Another FDA Funny

UPDATE:
I received a reply of sorts from the FDA along with a visit from the spyputer at FDAs DIMES HQ (ref: Elk Watching People). The reply was not from Dr. Galson to whom I wrote, but was an unsigned so-called response from an unnamed party at the FDA aka 'CDER'. The reply did not answer my query but danced around the issues in typical bureaucratic style.

I understand this because at one time in my career I worked with HHS and the USPHS, as well as the Washington state DSHS. Several years was enough to make clearly understand why integrity is so much a critical philosophy in my life.

If you would like to read a 2004 in depth article regarding statins from two key researchers, please see Dangers of Statin Drugs: What You Haven’t Been Told About Popular Cholesterol-Lowering Medicines

***

The FDA once again targets natural treatments while avoiding the ever increasing number of problems with their "approved" drugs.

What you don't read here is that RRY is the very statin that is the basis for the pharmaceutical industry's drug.

Statins are associated with rhabdomyolysis which can lead to very serious side effects, kidney failure and death. The statins have been associated with death yet remain on the market.

The statins also lead to cancer and Alzheimer's disease.

There is a prohibition of selling a substance that causes cancer, yet the FDA kow-tows to Big Pharma in deference to patients who can do as well or better with natural approaches to health problems.

And yes, there is a "cholesterol myth" but the FDA doesn't tell you about this either. The agency just waits for another BIG PAYOFF from Big Pharma to push yet another dangerous drug with little or no benefit, except taking your money...

Wonder why only Swanson and Sunburst Biorganics brands are being attacked when there are a number of companies selling RRY? I am waiting for this answer too, just as I wait for a prescribing physician to explain the risks of the statin drugs to their patients.

FDA Warns Against Use of Red Yeast Rice Supplements

ROCKVILLE, Md., Aug. 10 -- The FDA has warned consumers against using three brands of red yeast rice, a product marketed as a natural remedy for high cholesterol, because they may contain lovastatin, the active ingredient in Mevacor.

The products, marketed in stores or on the Web, are Red Yeast Rice and Red Yeast Rice/Policosonal Complex, sold by Swanson Healthcare Products, and manufactured by Nature's Value, and Kabco, respectively; and Cholestrix, sold by Sunburst Biorganics.

FDA investigators conducting routine testing of the supplement detected lovastatin, which was the first statin approved by the FDA. It has been available as a generic drug since 2002.

Steven Galson, M.D., M.P.H., director of FDA's Center for Drug Evaluation and Research, said consumers may be unaware of side effects associated with lovastatin. These include rhabdomyolysis, especially when lovastatin is combined with the antidepressant nefazodone, certain antibiotics, drugs for fungal infections and HIV infections, and other cholesterol-lowering medications.

The FDA recommended that consumers who use any red yeast rice product obtain medical advice if they have muscle pain or other problems that may be associated with the red yeast.

The agency issued warning letters advising Swanson and Sunburst Biorganics to stop promoting and selling the products.

The FDA's warning letters said that the products Red Yeast Rice, Red Yeast Rice/Policosonal Complex, and Cholestrix represent unapproved new drugs that are marketed in violation of the Federal Food, Drug, and Cosmetic Act.

More Folly

With flu season gearing up for another frivolus PR campaign, watch that trap that goes for the jab!

Bush Set To Veto To Remove Mercury From Infant Vaccines
Posted by: SAFE MINDS
on 07-20-2007.

"HHS-Labor-Education Appropriations Bill has objectionable provisions such as a measure to ban the use of childhood flu vaccines that contain thimerosal."

President Bush would veto the HHS-Labor-Education Appropriations Bill because of the cost and "objectionable provisions" such as a measure to ban the use of childhood flu vaccines that contain thimerosal, a mercury-based preservative.

Autism advocacy groups are outraged because President Bush stated in a questionnaire during his 2004 campaign: "I support the removal of Thimerosal from vaccines on the childhood national vaccine schedule. During a second term as President, I will continue to support increased funding to support a wide variety of research initiatives aimed at seeking definitive causes and/or triggers of autism. It is important to note that while there are many possible theories about causes or triggers of autism, no one material has been definitely included or excluded."

But since 2005, President Bush has steadfastly refused to issue an Executive Order banning high amounts of mercury in vaccines that would protect children and pregnant women despite repeated requests from the autism community that he uphold his campaign promise. Under his current administration, mercury has been and will continue to be knowingly injected into the youngest of American citizens. The controversial mercury-containing preservative thimerosal has been linked by thousands of parents as being the cause of their children's mercury poisoning and autism.

The flu vaccine which continues to be manufactured with mercury is recommended for all pregnant women, infants and children despite the fact that the Institute of Medicine in 2001 recommended against the policy of exposing these same sensitive groups to thimerosal containing vaccines. According to the EPA, one in every six women of childbearing age already has blood levels of mercury high enough to cause neurological damage to their unborn children due to environmental exposures alone.

"Injecting even more mercury into the bodies of pregnant women, infants and children when it is not a necessary component of vaccines is just bad medicine," said Lyn Redwood, president of SafeMinds and parent of a mercury-injured child. "It defies logic that a flu vaccine must be disposed of as a hazardous waste if it is not used, but somehow injecting the same mercury-containing vaccine into a baby is safe."

another thought might be the expense of hazardous waste disposal or maybe a connection with behavioral change and cellular (EMF/WI-FI) transmissions...
only the Shadow knows!

Dialing for Dinosaurs

Polls are interesting, usually because a predetermined result is expected based upon the way one writes the questions to be posed. I learned this in grad school when reading a required text titled "How to Lie With Statistics".

While I've always been skeptical of polls, based on my knowledge, this one isn't too bad.

Of course you would have to admit, if you read this blog regularly, I am a bit biased in favor of natural health care. My bias is because I know it works and I want all people to be able to have the option as their right of choice. Some will choose it, some will not.

Part of the problem lies with doctors who refuse to admit that non-medical treatment options offer hope and benefit.

Consider the Everett WA cardiologist in the Western Washington Medical Group who was exceptionally rude and disrespectful to a client of mine who was there for an evaluation of her condition.

I gave her a medicalarticle addressing the effective use of three supplements for heart conditions.

This doctor refused it and instead of looking at it and taking it for further reading, threw it back to her saying "I don't know anything about this, and it's not proven."

The same attitude prevails withe the cancer industry and the providers who adamantly adhere to false knowledge that supplements, nutritional, herbal and other treatments
do not work for cancer or interfere with the slash and burn techniques of chemo and radiation.

The best one I've hear came from a client taking chemo in a Lewiston, ID medical center. She was told not to eat broccoli because it would interfere with the chemo.

Now my take on that is that, yes, it interferes for the better because the brassica family of foods, of which broccoli is a member, is anti-cancerand so you would ultimately be able to get a better effect and possibly take fewer treatments.

For the 9.6% that stick with what they believe is 'proven', it might help them to know that it really isn't. The current methods are just what is used, and the real effective rate of cure is about 2%. It's the old rule, "we've always done it this way so we will keep doing it this way" mentality. After all, it is a cash cow first, and maybe a few might survive the damage. Survive the treatment's damage? Maybe that's good is you move on to a life on a lot of drugs to keep living in a compromised state.

What concerns me is the misunderstanding shown in the last section of questions. The majority of supplements are already proven to be safe and effective. The science is there. It's just that the consumer never hears about this body of knowledge.

And media outlets like MSNBC fail in their mission to give you the facts. Maybe Dan Abrams or Keith Olbermann will read this and call me to explain.

So, if 52% of those questioned would try something different, or 41% keep taking supplements it is a good thing. Then, I think the dinosaurs of the AMA and mainstream medicine should get going and read up on some of the proven studies, get a second opinion from me or take some of my classes.

Media pollsters can do the same.

52% Would Try Alternatives Over Chemo
MSNBC, 9 August, 07

Would you be willing to try alternative medicine for a serious health condition?
*3637 responses

Yes, I'd try an alternative therapy before undergoing something proven but unhealthy, such as chemo.
52%

I might supplement my doctor's suggested treatment with natural medicine.
33%

No. I'm sticking to what the medical community has found to be tried and true.
9.6%

I'm not sure.
5.3%

Do you take dietary supplements, including herbs and vitamins?
*8457 responses

Regularly
84%

Occasionally
8.8%

No
7.7%

Will the FDA's new manufacturing standards for supplements change your mind on the products?
* 8420 responses

Yes. At least now I'll know they contain what they promise and aren't contaminated with something scary.
45%

No. I already trust the supplements I take, so this won't make a difference to me.
41%

No. Makers of these products still don't have to prove they do any good. I'll keep steering clear.
6.3%

I'm not sure.
7.8%
http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/19371372/

More Junque Science

The first question I have to pose is, "Who paid for this study?"

The second issue is the one that perhaps is much more important, stomach cancer.

It may be considered 'safe' to use these very mas marketed drugs if you have a concern for the health of your heart. And it may not, over longterm use. Of course no one is telling.

And what else they are not telling you, is something very important, and something we've addressed in other posts on this BLOG.

Nexium and Prilosec block what is called the P450 Cytochrome Pathway.

The P450 Cytochrome Pathway is critical to detoxification physiology that occurs in your liver.

When you use these drugs consistently your body incurs a risk of severe toxicity and the degelopment of stomach cancer, or cancers in corresponding organs such as the liver, pancreas, et al.

Now, when you have 'heartburn' one of the reasons is that you have TOO LITTLE hydrochloric acid in your stomach and you don't digest protein very well. Another is that you do not chew your food thoroughly, because, in case you did not know, digestion starts in the mouth.

It's that gulp and go process that dogs do all the time, but they are geared up for it by their physiology.

