Other News

Health news and comment from around the world.

» 2008

December 28, 2007

UK tells pregnant women to boost vitamin D intake
The British government has told pregnant and breastfeeding women to increase their intake of vitamin D during the darker winter months to reduce the risk of seizures and the bone disease rickets in their children. The Department of Health said doctors were reporting increasing numbers of cases of vitamin D deficiency in children. It said that children from Asian, Afro-Caribbean and Middle Eastern backgrounds could be at greater risk. Dark skinned people do not absorb as much sunlight -- a source of the vitamin -- through the skin, and may also cover up most exposed parts of their body for cultural reasons, it said.
Read article at reuters.com

December 27, 2007

Nuclear Plants Raise Leukaemia Threat
On Dec. 8, physicians and health researchers from the University of Mainz, 425 km southwest of Berlin, said children living within a radius of five kilometres from nuclear power plants are at higher risk of contracting leukaemia.
Read article on the Inter Press Service News Agency website

December 19, 2007

Are you getting enough vitamin D?
The sunshine vitamin: Researchers sound alarm over shortage among non-whites
Vitamin D tests conducted on a group of University of Toronto students have found that virtually all non-whites had insufficient levels of the sunshine vitamin, putting them at elevated risk of debilitating diseases such as osteoporosis, cancer and diabetes. The research, which is awaiting publication in a medical journal, found that 100 per cent of those of African origin were short of vitamin D, as were 93 per cent of South Asians (those of Indian or Pakistani origin), and 85 per cent of East Asians (those of Chinese, Indochinese or Filipino origin, among other countries). The findings have alarmed the researchers, who say that if the results are typical of Canada's growing non-white population, the country could be facing a public health crisis.
Read article in the Globe and Mail (Canada)

December 19, 2007

Scans put people at risk of cancer, experts say
The 'worried well' are putting their health at risk by going for expensive body scans which use dangerous blasts of radiation, according to Government experts. Private clinics should stop offering whole body computed tomography (CT) scans and regulation of the industry should be tightened, Government advisers will say in a new report. The scans could even be banned. The risks of massive doses of radiation used to carry out the scans do not outweigh the risks for people who are not displaying symptoms, the report from Committee on the Medical Aspects of Radiation will say.
Read article in the Daily Telegraph (UK)

December 18, 2007

Lung cancer 'link to lack of sun'
Lack of sunlight may increase the risk of lung cancer, a study suggests. Researchers found lung cancer rates were highest in countries furthest from the equator, where exposure to sunlight is lowest. It is thought vitamin D - generated by exposure to sunlight - can halt tumour growth by promoting the factors responsible for cell death in the body. The University of California, San Diego study appears in the Journal of Epidemiology and Community Health.
Read article at BBC News (UK)

December 18, 2007

Cancer Kills Over 20 Thousand People A Day Says Global Report
A new global cancer report by a leading US health organization estimates that cancer will kill 7.6 million people worldwide this year (about 20,000 cancer deaths a day), and more than 12 million people will find out they have the disease.
Read article at medicalnewstoday.com (UK)
Comment: Scientific and clinical evidence shows that the use of vitamins and other essential nutrients are of paramount importance in the battle against cancer and, moreover, that this disease could be largely unknown to future generations if these findings were implemented into public health policies. The biggest obstacles preventing the building of a world without cancer are the multi-trillion dollar pharmaceutical drug cartel and its "business with disease."

December 13, 2007

Increase folic acid dose to prevent birth defects, society urges
Women planning pregnancy should boost their intake of folic acid even more, as it could play a key role in reducing as many as half of certain birth defects, according to new guidelines released Wednesday. The recommendations were produced for health-care professionals by a multidisciplinary panel of experts from the Society of Obstetricians and Gynaecologists of Canada and Toronto's Hospital for Sick Children. Women with no personal health risks, a planned pregnancy and a diet of foods rich in folate should take a multivitamin containing between 0.4 and one milligram of folic acid at least two to three months before conception and throughout pregnancy, the recommendations say. However, women who are at higher risk, including those who are smokers, obese, diabetic or with previous history of spina bifida in the family should be supplementing their diet with multivitamins containing five milligrams of folic acid, three months prior to and up to 12 weeks following conception.
Read article on the website of the Canadian Broadcasting Corporation

Eating Less Red And Processed Meat Likely Reduces Cancer Risk, Study
A new study by researchers in the US suggests that people who eat the least red and processed meat are the least likely to develop cancer compared to people who eat the most.
Read article at medicalnewstoday.com

December 12, 2007

I quit the cancer treatment and got better my own way
Two years ago, Alison Kelly was at death's door. She had initially been told the lump on her left breast was benign and not to lose a night's sleep over it. Subsequently, she was found to have advanced-stage cancer and underwent a mastectomy. But it wasn't the disease, she believed, that was in danger of killing her; it was the cure. After suffering a profoundly negative reaction to chemotherapy, the 47-year-old Drogheda woman did something that most cancer patients wouldn't contemplate. She abandoned her treatment and walked away from conventional medicine.
Read article in the Irish Independent (Ireland)

Maximum levels should not be based on RDA, group says
A petition will today be handed to the Minister for Health in Ireland against a proposal to base the maximum levels for vitamins and minerals on recommended daily allowances - a concept which has been criticised as being 40 years out-of-date. The Irish Association of Health Stores (IAHS) said they have a gathered tens of thousands of names demanding the Irish government and European Commission to "respect the right" of consumers to have high level doses. More than 60,000 people - some 1.5 per cent of the population of Ireland - have signed-up to the petition which will be handed to Minister Mary Harney. The sheer volume of signatures shows how important the issue is being taken, and IAHS is expecting more to come onboard.
Read article at nutraingredients.com
Comment: Click here to read the Irish Association of Health Stores’ press release, “TENS OF THOUSANDS OF CONSUMERS APPEAL TO MARY HARNEY”.

Vitamin D dose study adds weight to intake increases
Doses of vitamin D3 of 2,000 International Units (IU) - the current tolerable upper intake level (UL) in Europe and the US - are needed to ensure blood levels of the vitamin amongst post-menopausal African-American women, says a new study. Over 200 women took part in the three year study, published in the American Journal of Clinical Nutrition, which adds to an ever-growing body of science suggesting an urgent need to review current daily intakes of the vitamin.
Read article at nutraingredients.com

December 10, 2007

Cosmetics threat to drinking water
Britain's drinking water is under threat from medicinal chemicals and cosmetic products flushed down the drains of millions of households, a report has claimed.
Experts warned that treatment works are currently unable to remove all these substances, leaving some of them to contaminate water supplies.
Read article at Channel 4 News (UK)
Comment: Chemical drug medicines found in the UK water supply now include anti-depressants, painkillers and chemotherapy drugs.

December 8, 2007

"Doomsday Seed Vault" in the Arctic
Bill Gates, Rockefeller and the GMO giants know something we don’t
What leads the Gates and Rockefeller foundations to at one and the same time to back proliferation of patented and soon-to-be Terminator patented seeds across Africa, a process which, as it has in every other place on earth, destroys the plant seed varieties as monoculture industrialized agribusiness is introduced? At the same time they invest tens of millions of dollars to preserve every seed variety known in a bomb-proof doomsday vault near the remote Arctic Circle ‘so that crop diversity can be conserved for the future’…
Read article by F. William Engdahl at globalresearch.ca
Comment: The other sponsors of the vault include Monsanto Corporation, the Syngenta Foundation and the US agribusiness giant DuPont/Pioneer Hi-Bred, one of the world’s largest owners of patented genetically-modified (GMO) plant seeds and related agrichemicals.

December 6, 2007

EU to release proposed list of banned herbs imminently!
Something many of us have been concerned about for years is now imminent - the intention of the European Union to ban a range of botanicals, including some that have been used for hundreds or even thousands of years in traditional systems of healthcare.
Read article on the Alliance for Natural Health (ANH) website (UK)

France suspends commercial GMO seed use, studies safety
France formally suspended on Thursday the commercial use of genetically modified (GMO) seeds in the country until early February and ordered a biotech safety study.
Read article at reuters.com

December 5, 2007

Study finds fitness level, not body fat, may be stronger predictor of longevity for older adults
Adults over age 60 who had higher levels of cardiorespiratory fitness lived longer than unfit adults, independent of their levels of body fat, according to a study in the December 5 issue of JAMA.
Read article at physorg.com

December 4, 2007

Is cooked food dangerous?
Shock news from the world of dietary research: raw-food fanatics may not be so deranged after all. Research has emerged showing a direct link between a chemical called acrylamide and womb and ovarian cancer in women. Acrylamide is produced when we roast, fry or bake our food.
Read article in The Guardian (UK)
Comment: Chips, crisps, fast foods and processed foods contain the highest levels of acrylamide. The researchers found that women who eat crisps or chips every day may double their chances of ovarian or womb cancer.

December 3, 2007

You are what your mother eats: study
A mother's likes and dislikes, particularly for fruit and vegetables, is passed on to her infant during breastfeeding, suggests new research from the US. A study of 45 infants, just under half of which were breastfed, showed that a baby's preference for a certain food is dependent on its mother's tastes, but only if the baby is breastfed, report researchers in this month's issue of Pediatrics.
Read article at nutraingredients.com

November 30, 2007

All farming will be "organic" 100 years from now – oil expert
An alarming vision of how the world will look after the oil runs out – but also of a crucial role for organic farming – has been given by a leading "peak oil" expert.
Read article at Natural Products Online (UK)

November 29, 2007

Hospital blunders 'kill 90,000 patients'
More than 90,000 patients die and almost one million are harmed each year because of hospital blunders, research suggests. Errors during surgery, misdiagnosis, falls, infections and complications are all to blame for the problems that contribute to the death and injury tolls in England each year. Researchers found that between 8.7 per cent and 10 per cent of hospital stays involved such mistakes and up to a half were preventable. Prof Trevor Sheldon, the author of the study published in the British Medical Journal, said a stay in hospital was as "risky as bungee jumping".
Read article in the Daily Telegraph (UK)

November 27, 2007

Malnutrition 'a widespread risk'
A quarter of all adults admitted to hospital and care homes in the UK are at risk of malnutrition, a major survey has found. The British Association for Parenteral and Enteral Nutrition (Bapen) collected data on 11,665 new admissions to 372 institutions over three days. The association is calling for nutrition screening on admission as standard for all patients.
Read article at BBC News (UK)
Comment: We should not mislead ourselves into thinking that it is only adults admitted to hospital and care homes who are at risk of malnutrition. A recent report suggested that up to 6 per cent of the UK population could now be suffering from serious vitamin and mineral deficiencies.

