,000 years, but the privatization of seeds has only occurred very recently. In that short time, seed diversity has been decimated, farmers have been put out of business due to rising seed costs… and the pesticide companies that control most seeds today have flourished.

According to Worldwatch:2

“…by the early 1900s, the U.S. and Canadian governments began promoting the development of large export-oriented agriculture industries based on only a few crops and livestock species.

To maximize uniformity and yields, seed breeding moved off the farm and into centralized public research centers, such as U.S. land grant universities. Variety development became commodity-oriented.

Scientific advances in the 1970s and ’80s heralded a new era in agriculture. To boost flat sales, Monsanto and other agrichemical companies ventured into genetic engineering and transformed themselves into the biotechnology industry.

They bought out traditional seed companies and engineered their herbicide-resistant genes into the newly acquired seed lines.” It’s been all downhill from there…

93 Percent of Seeds Have Been Lost in the Last 80 Years

If you were alive in 1903, you would have been able to choose from more than 500 varieties of cabbage, 400 varieties of peas and tomatoes, and 285 varieties of cucumbers.

Eighty years later in 1983, the varieties had dwindled sharply, to just 28 varieties of cabbage, 25 varieties of peas, 79 for tomatoes, and just 16 varieties of cucumbers.

In a comparison of seeds offered in commercial seed houses in the early 1900s to the seeds found in the National Seed Storage Laboratory in 1983, researchers found 93 percent of seeds were lost over eight decades.

The National Geographic infographic below shows just how many varieties of fruits and vegetables appear near extinction.3 Even more concerning is the fact that the data is already more than 30 years old, and the problem may have gotten even worse since.

For the record, it’s not only fruits and vegetables that are disappearing. The Millennium Seed Bank Partnership estimates that 60,000 to 100,000 plant species are in danger of extinction.4

Food Variety Infographic

Loss of Seed Diversity Coincides with the Consolidation of Seed Companies

Seeds have traditionally been saved and shared between farmers from one harvest season to the next. Farmers rarely ever had to buy new seed. Nature, when left alone, provides you with the means to propagate the next harvest in a never-ending cycle.

Now, however, farmers relying on patented seeds must buy them each year from pesticide companies like Monsanto. Saving such seeds is illegal because it is considered to be patent infringement.

Many farmers depend on Monsanto’s genetically modified (GM) (and patented) seeds. More than 90 percent of US soybeans and 80 percent of corn acreage is planted with Monsanto’s patented GM seeds.5

For 200 years, the patenting of life was prohibited, especially with respect to foods. But all of that changed in 1978 with the first patent of a living organism, an oil-eating microbe, which opened the proverbial floodgates.

Patenting of life forms was never approved by Congress or the American public. But as far the GMO industry is concerned, they own a gene, wherever it ends up.

According to the Organic Consumers Association (OCA), as of August 2013 Monsanto owned 1,676 seed, plant, and other similar patents.6 This was the plan all along. As reported by Friends of the Earth International:7

"At a biotech industry conference in January 1999, a representative from Arthur Anderson, LLP explained how they had helped Monsanto design their strategic plan. First, his team asked Monsanto executives what their ideal future looked like in 15 to 20 years.

The executives described a world with 100 percent of all commercial seeds genetically modified and patented. Anderson consultants then worked backwards from that goal, and developed the strategy and tactics to achieve it.

They presented Monsanto with the steps and procedures needed to obtain a place of industry dominance in a world in which natural seeds were virtually extinct."

Seed Industry Consolidation Increases Along with Seed Costs

In 1996, there were still about 300 independent seeds companies left in the US. By 2009, there were fewer than 100.8 With the rise of GM crops and seed patents, meanwhile, the pesticide industry has been snapping up an ever-growing share of the seed industry.

Just four agrichemical companies own 43 percent of the world’s commercial seed supply, and 10 multinational corporations hold 65 percent of global commercial seed for major crops.9 According to Philip Howard, an associate professor at Michigan State University:10

“The commercial seed industry has undergone tremendous consolidation in the last 40 years as transnational corporations entered this agricultural sector, and acquired or merged with competing firms.

This trend is associated with impacts that constrain the opportunities for renewable agriculture, such as reductions in seed lines and a declining prevalence of seed saving.”