Another concern, especially if you are very, very young or over 35, is that you do not have adequate digestive enzymes to help you with proper digestion and assimilation of nutrients.

Then you could try a teaspoon of raw organic apple cider vinegar in a glass of water about 15 minutes before you eat, or a lick of celtic or Nine Times Taoist salt.

20 mg Prilosec Rx costs $360.97, active ingredients cost $0.52, profit is 69,417%.

And for your additional consideration -

Long term side effect of stomach acid blockers such as Pepcid, Tagamet, Zantac, Prilosec.
Potentially harmful acidity develops in the tissues of the body when the system's ability to eliminate the acids that are produced (metabolic waste, acid forming foods, and the system's various stress mechanisms) is reduced. The stomach is one of the primary venting mechanisms for this build up of hydrogen ions (acids are typified by an abundance of such ions) and when our stomach's acid producing mechanisms are pharmaceutically inhibited, the hydrogen ion concentrations become too abundant to be efficiently eliminated by other pathways of elimination. Consequently, the acids build up in the tissues and fluid compartments of the body, where they greatly interfere with the normal cellular functions. The overly acidic condition of the intercellular fluid compartment makes it an ideal breeding ground for harmful micro-organisms, creating an enormous burden on the immune system. This build-up can lead to fatigue, poor mental and emotional health and eventual chronic degenerative illness.

Stomach Acid Suppression and Increased Risk of Pneumonia -
The normal acidity of the stomach via hydrochloric acid production acts as a natural protective barrier against bacteria and viruses. Apparently, chronic use of acid suppressing medications increases risk for pneumonia. Normally the gastric pH is below 4, an environment that kills most pathogens. However, the dispensing of antacids can interfere with this natural barrier and lead to increased colonization of ingested pathogens.
Risk of Community-Acquired Pneumonia and Use of Gastric Acid-Suppressive Drugs. Laheij, RJF, et al. JAMA 292,16, 2004

Nutrient Depletion caused by acid blocking drugs -
Lansoprazole: 1) Omeprazole, a drug closely related to lansoprazole, taken for seven days led to a near-total loss of stomach acid in healthy people and interfered with the absorption of a single administration of 120 mg of beta-carotene.1 It is unknown whether repeated administration of beta-carotene would overcome this problem or if absorption of carotenoids from food would be impaired. Persons taking omeprazole and related acid-blocking drugs for long periods may want to have carotenoid blood levels checked, eat plenty of fruits and vegetables, and consider supplementing with carotenoids. 2) Folic acid is needed by the body to utilize vitamin B12. Antacids, including lansoprazole, inhibit folic acid absorption.2 People taking antacids are advised to supplement with folic acid. 3) Omeprazole, a drug closely related to lansoprazole, has interfered with the absorption of vitamin B12 from food (though not supplements) in some,3 4 but not all, studies.5 6 This interaction has not yet been reported with lansoprazole. However, a fall in vitamin B12 status may result from decreased stomach acid caused by acid blocking drugs, including lansoprazole.

Omeprazole: 1) Folic acid is needed by the body to utilize vitamin B12. Antacids, including omeprazole, inhibit folic acid absorption.1 People taking antacids are advised to supplement with folic acid. 2) Omeprazole interferes with the absorption of vitamin B12 from food (though not from supplements) in some2 3 4 5 but not all6 7 studies. A true deficiency state, resulting in vitamin B12-deficiency anemia, has only been reported in one case.8 The fall in vitamin B12 status may result from the decrease in stomach acid required for vitamin B12 absorption from food caused by the drug. This problem may possibly be averted by drinking acidic juices when eating foods containing vitamin B12. However, all people taking omeprazole need to either supplement with vitamin B12 or have their vitamin B12 status checked on a yearly basis. Even relatively small amounts of vitamin B12 such as 10–50 mcg per day, are likely to protect against drug induced vitamin depletion.

Our advice - ask what the risks are versus benefit before you accept a drug.

Ask what options are available, starting with sound nutrition and lifestyle changes.

FDA: Heartburn drugs seem OK for heart

9 August 2007

The popular heartburn drugs Prilosec and Nexium don't appear to spur heart problems, say preliminary U.S. and Canadian probes announced Thursday.

The Food and Drug Administration and its Canadian counterpart began reviewing the drugs, used by tens of millions of people, back in May, when manufacturer AstraZeneca provided them an early analysis of two small studies that suggested the possibility of a risk.

Those studies compared treating the chronic heartburn known as gastroesophageal reflux disease, or GERD, with either of the two drugs or with surgery, and tracked patients for five to 14 years. The company's initial analysis counted more patients treated with drugs who had had heart attacks, heart failure or heart-related sudden death.

The FDA followed up on those studies, and found that they seemed skewed: Patients who underwent surgery were younger and healthier than those treated by drugs, suggesting the heart link was a coincidence.

While the studies' designs make safety assessments difficult, many of the participants who developed heart problems had risk factors before starting the drugs, Health Canada said Thursday.

The FDA then looked at 14 additional studies of the drugs, and found no evidence of heart risks. In fact, in a few studies where patients received either medication or a dummy pill, those who took the heartburn drugs actually had a lower incidence of heart problems.

The FDA plans to complete its probe within three months, but issued a public notice Thursday that it "does not believe that health care providers or patients should change either their prescribing practices or their use of these products at this time."

Health Canada reached the same initial conclusion. It also urged doctors and patients to make no changes until its own probe is finished by year's end, noting that untreated GERD can lead to serious complications.

The drugs are among a family of acid-reducers known as proton pump inhibitors. FDA's Dr. Paul Seligman said Thursday that while the agency's focus is on Nexium and Prilosec, it is "interested in the data from all similar products" as it looks for all available evidence to settle the heart question.

Nexium is the world's No. 2 selling drug, with 2006 sales of $6.7 billion, according to health care research firm IMS Health.

More on Natural Cancer Therapies

Dr Tullio Simoncini believes that cancer doesn’t depend on mysterious causes (genetic, immunological or auto immunological) as the official oncology proposes, but it comes down from a simple fungal infection, whose destroying power in the deep tissues is actually under estimated.

His Premise -

The present work is based on the conviction, supported by many years of observations, comparisons and experiences, that the necessary and sufficient cause of the tumour is to be sought in the vast world of the fungi, the most adaptable, aggressive and evolved micro-organisms known in nature.

I have tried many times to explain this theory to leading institutions involved in cancer issues (the Ministry of Health, the Italian Medical Oncological Association, etc.) elaborating on my thinking, but I have been brushed aside because of the impossibility of setting my idea in a conventional context.

A different, international audience represents the possibility of sharing a view about health, which differs, from what is widely accepted by today's medical community, either officially or from the sidelines.

There is an opposition between the allopathic and the Hippocratic medical ideal. The former has the disadvantage of its inability to consider the individual as a whole. Therefore it brings with it all the distortions and aberrations which such a point of view entails (excessive specialisation, therapeutic aggressiveness, superficiality, harmfulness etc.). The latter approach instead tends in the direction of being too generic, non-scientific, and devoid of therapeutic incisiveness.

The position that I promote represents instead a meeting point of these two conceptions of health, since, from the conceptual point of view, it sublimates and adds value to both, while highlighting how they both are victims of a common conformist language.

The hypothesis of a fungal aetiology in chronic-degenerative illness, able to connect the ethical qualities of the individual with the development of specific pathologies, reconciles the two orientations (allopathic and holistic) of medicine. The hypothesis is a strong candidate for being that missing element of psychosomatics that has been sought but never found by one of the fathers of psychosomatics, Wiktor Von Weiszäcker.

In considering the biological dimensions of the fungi, for instance, it is possible to compare the different degrees of pathogenicity in relation to the condition of organs, tissues and cells of a guest organism, which in turn also and especially depend on the behaviour of the individual.

Each time the recuperative abilities of a known psycho-physic structure are exceeded, there is an inevitable exposure, even considering possible accidental cofounders, to the aggression -- even at the smallest dimensions -- of those external agents that otherwise would be harmless.

In the presence of an indubitable connection between patient morale and disease it is no longer legitimate to separate the two domains (allopathic and naturopathic) which are both indispensable for improving the health of individuals.

The Platonic separation of the human mind from the human body, responsible for the present mechanistic and materialistic character of today's medicine, is outdated. So is the pessimistic Kantian position concerning integration of the rational and emotional sides of man ("the starred sky above me, the moral law within me"), which generates the present myopia of today's medical epistemology. With such outdated cognitive frameworks inevitably come all the mindsets that carry similar restrictive and limiting presuppositions.

There's More to IVC for Cancer Than Doctors Admit

Biochemical individuality based nutritional therapy is the core of health. I work from this model every day and see great results. I too wish more people had this knowledge and therapy available to them. I also with that more medical people would open their minds to this process.

Dr. Gayle

INTRAVENOUS VITAMIN C and CANCER, from the orthomolecular perspective

"...it takes much more than logic and clear-cut demonstrations to overcome the inertia and dogma of established thought." — Irving Stone

Irving Stone was an early thinker and writer about vitamin C (its scientific name is ascorbic acid). He knew it would be an uphill battle to change the way the medical profession viewed vitamin C. While most doctors accept that scurvy is a vitamin C deficiency illness, few have made the rather humongous jump to seeing high dose intravenous vitamin C as a major player in the management of cancer.

There is actually a wide spectrum of medical uses for vitamin C. Evidence exists documenting it as the best antiviral agent now available ... IF used at the proper dose. Vitamin C can neutralize and eliminate a wide range of toxins. Vitamin C will enhance host resistance, greatly augmenting the immune system's ability to neutralize bacterial and fungal infections. Now the National Institutes of Health has published evidence demonstrating vitamin C's anti-cancer properties. With so many medical benefits, why do so few doctors know of them?