November 26, 2007

France, Germany seek to break deadlock on GMO foods
Agricultural powerhouses France and Germany sought on Monday to break the deadlock that has kept genetically modified crops out of most of Europe, saying rules must be changed to ease their approval. "This authorisation process of GMOs is highly unsatisfactory and worrying, it cannot stay like this," German Agriculture Minister Horst Seehofer told reporters on arriving for a meeting of EU farm ministers.
Read article in the Guardian (UK)
Comment: Further evidence that the EU is intent on overriding the wishes of its own citizens, the vast majority of whom remain resolutely opposed to consuming foods containing GMOs.

November 22, 2007

WTO gives EU more time on genetically modified foods
Adding to the uncertainty over European policies toward genetically modified foods, the World Trade Organization said Thursday that the European Union would be given more time to end blockages on imports of engineered foods like corn. "The period during which the EU was meant to have worked this out expired, and the parties decided to extend the deadline to Jan. 11," said Keith Rockwell, a spokesman for the WTO. The EU had been due to end the blockages by Nov. 21. The agreement came after EU officials held a series of talks with their counterparts in the United States, Argentina and Canada over the past weeks, said Peter Power, a spokesman for the EU trade commissioner, Peter Mandelson. Argentina, Canada and the United States have sued the European Union at the WTO, which ruled last year that a de facto EU ban on imports of genetically modified foods between 1984 and 2004 was illegal.
Read article in the International Herald Tribune

November 22, 2007

South Africa: Health Director-General Defends Traditional Medicine
Health department director-general Thami Mseleku yesterday defended the government's slow progress in regulating complementary and African traditional medicines, taking on critics who wanted these remedies to be controlled in the same manner as western pharmaceutical products. "There is a war on African traditional medicines in SA," he said. "You have people who are out to discredit these medicines despite the fact that Africans in their millions use them. We have to regulate rather than condemn." As in Europe and the US, South African consumers are increasingly seeking alternatives to western pharmaceuticals, including herbs and nutritional supplements such as vitamins.
Read article at allafrica.com
Comment: Millions of African people increasingly prefer natural alternatives to the pharmaceutical industry's toxic patented chemical drug medicines, recognizing that they are safer and more effective than putting their health into the hands of the multi-billion dollar "business with disease".

November 21, 2007

EU officials propose ban on genetically modified corn seeds
European Union environment officials have determined that two kinds of genetically modified corn could harm butterflies, modify food chains and disturb life in rivers and streams, and they have proposed a ban on the sale of the seeds, which are made by DuPont Pioneer, Dow Agrosciences and Syngenta. The preliminary decisions, seen by the International Herald Tribune, are circulating within the European Commission, the EU executive, which has the final say. Some officials there are skeptical about a ban that would upset the powerful biotechnology industry and could exacerbate tensions with important EU trading partners like the United States.
Read article in the International Herald Tribune

November 20, 2007

Cancer studies 'wasted millions'
Millions of pounds of charity donations and taxpayers' money have been wasted on worthless cancer studies, the BBC has learned. File On 4 has discovered thousands of studies have been invalidated. It found some scientists have failed to carry out simple and inexpensive checks to ensure they are working with the right forms of human tumour cells.
Read article at BBC News (UK)
Comment: This story largely misses the point, in that, globally speaking, countless billions of pounds of charity donations and taxpayers' money have now been wasted on worthless cancer studies. As the two-time Nobel Prize winner Linus Pauling once put it: "Everyone should know that most cancer research is largely a fraud and that the major cancer research organisations are derelict in their duties to the people who support them." In sharp contrast to the fraudulent nature of the so-called "war on cancer", Dr. Rath and his team of researchers at the Dr. Rath Research Institute have identified a specific combination of nutrients that work synergistically to stop the spread of cancer cells. To learn more, click here.

November 18, 2007

CODEX MOVES CLOSER TO EU BLUEPRINT
The 29th session of the Codex Committee on Nutrition and Foods for Special Dietary Uses, held at Bad Neuenahr, Germany, ended on Friday, November 16, 2007, following a week of deliberations. This Codex committee, more than any other, is deciding the fate of international principles, guidelines, and standards affecting natural health products and health claims. The U.S.-based, international non-governmental organization (INGO), the National Health Federation (NHF), was the only INGO present representing consumers' rights to freedom of choice in healthcare, and its three-person delegation was responsible for more interventions during the course of the meetings than all other INGOs put together.
Click here to read the National Health Federation's press release.

November 16, 2007

Public 'Eating GM Food Without Knowing'
Supermarkets are deceiving their customers by widely stocking goods sourced from animals fed genetically-modified soya and maize, a campaign group has warned. According to the Soil Association, the practice means GM food is entering the UK "by stealth" via feed given to animals reared for dairy and pork products.
Read article at Sky News

November 16, 2007

Exposure to GM foods linked to Morgellons disease
Researchers at the State University of New York believe exposure to GM foods may be causing new cases of Morgellons disease, reports Metro. The researchers say that Agrobacterium, a bacterium that causes tumors in plants, has been found in Morgellons sufferers. Agrobacterium is well known for its ability to transfer DNA between itself and plants, and for this reason it has become an important tool for plant improvement by genetic engineering. Morgellons disease is a largely unexplained skin condition (named in 2002) that leads crawling, biting, and stinging sensations. Sufferers also frequently report finding fibres on or under the skin and experience persistent skin lesions. In addition to skin manifestations, some also report fatigue, mental confusion, short-term memory loss, joint pain, and changes in vision.
Read article at Natural Products Online (UK)

November 14, 2007

Study Finds Physicians And Nurses Both Take And Recommend Dietary Supplements
The landmark "Life...supplemented" Healthcare Professionals (HCP) Impact Study found that more than three quarters of U.S. physicians (79 percent) and nurses (82 percent) recommend dietary supplements to their patients. The study also shows that an almost equal number -- 72 percent of physicians and 89 percent of nurses -- personally use vitamin, mineral, herbal and other supplements either regularly, occasionally or seasonally, which is a higher percentage than the 68 percent of adults who report they take nutritional or dietary supplements. With mainstream use of dietary supplements in the U.S. -- more than 150 million Americans take them each year -- the 2007 "Life ... supplemented" HCP Impact Study on dietary supplements was designed to evaluate the personal attitudes and use of dietary supplements by physicians and nurses and to determine if those factors impact whether they recommend supplements for their patients.
Read article at medicalnewstoday.com

November 12, 2007

CODEX MEETING IN GERMANY SET TO DECIDE FUTURE FOR VITAMIN CONSUMERS AROUND THE WORLD
Read press release on the Alliance for Natural Health (ANH) website (UK)

November 10, 2007

Luxembourg Appeal: Towards an International Ban on Mercury in Dental Amalgam
Invited by the "Aktionsgruppe für Umwelttoxikologie (AKUT asbl)" in Luxembourg and the "European Academy for Environmental Medicine" (EUROPAEM) and under the patronage of the Ministry of Health Luxembourg, renowned scientists, researchers, doctors specialized in environmental medicine, physicians, and dentists as well as politicians, NGOs, and patient groups met on the 10th of November 2007 to draw attention to the serious risks for health and environment coming from mercury out of dental amalgam. Following this international conference, they published unanimously this urgent appeal addressing the European Commission, the European Parliament, and all national health authorities within and outside of Europe to ban mercury in dental amalgam.
Click here to read the text of the appeal

November 9, 2007

Food on agenda for US-EU trade talks
The first meeting of the Transatlantic Economic Council (TEC) takes place in Washington this week, with the freeing up of the food trade on the cards. The trade talks aim to improve trade relations between the two powerhouses in an effort to remain competitive on a global basis, particularly in view of growing pressures from Asian traders. US and EU negotiators say they hope to reach deals on regulatory rules that limit trade in food during the two day talks, which begin in Washington tomorrow.
Read article at nutraingredients-usa.com
Comment: Signed in April 2007, the transatlantic economic integration agreement that created the Transatlantic Economic Council (TEC) threatens the harmonizing of U.S. dietary supplement legislation to restrictive European regulations. To learn more, click here.

November 2, 2007

Study Shows Vitamin "Pill-Poppers" Are Healthier
New research indicates that NOT taking supplements may be harmful to your health, and that a single daily multi-vitamin is inadequate. A study of hundreds of persons who take a number of different dietary supplements has found that the more supplements they take, the better their health is. The study authors reported that a "greater degree of supplement use was associated with more favorable concentrations of serum homocysteine, C-reactive protein, high-density lipoprotein cholesterol, and triglycerides, as well as lower risk of prevalent elevated blood pressure and diabetes."
Read news release at orthomolecular.org

November 1, 2007

NHS cancer plan is 'ineffective'
Rates of avoidable deaths from cancer in England and Wales are not falling as fast as the NHS Cancer Plan predicts, a report warns. Between 1999 and 2005 the decline in deaths from cancer which should have been treatable slowed year on year, analysis by think-tank Civitas shows. The figures suggest the £2bn injection in funding in cancer services is not having an impact, they concluded.
Read article at BBC News (UK)
Comment: Cancer can be controlled, but the British government's £2bn injection in funding has been totally wasted. Why? Because the sole beneficiaries from the sale of patented synthetic toxic chemical drugs for the treatment of cancer are the gargantuan bank accounts of the pharma cartel. To learn how cancer can be eradicated naturally, without the devastating side-effects of chemotherapy and radiotherapy, click here.

