Death by Avandia, Placebo as a Cure - NewsGrabs 13 January 2008
Health Supreme's NewsGrabs - a selection of contrary and underprivileged news in health and related sectors. Find what you may have missed - watch out for NewsGrabs.
Here is this week's selection:
France best, US worst in preventable death ranking
France, Japan and Australia rated best and the United States worst in new rankings focusing on preventable deaths due to treatable conditions in 19 leading industrialized nations, researchers said on Tuesday. If the U.S. health care system performed as well as those of those top three countries, there would be 101,000 fewer deaths in the United States per year, according to researchers writing in the journal Health Affairs.
Canadian Universal Health Care Better and Cheaper than U.S., Says Research
Canada's health care system offers "excellent value for the money" says a British researcher who has studied preventable deaths in 19 industrialized nations. The study looks at "amenable mortality" -- deaths that would not have occurred if effective health care had been available.
Are Google Results Hazardous To Your Health?
The Center for Medicine in the Public Interest (CMPI) is a medical industry thinktank, fronted by former Bush Administration FDA officials. CMPI released a study this week outlining the perils of relying on Google for prescription medication information. “What we found was not only disturbing, but dangerous to public health,” said CMPI vice president Robert Goldberg.Dangerous for health, or dangerous for the pharma's business, that is the question. What about all those Viagra and assorted drug sellers on the internet who send us spam and offer great discounts? They don't seem to be on the CMPI radar at all. But then ..."CMPI is partially funded by the pharmaceutical industry, the Lilly Endowment (connected to Eli Lilly) being one of the largest contributors. Patients shying away from pharmaceuticals is bad for business."
Reminiscence on the passing of Senate President Ben Altamirano
The sponsor of a New Mexico bill to institute a nutrition council and ProTem President of the NM Senate has recently passed away. The bill, if passed, would have allowed to get aspartame, the controversial artificial sweetener, off the market in New Mexico. The article is by Stephen Fox, author of the bill.
Low vitamin D heart health risk
Having too little vitamin D has been linked to an increased risk of heart disease, a US study has found. Vitamin D is mainly obtained from exposure to the sun, as well as from certain foods such as oily fish and eggs. A lack of the nutrient, already known to cause weakened bones, has also been linked to multiple sclerosis and rheumatoid arthritis.
Cranberries really are a miracle cure for women
The remarkable healing property in cranberries stems from a heavy molecule known as non-dialyzable material or NDM. This molecule, isolated by Prof. Ofek and his colleagues, seems to coat some bodily surfaces with Teflon-like efficiency, preventing infection-causing agents from taking root. Surprisingly, NDM appears to have no effect on some of the good bacteria in our bodies, says Prof. Ofek.
Surprise -- cholesterol may actually pose benefits, study shows
“We were not expecting to get these kind of results,” Riechman explains. “We need further research in this area, but what we found could really make us look differently at cholesterol, especially as it relates to a vigorous workout.”... the researchers found that there was a significant association of dietary cholesterol and change in strength. In general, those with higher cholesterol intake also had the highest muscle strength gain. Cholesterol circulating in the blood also appeared to have contributed to greater muscle gain in the participants, Riechman said. “Needless to say, these findings caught us totally off guard,” he explains.
My comment:This is opening a can of worms but it should not be any surprise at all. Cholesterol is a vital substance for our metabolism, not only for muscle strength. To lower cholesterol or block its manufacture in the liver, as statin drugs do, is pure idiocy. Higher cholesterol levels have been associated with less heart related deaths. Statins tend to dissolve muscle tissue. The heart is a muscle. Go figure.
Brain aging expert challenges the existence of Alzheimer's as a 'disease'
In his provocative and ground-breaking new book, Dr. Whitehouse questions current approaches to Alzheimer’s disease (AD) diagnosis and treatment and brings a new understanding to everything we thought we knew about brain aging. Dr. Whitehouse and co-author Daniel George, M. Sc., published “The Myth of Alzheimer’s” to expose what they believe to be the unsound clinical, political, and scientific framework of AD and explain why it continues to be so difficult to address a condition concerning so many people as they age.“AD cannot be biologically or clinically differentiated from normal aging. There is no one profile of AD that is consistent from person to person,” says Dr. Whitehouse. “Alzheimer’s is a heterogeneous process because it reflects the different way people’s brains age over their lifetimes.”
Nalgene Bottles Pulled From Shelves
Worries about the hormone-mimicking chemical bisphenol A (BPA) used in Nalgene plastic water containers have led a major Canadian retailer to remove Nalgene, along with other polycarbonate plastic containers, from store shelves in early December.