One explanation stems from ascorbic acid's designation as a "vitamin." Consider Dorland's Illustrated Medical Dictionary's definition of vitamin: A general term for a number of unrelated organic substances that occur in many foods in small amounts that are necessary in trace amounts for the normal metabolic functioning of the body. As a vitamin, only a minuscule 60 mg of ascorbic acid is needed to prevent the emergence of scurvy symptoms. As a medical treatment for cancer and life-threatening infections and toxic exposures, tens of thousands of milligrams of ascorbic acid must be administered, often by the intravenous (IV) as well as the oral route.

The Center's founder, Dr. Hugh Riordan, was a true scientist who believed in the power of scientific measurement over dogma. With the establishment of The Center in 1975, he routinely checked plasma vitamin C levels in chronically ill patients. He found these sick patients to be consistently low in their plasma C levels. Interestingly enough, the cancer patients he was seeing had VERY LOW vitamin C reserves. This matched scientific literature documenting low vitamin C levels in cancer patients. Cancer cells were actively taking up vitamin C in a way that depleted tissue reserves of C.

PET scans are commonly ordered by oncologists to evaluate their cancer patients for metastases (cancer spread to other organs). What is actually injected into the patient at the start of the scan is radioactive glucose. Cancer cells are anaerobic obligates, which means they depend upon glucose as their primary source of metabolic fuel. Cancer cells employ transport mechanisms called glucose transporters to actively pull in glucose.

In the vast majority of animals, vitamin C is synthesized from glucose in only four metabolic steps. Hence, the molecular shape of vitamin C is remarkably similar to glucose. (Figure 1) Cancer cells will actively transport vitamin C into themselves, possibly because they mistake it for glucose. Another plausible explanation is that they are using the vitamin C as an antioxidant. Regardless, the vitamin C accumulates in cancer cells.

If large amounts of vitamin C are presented to cancer cells, large amounts will be absorbed. In these unusually large concentrations, the antioxidant vitamin C will start behaving as a pro-oxidant as it interacts with intracellular copper and iron. This chemical interaction produces small amounts of hydrogen peroxide.

Because cancer cells are relatively low in an intracellular anti-oxidant enzyme called catalase, the high dose vitamin C induction of peroxide will continue to build up until it eventually lyses the cancer cell from the inside out! This effectively makes high dose IVC a non-toxic chemotherapeutic agent that can be given in conjunction with conventional cancer treatments. Based on the work of several vitamin C pioneers before him, Dr. Riordan was able to prove that vitamin C was selectively toxic to cancer cells if given intravenously. This research was recently reproduced and published by Dr. Mark Levine at the National Institutes of Health.

As feared by many oncologists, small doses may actually help the cancer cells because small amounts of vitamin C may help the cancer cells arm themselves against the free-radical induced damage caused by chemotherapy and radiation. Only markedly higher doses of vitamin C will selectively build up as peroxide in the cancer cells to the point of acting in a manner similar to chemotherapy. These tumor-toxic dosages can only be obtained by intravenous administration.

Over a span of 15 years of vitamin C research, Dr. Riordan's RECNAC (cancer spelled backwards) research team generated 20 published papers on vitamin C and cancer. RECNAC even inspired its second cancer research institute, known as RECNAC II, at the University of Puerto Rico. This group recently published an excellent paper in Integrative Cancer Therapies, titled "Orthomolecular Oncology Review: Ascorbic Acid and Cancer 25 Years Later." RECNAC data has shown that vitamin C is toxic to tumor cells without sacrificing the performance of chemotherapy.

Intravenous vitamin C also does more than just kill cancer cells. It boosts immunity. It can stimulate collagen formation to help the body wall off the tumor. It inhibits hyaluronidase, an enzyme that tumors use to metastasize and invade other organs throughout the body. It induces apoptosis to help program cancer cells into dying early. It corrects the almost universal scurvy in cancer patients. Cancer patients are tired, listless, bruise easily, and have a poor appetite. They don't sleep well and have a low threshold for pain. This adds up to a very classic picture of scurvy that generally goes unrecognized by their conventional physicians.

When Center cancer patients receive IVC, they report that their pain level goes down, and that they are better able to tolerate their chemotherapy. They bounce back quicker since the IVC reduces the toxicity of the chemotherapy and radiation without compromising their cancer cell killing effects. IVC is complementary to oncologic care. IVC is not "either/or" - it's a good "both/and" proposition. IVC can help cancer patients withstand the effects of their traditional therapies, heal faster, be more resilient to infection, develop a better appetite, and remain more active overall. These things promote a better response to their cancer therapy.

IVC has been used for three decades here at The Center. There have been no serious complications, but there are a couple of potential complications that need to be screened for. Because vitamin C enhances iron absorption, iron overload must be ruled out. The high sodium load of IVC can create a fluid overload in a patient with congestive heart failure, renal insufficiency or failure. We also check our patients for G6PD deficiency (an enzyme used to maintain stability of the red blood cell membranes). Although many physicians worry that large doses of vitamin C may cause kidney stones, we have rarely seen the phenomenon, and several huge clinical trials in the medical literature refute this misconception.

To summarize, most organisms make their own vitamin C. When they are under stress, either by illness or injury, Mother Nature has provided them with a means to facilitate healing: they synthesize more ascorbic acid. As a result, they are in less pain, they remain active, they can sleep, and they have a better appetite: all functions which promote healing.

Dr. Riordan once said that here at The Center, we don't treat cancer... we treat people who happen to have cancer. IVC is a tool that allows our Center physicians to harness a healing mechanism that our human ancestors lost long ago: the ability to dramatically increase tissue levels of vitamin C. Research shows that the astonishingly high levels achievable only by IVC not only help fight the risk of infection and the pain of metastases, they actually aid in the defeat of the cancer cells themselves, through a very elegant mechanism that does no harm to healthy cells. It's a discovery that the medical world is only beginning to discover.

Ron Hunninghake, M.D.,
Chief Medical Officer, Olive W. Garvey Center for Healing Arts

About Loss

Our deepest sympathy goes out to the families of those lost in the Minnesota bridge tragedy.

These same sentiments go daily to those lost in the terrible conflict in the mid-east, loved ones and families...

May peace be with you all.

Here's What's Up

The people's hero, David Graham, MD, a drug safety officer at the F.D.A., called for Avandia’s withdrawal. Dr. Graham estimated that its toxic effects on the heart had caused as many as 205,000 heart attacks, strokes and death from 1999 to 2006. For every month that Avandia is sold, he said, another 1,600 to 2,200 patients are likely to suffer from heart attacks and strokes, some of them fatal.

Meanwhile, back at 'the ranch'- depending on whether you define this as the Oval Office which benefits from millions in Pharma Cartel money, the new 'faster track' fast-track drug approval for money scheme, thousands paid in lobbying efforts to senators and representatives to pass the recent drug bill originally brought to you by Teddy Kennedy, or the failure to pass a Medicare drug bill allowing price negotiation (a Bush giveaway) - the people have been had. Especially any one with diabetes.

We reported over four years ago to all the people with diabetes on our news service alert plan the cardiac risks of Avandia. Readers of our most recent newsletter learned more.

This is not unlike how more than fifteen years ago we began warning women NOT to submit to mammography because it DOES cause cancer. Today you read this same news again because someone did a new study. yet when do you see that there has been a change to thermography or ultrasound for diagnosis in all these years. You don't. And you don't because of the $$$.

We agree with Dr. Graham. In the mean time, so should you.

We also agree that everyone should force this issue with their elected officials, especially if they are ones who voted for this FDA bill (see a recent post about being screwed by Congress). And we strongly agree that there should be NO drug on the market with any serious health risk as a side effect. For the FDA, to do less is unconscionable.

Read here about drugs: http://Rxlist.com (skip the patient information, because that's just fluff).

And if you want to know healthful and safe approaches to prevent and care for diabetes, let us know. The VA has proven it is reversible, so the facts are in.

There is help for Type I too.

Advisers: Avandia should stay on market

By ANDREW BRIDGES, Associated Press Writer Mon Jul 30, 6:41 PM ET

The widely used diabetes drug Avandia should remain on the market, government health advisers overwhelmingly recommended Monday, saying evidence of an increased risk of heart attack doesn't merit removal.

The nonbinding recommendation to the Food and Drug Administration came on a 22-1 vote by the panel.

"We're being asked today to take a very draconian action based on studies that have very significant weaknesses and are inadequate for us to make that kind of decision," said Rebecca Killion, a diabetic from Bowie, Md., and the panel's patient representative.

However, in an earlier 20-3 vote, the panelists said that available data show the drug does increase heart risks.

Panelists said the drug's label should include a so-called "black-box" warning, the most severe the FDA can require, to flag that risk. Some suggested the label caution against using the drug together with insulin because doing so may elevate heart risks. That joint use is currently FDA-approved. The experts also asked that the drug be studied further.

The FDA isn't required to follow the advice of its advisory committees but usually does.

The manufacturer, GlaxoSmithKline PLC, earlier recommended continuing long-term studies of the drug and updating the label to inform doctors and patients of what's known so far about any heart risks. FDA scientist Dr. David Graham said waiting for more results could subject as many as 2,200 people a month to serious side effects from the drug.

Graham also told the joint panel of experts that the drug's heart risks, combined with its lack of unique short-term benefits in helping diabetics control blood sugar, meant continued sales were not justified.

But Glaxo contended there is no increased risk, citing its own analyses of studies of Avandia, also called rosiglitazone.

"The number of myocardial infarctions is small, the data are inconsistent and there is no overall evidence rosiglitazone is different from any other oral antidiabetes agents," said Dr. Ronald Krall, the company's senior vice president and chief medical officer.