October 30, 2007

Nutrition plans 'doomed to fail'
Government plans to tackle malnutrition among hospital and care home patients are doomed to failure, a patients' group has claimed. Ministers will launch what they are calling a "groundbreaking" drive to improve the nutrition of the elderly. It will call on NHS and social care providers to weigh patients to keep track of whether they eat properly. But Patient Concern said it failed to instil a culture of accountability and was likely to be just "words on paper". Research has shown that about a third of hospital and care home patients are malnourished.
Read article at BBC News (UK)
Comment: A recent report showed that up to 3.6 million people in the UK now suffer from malnutrition. As a result, according to the British Association for Parenteral and Enteral Nutrition, malnutrition currently costs the UK's National Health Service more than £7.3bn (€10.8bn / US $14.8bn) a year. The estimates suggest that up to 6 per cent of the UK population could be suffering from serious vitamin and mineral deficiencies, whilst UK hospital figures now show malnutrition to be found in all age groups, including newborn babies.

October 30, 2007

Rickets cases rise among Asians
Vitamin supplements are to be handed out in Lancashire after 56 reported cases of rickets. The cases of the disease, which can cause bow legs, have been reported in Asian communities in East Lancashire.
Read article at BBC News (UK)
Comment: The incidence of rickets, a disease caused by a deficiency of vitamin D, appears to be on the rise in a number of Western countries. Although our bodies can produce vitamin D through exposure to sunlight, the use of sunscreens – which has increased in recent years – along with recommendations to limit our exposure to sunlight may perhaps be contributing to an increased incidence of vitamin D deficiency. A lack of vitamin D has been linked to the development of multiple sclerosis, diabetes and cancer, amongst many other diseases.

October 30, 2007

Doctors Say, Raise the RDAs Now
The US Recommended Daily Allowance/Daily Reference Intakes are too low and most should be raised immediately, says an independent panel of physicians, academics and researchers. In a statement this week, the Independent Vitamin Safety Review Panel said: "Government-sponsored nutrient recommendations, such as the US RDA/DRIs, are not keeping pace with recent progress in nutrition research. While current official recommendations for vitamin A, iron, calcium, and some other nutrients are generally adequate, the public has been asked to consume far too little of many other key nutrients. Inadequate intake, and inadequate standards to judge intake, have resulted in widespread nutrient inadequacy, chronic disease, and an undernourished but overweight population." Citing a large number of physician reports and clinical studies, the IVSRP called for substantial increases in daily intake of the B-vitamins, vitamins C, D and E, and the minerals selenium, zinc, magnesium and chromium. "Raising the RDA/DRI will save lives and improve health," the Panel said. "Clinical and sub-clinical nutrient deficiencies are among the main causes of our society's greatest healthcare problems. Cancer, cardiovascular disease, mental illness, and other diseases are caused or aggravated by poor nutrient intake. The good news is that scientific evidence shows that adequately high consumption of nutrients helps prevent these diseases."
Read news release at orthomolecular.org

October 29, 2007

Massive rise in Europe GM crops
Figures to be published later on Monday show the area planted with genetically modified crops in Europe has grown by 77% since last year. This year over 1,000 sq km of GM maize was harvested.
Read article at BBC News (UK)

October 28, 2007

GM: The Secret Files
Ministers are secretly easing the way for GM crops in Britain, while professing to be impartial on the technology, startling internal documents reveal. The documents, obtained through the Freedom of Information Act, show that the Government colluded with a biotech company in setting conditions for testing GM potatoes, and gives tens of millions of pounds a year to boost research into modified crops and foods. The information on funding proved extraordinarily difficult to get, requiring three months of investigation by an environmental pressure group, a series of parliamentary questions, and three applications for the information. Friends of the Earth finally obtained still partial information last week which shows that the Government provides at least £50m a year for research into agricultural biotechnology, largely GM crops and food. This generosity contrasts with the £1.6m given last year for research into organic agriculture, in spite of repeated promises to promote environmentally friendly, "sustainable" farming.
Read Geoffrey Lean's article in the Independent on Sunday (UK)

October 28, 2007

Official: organic really is better
THE biggest study into organic food has found that it is more nutritious than ordinary produce and may help to lengthen people's lives. The evidence from the £12m four-year project will end years of debate and is likely to overturn government advice that eating organic food is no more than a lifestyle choice. The study found that organic fruit and vegetables contained as much as 40% more antioxidants, which scientists believe can cut the risk of cancer and heart disease, Britain's biggest killers. They also had higher levels of beneficial minerals such as iron and zinc.
Read article in the Sunday Times (UK)

October 24, 2007

EU COMMISSION'S PROPOSALS TO LIMIT VITAMIN AND MINERAL DOSES NOT FIT FOR PURPOSE
A group of scientists and doctors, led by Scientific Director of the Alliance for Natural Health (ANH), Dr Robert Verkerk, and ANH's Medical Director, Dr Damien Downing, is calling for the European Commission to review the methods it is contemplating using to set maximum permitted levels for vitamins and minerals in food supplements and fortified foods. The scientists claim that the methods being considered are both "unscientific" and "flawed".
Read press release on the Alliance for Natural Health (ANH) website (UK)

October 20, 2007

'Traditional medicines help serious illness'
Health Minister Manto Tshabalala-Msimang said on Saturday traditional medicines had huge potential to produce new and alternative treatments for serious health conditions. "People are using traditional medicines and natural therapies in alleviating conditions associated with HIV and Aids, diabetes, malaria and other serious health conditions affecting them," said Tshabalala-Msimang.
Read article at iol.co.za (South Africa)

October 17, 2007

China's health minister calls for more respect to traditional Chinese medicine
China's Health Minister Chen Zhu has called for respect to traditional Chinese medicine (TCM), the scientific value of which is doubted by some people. "A prudent scientist should not judge TCM in haste if he did not understand its meaning, advantage and core theories," Chen, a Paris-trained hematology scientist, said in Beijing on Monday at a health forum.
Read article in the People's Daily (China)
Comment: About 3,000 hospitals in China provide TCM treatments to nearly 234 million patients each year.

October 16, 2007

Donegal study shows seven out of ten people getting too much fluoride
Seven out of ten people in Co Donegal are getting too much fluoride, says VOICE campaigner Robert Pocock. His comments are backed up by results from a survey involving volunteers from three different fluoridated areas of County Donegal, who monitored their urinary fluoride intake over a 24-hour period. The survey was carried out by Clane GP, Dr Andrew Rynne who engaged an EU accredited pathology laboratory to obtain the results. Urine samples from Inishowen, Letterkenny and Stranorlar were obtained from people aged between 19 and 68 and evenly split between men and women. 72% of the subjects tested in Co Donegal were at or above the safe intake of fluoride. The safe level was based on the UK Food Standard Agency guideline value based on daily fluoride intake related to body weight. The proportion at or above the safe limit in largely unfluoridated UK is 20%, suggesting that the addition of fluoride to Irish drinking water is completely unjustifiable.
Read press release on the Voice of Ireland Concern for the Environment (VOICE) website (Ireland)

October 15, 2007

Vitamin D deficiency linked to greater pain
A new study has linked vitamin D and a reduction of chronic pain, lending to voices calling for increased fortification or supplementation of the nutrient in diets. The study, presented at the American Society of Anesthesiologists 2007 Annual Meeting in San Francisco, found that one in four patients who suffer from chronic pain also have inadequate blood levels of vitamin D. As such, the researchers put forth that the vitamin D deficiency possibly contributed to the patients' ongoing pain.
Read article at nutraingredients.com

October 15, 2007

U.S. Cancer Death Rates Are Found to Be Falling
Death rates from cancer have been dropping by an average of 2.1 percent a year recently in the United States, a near doubling of decreases that began in 1993, researchers are reporting.
Read article in the New York Times (USA)
Comment: The vast bulk of these decreases have taken place since the Dietary Supplement Health and Education Act (DSHEA) was passed by Congress in 1994. DSHEA classifies supplements as foods and places the burden of proof on the U.S. Food and Drug Administration to show that any particular dietary supplement is unsafe. The text of DSHEA makes specific reference to Congress having found that there is a link between the ingestion of dietary supplements and the prevention of chronic diseases such as cancer, heart disease, and osteoporosis. It also states that preventive health measures, including appropriate use of safe nutritional supplements, will limit the incidence of chronic diseases, and reduce long-term health care expenditures. 52 percent of Americans now identify themselves as regular users of dietary supplements.

October 12, 2007

Journal editor attacks nutraceutical industry
Mark Ridinger, editor of the journal Clinical Pharmacology and Therapeutics launched a stinging attack on the nutraceutical industry. ANH responds…
Mark Ridinger, editor of the scientific journal Clinical Pharmacology and Therapeutics, a publication of the esteemed Nature group, has launched a stinging attack on the nutraceutical industry, which he refers to as the "nutraceutical-industrial [N-I] complex". He's effected the attack through the pages of the very journal of which he is editor - call it editorial license if you like. The good news is it likely means that our failure to stop taking our nutrients, herbs and other natural concoctions with which we have evolved over thousands of years is really starting to get on the goat of those who'd like us to submit to what they seem to profess is "pharmaceutical heaven".
Read article on the Alliance for Natural Health (ANH) website (UK)

October 11, 2007

How Corporations Engineered the Non-Regulation of Dangerous Genetically Modified Foods
Government officials around the globe have been coerced, infiltrated, and paid off by the agricultural biotech giants. In Indonesia, Monsanto gave bribes and questionable payments to at least 140 officials, attempting to get their genetically modified (GM) cotton approved.
Read article on the website of the Organic Consumers Association (USA)

October 10, 2007

How Hospitals Systematically Harm People
Visiting the hospital is supposed to heal people, but it's hard to get better in a place that uses toxic chemicals and serves processed food. Is change on the way?
Read article at alternet.org
Comment: In the U.S. alone, an estimated 2 million people a year contract infections in hospitals, and nearly 100,000 are expected to die from them this year, according to the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.