He further stated,"[t]he Big Six chemical/seed companies [Monsanto, Bayer, Dow, Syngenta, DuPont and BASF] have increased their cross-licensing agreements to share genetically engineered traits, strengthening the barriers to entry for smaller firms that don't have access to these expensive technologies."11

Howard has also compiled the graphic below, which depicts changes in ownership involving major seed companies and their subsidiaries from 1996 to 2013.12

As for seed costs, prices for GM soybean seeds rose 325 percent from 1995 to 2011, with GM soybean seed costing about 47 percent more than non-GM soy.13 GM corn seed is also about double that of conventional seed, and according to the Center for Food Safety:14 “In addition to the cost of seeds, a ‘trait fee’ is charged—this fee has also precipitously risen from $4.5[0] per bag of soybean seed in 1996 to an estimated $17.50 by 2008.”

As the Worldwatch Institute reported:15 “With the profitability of seed increasing over the last 15 years, largely because of patents and contracts, the money and incentive for public institutions to develop new varieties are declining. Farmers also are saving less seed.”

seed industry structure
Insane Government Policy Targets Seed Swap at Community Library

The Cumberland County Library System in Pennsylvania set up a “seed library” at Mechanicsburg’s Joseph T. Simpson Public Library last year. Locals could borrow heirloom seeds for the growing season and then replace them at the end of the year. The library thought the system would encourage “residents to learn more about growing their own food and acquiring self-sufficiency skills.”16

All was well in the community… until the US Department of Agriculture (USDA) sent a letter telling them they were violating the 2004 Seed Act, which regulates the selling of seeds. For good measure, the USDA also sent in a high-ranking official and lawyers to meet with the library. As Global Research reported, the USDA was only doing their job, stopping possible “agri-terrorism” at the hands of community residents planting heirloom tomatoes…17

“Feds told the library system that they would have to test each individual seed packet in order for the facility to continue, an impossible task, which meant that the seed library was shut down. Cumberland County Library System Executive Director Jonelle Darr was told that the USDA would, ‘continue to crack down on seed libraries that have established themselves in the state.’

Cumberland County Commissioner Barbara Cross applauded the USDA’s decision, warning that allowing residents to borrow seeds could have led to acts of ‘agri-terrorism.’...While the USDA is busy cracking down on local seed libraries in the name of preventing cross-pollination, many accuse the federal agency of being completely in the pocket of biotech giant Monsanto, which itself has been responsible for cross-pollinating farmers’ crops with genetically modified seeds on an industrial scale.”18

In reality, “old-fashioned” seed swaps such as the one attempted at the Joseph T. Simpson Public Library are one of the best ways to secure non-GMO, heirloom seeds for your garden. You can try this on your own with friends and neighbors or local gardening clubs. The National Gardening Association, for instance, has an online seed swap that allows you to post either seeds you’d like to share or seeds you’re looking for. It’s a free service and, as they say on their site, “one gardener’s extras are another’s treasures.”19 If you’re interested in learning more, keep an eye out for the film “Seed: The Untold Story,” which is slated to be released in 2015.

Support Seed Diversity by Ditching GM Food

Voting with your pocketbook, at every meal, matters. It makes a huge difference and can help to protect the future integrity of our food supply. Along those lines, here are seven ways you can take power back from the corporate bullies that are trying to control the food supply:

Stop buying all non-organic processed foods. Instead, build your diet around whole, unprocessed foods, especially raw fruits and vegetables, and healthy fats from coconut oil, avocados, organic pastured meat, dairy, and eggs, and raw nuts
Buy most of your foods from your local farmer's market and/or organic farm
Cook most or all your meals at home using whole, organic ingredients
Frequent restaurants that serve organic, cooked-from-scratch, local food. Many restaurants, especially chain restaurants (Chipotlé is a rare exception), use processed foods for their meals
Buy only heirloom, open-pollinated, and/or organic seeds for your garden. This includes both decorative plants and edibles – or get them via seed swaps
Boycott all lawn and garden chemicals (fertilizers, pesticides, etc.) unless they are "OMRI Approved," which means they are allowed in organic production. If you use a lawn service, make sure they're using OMRI Approved products as well
Join the Organic Consumers Association's new campaign, "Buy Organic Brands that Support Your Right to Know"

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Re: Dr. MERCOLA --> alternative health and fitness

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WASHINGTON – The signs are everywhere of an imminent "catastrophic collapse" of the U.S. health-care system that will leave Americans clamoring for medical attention, medical supplies and hospital care, says the former president of the Association of American Physicians and Surgeons.