Previously, the FDA had said information from dozens of studies pointed to an increased risk of heart attack.

That conclusion swayed the panel but apparently did not rise to the level of requiring any regulatory action more dire than beefed-up warnings and continued scrutiny.

"It's suggestive but by no means conclusive," said Dr. Thomas Pickering, an assistant professor of medicine at Columbia University Medical Center.

The lone dissenting panel member on the main vote, Arthur Levin, said there was a strong suggestion of a safety signal. That, along with widely shared doubts that further study would settle the issue and the enormity of the potential risk to the public health, moved him to vote "no."

"I logically can't find any way to leave this drug on the market," said Levin, director of the Center for Medical Consumers in New York.

About 1 million Americans with Type 2 diabetes use Avandia to control blood sugar by increasing the body's sensitivity to insulin. That sort of treatment has long been presumed to lessen the heart risks already associated with the disease, which is linked to obesity. News that Avandia might actually increase those risks would represent a "serious limitation" of the drug's benefit, according to the FDA.

Graham's boss, Dr. Gerald Dal Pan, also said the balance between the risks and benefits of Avandia didn't favor the drug. But the FDA isn't of one mind on the drug: the issue exposed a rift between agency officials charged with approving new medicines and those who monitor their safety once on the market.

"It is important that the committee understand there is a fundamental disagreement within (the FDA's drugs office) on the scientific conclusions that should be drawn," said Dr. Robert Meyer, head of the FDA office that reviews new diabetes drugs.

The FDA moved up the date of Monday's meeting after the May publication of a study in The New England Journal of Medicine that generated new concerns about Avandia's safety. The analysis of 42 studies revealed a 43 percent higher risk of heart attack for those taking Avandia compared with people taking other diabetes drugs or no diabetes medication.

Separately, the FDA is working to add so-called "black box" warnings to the labels of both Avandia and a second oral diabetes drug, Actos, to caution patients about the increased risk of heart failure associated with the drugs. That risk is separate from those discussed Monday.

The diabetes epidemic affects more than 18 million Americans. Most have Type 2, where the body makes too little insulin or cannot use what it does produce.

Each day, there are 4,100 new cases of diabetes in the United States, and 810 deaths, said Dr. Robert Ratner, vice president of medical affairs at the MedStar Research Institute. Of those deaths, 60 percent are due to heart disease, Ratner told the panel.

Congress has pointed to Avandia as evidence of FDA's fumbling of safety problems that emerge long after drugs win agency approval. The House and Senate are at work on legislation to overhaul the FDA.
___

On the Net:
http://www.nytimes.com/2007/07/30/health/30cnd-avandia.html?ei=5090&en=99cebe0695132539&ex=1343448000&adxnnl=1&partner=rssuserland&emc=rss&adxnnlx=1185915836-9+YCcKa2QolwI3fgltYfOA&pagewanted=print
Avandia: http://www.avandia.com/
Food and Drug Administration: http://www.fda.gov/

July 30, 2007
F.D.A. Panel Votes to Keep Diabetes Drug on Market
By GARDINER HARRIS

GAITHERSBURG, Md., July 30 — A federal drug advisory committee voted 20 to 3 late this afternoon that Avandia, a controversial diabetes drug made by GlaxoSmithKline, raises the risks of heart attacks, but it then voted 22 to 1 that the drug should nonetheless remain on the market.

The divided vote came after committee members said that studies concerning Avandia were too murky to merit drastic regulatory action and that other diabetes medicines might have similar risks.

“My feeling here is that we’re being asked to take a very draconian action based on studies that are very inadequate for us to make that kind of decision,” said Rebecca Killion, a patient representative and committee member from Bowie, Md.

Dr. Clifford J. Rosen, chairman of the committee who is from St. Joseph Hospital in Bangor, Me., said after the meeting that “there was enough concern on the advisory committee that virtually everybody felt there was risk” of heart attacks from taking Avandia.

Patients who have congestive heart failure or a history of cardiovascular disease, or those taking insulin or nitrates should not be given Avandia, Dr. Rosen said.

“There are going to be changes in the way this is promoted and certainly in how physicians use this drug,” Dr. Rosen predicted.

GlaxoSmithKline told the committee that it did not believe that Avandia increases the risks of heart attacks “and we still don’t,” said Christopher A. Viehbacher, president of the company’s American drug business, after the meeting ended.

He said that if the F.D.A. ordered a strong warning placed on Avandia’s label, some patients would take other medicines that might be more dangerous. “I don’t think it’s a slam dunk yet as to what the F.D.A. is going to do with this,” he said.

The votes came after an extraordinary meeting in which officials from the Food and Drug Administration, which brought the committee together, openly disagreed with one another about the right course to take.

Dr. David Graham, a drug safety officer at the F.D.A., called for the drug’s withdrawal and estimated that its toxic effects on the heart had caused as many as 205,000 heart attacks, strokes and death from 1999 to 2006. For every month that Avandia is sold, he said, another 1,600 to 2,200 patients are likely to suffer from heart attacks and strokes, some of them fatal.

Dr. Robert Meyer, director of the office within the F.D.A. that approved Avandia’s initial application, immediately disagreed with Dr. Graham.

“I think it’s important that the committee understand there’s a fundamental disagreement” within the agency, he said. Other diabetes drugs also have risks, Dr. Meyer said, and doctors and patients need a variety of treatment options.

Dr. Douglas C. Throckmorton, a deputy director of the F.D.A.’s center for drugs, explained at a news conference after the meeting that the split within the agency resulted from the “complexity” of the issue.

The F.D.A. usually follows the advice of its advisory committees, especially when the votes are so lopsided. Agency officials said they did not know when they would come to a decision and refused to characterize the form that any new Avandia warning might take.

The open disagreement within the F.D.A. reflects a fierce debate that has occurred among diabetes experts across the country since The New England Journal of Medicine published a study in May suggesting that Avandia increases the risks of heart attacks.

In the revelations since then, F.D.A. officials have said that GlaxoSmithKline told the agency about these risks nearly two years ago, but that because of fierce internal disagreements, the agency never warned patients about them. In Europe, regulators required that the drug’s label reflect some concerns about these risks.

The agency’s lack of action helped persuade some lawmakers to support legislation that has since passed both the House and Senate that provides the agency with more money and power to police drug safety issues. That legislation is expected to be sent to President Bush within days.

About a million patients in the United States took Avandia last year, and a nearly identical number took Actos, a similar pill made by Takeda that may be safer. Avandia’s global sales last year totaled $3.4 billion, but its sales have plunged since May.

The Avandia controversy largely revolves around whether several highly complex statistical analyses of dozens of studies show that Avandia increases the risks of heart attacks. Separate from this argument, there is considerable evidence that both Avandia and Actos worsen the condition of heart failure.

Dr. Murray Stewart, a GlaxoSmithKline vice president, said that in recent months the company has examined data from several large managed care companies in the United States that included 1.35 million patients with diabetes. The company’s analyses, he said, showed that patients who took Avandia suffered no greater risk of heart attack or death from heart problems.

The committee disagreed, with most members saying that while GlaxoSmithKline should continue to market Avandia, the F.D.A. should place strict warnings on its label.

“I also think there needs to be a stiffening of the warnings,” said Dr. Peter J. Savage, a committee member from the National Institutes of Health, echoing the comments of others.

Dr. Steven Nissen, a Cleveland Clinic cardiologist who authored the study in The New England Journal of Medicine in May, said in an interview after the hearing that he would have voted to remove Avandia from the market. But he said he was encouraged that the committee “affirmed the finding that there was an increased cardiovascular risk from the drug.”

He predicted that Avandia’s sales would plunge with the new warning.

The disagreements within the F.D.A. affected almost every aspect of the hearing. In their presentations, Dr. Graham and his boss, Dr. Gerald Dal Pan, both referred to studies that suggested that Actos is safer to the heart than Avandia. But the Actos studies have not been thoroughly reviewed by the F.D.A., and the underlying data from them were not given to committee members.

When asked why, Dr. Graham said that “we were promised that that would be done for this meeting.” Officials eventually explained that the agency did not enough resources to get the analysis done for the meeting, he said.

“So then I’m faced with a dilemma,” Dr. Graham said. “Do I keep silent about that and not breathe a word of it, or do I present it?”

Dr. John R. Teerlink, a committee member from the University of California in San Francisco, said that the agency should “either have the political will to either schedule the meeting when we had the data or not to present data that we couldn’t look at.”

The public debate about Avandia has brought about a remarkable number of independent examinations of the drug’s safety, and several researchers shared their findings with the committee during the hearing’s open public comment period.

Executives with both Tricare, a managed care company that serves active and retired military personnel, and WellPoint, a huge health insurer, said they had found no evidence in their records that patients given Avandia had suffered more heart attacks.

Dr. Sidney Wolfe of the drug safety advocacy group Public Citizen, said F.D.A. records show that Avandia has a lot more problems associated with it than just heart risks.

“If Avandia were up for approval today, based on what we know now, it would be rejected,” he said.

Multiple speakers reminded the committee that few diseases have a greater public health impact than diabetes. Each day in the United States, there are 4,100 new diabetes cases and 810 deaths from the disease, said Dr. Robert E. Ratner of the MedStar Research Institute in Washington. Also every day, about 230 diabetes patients suffer amputations, 120 suffer kidney failure and 55 go blind.

He said that while controlling blood sugar levels has proven health benefits in the short term, no study has proven that diabetes drugs extend lives.

“We’re not keeping people alive with our drug therapy because our drug therapy isn’t adequate,” he said. And he said that no diabetes medicine has conclusively proven that it helps protect the heart. He also noted that diabetes patients often fail to take their medicines properly, and that doctors often fail to treat the disease aggressively enough.