October 10, 2007

Low zinc levels may raise pneumonia risk in the elderly
Low blood levels of zinc may be linked to an increased risk of pneumonia amongst the elderly, suggesting the benefits of supplements for this at risk population, says new research. "Normal serum zinc concentrations in nursing home elderly are associated with a decreased incidence and duration of pneumonia, a decreased number of new antibiotic prescriptions, and a decrease in the days of antibiotic use," wrote lead author Simin Meydani in the American Journal of Clinical Nutrition. "Zinc supplementation to maintain normal serum zinc concentrations in the elderly may help reduce the incidence of pneumonia and associated morbidity."
Read article at nutraingredients-usa.com
Comment: Bearing in mind additional research, published earlier this year, showing that a daily zinc supplement may significantly reduce infections in the elderly and have implications for boosting "healthy ageing", it is surely high time that these findings were acted upon and implemented into national public health policies.

October 9, 2007

Public 'misled' on exercise needs
"Misleading" government guidelines have led to many Britons wrongly believing that moderate exercise is as beneficial as a vigorous workout, a study alleges. In a survey of nearly 1,200 people, around half of men and three quarters of women thought moderate exercise conferred the greatest health benefits. Guidelines urge 30 minutes of moderate exercise each day five days per week. But the authors of the study, published in Preventive Medicine, said vigorous exercise was best for averting disease.
Read article at BBC News (UK)
Comment: The study's lead author said that he found it extremely worrying that British adults now believe that a brief stroll and a bit of gardening is enough to make them fit and healthy. He added that whilst brisk walking offers some health benefits, vigorous activities such as jogging or running offer maximal protection from disease.

October 8, 2007

Should We Discard Herbal Medicine - Unless Provided by Pharma?
An examination of three randomized trials involving individualized herbal remedies was sufficient for two researchers to suggest that herbal medicine should be discarded. Call me biased, but could it be that the "study" involving a total of three research papers and a well-known antagonist of alternative medicine, Prof Edzard Ernst, has been thrown together in a great hurry for the express purpose of influencing the imminent new law (statutory regulation...) for the herbalist profession? There are many interesting comments from readers on the newspapers' sites. One reader's letter and comment on the study that was sent to the papers carrying the story did not make it through to actual publication. It does however provide a glimpse of the interests that could be hiding behind this story ... perhaps it is all a question of money.
Read article and comments from readers of UK newspapers at newmediaexplorer.org

October 5, 2007

Senior doctors allege lack of evidence on fluoride safety
The government is accused by senior doctors today of selectively using inadequate evidence to promote the use of fluoride in the water supply. The public health measure, intended to improve the country's teeth, has attracted huge controversy. Anti-fluoride campaigners claim the chemical has potentially harmful side-effects, while dentists and some public health experts insist it is entirely beneficial and saves children from tooth decay. In the British Medical Journal today, Sir Iain Chalmers, editor of the James Lind Library, which was set up to help people understand the evidence base of medicine, KK Cheng, professor of epidemiology at Birmingham University, and Trevor Sheldon, professor and pro-vice-chancellor at York University, say there is not enough evidence either way.
Read article in The Guardian (UK)

October 5, 2007

Irish tap water not suitable for baby formula
The State's 18 maternity hospitals were warned yesterday by VOICE spokesman Robert Pocock that Irish tap water is not suitable for making up infant formula. The timing of this warning is important as this is National Breastfeeding Week. Breast-fed babies in Ireland are in a minority, with most receiving infant formula. At 40% Ireland has the lowest rate of breast-feeding in all Europe, with Nordic countries in the high 90% range. The advice refers to new research which reveals that the risk of dental fluorosis (the only cause is over-exposure to fluoride) starts from birth and not, as previously believed, only in later infant years. Dental fluorosis has increased eightfold among Irish teenagers since 1984. With four in ten now affected, it is described by Irish Dentists Opposing Fluoridation as an epidemic.
Read press release on the Voice of Ireland Concern for the Environment (VOICE) website (Ireland)

October 5, 2007

Cosmetics could be killing you
THE average woman absorbs two kilograms of chemicals from cosmetics every year - from cancer-causing compounds in face cream to arsenic in eyeshadow. A  typical woman's daily beauty regime may involve applying as many as 175 chemical compounds to their skin and hair. Of course, the manufacturers would say these chemicals and resulting products are safe, but a growing school of thought begs to differ.
Read article from the Daily Telegraph at news.com.au (Australia)

October 5, 2007

EU LEGISLATION AND NATURAL HEALTH
The good, the bad and the ugly
You might think that getting your head around the tsunami of regulation set to bombard the natural health shores over the next decade is more than you can, or want, to get your head around. But in this guide, the Alliance for Natural Health has taken the mystery out of the legal jargon and condensed the potential ramifications of key pieces of European legislation into succinct points. We give the key take-home points on the good, the bad and the ugly of the Big Four EU laws on natural health that are in the process of impacting the natural health sector.
Read PDF on the Alliance for Natural Health (ANH) website (UK)

October 5, 2007

Consumers taking dietary supplements more regularly, says survey
More consumers say they take dietary supplements on a regular basis than before, according to a new poll conducted for the Council for Responsible Nutrition (CRN). The trade association commissioned an online survey undertaken by market researcher, Ipsos-Public Affairs. The research revealed 52 percent of Americans identify themselves as regular users of dietary supplements, up from 46 percent in 2006.
Read article at nutraingredients-usa.com

October 4, 2007

New attack on herbal medicine by Prof Ernst and colleagues
CAM bashing seems to have become a sport for Prof Ernst and colleagues at Peninsula Medical School, University of Exeter. This instance reminds us just how far the science needs to be twisted for Prof Ernst to have managed to make headlines over the risks and lack of efficacy of herbal medicines.
Read article on the Alliance for Natural Health (ANH) website (UK)
Comment: Guo, Canter and Ernst have entitled their paper: "A systematic review of randomised clinical trials of individualised herbal medicine in any indication." You would be forgiven for thinking that this was a review of dozens or even hundreds of studies. But just three? Yes, although Prof Ernst and colleagues started their review with a hopeful 1345 references in the peer reviewed literature, their particular and harsh inclusion criteria managed to whittle away some 98.8% of the references leaving just 0.2% - i.e. three! How the journal allowed this paper to be titled a "systematic review" and how they allowed the title to include its relevance to "any indication" is anyone's guess. This truly is an abuse of science.

October 3, 2007

High white cell count may predict cancer: study
Postmenopausal women with elevated white blood cell (WBC) counts appear to be at increased risk of developing certain types of cancer, including breast, colorectal, endometrial, and lung cancers, a new study shows. Higher WBC counts also raise the risk of dying from cancer, according to the study.
Read article at reuters.com

October 1, 2007

BOOZE & BREAST CANCER
The news Friday suggesting that even a glass or two of wine a day will leave women at risk of breast cancer is, well, sobering. Does this mean that women, young and old, invite disaster if they participate in happy hour? No: The headlines not only overhype the danger, they omit a reliable countermeasure.
Read article in the New York Post (USA)
Comment: The important fact left out of Friday's stories was that a high intake of folic acid and high plasma folate levels appear to completely mitigate the excess risk of breast cancer associated with alcohol intake.

September 28, 2007

Centenarians reach a record high
The number of people living beyond 100 years has reached a record high in England and Wales, according to official figures. The Office for National Statistics says there are now 9,000 "centenarians" - a 90-fold increase since 1911. Estimates suggest this will carry on rising to 40,000 by 2031. The rapid increase in the number of very elderly people began in the 1950s and is due to improvements in housing, healthcare, nutrition and sanitation.
Read article at BBC News (UK)
Comment: Discussing these figures, Dr Lorna Layward, from Help the Aged, repeated an oft-heard misperception when she said: "It's hard to know whether these extra years are providing extra years of good health." In fact, however, research done at Boston University in the New England Centenarian Study has found that centenarians disprove the perception that "the older you get the sicker you get." Instead, say the researchers, centenarians teach us that "the older you get the healthier you've been." As such, whilst the increasing number of dangerous patented pharmaceutical drugs taken by elderly people with health problems continues to concern us, we remain convinced that if scientific advances in the areas of vitamin research, cellular health and other non-patentable natural therapies were implemented into national healthcare systems, a long healthy extended lifespan would become the norm rather than the exception.

September 27, 2007

Against the grain: 'Economics, not common sense, drives GM crops'
Dr Michael Antoniou argues that genetically modified crops are dangerous and unnecessary
Genetic modification technology is a great research tool but it's crude. Some scientists claim that GM is just an extension of natural evolution, a development of cross-breeding, but this is, technically, totally inaccurate. The way genetic modification has been used to manufacture GM crops causes thousands of changes in the DNA of the plants' cells, variations of a different quality and quantity to cross-breeding. Some of these are benign, but some are going to disrupt one or more functions of the plant. So it may now be herbicide resistant, but unable to stand heat, its nutritional value may be lowered, known toxins increased, or even new toxins introduced into the plant.
Read article by Dr Michael Antoniou in The Independent (UK)

September 24, 2007

Michael Caine and co join vitamin plea to Brown
Celebrities have added their weight to the Save Our Supplements campaign which today sent an open letter to UK Prime Minister Gordon Brown calling for high levels for vitamin supplements to remain on the market. Stars including Cilla Black, Lord Andrew Lloyd-Webber, Sir Cliff Richard, and Sir Michael Caine have backed the campaign which is asking for the EU's proposed Food Supplements Directive to continue allowing high levels of minerals and vitamins.
Read article at nutraingredients.com

September 24, 2007

EU law bitter pill to take
OVER 100,000 people nationwide have signed a petition opposing EU plans to place restrictions on vitamins and minerals sold in health food stores. The petition is part of a campaign to stop the EU Supplements Directive coming into force here in less than two years.
Read article at independent.ie (Ireland)
Comment: The Irish Association of Health Stores, the GM-free Ireland group and other umbrella groups are now threatening a 'no' vote in Ireland's EU Treaty referendum.