Dr. Lee Hieb, a practicing orthopedic surgeon and author of a new book called "Surviving the Medical Meltdown," says the evidence is mounting that Obamacare, or the Affordable Care Act, is making health care scarcer and that the worst is yet to come:

• Shortages of everyday medical supplies – from tetanus toxoid to thyroid, not to mention standard medical equipment – are everyday occurrences now in both urban and rural areas;

• Wait time for routine specialty care is dramatically increasing;

• There are not enough specialists to cover emergency-room calls;

• Hospitals in inner cities and poorer rural regions around the country are closing their doors rather than face economic ruin; and

• It is difficult in some areas to find a primary care physician, especially for Medicare and Medicaid patients.


"Catastrophic collapse due to a 'doctor death spiral' will occur when we drop below a critical number of practicing physicians," Hieb predicts. "As our population ages, it requires more physician man-hours of medical care. But as our population ages, so too do our physicians. More than half of the surgeons who cover emergency rooms are over 50. And although they are some of the most productive physicians, they are being overloaded and overstressed, and are beginning to burn out. Many are retiring early; others are dramatically reducing their patient loads. Recent surveys suggest up to 60 percent of physicians are preparing to do one or the other within two years."

Are you prepping for hard times ahead? Make sure "Surviving the Medical Meltdown" by Dr. Lee Hieb is part of your survival library.

Yet, the problems evident today, she says, represent the tip of the iceberg headed for the kind of medical care to which Americans have become accustomed.

"The one certainty? Things will be getting much worse because the current system is unsustainable – either in manpower or in dollars and cents," she explains.

Hieb doesn't spend a lot of time in her book explaining how Obamacare will lead to this tipping point. Instead, "Surviving the Medical Meltdown" is written to prepare Americans to make it through the coming crisis – from insurance issues, getting the most from your doctor's visits, how to avoid unhealthy foods and toxins that can make you sick and stockpiling the most important medical supplies for yourself and your family.

The one place to which Hieb argues Americans should not look for medical help is the government.

"As the current medical system collapses of its own internal inconsistencies, people who have been conditioned to look to government for solutions will predictably look to the federal government for help," she says. "And government being government will never ignore the chance of using a crisis to further its agenda of power and growth. But let's look around us. How has government done in the fields of education, banking, the post office or the DMV?"

She answers her own question: "Single-source medical care is lousy. The longer such a system exists, the worse it becomes. By the time the Berlin Wall fell and we could peek into the world of Soviet medicine, for example, 57 percent of Soviet hospitals had no hot water, and 36 percent had no running water at all. There were dead cats lying in the hallways, and a legion of babies were exposed to HIV because needles were reused without sterilization."

One of the first signs of collapse of the medical system, Hieb says, will be hospital closings. And that is already happening, as WND previously reported.

In 2013, 18 acute-care hospitals across the United States shut their doors in 2013. In 2014, at least 12 more hospitals closed in rural areas alone.
UNquote

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Re: Dr. MERCOLA --> alternative health and fitness

Post by BroJones »

Re: weight loss.

I'm working on this also; and having some success, down about 11 pounds in 3 months...
By Dr. Mercola

Losing weight has become an obsession largely because there are so many overweight individuals. Estimates are that nearly 50 million Americans are dieting at any one time,1 yet nearly two-thirds remain overweight or obese.

If you’re one of those 50 million, then you may want to consider adding EFT to your toolbox. EFT, or Emotional Freedom Technique, is a powerful energy psychology tool for weight loss because it addresses the emotional blocks that underlie most weight-related issues, such as overeating tendencies and poor body image.

The film “Tapping for Weight Loss” features EFT Master Carol Look2 and Jon Gabriel, author of The Gabriel Method, as they assist a group of adults in clearing out the emotional barriers that impede their weight loss success.

Why Diets Don’t Work

Diets rarely work because they don’t address the stress and emotional underpinnings that drive you to overeat, or to eat the wrong foods. “Willpower” and self-discipline only gets you so far and is typically unsustainable over the long run.

Even if a diet helps you drop a few pounds, keeping them off is another challenge altogether—and typically even a greater one. Statistics show that nearly 65 percent of dieters return to their pre-dieting weight within three years.3

Those on “crash diets” fare even worse—only five percent keep it off. If you want to shed your excess pounds and keep them off, fad diets are not the solution. Permanent lifestyle changes are needed... ones that address emotional as well as physical factors.