“Why do we need new therapies for type-two diabetes?” Dr. Ratner asked. “We have an epidemic of diabetes and its complication that will soon swamp our medical delivery system.”

Most diabetics die from heart disease, since the disease has severe effects on the heart. If Avandia actually increases the risks of heart attacks, that “denotes a serious limitation” of the drug’s usefulness, an F.D.A. reviewer concluded in a report before the meeting.

It's Drug Pushers and Junque Science Again...or Menstruation key to bone rebuilding

So with the mass marketing of Gardasil in timing with the push for a pill to stop your menstrual cycle, this report shows something close to normal human physiology.

Gee, maybe there is a way back to truth in labeling, or, as it were, scientific research without pre-determined outcomes.

My alarm went off with Gardasil, as readers of this BLOG well know. It also went off when the big ad campaign came out to get you to buy into how great life is without that part of being a woman that they want to deny you next.

One pill, no period.

Sounds easy, but did they forget to include in the ad all the problems you'll encounter because of the pill's nutrient depletions? Not!

And of course they probably forgot to mention that as you age, you just might be forced into a category of those swallowing TIDE.

Yes, bisphosphonates are made from by-products of laundry detergent. And, yes, they do destroy bone and increase your risk of developing esophageal cancer.

Aren't these baby boomers going to be a lucky bunch, while Merck, Pfizer, and P & G laugh all the way to the bank.

And then those natural types, like yours truly, will do what she can to educate others on the positive health benefits of menstruation.

This is also something your Taoist teacher will tell you if you listen.

Menstruation key to bone rebuilding in anorexics

Adequate nutrition can rebuild bone mass in women with anorexia, but the restoration of normal menstrual periods appears to be necessary for fully normal bone metabolism to be recovered, a new study shows.

"Our observations may be important to an understanding of the mechanism of possible reversal of osteoporosis in anorexia nervosa, for which there is as yet no effective treatment," Dr. Jennifer Dominguez of Columbia University Medical Center in New York City and her colleagues conclude.

Studies in which anorexic women have been given oral contraceptives or estrogen to help restore bone mass have had mixed results, Dominguez and her team note, while the process by which bone thinning occurs in these patients is not fully understood. Further, they add in the July issue of the American Journal of Clinical Nutrition, "the role of nutrition in the recovery of bone has been underestimated."

To better understand bone loss and rebuilding in these patients, the researchers followed 28 women with anorexia nervosa who were undergoing treatment to help regain weight, comparing them to a control group of 11 healthy young women.

After just over two months on nutrition therapy, the anorexia nervosa patients showed significant increases in bone mineral density, the researchers found. Patients' levels of the protein osteocalcin, which is secreted by bone cells and is a key marker of bone formation, also rose. But levels of N-telopeptide, a marker for bone breakdown, remained abnormally high, except among eight women who began menstruating normally after recovering 90 percent of their ideal body weight.

The average bone mineral density among women who didn't begin menstruating after treatment was lower than the bone mineral density for the women who started menstruating and the healthy controls.

The findings suggest, Dominguez and her colleagues note, that women with anorexia have normal to increased rates of bone formation, but that bone breakdown outpaces bone building, resulting in loss of bone mineral density.

"Our data suggest that nutritional therapy is critical and necessary for optimal effect of other therapies," the researchers write. These drugs include antiresorptives -- drugs that block bone breakdown - and estrogen replacement therapy. In fact, they add, such treatment may not be effective until nutritional therapy has restored normal bone formation.

SOURCE: American Journal of Clinical Nutrition, July 2007.

Doctor Wants More Money to do Basic Legal Care

Confused older patients die sooner according to an article today from Reuters.

This doesn't surprise me because most patients are confused about drugs and how to use them for several reasons.

One reason it seems to affect people with Medicare of Medicaid coverage is the bias against the poor in MSMed today. This is related to dictates of Big Insurance to doctors and others in the health industry, all relying on reimbursement.

Secondly, US Codes do require that a physician, nurse practitioner or physician assistant specifically explain the risks and benefits of using a drug and how to properly use it. There's more than just giving the information in the communication process, or don't medics get that?

And now why, with a risk of higher health care costs, do arrogant doctors deem they should neglect patients unless they get more KA-CHING?

EFFECTIVE COMMUNICATION'

Cancer patients are more intensively managed by health-care staff and may not need to be as personally involved in their own care, which may explain why health literacy did not affect their fates.

Dr. Anne Fabiny, chief of geriatrics at Cambridge Health Alliance in Massachusetts, said one of her patients made repeated trips to the emergency room when she felt dizzy from taking her daily blood pressure pills in one sitting.

The solution itself was easy: space out the doses over each day. The challenge was making sure her patient understood.

Many doctors do not check that their elderly patients can see or hear instructions in the first place, she added.

"I write out all my instructions for all my patients now (and) have them read the instructions back. If they can read it, (I ask) does that make sense to you?" Fabiny said in a telephone interview.

"Until physicians are compensated for the time it requires to have this sort of effective communication, it will continue to be a problem."

and here is the first part of the article by Ishani Ganguli

Understanding doctors' orders can be a matter of life or death for senior citizens: those who had trouble comprehending their physicians died sooner than their more savvy peers, U.S. researchers said on Monday.

Medicare clients who were confused by pill bottles or appointment slips were 52 percent more likely to die over the six years of the study, especially from heart disease.

"Patients with inadequate literacy know less about their diseases ... They are much more likely to be hospitalized," said Dr. David Baker of Northwestern University, who led the research.

"It's not just higher hospital rates. It's significantly higher mortality."

Baker and colleagues followed 3,260 Medicare patients 65 and older in four U.S. cities. To test the volunteers' so-called health literacy, which drops with age, they quizzed them on how well they understood prescription bottles, appointment slips and insurance forms.

"(We provided) a prescription bottle that says 'take this medicine on an empty stomach one hour before meals or two hours after.' The question is, you're going to eat lunch at noon, what time are you going to take this medicine?" Baker said in a telephone interview.

In another example: "Normal blood sugar is 80 to 130. Your blood sugar today is 160. Is your blood sugar normal? A quarter of patients couldn't get this correct," Baker said.

The 25 percent of people who got 55 percent or fewer of the questions right were rated as having inadequate health literacy. Another 11 percent scored as marginally literate and had a 13 percent higher chance of dying in the six years.

The findings held regardless of factors such as income and education, the researchers reported in the Archives of Internal Medicine.

Baker said he was not surprised that less literate patients were more vulnerable to death from heart disease -- which puts more burden on the patient to maintain their health.

"If somebody has heart problems or they have diabetes or high blood pressure, there's a whole host of things they need to be able to do to have good health in the future -- take medicines correctly, eat a low salt diet, exercise regularly," he said.

A New Approach Necessary, Not More New Drugs

"The so-called Sydney Declaration's central message is that governments need to dedicate more resources to HIV research if the world is to effectively combat the Aids pandemic.

The document says this will help speed up the implementation of new drugs and technologies to prevent, diagnose and treat an infection which has already killed 25 million people."

These are the last two paragraphs of the article linked in the headline above. I purposely highlighted a portion of the sentence in the first paragraph to call attention to something.

That something is faulty thinking or the traditional approach to solving a problem. I think this is what has to change.

It has to change because there is a nutritional approach that needs to be included in the fight against HIV/AIDS. These supplements are valuable and available, and low cost.

Instead of striking a deal with Big Pharma for low cost antiretroviral drugs, maybe Bill Clinton might do better if he'd become less linear in his thinking. If he changed his thinking he might get that there are negative effects of the problem and the drugs. Then he might go for something less harmful, with more promise and is easier to get to the people.

If you're interested in our approach just let us know.

Censure Required Over More Mercury

While politicians in D.C. contemplate their handouts from vaccine manufacturers like Merck (profits rising), no one seems interested in censuring Bush.

Perhaps he will come forward to volunteer himself, or perhaps his twin daughters, to take some mercury injections. This might be a viable experiment to gather data that might end the debacle once-and-for-all.

The mercury issue is just another example of administration double-speak. It is, in this case, tantamount to experimentation without consent.

But then this has been a long-existing US policy. Right mate?

And just another way to build profit for Bush cronies under the false assumption that flu vaccine works.

Using last year's flu to make this years vaccine is junque science of the highest order.

Remember, the ones who get sick are the ones who have had the shot...maybe it is dumbing down your immune system.

It's worth your time and consideration to keep you and your health from jumping off a cliff.

Bush Set To Veto HHS-Labor-Education Appropriations Bill Because of Provision To Remove Mercury From Infant Vaccines

According to the Congressional Quarterly (21 Jul 2007), the White House stated on Tuesday that President Bush would veto the HHS-Labor-Education Appropriations Bill because of the cost and "objectionable provisions" such as a measure to ban the use of childhood flu vaccines that contain thimerosal, a mercury-based preservative.

Autism advocacy groups are outraged because President Bush stated in a questionnaire during his 2004 campaign: "I support the removal of Thimerosal from vaccines on the childhood national vaccine schedule.

During a second term as President, I will continue to support increased funding to support a wide variety of research initiatives aimed at seeking definitive causes and/or triggers of autism. It is important to note that while there are many possible theories about causes or triggers of autism, no one material has been definitely included or excluded."

But since 2005, President Bush has steadfastly refused to issue an Executive Order banning high amounts of mercury in vaccines that would protect children and pregnant women despite repeated requests from the autism community that he uphold his campaign promise. Under his current administration, mercury has been and will continue to be knowingly injected into the youngest of American citizens. The controversial mercury-containing preservative thimerosal has been linked by thousands of parents as being the cause of their children's mercury poisoning and autism.