September 22, 2007

Garden project launched in rural KZN town
In a bid to create a better quality of life for residents of Centocow in southern KwaZulu-Natal, health minister Manto Tshabalala-Msimang has launched a food and gardening project in the area. The area was specifically chosen as it has an infant mortality rate higher than the provincial rate of 67 deaths per 1 000 births. The garden project, which employs about 100 community members, aims to bring relief to the malnourished residents through the development of skills such as gardening. The intention is also that the project will eventually supply the local Appollinaris Hospital with fresh produce. Tshabalala-Msimang says apart from the nutritional benefits, the programme will contribute towards food security and job creation.
Read article at sabcnews.com (South Africa)

September 22, 2007

Vitamin E trials 'fatally flawed'
Generations of studies on vitamin E may be largely meaningless, scientists say, because new research has demonstrated that the levels of this micronutrient necessary to reduce oxidative stress are far higher than those that have been commonly used in clinical trials. In a new study and commentary in Free Radical Biology and Medicine, researchers concluded that the levels of vitamin E necessary to reduce oxidative stress – as measured by accepted biomarkers of lipid peroxidation – are about 1,600 to 3,200 I.U. daily, or four to eight times higher than those used in almost all past clinical trials. This could help explain the inconsistent results of many vitamin E trials for its value in preventing or treating cardiovascular disease, said Balz Frei, professor and director of the Linus Pauling Institute at Oregon State University, and co-author of the new commentary along with Jeffrey Blumberg, at the Jean Mayer USDA Human Nutrition Research Center on Aging at Tufts University.
Read article at physorg.com
Comment: Whilst these findings are certainly interesting, they do not take the concept of nutrient synergy into account. The latest clinical studies and lab research, for example, show us that it is not the intake of any one single nutrient that ensures full health, but the intake of a complete spectrum of various different micronutrients, such as vitamins, minerals, amino acids and trace elements. Cellular Health research therefore focuses on nutrient synergy as the most effective approach to optimizing cellular metabolism and restoring its balance, and has repeatedly shown that this approach is more effective than using individual nutrients, or their random combination. As such, we would argue that lower levels of vitamin E than 1,600 to 3,200 I.U. daily may be able to reduce oxaditive stress if accompanied by a scientifically targeted combination of additional nutrients.

September 20, 2007

Low vitamin D linked to higher risk of hip fracture
Women with low levels of vitamin D have an increased risk of hip fracture, according to a study led by the University of Pittsburgh Graduate School of Public Health presented this week at the 29th annual meeting of the American Society for Bone and Mineral Research at the Hawaii Convention Center.
Read article at physorg.com

September 19, 2007

'Health disaster' in French Caribbean linked to pesticides
The indiscriminate use of toxic pesticides on banana plantations in the French Caribbean has left much of the islands of Martinique and Guadeloupe poisoned for a century to come, a report to the French parliament warned yesterday. The two islands and their 800,000 inhabitants faced a "health disaster", with soaring rates of cancer and infertility, said Professor Dominique Belpomme, a French cancer specialist. Based on present trends, half the men of Martinique and Guadeloupe were likely to develop prostate cancer at some point in their lives, Professor Belpomme said. Birth defects in children were also becoming far more common, he warned.
Read article in The Independent (UK)

September 19, 2007

Academics urge food agency to act tougher on additives
· Consumers should come before industry, says letter
· Warning that watchdog is at risk of losing credibility
The government's Food Standards Agency today comes under fresh attack from two leading academics who have joined forces to urge the watchdog to act "more firmly and responsibly" on behalf of consumers over the dangers of chemical food additives. On the eve of a crucial FSA meeting tomorrow, they have written to its 13 board members expressing concern that the watchdog is not being proactive enough on an important scientific issue which has ramifications for public health.
Read article in The Guardian (UK)

September 18, 2007

Restricting pesticides could greatly reduce suicide rates worldwide
National and international policies restricting the pesticides that are most toxic to humans may have a major impact on world suicides, according to new research from the University of Bristol published this week in the International Journal of Epidemiology (IJE). Professor David Gunnell of the University's Department of Social Medicine and colleagues from the South Asian Clinical Toxicology Research Collaboration in Sri Lanka found that Sri Lanka's import restrictions on the most toxic pesticides were followed by marked reductions in suicide.
Read article at physorg.com

September 17, 2007

Some pesticides cause asthma in farmers: study
Farmers' use of certain pesticides can cause asthma, a breakthrough study presented in Stockholm at an international conference on respiratory diseases showed.
Read article at physorg.com

September 17, 2007

Monsanto, Dow join forces for new GM corn
Biotechnology companies Monsanto and Dow AgroSciences have teamed up to launch what they claim to be the industry's first eight-gene stacked combination in corn, which the firms say will further expand their presence in the GM market for the crop. SmartStax, which is designed to be the "all-in-one" answer to yield protection from weed and insect threats, could be commercially available as early as the end of the decade, the companies said last week. "The combination of these trait technologies signals the start of the next generation of products with improved plant protection and yield increases for the farmer," said Jerome Peribere, president and CEO of Dow AgroSciences. The new variety will incorporate eight different herbicide tolerance and insect-protection genes from both of the companies.
Read article at nutraingredients-usa.com
Comment: If Monsanto and Dow AgroSciences think that consumers actually want to eat eight-gene stacked corn products, then they are mistaken.

September 17, 2007

Organic lobby targets 'dangerous' E-numbers
· Trade group urges ban for chemical additives
· Anger over burden on parents to check labels
The government will this week come under fresh pressure to protect children by moving towards an outright ban on potentially "hazardous" chemical additives in food, following the intervention of the influential organic food industry. A powerful coalition of companies - whose members include the supermarket Waitrose, baby food manufacturer Organix, chocolate maker Green and Black's, and Britain's biggest organic brand, Yeo Valley - has accused the government's Food Standards Agency of failing to consult it over new guidance for parents on the side-effects of E-numbers, and of ducking the opportunity for tighter regulation. In a strongly-worded letter sent to Dame Deirdre Hutton, chairwoman of the FSA, at the weekend, the Organic Trade Group said it was unacceptable that the FSA was not making full information available to parents about crucial new research, adding that its new advice was flawed.
Read article in The Guardian (UK)

September 17, 2007

Return of GM: ministers back moves to grow crops in UK
Climate concerns will reduce chance of new public backlash, says industry
Government ministers have given their backing to a renewed campaign by farmers and industry to introduce genetically modified crops to the UK, the Guardian has learned. They believe the public will now accept that the technology is vital to the development of higher-yield and hardier food for the world's increasing population and will help produce crops that can be used as biofuels in the fight against climate change. "GM will come back to the UK; the question is how it comes back, not whether it's coming back," said a senior government source.
Read article in The Guardian (UK)
Comment: Recent polls show that about 70% of the European public remains opposed to GM foods. Nevertheless, it would seem that the British government sees the wishes of the GM industry as more important than the concerns of its own citizens.

September 14, 2007

Pharmacist fined for natural therapies
A Tennessee pharmacist has received a $1 million fine for treating customers at his health-food store with juices and dietary supplements. The Tennessee Board of Medical Examiners ruled in May that Larry Rawdon's practice of treating ailments such as cancer with alternative therapies is harmful, The Nashville Tennessean reported Thursday. The $1 million fine is the largest the board has ever handed out, the newspaper said.
Read article at physorg.com
Comment: Far from being "harmful", the practice of treating ailments such as cancer with natural therapies is supported by an abundance of knowledge and scientific data that has been available for 50, 60, 70 even 80 years. As such, by fining this pharmacist $1 million, the only thing that the "business with disease" has proven is that the attempts to protect its global pharmaceutical market - currently valued at an annual $643 billion - are becoming increasingly desperate.

September 14, 2007

PUBLIC VIEW FOOD SUPPLEMENTS DIRECTIVE AS REASON TO VOTE "NO" IN REFERENDUM ON EU TREATY
At a public meeting about the Food Supplements Directive held in Dublin on Wednesday and attended by over 100 people, serious concern was expressed about the control being exerted over the lives of Irish citizens by the EU.  Politicians, consumers and nutritional therapists were amongst those attending. MEP Kathy Sinnott, who addressed the meeting, commented that the EU "is about economics" and stated that experts attached to EU working groups are frequently sourced from industry, resulting in victory for vested interests. Citing her own personal experience in restoring the health of her son, Jamie, by the use of supplements, Ms. Sinnott expressed the view that the impact of the Food Supplements Directive could lead to a monopoly by the pharmaceutical industry.
Read press release on the website of the Irish Association of Health Stores (Ireland)
Comment: Jill Bell, President of the Irish Association of Health Stores summed up the feelings of those present at the meeting: "Outrage about the Food Supplements Directive has reached such a pitch now, that it looks likely that the 2.5% of the population who have signed the petition will be unwilling to give a ‘yes’ vote in the referendum to be run on the EU Treaty." She added "The Food Supplements Directive seems to have stirred a hornet's nest in relation to people's feelings about the EU. People are becoming angry about the degree to which Brussels is interfering with our basic freedoms."

September 12, 2007

Organisations accuse UK regulator of industry bias
Three consumer organisations have accused the UK regulator of having "misled" the public and of being in the pocket of manufacturers over its approach to a major study on food additives. The accusation by three major organisations could damage the credibility of the regulator, further eroding public trust in the safety of processed foods. In a joint letter to Deirdre Hutton, chair of the Food Standards Agency (FSA), the Soil Association, the Hyperactive Children's Support Group, and Sustain alleged that the regulator had "misled the public" by failing to explain clearly that all children can be affected by artificial food colourings.
Read article at foodnavigator.com
Comment: By actively supporting unnecessary restrictions on the sale of food supplements, such as the European Union's Food Supplements Directive and the Codex Guidelines on Vitamin and Mineral Food Supplements, the UK's Food Standards Agency has already proven that its policies are biased towards the interests of big business, especially the pharma industry. As such, the Agency's approach to food additives - many of which are manufactured by the pharma industry - is entirely consistent with its ongoing support for the business with disease.