Junk Food Manufacturers Work Hard to Make Their Products Irresistible

Not only do emotions play a key role in unhealthy eating patterns, but processed food manufacturers want you to crave their foods. In fact, they’ve gone to great lengths to make their products addictive with carefully calculated flavors, textures, and chemical additives.

For the most part, their efforts have been successful. In 2005 alone, Americans spent a staggering $60 billion on snack foods.4 Junk food manufacturers have taken flavor science to extraordinary levels, and the artificial ingredients used to produce that sought after "bliss point" can seriously confuse your body's metabolism.

Americans' reliance on processed foods and sugar is undoubtedly one of the primary factors driving our staggering obesity rates. But rest assured: even these addictive pseudo-foods are no match for EFT!

EFT for Cravings—Far Better Than Willpower

When trying to achieve your optimal weight, EFT can be used in two ways. The first is as a means of managing food cravings when they arise. The second is to get at deeper emotional issues that are actually driving your undesirable eating behaviors.

Before getting into the deeper emotions, let’s look at how EFT can help with a sudden attack of “the munchies.” While food cravings certainly feel physical, they’re often rooted in unconscious emotions. Food works to temporarily suppress unpleasant feelings—those feelings we don’t want to feel. Cravings are an effective distraction!

By tapping on the craving itself—the cookies or chips you’re dying to eat and how badly you want them—you can reduce your stress and release some of the emotions behind the cravings. Once you do that, the craving diminishes.

In an Australian study5 involving 96 overweight and obese adults, EFT significantly reduced food cravings and increased the participants’ ability to show restraint—even after six months.

A basic approach to tapping for food cravings is outlined below. Be sure to also watch the demonstration video above, which shows how tapping can be used to manage cravings. Here is the basic approach:

Identify a food you crave by visualizing it or imagining you’re eating it
Tap on your activated thoughts (for example, “I want this,” “I have to have it,” etc.)
Tap on each of the specific sensations or thoughts you have about the food (sweetness, saltiness, creaminess, crunchiness, how it feels in your mouth, how it smells, etc.)
Scan your body for any tension, and tap on that too

When your craving settles down, try even harder to activate it. You can place the actual food in front of you in order to intensify your craving. If you indulge in the food, then tap on your thoughts and feelings about your indulgence.

Tapping may reduce the craving in the moment, but this alone doesn’t typically produce long-term behavior change. For lasting change, you have to delve deeper into the emotional underpinnings of your eating behaviors.

Diving Deeper into the Well

In order for permanent lifestyle changes to occur (e.g. diet, exercise, smoking, drugs, and alcohol, etc.) you typically need to address your underlying emotional issues—which is highly effective with a tool like EFT as stress is typically a major factor.

Chronic stress has a pronounced impact on food cravings and appetite, digestion, nutrient absorption, and metabolism, as well as being directly linked to abdominal obesity. Studies show the leading cause of stress for Americans is money.

If you have chronically elevated stress, then chances are your cortisol is not at optimal levels and rhythms, as chronic stress tends to activate the fight or flight part of your nervous system, which stimulates a number of stress hormones such as cortisol.

Among other things, cortisol cannot only deplete your muscle mass and cause your body to manufacture belly fat, it may also pave the way to diabetes, heart disease, and immune dysfunction. Elevated cortisol levels also impair the functioning of your prefrontal cortex—the part of your brain that helps you make rational decisions.

If your brain is swimming in stress hormones, then your reasoning may be impaired, which makes it even harder to make good lifestyle choices.

The Link Between Childhood Trauma and Obesity

Weight issues often stem from unresolved childhood traumas and long-standing anxiety or depression. According to EFT expert Steve Wells, anxiety is by far the most common emotion associated with weight-related issues.6

One of the largest scientific studies ever conducted about the relationship between childhood trauma and health, the Adverse Childhood Experiences Study (ACES), found a strong relationship between the number and severity of childhood traumas and the incidence of disease later in life, including heart disease, cancer, and obesity.

However, just because these emotional injuries occurred does not mean you are permanently impaired. EFT has been scientifically shown to reduce cortisol levels and anxiety. In 2012, a triple blind study7 found that EFT reduced cortisol levels and symptoms of psychological distress by 24 percent—more than any other intervention tested.