The flu vaccine which continues to be manufactured with mercury is recommended for all pregnant women, infants and children despite the fact that the Institute of Medicine in 2001 recommended against the policy of exposing these same sensitive groups to thimerosal containing vaccines.

According to the EPA, one in every six women of childbearing age already has blood levels of mercury high enough to cause neurological damage to their unborn children due to environmental exposures alone.

"Injecting even more mercury into the bodies of pregnant women, infants and children when it is not a necessary component of vaccines is just bad medicine," said Lyn Redwood, president of SafeMinds and parent of a mercury-injured child.

"It defies logic that a flu vaccine must be disposed of as a hazardous waste if it is not used, but somehow injecting the same mercury-containing vaccine into a baby is safe."

Cell Phone Safety

I have added several comments in parentheses. The cell phone companies do know of the hazards, the information can be found in their patent applications.

RADIATING INFORMATION

Radiation of cellular telephones is not danger free, as the cellular companies claim at present.

Therefore, the Doctors Chamber of Vienna has taken a responsible decision to make the public aware of the possibility of negative influences of cellular radiation, from a medical point of view.

10 MEDICAL RULES RELATING TO CELLULAR TELEPHONES

• In principle, telephone calls should be as few and as brief as possible. It is recommended that children and youth abstain from conducting cellular telephone calls!

• The cellular telephone should not be held near the head while sending out the call!

• Cellular telephones should not be used in vehicles (cars, buses, trains) – the radiation there is higher! (Inside buildings too)

• While sending SMS messages the cellular telephone should be held as far away as possible from the body!

• During a cellular telephone conversation a distance of several meters (6-8 feet)should be kept from other people – the radiation is harmful to them as well!

• No on-line games (GPRS) should be played on the cellular telephone!

• Wired speaker telephones are dubious – the wire conducts the radiation!

• LAN or UMTS wireless speaker telephones create a high radiation load!

• Cellular telephones should not be kept in trousers pockets – the radiation may harm masculine fertility!

• Cellular telephones should be turned off during the night (battery removed) and, they should be kept away from the sleeping area!

The Sunflower Project

I AM ELECTROSENSITIVE! PLEASE TURN OFF THE POWER ON YOUR CELL PHONE!

Thank you for your cooperation!

Even trace amounts of electromagnetic radiation (EMR) from devices like cell phones have a negative effect on my health – i.e. they make me feel sick.

I have a condition called Electrosensitivity, where even small amounts of EMR will have a negative effect on my well-being.

EMR/Microwaves from cell phones can cause the following symptoms:

(1) headaches, (2) heart pain and palpitations, (3) nausea, (4) inability to concentrate, (5) painful lymph nodes, and so on.

In the past few years, people with this condition have been growing exponentially.

We need your cooperation in creating an environment that is comfortable for everyone. Please keep your cell phone off when around others – and especially when in public vehicles like buses and trains.

What is Electrosensitivity? Electrosensitivity is a condition where a person will feel sick when exposed to the EMR given off by electronic devices such as mobile phones and computers. Symptoms appear when the person is exposed to the offending EMR and disappear when the said person moves away and is out of range of these offending EMR.

Major Symptoms: Headache, Sleep disturbances (Insomnia), Dizziness, Nausea, Heart Palpitations, Concentration Problems, Fatigue, Listlessness, Indigestion, Redness of Skin, Tingling Sensation, Anxiety Attacks, etc.

Fifty Percent of Population Affected by Year 2017? The percentage of people affected throughout the world has been increasing exponentially and it is predicted that by the year 2017 over half the population may be suffering from symptoms of this disorder.

The percentage of people throughout the world who are believed to be electrosensitive.

What are the experts saying? In 2005, the World Health Organization (WHO) officially recognized the existence of electrosensitivity. The condition has been researched for over twenty years throughout the world. Even in Japan, the Ministry of Health, Labor, and Welfare funded such research. Moreover, increasing case studies are increasingly being reported from around the world. The Vienna Medical Association, noting a cause and effect relationship between the increase in cell phones and the increasing number of people affected, has created posters (posted in hospital waiting rooms) warning of dangers and listing rules for their use.

Cell Phone Radiation's Effect on Bodily Systems

An Increase in Cancer

• Use of a cell phone for ten-plus years increases your chance of
cancer of the auditory nerve by 200%. This chance increases by 400% if you use the cell phone on the same side of the head.

• The amount of radiation emitted by cell phones can break DNA strands.

• Experiments on animals show a doubling of the risk of brain tumors.

Affects Reproduction

• Exposure causes a decrease in sperm.

• Experiments have shown an increase in death of chick embryos exposed to EMR.

Triggers Allergies like Atopic Dermatitis/Eczema

• Exposure to EMR from cell phones has been shown to cause an increase within the body of substances triggering allergic reactions.

Disruption of Hormones

• EMR exposure brings about a decrease in melatonin, a hormone coupled with proper sleep and boosting immunity. A decrease in melatonin has been shown to be associated with sleep disturbances, Sudden Infant Death Syndrome (SIDS), miscarriages, heart disease, cancer, Alzheimer's, Parkinson's, depression, and an increase in suicides.

References: Ogino, Ph.D. Dangerous Cell Phones (Abunai Ketai Denwa); Cherry, N….

Q: Why do I have to turn my cell phone completely off? Can't I leave it on vibration mode? Your cell phone is on a regular basis sending microwaves out to the nearest cell phone tower/mast in order to make confirmation so that it will be prepared to send and receive information. When the power is on, microwaves are constantly being sent and received. So in order to not negatively expose those nearby you, please turn off your cell phone completely when not in use.

Q: How about playing games or sending messages? Even when you are not speaking, the sending and receiving of messages or the playing of games causes exposure to EMR. For this reason, the Vienna Medical Association is even cautioning against the use of text-messaging and the playing of games on a cell phone. It is pointed out by the Vienna Medical Association that especially in vehicles (cars, buses, and trains), the microwaves will tend to bounce off the metal frame of the vehicle causing an increase in exposure levels. This makes this especially dangerous for children who are more susceptible to the effects of EMR due to their thinner skulls and rapidly growing bodies, which are hence composed of rapidly dividing cells.

The Sunflower Project

There has been a drastic increase in environmental illnesses like Multiple Chemical Sensitivity (MCS), Atopic Dermatitis, Asthma, Autism, CFIDS, and so on due to an increase in environmental pollutants (visible and invisible). The goal of the Sunflower Project is to create a clean, safe, and healthy living environment for all living beings.

http://www.buergerwelle.de/pdf/sunflower_project.pdf

Paul Raymond Doyon MAT (TESOL), MA
Advanced Japanese Studies, BA Psychology

"All that is necessary for evil to triumph is for good men to do nothing"
--------
Vienna doctors group say children shouldn't have phones
http://omega.twoday.net/stories/903250/

Austrian doctor’s group warns of excessive mobile phone use by children
http://omega.twoday.net/stories/895483/

http://omega.twoday.net/search?q=electrosensitivity
http://omega.twoday.net/search?q=microwaves
http://omega.twoday.net/search?q=cell+phone+dangers
Starmail - 20. Jul, 09:35

More of What's Behind Gardasil

The Politics And PR Of Cervical Cancer
A four-article series by Center for Media
and Democracy's Associate Director, Judith Siers-Poisson.
7-19-7

A four-article series by Center for Media and Democracy's Associate Director, Judith Siers-Poisson.

Part 1: Setting the Stage

Part 2: Research, Develop, and Sell, Sell, Sell

Part 3: Women in Government, Merck's Trojan Horse

Part 4:Profit Knows No Borders, Selling Gardasil to the Rest of the World

Courtesy:Jeff Rense

Please ignore headlines, they are written only to grab your attention

Intensive diet doesn't prevent breast cancer: study

This story, and it's headline, is circulating in the media right now. Since most people don't take the time to read the entire story, they miss a key fact that counters the use of sensationalism in headline writing.

Read the article and what you really find is this -

"...healthy eating habits and frequent exercise can nonetheless dramatically reduce the chance of remission while providing additional health benefits."

"Women who ate at least five servings of fruit and vegetables a day and exercised six times a week cut their cancer recurrence in half."

The not so good advice is relying on the USDA food pyramid. Better nutrition advice is available.

Another point excluded is the warning that mammogram and other radiation exposure increases breast cancer rates and re-occurrence.

Probably one of those times to pay your money and take your chances, right?

So You Think Mammography Isn't a Cause of Cancer?

We've been saying this for more than 10 years.

Reading this article just might be enough to convince you that radiation does cause breast cancer, and that the side effects of mammography are heart disease and thyroid impairment.

I hope so!

Heart X-ray raises cancer risk

By Maggie Fox, Health and Science EditorTue Jul 17, 5:15 PM ET

A special type of X-ray used to diagnose heart disease may cause cancer in women and young adults and should be used with caution, U.S. doctors reported on Tuesday.

The procedure, called a computed tomography (CT) coronary angiography, is meant to reduce complications because it can see inside the heart and its arteries without invading the body.

But it gives a high dose of radiation, enough to cause cancer in vulnerable people, the researchers reported in the Journal of the American Medical Association.

They said women and young men are especially at risk.

"The same amount of radiation appears to be more likely to cause cancer in woman than in men," Dr. Andrew Einstein, cardiologist at Columbia University Medical Center who led the study, said in a telephone interview.

"A second difference between women and men is the risk of breast cancer. The heart sits in the chest right behind the breasts so the breasts end up being irradiated."

Younger people are more at risk in part because it can take years for cancer to develop after radiation damage, Einstein said.

The researchers found that a 20-year-old woman had a 1 in 143 lifetime risk of developing cancer from one of the scans. An 80-year-old man would have a 1 in 3,261 risk, they found.