September 7, 2007

US FDA Guidance on health claims signals possible end-run of DSHEA
The American Association for Health Freedom (AAHF) in association with its international affiliate, the Alliance for Natural Health (ANH) have today submitted a powerful critique of the US Food & Drug Administration's (FDA) proposal for evaluation of health claims which has been open to public consultation. Since the passage of the Dietary Supplement Health & Education Act in 1994, American citizens have enjoyed one of the most liberal regimes for dietary supplements anywhere in the world. This legal regime was won only after unprecedented public lobbying of Congress, stimulated by concerns over unnecessary restrictions on natural products. The FDA was forced to re-consider its approach to health claims following a Court of Appeals decision which followed the Pearson v Shalala case in 1999. The AAHF acted as joint plaintiffs in this ground-breaking case which challenged the FDA's decision to disallow four substance/disease relationship claims. However, this latest proposal by the FDA is set to create a situation where only the largest, most well funded companies, such as pharmaceutical corporations, will be able to afford the evidence-based, stringent data requirements for health claims. These requirements would prevent smaller companies, which have historically been the key pioneers and innovators in the natural health field, from making claims as they would not be able to afford the cost of substantiation.
Read press release on the website of the Alliance for Natural Health (UK)

September 7, 2007

NHF MISSION: STOP FDA FROM TREATING SUPPLEMENTS LIKE DRUGS
Much has been made about the threat posed by the food-safety provisions contained in the FDA Revitalization legislation now pending before Congress (S.1082 and H.R.2900) and the yet-to-be-finalized decisions on this legislation.  House and Senate Conferees will be appointed when Congress returns from its August recess in the next few days. These threats circulating in the community were also long ago recognized by the National Health Federation (NHF), which is following up on its previously successful lobbying efforts to get a pro-supplement colloquy on the floor of the U.S. Senate about this legislation.  While some – who, interestingly enough, previously denigrated the colloquy – are now claiming sole credit for it through their letter-writing campaign, they forget that without the NHF's lobbying connection to actually get Harkin and Hatch to do the colloquy and "close the loop," the letter-writing campaign, which was directed to another goal anyway, would not have been successful. Now, the NHF is using the FDA Revitalization legislation as an opportunity to prevent future Food and Drug Administration actions that really could go against the core of our health-freedom beliefs.  In this case, it means putting controls on how an otherwise-unaccountable FDA, conducts any future actions to ban supplements based on its own illegitimate bureaucratic misinterpretation of the DSHEA law.
Read press release from the National Health Federation (USA)

September 6, 2007

Scientists Find Organic Agriculture Can Feed the World & More
Two usual objections are levelled against the proposal that organic agriculture can feed the world. Organic agriculture, opponents claim, gives low yields, and there isn't enough organic fertilizer to boost yields substantially. A team of scientists led by Catherine Badgley at the University of Michgan Ann Arbor in the United States has now refuted those common misconceptions about organic agriculture. Organic agriculture gives yields roughly comparable to conventional agriculture in developed countries and much higher yields in developing countries; and more than enough nitrogen can be fixed in the soil by using green manure alone.
Read article on the Institute of Science in Society (ISIS) website (UK)

September 6, 2007

Parents warned of additives link
Parents have been warned of the effects of food additives on their children's behaviour after new research found a possible link to hyperactivity. A Food Standards Agency (FSA) study of 300 random children found they behaved impulsively and lost concentration after a drink containing additives.
Read article at BBC News (UK)

September 4, 2007

Deodorants 'may be linked to breast cancer'
Scientists have discovered a potential link between deodorants and breast cancer. High levels of aluminium, which makes up 90 per cent of the anti-perspirant part of most products, were found in the breast tissue of cancer patients who had undergone mastectomies. The element has been linked to the disease by earlier studies. Scientists have previously warned that aluminium could be absorbed through the skin, particularly after the armpits are shaved.
Read article in the Daily Telegraph (UK)

August 31, 2007

UnLucky Me
Last week during my latest 5-day stay in Puerto, I noticed that Lucky Me has a new design for the billboards they have put up in the schools of the city.  This and the previous one had the same message:  Lucky Me instant noodles are good for children. Lucky Me deserves a prize, or at least a nomination, for creativity and good advertising and PR.  One is reminded of how generations of Filipinos actually believe that Star Margarine can make one grow tall.  Studies now tell us that margarine is actually so bereft of nutrients that cockroaches do not even bother to touch them.
Read Vic Milan's article in the Palawan Sun Newsweekly (Philippines)

August 30, 2007

African Traditional Medicine conference underway
Details of South Africa's first approved human clinical study on traditional medicine has been revealed at the three-day African Traditional Medicine conference underway in Durban. The conference is aimed at formulating a national policy on traditional medicine. It is expected to be finalised in less than a year. Traditional leaders are discussing the use of medicinal plants and how they can help treat infections.
Read article at sabcnews.com (South Africa)

August 30, 2007

Lead may have hastened Beethoven's death
An Austrian scientist says a sample of composer Ludwig van Beethoven's hair taken after his death indicates medical treatment hastened his death.
Read article at physorg.com
Comment: Beethoven died in 1827. Isn't it astonishing, therefore, that, 180 years later, orthodox medicine is still hastening the deaths of its patients via the use of dangerous, and mostly ineffective, treatments?

August 28, 2007

Chinese astronauts test traditional Chinese medicines in space
China's astronauts have been testing new varieties of traditional Chinese medicine that could help treat osteoporosis, insomnia and improve immunity. Doctors with the China Astronaut Research and Training Center say the new remedies will be prepared for sale after further tests during the country's third manned space program in 2008. The medicines have been packaged in pill and capsule forms for the first time so astronauts will be able to take them in space.
Read article in the People's Daily (China)

August 27, 2007

Police tear-gas farmers in clash over French GM crops
Growing tensions in France between opponents and supporters of genetically modified crops have led to violent confrontations. Gendarmes used tear gas and batons to prevent pro-GM farmers from invading a picnic for militant opponents of genetically modified maize at the town of Verdun-sur-Garonne in south-west France over the weekend. Hardly a day has gone by this summer without opponents of GM maize – both environmental campaigners and small farmers – invading fields and trampling or cutting down crops. The protesters, led by the small- farmers' leader, José Bové, claim a citizens' right to destroy crops which, they say, threaten ecological calamity and the subjection of farmers to the whims of agro-industrial, multinational companies.
Read article in The Independent (UK)

August 26, 2007

Beginning of the End for Patents on GM Crops?
Monsanto has just lost four patents on GM crops in less than five months, thanks to the challenge mounted by the Public Patent Foundation. The patents were all on gene sequences involving the cauliflower mosaic virus (CaMV) promoter, which is crucial for getting engineered genes to work. It is in practically all of Monsanto's GM crops grown commercially. The US patent office ruled that the patents should not have been granted, because the claims were not new, or were so obvious that patents were unwarranted. This could be the beginning of the end for GM crop patents, if not GM crops, and is likely to undermine Monsanto's notorious court cases against farmers whom they accuse of patent infringement by replanting seeds from GM crops.
Read press release on the Institute of Science in Society (ISIS) website (UK)

August 23, 2007

ANH forced to publicly rebuke US based Natural Solutions Foundation
In an unusual move the ANH has felt compelled to prepare a rebuttal to an email sent out by the US based Natural Solutions Foundation which in our view, wrongly interprets the ANH's recent work in protecting natural sources of vitamins and minerals in Europe.
Read article on the Alliance for Natural Health (ANH) website (UK)
Comment: For further information about the Natural Solutions Foundation and its President, Major General Albert (Bert) N. Stubblebine III (U.S. Army, Retired), click here.

August 17, 2007

Exercise 'must be tough to work'
To be healthy, you really do need to break into a sweat when you exercise, say experts. American College of Sports Medicine members are concerned official advice to do 30 minutes of gentle exercise each day is being misconstrued. Some may take this to include a mere stroll to the car, Circulation reports. People should do at least 30 minutes of moderate exercise five days a week, or 20 minutes of vigorous exercise, like jogging, three days a week, they say.
Read article at BBC News (UK)

August 10, 2007

ANH PRESS RELEASE: Natural Sources of Vitamins and Minerals protected from potential bans
Alliance for Natural Health's initiative opens the door to natural sources of vitamins and minerals in functional foods and supplements.
Since the European Court of Justice (ECJ) ruling in July 2005, the ANH, seemingly a lone voice in the crowd, has firmly upheld that natural sources of vitamins and minerals were outside the scope of the Food Supplements Directive (FSD). Almost exactly two years to the day since the ruling, this has now been confirmed by the European Commission, in what promises to be a critical victory for natural health. The ANH has received a letter this week, jointly signed by two heads of unit at the European Commission, which indicates clearly that all natural sources of vitamins and minerals, which could have been subject to a ban EU-wide, will escape the draconian EU Food Supplements Directive, and will now be regulated as foods.
Read press release on the Alliance for Natural Health (ANH) website (UK)

August 9, 2007

International experts condemn Irish water treatment practices
Ireland has been heavily criticized by top medical, dental, scientific and environmental professionals, including a Nobel Prize winner for Medicine. Six hundred international experts signed an online petition in a bid to stop the practise of fluoridation. They condemned the few countries that still fluoridate drinking water, including Ireland, claiming it is an outdated and unscientific practice.
Read article on the Voice of Irish Concern for the Environment (VOICE) website (Ireland)

August 6, 2007

Another Supposed Health-Freedom Crisis – The Real Facts on Durbin's Amendment
A recent send-out by a health-freedom organization claims that a new health-freedom crisis exists.  This supposed crisis disaster relates to the inclusion or exclusion of Senator Dick Durbin's food-safety amendment in the FDA user-fee and reform legislation pending before Congress.  S.1082 passed the Senate and H.R. 2900, also known as the FDA Amendments Act of 2007, passed the House of Representatives. A joint House/Senate conference committee has yet to be appointed to approve a final bill, before being re-passed by both chambers. The supposed crisis is that if the Durbin amendment is not included in the final bill approved by Congress, its absence will have a decisive difference in federal nutritional foods and supplements policy. In the Congressional-legislative domain, telling members of Congress to support anything Senator Durbin does – as this group suggests people do – especially when it does not relate to a real health-freedom peril, helps Durbin in his future efforts to legislate for more FDA control over whole foods and supplements. Why would any health-freedom group knowingly want to proactively support Senator Durbin in these efforts?  The answer is:  A real health-freedom group would not.
Read article on the website of the National Health Federation (NHF)

August 3, 2007

Unfair to criticise traditional health cures – minister
HEALTH Minister Manto Tshabala-Msimang and her director-general yesterday stridently defended the role of traditional medicines. Traditional African remedies were being criticised by conventional medicine and the pharmaceutical industry in a way other remedies were not, she said.
Read article at businessday.co.za (South Africa)

August 2, 2007

Irish retailers mount consumer campaign on FSD "Violation"
The Irish Association of Health Stores (IAHS) is spearheading a major consumer campaign to counter moves within the EU to dramatically cut maximum allowable levels of vitamins and minerals. The IAHS says that any attempt by Brussels to peg levels at recommended dietary allowances (RDAs) levels would amount to a "violation of the consumer's right to choose". And it argues that higher potency VMS products have been on sale in Ireland and the UK for many years without any serious side effects.
Read article at Natural Products Online (UK)
Click here to sign the Irish Association of Health Stores' petition.