Old Emotional Wounds Can Sabotage Your Success

Emotions such as fear, anger, resentment, and guilt can hijack your best intentions and impact you on a deep biological level, making it difficult to shift unhealthy lifestyle patterns. Learning the basic mechanics of EFT is relatively easy, but identifying and resolving core issues that are largely unconscious can sometimes pose a bit of a challenge. If you have serious issues, especially those related to trauma or abuse, then I advise against self-treatment and recommend consulting a professional EFT practitioner.8 When tackling your weight with EFT, here are a few things to keep in mind:

Look at safety issues first. Very often, people gain unwanted weight when they don’t feel safe around someone or something. Ask yourself what was going on in your life when you began gaining weight, or in the months prior. Does it feel safe for you to lose the weight? Is it safe for others? Do you have issues around trust that may be coming into play?
Issues of self-hate, unworthiness, or not being “good enough.” What’s your self-talk around your weight and your body image? Do you believe you deserve a healthy body? What is the “critical voice” in the back of your head saying to you?
Rebellion against deprivation. Do you feel deprived? Are you rebelling against feeling restricted in the past? Whom or what might you be rebelling against?
If the cravings weren’t there, what else might come up? Cravings are not the real issue, but instead a distraction. What emotion might you be trying to avoid... anger, loneliness, helplessness, fear? What is your truth?
Your tapping target is an emotion. What’s the feeling behind your thoughts, beliefs, and behaviors? If you’re troubled by a past event or experience, what’s the feeling associated with it? The more specific you can be, the better.

Additional EFT Resources

In addition to managing food cravings and eating appropriately, EFT can be used to learn love and acceptance of your body, as it is—extra pounds and all. Shame, fear of failure, limiting beliefs, anxiety about change, and self-sabotaging behaviors can all be addressed with EFT. Hating yourself is definitely counterproductive to your goals, and one of the great benefits of EFT is identifying and releasing the thoughts and feelings that may be sabotaging your success.

The nice thing is, once you’ve learned the tapping basics, it’s always there at your fingertips—whenever and wherever you need it. The following are a few more resources to help you with your learning:

Basic EFT course and tutorial
Tips for eliminating food cravings
“Turbo Tapping” for soda addiction
EFT for intermittent fasting
EFT for stress

Basic Lifestyle Reminders

EFT should be an adjunct to—not a replacement for—a healthy diet and exercise program. If you’re struggling to shed those extra pounds, make sure you’re addressing all of the basic lifestyle areas. For more help with weight, please also visit our weight management section.

Diet: Make sure you’re eating a diet of whole foods, not processed foods, ideally organic, low in refined sugar and processed fructose, high in fiber, and free of refined grains and carbohydrates. Make sure you’re consuming enough healthy fat.

Half of the population suffers with insulin resistance and would also benefit from intermittent fasting, which is one of the most effective ways to resolve insulin resistance and shed excess weight. Eating naturally fermented foods will help build your gut flora, which also helps you achieve a healthy weight.
Exercise: Ideally, your exercise routine would include high-intensity exercise, interval training, strength training, balance and flexibility, and intermittent non-exercise movement throughout the day. Variety is key! I recommend walking 7,000-10,000 steps per day, in addition to your workout regimen. Also, seek to sit less than three hours a day.
Sleep: Make sure you’re getting seven to nine hours of deep, restorative sleep per night.
Sunlight: Spend some time outdoors in natural sunlight to help optimize your vitamin D levels, as well as giving you sunlight’s other health benefits. Daytime sunlight exposure can also help you sleep better at night.


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BroJones
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Re: Dr. MERCOLA --> alternative health and fitness

Post by BroJones »

Using coconut oil like butter on Ezekiel bread... i like it!

Dr Mercola is going to discuss a certain herb that he says is nearly a "Universal cure for cancer." Which herb do you think this is?

oops - he doesn't use the word "cure" - rather, he says "treatment"...
Last edited by BroJones on May 4th, 2015, 8:00 am, edited 1 time in total.

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Re: Dr. MERCOLA --> alternative health and fitness

Post by rewcox »

BroJones wrote:Using coconut oil like butter on Ezekiel bread... i like it!

Dr Mercola is going to discuss a certain herb that he says is nearly a "Universal cure for cancer." Which herb do you think this is?
That is a healthy combination!

I don't know much about herbs. I really like cilantro.

Epsom salts and dinosaur dirt seem to be popular at LDSFF.

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