A 60-year-old woman would have a 1 in 715 risk of cancer while a 60-year-old man would have a 1 in 1,911 risk.

The CT angiography is sometimes used in emergency rooms when someone comes in with chest pain and doctors need to assess quickly whether a heart attack is likely, Einstein said. He said 6 million patients come into U.S. emergency rooms alone with chest pain every year.

"We are still trying to find out what the role of CT coronary angiography is," he said. "I think it may not be the test of choice for young women."

Einstein's team used a report last year from the National Research Council, an independent body that advises the federal government, that looked at the effects of low-level ionizing radiation on health.

They tested the CT angiography to see how much radiation it actually delivered. They combined their findings with the report on radiation to estimate the risks to patients.

The most common way to see if someone had clogged arteries is a standard angiogram, which uses a standard X-ray.

The doctor uses a catheter to inject a chemical called a contrast agent that makes the arteries easier to image, and this process can cause side effects as it involves punching a hole in an artery.

Copyright © 2007 Reuters Limited.

Too Much Spin, I'm Dizzy Already

That dizzy feeling comes from reading the health news, hoping for some juicy tidbit that needs some additional commentary. Too bad most people take it all as 'gospel', and too bad so much of it is purely 'old news' making the rounds again in different clothes.

Probably more than enough to make the public gasp!

Here is the no brainer on Chris Benoit - steroids and other drugs in his system. (Try Leaflady's Formula One for cellular energy and no crazy rage).

Now with Gardasil, about 35 use-less drugs by vaccination at age 11. And today, whilst it is known that one of the side effects of this and other vaccines is arthritis, it is announced that arthritis costs the economy $1.2 + Billion a year.

So, more vaccines leading to more arthritis, that must be the sought after end result.

Profit by another name, eh?

Then we go to this new grapefruit and breast cancer issue. I'm probably still thinking on this one, but I can point out with certainty - blocking the P450 pathway can -IN FACT - lead to cancer.

Stomach cancer most likely, from my point of view. You see all those acid blocking pills pushed at you for heartburn lead right along this trail.

The P450 pathway is an extremely important DETOXIFICATION pathway. Not one, but ALL of the purple pill category drugs block this process.

When you don't want to risk stomach cancer remember that you can say NO to any medical person writing you a prescription for Nexium, Prevacid and similar drugs. Saying yes might be a ticket to your last ride, death.

They don't like you to take prescription drugs with grapefruit juice. This is because the juice, in most cases, can intensify drugs.

Maybe you could take less drug and more grapefruit juice, just like taking less of that breast cancer drug TYKERB with fatty food. The BBC news reports combining medicines with the right food could improve the effectiveness of drugs and reduce the costs of treating patients, according to experts.

Of course eating the right foods and getting good nutrition reduces or eliminates your risk of cancer and other diseases - something to ponder.

Stop it on the front end, or what is called prevention.

To prevent breast cancer, start saying NO to mammogram.

Prevent acid reflux by drinking more pure water not with meals, eating slowly and chewing food, exercising, using digestive enzymes with meals, and checking for adequate hydrochloric acid in your stomach because many with reflux don't really have enough acid.

One of those old recipes that works extremely well is adding a teaspoon of apple cider vinegar to a glass of water and drink it 20 minutes before you eat. It'll keep your bones strong too.

At last, a report on our 2004 report

No credit to CHI, but finally MSM (mainstream media) reports on a vector in the rising tide of hospital infection -

Doctor's and others: CELL PHONES.

"Cell Phones may carry more bacteria than toilets."

Problem Pundits

B vitamins are used in the body individually or in combination with enzymes to help release energy from carbohydrates, fat, and protein. Vitamin B coenzymes are crucial to the metabolic pathways that generate the energy needed by every cell in the body. Because they are co-dependent in their metabolic activities, a deficiency of one B vitamin can affect optimal functioning of organ systems throughout the body.
Folic acid (folate) is a member of the B-complex family. It is found in abundance in leafy green vegetables, but is often deficient in the standard American diet. Folic acid participates in a coenzyme reaction that synthesizes DNA needed for cell growth and new cell formation and helps convert vitamin B12 to one of its coenzyme forms.

Yes, the B complex vitamins are probably the most important vitamins today because of the food industry's removing then years ago. All you have to do is to look at dis-ease rates.
More dis-ease, more drugs. Then the drugs often deplete folic acid and B12.
Pretty clear smoke & mirros application I'd say.
B vitamins are necessary for healthy brain and nerve function, metabolising food, treating TB and obviously preventing birth defects (known for many decades), as well as many more beneficial uses.
The key point is to remember when using single B vitamins, ALWAYS take complete B complex with it. This is the key to preventing that 'neuropathy' propaganda that doctors rely on to make you believe B vitamins are bad for health.
Also remember - B vitamins in the blood is not the same as B vitamins in the cell, so push your doctor, especially as you age to test intra-cellularly for accuracy.
And, if you take the prevention path you most likely won't become a cash cow for the medical-pharmaceutical industry.

The Food and Drug Administration (FDA) has spent enormous resources trying to prevent people from supplementing with folic acid. The FDA argues against folic acid supplementation because the presence of folic acid in the blood could mask a serious vitamin B12 deficiency. In a study in the Journal of the American Medical Association, Losonczy et al. (1996) addressed the FDA's concerns by recommending that folic acid supplements be fortified with vitamin B12 as a prudent way of gaining the cardiovascular benefits of folic acid without risking a B12 deficiency.
Even though major medical journals (e.g., New England Journal of Medicine) long ago endorsed the use of folic acid to reduce cardiovascular disease (Malinow et al. 1998), the FDA still does not accept that folic acid has any benefit other than preventing a certain type of birth defect.
A study by Giovannucci et al. (1998) in the Annals of Internal Medicine showed how fatally flawed the position of the FDA is. Data from the famous Harvard Nurses' Health Study conducted at the Harvard Medical School showed that long-term supplementation with folic acid reduces the risk of colon cancer by an astounding 75% in women. The fact that there are 90,000 women participating in the Harvard Nurses' Health Study makes this finding especially significant. The authors of this study explained that folic acid obtained from supplements had a stronger protective effect against colon cancer than folic acid consumed in the diet. This new study helps to confirm the work of Dr. Bruce Ames, the famous molecular biologist who has authored numerous articles showing that folic acid is extremely effective in preventing the initial DNA mutations that can lead to cancer later in life. This Harvard report, showing a 75% reduction in colon cancer incidence, demonstrated that the degree of protection against cancer is correlated with how long a DNA-protecting substance (folic acid) is consumed. It was the women who took more than 400 mcg of folic acid a day for 15 years who experienced the 75% reduction in colon cancer, whereas short-term supplementation with folic acid produced only marginal protection.

***

Canadian folic acid fortification cuts neural-tube defects by nearly half
The July 12, 2007 issue of the New England Journal of Medicine reported the finding of Canadian researchers that their country’s fortification of grain products with folic acid has resulted in a 46 percent decline in the incidence of congenital neural-tube deformation. Impaired development of the neural-tube during a child’s prenatal period can result in lifelong physical or mental disabilities, and, in many cases, death. A deficiency of the B-vitamin folic acid has been determined to be the cause of a large number of these defects.
“Canada decided to add folic acid to all flour produced in the country because formation of the neural-tube in embryos is particularly intense during the first four weeks of pregnancy, which is before a lot of women even know they’re pregnant,” explained the study’s lead author Dr Philippe De Wals, of the Université Laval in Quebec.
De Wals and his Canadian colleagues examined 1,909,741 live births, stillbirths, and terminations of pregnancies due to fetal abnormalities recorded between 1993 and 2002. Neural-tube defects, consisting mainly of anencephaly and spina bifida, occurred among 2,446 infants born during this period.
While there was no change in the rate of neural-tube defects occurring between 1993 and 1997 prior to the mandatory fortification of cereals with folic acid, a decrease of 46 percent was found after fortification was fully implemented in March, 2000. The decrease in spina bifida incidence was greatest at 53 percent, followed by a 38 percent decrease in anencephaly, and a 32 percent reduction in encephalocele. The greatest reduction in neural-tube deformations occurred in Newfoundland, Prince Edward Island, and Nova Scotia, which had the highest rates prior to 1998.
Health Canada recommended that pregnant women supplement with folic acid with or without multivitamins before folic acid fortification became mandatory, but many women failed to follow this advice. The authors observe that a recent study found a decrease from 4.9 to 0.6 neural-tube defects per 1000 births in the northern part of China as a result of prenatal folic acid supplementation. Health Canada still recommends folic acid supplements for women of child-bearing age.
Canada is one of only three other countries to mandate folic acid fortification of cereals. If implemented worldwide, it is estimated that as many as 100,000 cases of spina bifida and anencephaly could be prevented.

Consider PREVENTION as your best defense amidst the current wave of junque science.

Mixed Messages

"We have to get our voice heard above the cacophony of the junk science that is being heard."

This quote comes from the head of the CDC, Dr. Julie Gerberding.

I don't know where she was 30 or so years ago when the cooperation between professionals in health care was common.

The divide has certainly widened over the decades.

Of course - as I see it - a piece of this problem belongs to hospital administrators, insurers, and Big Pharma.

Administrators, and yes I once was one in several hospital settings, as a rule, cater to their own linear thinking and the bottom line. When budget cuts are the issue, only to keep the bottom line even, nurses are always near the top of the list.

What the administrator fails to recognize is that the product of a hospital is nursing care.

This of course leads to worsening patient care, higher dissatisfaction, worsening infection rates, more complications and probably more deaths.

More medication errors do happen, but this is overlooking the problem with the drugs, and we have Big Pharma to thank for that.