August 1, 2007

Gates Philanthropy in Stem Cell Transplant for Damaged Heart
Dr. Lilian Joensen exposes the Gates Foundation's betrayal of public trust in Argentina.
Read press release on the Institute of Science in Society (ISIS) website (UK)

July 30, 2007

Philanthropy Gates Style
The world's biggest philanthropic foundation is reaping huge profits investing in companies responsible for causing the problems it tries to solve; its grant-giving is also doing more harm than good in undermining health and agricultural systems, distorting national and global priorities, and preventing the necessary paradigm change that could help secure the future of the planet.
Read article on the Institute of Science in Society (ISIS) website (UK)

July 26, 2007

Transgenic Plum Gets USDA Non-regulated Status Based on False Claims of Safety
USDA deregulates its own transgenic plum despite overwhelming public objection
The United States Department of Agriculture Animal and Plant Health Inspection Service (USDA/APHIS) has recently granted non-regulatory status to a transgenic plum resistant to plum poxvirus after receiving 1 725 comments from state farm bureaus, organic growers, growers associations, consumer groups, agriculture support industries, academic professionals and individuals, with respondents against the petition (1 708) outnumbering those in favour by a factor of 100 to 1.
Read article on the Institute of Science in Society (ISIS) website (UK)

July 26, 2007

Hundreds of hospital fatalities 'avoidable'
One third of deaths in hospital investigated by a patient safety watchdog could have been avoided, claims a report released today.
Read article in the Daily Telegraph (UK)

July 25, 2007

Companies really know beans about moving genes
The trans-national seed, pesticide, and drug corporations have known for five or 10 years that the scientific foundation on which genetic engineering is built is false, but with billions of dollars riding on it they, with the support of our governments, continue to mislead us. In 1956, Francis Crick, co-discoverer of the structure of the DNA molecule, posited his central dogma of molecular biology, that each gene in the human genome contained the code to construct one protein that contributed one characteristic to a human. An article published by a large group of scientists in the journal Nature (June 14, 2007), exposes this as wrong.
Read article at cowichannewsleader.com
Comment: The collective work of 80 organizations worldwide states conclusively that, "the findings challenge the traditional view of our genetic blueprint as a tidy collection of independent genes, pointing instead to a complex network in which genes, along with regulatory elements and other types of DNA sequences that do not code for proteins, interact in overlapping ways not yet fully understood." A good reason to avoid GMOs, in other words…

July 18, 2007

GM Safflower with Human Pro-Insulin
Regulators show cavalier disregard for the safety of threatened species as well as human beings in proposed release of the GM pharm crop.
Read article on the Institute of Science in Society (ISIS) website (UK)

July 18, 2007

Calls get louder to raise vitamin D levels
Recommended daily intakes of vitamin D should be quadrupled to 800 International Units, says a leading US expert from Boston University School of Medicine. The review, published in the prestigious New England Journal of Medicine, increases the need for policy makers to review current guidelines for the vitamin, and could open opportunities for food fortification and supplements. Dr. Michael Holick states that current recommendations of 200 IU per day for children and adults up to 50 years of age for vitamin D need to be increased to 800 - 1000 IU vitamin D3. "However, one can not obtain these amounts from most dietary sources unless one is eating oily fish frequently," said Holick. "Thus, sensible sun exposure (or UVB irradiation) and/or supplements are required to satisfy the body's vitamin D requirement."
Read article at nutraingredients.com

July 18, 2007

New review bashes vitamin C – unjustifiably
A press statement issued yesterday, pre-empting the release of an updated review by the medical review group, the Cochrane Collaboration, has precipitated headlines around the world such as "Vitamin C does not stop colds". The Alliance for Natural Health (ANH) challenges this interpretation and says that this appears to be little more than another cynical attempt to attack high dose vitamin C supplementation.
Read press release on the Alliance for Natural Health website (UK)

July 18, 2007

Seed sense
Hundreds of vegetable varieties have been lost from UK soils and are now illegal to grow.
Read article in the Guardian (UK)
Comment: If a variety has been dropped from the European Union's approved common catalogue, then its seeds cannot be bought or sold in the EU. The key beneficiaries from these restrictions are the GM industry and their close allies in the pharma industry, the long-term profits of whom are threatened by the continued existence of non-patentable and organic seeds.

July 18, 2007

Is vitamin K deficiency more common than thought?
Many apparently health people may be vitamin K deficient, says a new review, potentially increasing the risk of bone loss and also for arterial calcification.
Read article at nutraingredients.com
Comment: Lead author Ellen Cranenburg suggests that the research "raises the intriguing question of whether all (or: most) apparently healthy adults are subclinically vitamin K deficient."

July 17, 2007

Low vitamin D levels may increase metabolic syndrome risk
Low blood levels of vitamin D may increase the risk of developing metabolic syndrome among obese people, suggests a new study from Spain. The research, published online in the journal Clinical Nutrition, adds to an ever-growing body of science linking vitamin D deficiency to increased risk of certain diseases, including certain cancers, type-2 diabetes and osteoporosis.
Read article at nutraingredients.com

July 16, 2007

A MEETING OF ONE
Let's cut to the chase.  The 30th Session of the Codex Alimentarius Commission (CAC) in Rome, Italy just ended (July 2-7, 2007) and heaping platefuls of Codex standards and guidelines were advanced to their final stages as if starving people were gathered around a banquet table.  It did not matter what was heaped on the plate, it got passed to the table regardless.  It also did not matter that there were some 451 country delegation members and another 61 INGO delegate-observers from around the World in attendance or pretend attendance, the CAC Chairman, Dr. Claude Mosha, plowed forward on a one-man mission from God pushing aside any and all objections - excuse me, he called them "reservations" - that were made.  It would not have mattered if a plate of rotten tomatoes had been presented to him for approval, he would have approved them too.  In this one meeting, the Commission was rendered irrelevant as a meaningful "approving" body, for it merely rubberstamped without thought what had been done by others. 
Read press release on the website of the National Health Federation (USA)

July 16, 2007

Ministers wary of hot GM potato
The European Union is expected to sidestep hostile public opinion by approving the cultivation of a genetically modified crop via the "back door" of a bureaucratic Brussels procedure. Europe's farm ministers meet in Brussels today to consider a European Commission proposal to allow a new antibiotic-resistant GM potato, the first biotech crop released for planting since 1998. EU officials predict that ministers, running scared of anti-GM public opinion across Europe, will fail to agree to either block or approve the potato. This will mean that the "proposed act shall be adopted by the Commission" via the obscure process of "comitology", allowing governments to pass the buck to unelected officials.
Read article in the Daily Telegraph (UK)

July 16, 2007

Joint therapeutic agency plans shelved
New Zealand has shelved plans to set up a controversial joint agency with Australia to regulate therapeutic products, amid claims it would have grossly inflated the price of vitamins and other herbal remedies. New Zealand State Services Minister Annette King said the Therapeutics Products and Medicines Bill would be postponed until there was more support in parliament for the scheme.
Readarticle in The Age (Australia)

July 13, 2007

Daily allowances for vitamins need to be changed, study says
New recommended daily allowances for micronutrients need to be set if European regulation on the maximum levels of vitamins and minerals is to be successful, a study has said. The work by Dr Jaap Hanekamp and Professor Dr Aalt Bast, published in Environmental Liability, concludes that current recommended daily allowances (RDAs) are an inadequate tool to manage a "healthy lifespan."
Read article at nutraingredients.com
Comment: In their previous articles, Dr Hanekamp and Professor Bast have criticized the European Commission for being "overtly and unduly precautionary in terms of its focus on risks of over-exposure to food supplements." In this study, they call for new RDAs which will have a greater impact on long-term health.

July 10, 2007

Organic farming yields as good or better: study
Organic farming can yield up to three times as much food as conventional farming in developing countries, and holds its own against standard methods in rich countries, U.S. researchers said on Tuesday. They said their findings contradict arguments that organic farming – which excludes the use of synthetic fertilizers and pesticides – is not as efficient as conventional techniques. "My hope is that we can finally put a nail in the coffin of the idea that you can't produce enough food through organic agriculture," Ivette Perfecto, a professor at the University of Michigan's school of Natural Resources and Environment, said in a statement.
Read article at reuters.com

July 10, 2007

Kids in northern climes at risk of low vit D levels
About 55 per cent of seemingly healthy adolescents may be vitamin D deficient, says a US study, and are at increased risk of osteoporosis and other health problems later in life. Amongst African-American adolescents the proportion of children with low vitamin D levels was over 90 per cent, said the researchers, led by Babette Zemel, director of the Nutrition and Growth Laboratory, The Children's Hospital of Philadelphia.
Read article at nutraingredients-usa.com

July 5, 2007

Organic food 'better' for heart
Organic fruit and vegetables may be better for you than conventionally grown crops, US research suggests. A ten-year study comparing organic tomatoes with standard produce found almost double the level of flavonoids - a type of antioxidant. Flavonoids have been shown to reduce high blood pressure, lowering the risk of heart disease and stroke.
Read article at BBC News (UK)

June 29, 2007

Food safety agencies to sign cooperation agreement
In a ground-breaking move to improve food safety, the European Food Safety Authority and the US Food and Drug Administration will team up to share scientific information. The two entities will sign an agreement on 2 July in Brussels to co-ordinate their research efforts into food safety issues.
Read article at foodnavigator-usa.com
Comment: The signing of this cooperation agreement is not merely about food safety and is closely related to the recent signing of the Transatlantic Economic Integration Agreement and the planned US-EU single market. Rather than consumers, the key beneficiaries of these agreements will be some of the world’s richest and most powerful corporations - including the pharmaceutical industry.