And we have insurance to thank for a lot more.

It is really not tort reform that is needed but if you might dare to suggest the problems lie elsewhere than with trial attorneys, you might find yourself out of a job.

I have a lot of answers, based on the fact that I have saved a number of health care facilities from demise, and at the same time improved nurse-patient ratios, made money, and promoted the TEAM approach to care.

It is easier to do than most might even consider. It's tough because so many are locked in an outdated paradigm.

So, just a few days after your Congressional delegates succumbed to more handouts from Big Pharma and insurance (they helped draft the legislation), drastically damaging your right of choice to care, and natural care too, Gerberding issues this commentary.

I clearly do not agree with most of what the CDC supports. One example is that I am against vaccines(truth-be-told, they really do not work) and the failure of the agency itself to get out-of-the-box and address major health concerns (including prevention) from a different perspective.

Yes, Gerberding's idea is good. But, who is hearing her, and how does she propose bringing it in to action?

Start from ground up to fix health care: CDC head

By Maggie Fox, Health and Science EditorSat Jul 14, 3:14 PM ET

Reforming the tottering U.S. health care system should start at the very beginning of the process -- in medical school, the top public health official said on Saturday.

Dr. Julie Gerberding, director of the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, stepped into the debate over health care reform with a call for changing the way doctors, nurses, veterinarians, pharmacists and dentists are educated.

Not only are more schools needed, Gerberding said, but these professionals need to start their education all together, to foster cooperation and a sense of common mission.

"I believe that what we really need in this country are schools of health," Gerberding told reporters at the annual meeting of the American Veterinary Medical Association.

"If we are seriously thinking about building a health system, then we need to be training professionals in a collegial and collaborative manner."

Earlier in the week, PricewaterhouseCoopers' Health Research Institute reported that the United States will be short 1 million nurses and 24,000 doctors by 2020. It said that while applications to nursing program had risen, the number of students denied admission had grown six fold since 2002, mostly because of a shortage of instructors.

The veterinary association has forecast a shortfall of food supply veterinarians of 4 percent to 5 percent a year. Gerberding said vets are key to tracking outbreaks of avian influenza and noted that a veterinarian first figured out that West Nile virus was killing birds -- and people -- when it entered the United States in 1999.

POLITICAL REFORM

The issue of health care reform is at the fore of the 2008 presidential campaign. Congress, President George W. Bush, and coalitions of businesses and labor unions have all made proposals for change, although none are detailed.

The system is a conglomeration of public and private insurance, with the education of medical professionals left to state universities and private academic centers.

An estimated 43 million Americans lack any health care insurance at all, and the United States is the only industrialized nation without an organized national health care system.

"We are at a tipping point with our health care delivery system," Gerberding said. "We cannot afford to continue going in the direction that our system is going. We have to assure that all people have access.

"People in the United States spend $532 billion (a year) on health. That $532 billion is not spent very wisely."

Gerberding said the system is focused on treating disease and on end-of-life care, with little attention paid to preventing disease and helping people lead healthier lives.

Americans also have trouble getting good information about health, with the Internet and cable television being conduits for an increasing onslaught of misinformation, she said.

"We have to get our voice heard above the cacophony of the junk science that is being heard."

Don't Ya Just NO It

Herbert Benson, M.D., is the Director Emeritus of the Benson-Henry Institute (BHI), and Mind/Body Medical Institute Associate Professor of Medicine, Harvard Medical School.

A graduate of Wesleyan University and the Harvard Medical School, Dr. Benson is the author or co-author of more than 175 scientific publications and 11 books on the benefits of what has come to be called Mind-Body Medicine.

Dr. Benson published his first book in this subject area in 1975.

According the BHI's web site, Dr. Benson "has written that the fundamental element of mind/body medicine - the elicitation of the relaxation response - can be traced back to the earliest civilizations. It appears that one of our most basic bodily avenues to better health is the simple following of the breath, in and out, and the avoidance of distracting thoughts.

Dr. Benson and his colleagues have taken this universal activity and extensively researched and adapted it; today mind/body medicine and self-care has been shown to be effective and essential in improving our health and, thus, is growing in acceptance to become a third modality in health care, taking its place next to surgery and pharmaceuticals."

Now, here we are in 2007, and the same folks trying to cover up Rx drug deaths want you to believe that there is no proof of effective improvement in your health with supplements or meditation.

Thousands of years of proof is more than anecdotal in my mind.

What's in yours?

And in the mean time propaganda rolls on.

No Clear Evidence Meditation Can Boost Health: Study

THURSDAY, July 12 (HealthDay News) -- There's no definitive evidence that meditation eases health problems, according to an exhaustive review of the accumulated data by Canadian researchers.

"There is an enormous amount of interest in using meditation as a form of therapy to cope with a variety of modern-day health problems, especially hypertension, stress and chronic pain, but the majority of evidence that seems to support this notion is anecdotal, or it comes from poor quality studies," concluded researchers Maria Ospina and Kenneth Bond of the University of Alberta/Capital Health Evidence-based Practice Centre, in Edmonton.

They analyzed 813 studies focused on the impact of meditation on various conditions, including high blood pressure, cardiovascular disease and substance abuse.

Released Monday, the report looked at studies on five types of meditation practices: mantra meditation; mindfulness meditation; yoga, Tai Chi and Qi Gong.

Some of the studies suggested that certain types of meditation could help reduce blood pressure and stress and that yoga and other practices increased verbal creativity and reduced heart rate, blood pressure and cholesterol in healthy people.

However, the report authors said it isn't possible to draw any firm conclusions about the effects of meditation on health, because the existing studies are characterized by poor methodologies and other problems.

"Future research on meditation practices must be more rigorous in the design and execution of studies and in the analysis and reporting of results," Ospina said in a prepared statement.

Bond added that the new report doesn't prove that meditation has no therapeutic value, but it can inform medical practitioners that the "evidence is inconclusive regarding its effectiveness."

For the general public, the report "highlights that choosing to practice a particular meditation technique continues to rely solely on individual experiences and personal preferences, until more conclusive scientific evidence is produced," Ospina said.

The study was funded by the U.S. National Center for Complementary and Alternative Medicine in Bethesda, Md., part of the National Institutes of Health.

The U.S. National Center for Complementary and Alternative Medicine has more about meditation for health purposes.

Arm Device for Stroke, The Old-Fashioned Way

According to the FDA, for about $10,000 you'll be able to get one of these devices, just in case you lose the use of your arm from CVA.

Now - from my point-of-view - mind you, I always spot poor care when I see some one with the obvious after effect of stroke.

While Myomo is packing in profit, along with the Medicare approved supplier, insurer, and physiatrist or what ever specialty doctor prescribes the device, I wonder why no one taught this.

An often used, back-in-the-day as they say nowadays, a very well studied approach to get an arm working again was an ordinary sling. You know, the kind they give you at the ER when you get a sprained shoulder or some similar injury.

Using a simple sling to restrain the arm not subjected to the stroke injury, for as little as twenty minutes twice a day helps your effected arm to become functional again.

This very well studied premise was proven in many studies and re-reported in 2000.

The best fact is that it works, helps the person develop new neural pathways, and they regain the use of their arm.

And for a lot less than ten grand.

FDA Approves Robotic Arm Device for Stroke Survivors
Wednesday, July 11, 2007

Federal regulators have granted clearance to market a robotic arm brace designed to help stroke survivors regain use of paralyzed limbs and relearn how to move affected muscles, the device's maker said Tuesday.

Myomo Inc. said it would begin marketing the e100 NeuroRobotic System to rehabilitation clinics and medical specialists now that it has Food and Drug Administration clearance.

The lightweight brace slides onto an arm. Sensors placed on the front and back parts of the upper arm detect slight muscle contractions. That triggers a motor — contained in a backpack that the user also wears — that allows the user to control the arm's movement.

Unlike other devices to help stroke survivors regain mobility, no electrical stimulation or invasive procedures are required, Myomo says. Rather, the device helps individuals use their own biological signals to recover muscle control.

The destruction of brain cells from a stroke causes loss of function. The researchers say with repetitive therapy, other neurons can take over some of the lost function.

Boston-based Myomo — whose name is an acronym for "My Own Motion" — developed the arm based on research by two Massachusetts Institute of Technology graduates who won a $50,000 MIT business plan competition in 2004. Myomo is the privately held company that the MIT grads, John McBean and Kailas Narendran, are using to market the device.

The device is expected to cost $5,000 to $10,000, with specific pricing information forthcoming, said Maureen Liberty, a Myomo spokeswoman. The company isn't making sales projections.

The device is intended for use in clincal settings, and hasn't yet been shown to be safe or effective for home use, the company said. Clinical studies haven't demonstrated any known side effects or risks for stroke patients in therapy.

Courageous Members of Congress Need Your Thanks

These representatives voted NO on HR 2900.

Berry, Mitchell, Moran (KS), Paul, Woolsey, Blumenauer, DeFazio, DeLauro, Emerson, Flake, Goode, Hinchey, Lee, McDermott, Miller (FL), Miller, George.

Screwed By Congress

Once again we have an absolute example of the failure of members of the US Congress to heed the voice of the people.

While approximately 83% of all citizens in the states wanted a NO vote on S 1082/HR 2900 - the recent legislation promoting more money rolling in to the FDA to hurry passage of drug applications (about 300,000 deaths a year are related to FDA approved drugs), along with more restrictions on supplements (no record of death here) - those who hunger after Big $$$ from Big Pharma showed their true colors.

I already wrote my reps, if one can call them that, letting them know what I think of their vote.

I encourage you to look up how your 'reps' voted on these bills and let them know your thoughts.

403 members of the House voted yes.