Low B6 intake linked to colorectal cancer study
Low intake of vitamin B6 may increase a man's risk of colorectal cancer by 31 per cent, suggests a study from Japan . The study, published in this month's Journal of Nutrition, evaluated the intake of range of B-vitamins among 81,184 subjects taking part in the Japan Public Health Center-based Prospective Study. The results also appeared to show that men with higher alcohol intake also benefited from the potentially protective effects of vitamin B6.
Read article at nutraingredients.com

June 26, 2007

Children Sicker Now Than in Past, Harvard Report Says
The number of American children with chronic illnesses has quadrupled since the time when some of their parents were kids, portending more disability and higher health costs for a new generation of adults, a study estimates. An almost fourfold increase in childhood obesity in the past three decades, twice the asthma rates since the 1980s, and a jump in the number of attention-deficit disorder cases are driving the growth of chronic illnesses, according to researchers at Harvard University in Boston. The report is published in a themed issue of the Journal of the American Medical Association focusing on children's health.
Read article at bloomberg.com (USA)

GM crops: 'Point of no return in ten years'
EUROPE will increase its genetically modified (GMO) crop area by 50,000-100,000 hectares a year over the next decade, US biotech giant Monsanto has said. "It will be slow but within ten years GMOs will have reached the point of no return," said Jean-Michel Duhamel, Monsanto's director for southern Europe.
Comment: Whilst this is what Monsanto and its friends in the pharma industry want, poll after poll has repeatedly shown that it is the exact opposite to what consumers want.
Read article in The Scotsman (Scotland/UK)

June 25, 2007

The G(e)nomes of Zurich : Civil Society Calls for Urgent Controls on Synthetic Life
Scientists and industrialists in the controversial new field of synthetic biology (building life-forms from scratch) are meeting in Zurich , Switzerland this week amidst claims that the world’s first entirely human-made organism may be only weeks away from creation. Swiss and international civil society groups are calling for swift action to control this technology but the scientists themselves are advancing pre-emptive proposals to evade regulation.
Read article at etcgroup.org

June 23, 2007

HIV infection theory challenged
A longstanding theory of how HIV slowly depletes the body's capacity to fight infection is wrong, scientists say.
Read article at BBC News (UK)

June 22, 2007

Fitness level 'predicts heart problems'
Cardiovascular fitness may predict the odds of a future heart attack in men and women with no apparent signs of heart disease, a large study suggests. Researchers found that of more than 26,000 adults with no symptoms of heart disease, those who showed the greatest endurance on exercise tests had the lowest risk of suffering a heart attack or stroke over the next 10 years. Men with the highest fitness levels were 31 per cent less likely than their least-fit counterparts to have a non-fatal heart attack or stroke, or to require an invasive procedure for heart artery blockages. The risk for men with moderate fitness levels fell between the highest and lowest fitness groups. A similar pattern emerged among women, the study authors report in the American Journal of Epidemiology.
Read article on the National Nine News website (Australia)

Toxic industrial fluorides petition registered with EU Petitions Committee
The EU Petitions Committee has registered a petition regarding toxic industrial fluorides from Robert Pocock of Irish environmental group VOICE. The petition accuses the government of wilful negligence by administering a toxic concoction in its citizens’ drinking water. Pocock says: “The fluoride contaminants added to Irish drinking water are hazardous chemicals, they have never been toxicologically tested as safe for ingestion in Europe or elsewhere. We are delighted that the EU Petitions Committee has now registered our petition (No 210 of 2007) and will investigate it alongside the Kilkenny farm where similar industrial fluorides emitted into the air have been blamed for the ill-thrift of nearby farm animals.”
Read article on the Voice Of Irish Concern for the Environment (VOICE) website (Ireland)

June 21, 2007

Children 'put at risk of rickets'
Children are being put at risk of rickets because policies on vitamin D supplements are not been adhered to, experts have warned. Doctors in Dundee write in the British Medical Journal that they recently diagnosed five infants with rickets - which can stop bones forming properly. The government recommends that pregnant women should use vitamin D supplements. Babies from Asian, African, Afro-Caribbean or Middle Eastern backgrounds are particularly at risk. The paediatricians at Ninewells Hospital in Dundee said none of the mothers of the five children they had recently diagnosed had received vitamin D supplements. They warned parents were unaware of the risk because it was rarely mentioned by GPs or health visitors. Government recommendations state that pregnant and breastfeeding mothers should take vitamin D supplements. They are also recommended for infants in high-risk groups.
Read article at BBC News (UK)

SA and OF&G will ignore 0.9% GM threshold for organic
The UK ’s two leading organic certifiers say they will ignore a new ruling from the EC which will allow GM contamination of organic food of up to 0.9% with no requirement for labelling. This week the Soil Association and Organic Farmers & Growers will tell the environment minister David Miliband that they will maintain their current non-GM standards for organic food, at the effective minimum level of 0.1% GM however the Government decides to implement the new ruling. The organic certifiers, along with a delegation representing 70 organic businesses, will argue that maintaining non-GM policies for organic is entirely in line with consumers wishes, and vital to ensure continuing trust in organic food.
Read article at naturalproductsonline.co.uk

Scientists and MEPs for a GM free Europe
Independent scientists, MEPs, farmers and citizens united at the European Parliament condemning GMOs; the European Food Safety Authority to be sued
Scientists from six countries joined forces with Members of the European Parliament (MEPs) to call for a Europe wide and worldwide ban on growing GM crops at a special briefing in the European Parliament in Brussels on 12 June 2007 . The briefing, organized by ISIS, Third World Network and Green Network, and hosted by Janusz Wojciechowski, MEP, the vice-Chairman of the Committee on Agriculture and Rural Development for the European Union, coincided with the publication of key scientific papers, GM Food Nightmare Unfolding in the Regulatory Sham (ISIS scientific publication) and New Analysis of a Rat Feeding Study with a Genetically Modified Maize Reveals Signs of Hepatorenal Toxicity (CRII-GEN) on how national and international regulators have been ignoring damning evidence against the safety of GM food and feed while colluding with industry to manipulate scientific research to promote GM crops. The papers were presented at the briefing together with a comprehensive dossier containing more than 160 fully referenced articles from the Science in Society archives documenting the serious hazards ignored, the scientific fraud, the regulatory sham and violation of farmers' rights.
Read press release on the Institute of Science in Society (ISIS) website (UK)

June 20, 2007

Duma Drafts Tough GM Food Bill
The Russian Duma’s Security Committee has drafted a bill banning production and sale of genetically modified food. Moscow authorities threw their support behind the legislation. Moscow Duma deputies were among the drafters while Mayor Yuri Luzhkov called on President Vladimir Putin to address the GM food issue head-on.
Read article at kommersant.com (Russia)

June 17, 2007

EU health claims: ANH provides comments to EFSA
The European Food Safety Authority has asked for public comments on its planned procedures for allowing disease risk reduction claims for foods. Sounds promising, but ANH argues this is a passport system for big business...
Read submission by the Alliance for Natural Health (ANH) to the European Food Safety Authority (EFSA)

June 15, 2007

Committee fails to reach agreement on therapeutics bill
The select committee charged with considering the polarising Therapeutic Products and Medicines Bill has been unable to reach agreement, it reported today. The government administration select committee said it had examined the bill and was unable to reach agreement, and therefore could not recommend the bill be passed. The impasse leaves the bill in the hands of the Government. It had become increasingly unlikely the bill would be passed in its present form. The bill squeaked through its first reading on a vote of 61 to 60, but the Government's ability to pass it has been in doubt since independent MPs Taito Phillip Field and Gordon Copeland said they would vote against it. The bill has been deeply divisive, with those from the medical devices and pharmaceutical industries largely for it, but many in the complementary health sector against it. Under the regime, a joint Australia/New Zealand agency would regulate therapeutic products.
Read article in the New Zealand Herald

June 14, 2007

EU must accept biotech crops, trade commissioner says
The European Union must accept more genetically modified foods to avoid renewed complaints about market barriers at the World Trade Organization, the EU trade commissioner, Peter Mandelson, said Thursday. Any EU delay over the approval of genetically modified crops declared safe by scientists risks prompting legal challenges from farm exporters like the United States , Canada and Argentina , Mandelson said. In a case brought by these three countries, the WTO ruled last year that a 1998-2004 EU ban on new genetically altered foods was illegal.
Read article in the International Herald Tribune

New Irish government adopts GM-free policy
IRELAND AIMS TO BECOME A GMO-FREE ZONE
Following last night's Green Party historic agreement to form a coalition government with Fianna Fail, the two parties revealed their agreed policy "to negotiate for the whole island of Ireland to become a GMO-free zone." The announcement was received with jubilation by farmers and food producers on both sides of the border who have spent the last nine years campaigning to achieve this goal.
Read press release at gmwatch.org

Human genome further unravelled
A close-up view of the human genome has revealed its innermost workings to be far more complex than first thought. The study, which was carried out on just 1% of our DNA code, challenges the view that genes are the main players in driving our biochemistry. Instead, it suggests genes, so called junk DNA and other elements, together weave an intricate control network. The work, published in the journals Nature and Genome Research, is to be scaled up to the rest of the genome.
Read article at BBC News (UK)
Comment: To a number of scientists, the notion that some DNA should be classified as “junk” has long been contentious…

June 12, 2007

Ministers open door for GMOs in