CODEX ALIMENTARIUS: THE CONTROL AND DENIAL OF SCIENCE
Paul Anthony Taylor attended the meeting of the Codex Committee on Nutrition and Foods for Special Dietary Uses in November 2007 as a delegate of the National Health Federation, the only consumer-orientated pro-natural health organization in the world to have official observer status at Codex meetings. Paul's eye-witness report describes how Codex continues to deny the health benefits of vitamins, micronutrients and nutrition in the battle against today's most common diseases and explains how its key beneficiaries are the large multinational food, biotech and pharmaceutical corporations.
FDA Sued by Citizens
The New Year brings a surprise for the FDA – a lawsuit filed by Public Citizen seeking to force the FDA to do its pretended job of protecting American citizens from the dangers of drugs. Of course, the real FDA job, as prioritized by top FDA management, is to protect the sales of Big Pharma and create new market opportunities for Big Pharma and Big Biotech while using Americans for experimental purposes. The suit revolves around the dangers of toxic fluoride-containing antibiotics. The two brand names involved are Johnson & Johnson’s Levaquin and Bayer’s Cipro.
Nigeria Seeks Arrests In Pfizer Trovan Case
A federal High Court in Abuja yesterday issued a warrant of arrest for eight former directors of a pharmaceutical giant, Pfizer Specialties Ltd, AllAfrica.com reports.Both the federal and Kano State governments had instituted criminal charges against Pfizer over its alleged role in the deaths of the children who received the drug during a meningitis epidemic in 1996. They are claiming $700 million in damages and restitution from Pfizer. The government alleges Pfizer researchers selected 200 children and infants from crowds in Kano and gave about half of the group an untested anti-biotic, Trovan, without any approval from any authority.
Hot Flash: FDA Warns About BHRT Drugs
The agency sent warning letters to seven compounding pharmacies operations that their claims about the safety and effectiveness of their allegedly bio-identical hormone replacement therapy, or BHRT products, are unsupported by medical evidence, and are considered false and misleading. The move comes, partly, in response to a citizen’s petition filed by Wyeth, which wants to stop compounding pharmacies from making bioidentical versions of Prempro.
FDA Cracks Down on Custom-Made Hormones
"We want to assure that Americans receive accurate information about the risks and benefits of drug therapies," the FDA's chief medical officer, Dr. Janet Woodcock, said in a statement. The agency said it is concerned that the claims for safety and effectiveness mislead patients, doctors and other health care professionals.Wyeth complained to the FDA some time ago against these unregistered hormone preparations which, apparently, are cutting deeply into the sales of their hormone products. Who did we say the FDA was supposed to be working for? Oh yes, it's all about consumer safety, I forgot!
Big Pharma And Its Presidential Bets
These are the figures as compiled by OpenSecrets. Hillary Clinton received $269,436 from the pharma/healthcare sector, while Barak Obama garnered $261,784. Right behind was Mitt Romney, with $260,535 (please click on the chart to make it bigger). One caveat: this is as of Oct. 29.
Avandia: Government Estimates 83,000 Excess Heart Attacks Caused By Diabetes Drug
According to a November 2007 report by the Senate Finance Committee, an analysis by FDA scientists presented at a July 30, 2007, safety panel meeting estimates that Avandia has caused approximately 83,000 excess heart attacks since coming on the market. The report entitled, "The Intimidation of Dr. John Buse and the Diabetes Drug Avandia," summarizes the Committee's findings regarding GlaxoSmithKline's intimidation of Dr Buse, an independent scientist who first voiced concerns about Avandia back in 1999.
What Are the True Costs of Drug Marketing?
If all you want is the bottom line, Gagnon and Lexchin estimate the total at $57.5 billion, which is 24.4% of total drug sales; R&D expenses account for 13.4% of sales by contrast. This works out to $61,000 spent on promotion for every US physician.
America's Love-Hate Relationship with Drugs
While Americans are inundated with coverage of the Democrats' quibbling over Barack Obama's use of marijuana and cocaine as a teenager, a truly important drug story continues to be neglected: The hypocrisy of Big Pharma, psychiatric officialdom, and justice institutions regarding mood-altering (psychotropic) drugs -- specifically the denial of the similarity between illegal and psychiatric drugs.The illegal-psychiatric drug hypocrisy in the U.S. is an ugly triumph. It is a triumph of marketing over science. It is a triumph for pharmaceutical corporations and America's ever-growing prison-industrial complex. It is a triumph for those comfortably atop society who would rather Americans view their malaise as exclusively a medical rather than a social problem. And ultimately, it is a triumph of injustice and greed over human rights and a sane society.
Forget Drugs, Docs Like Those Placebos: Study
Doctors prescribe placebos more often than patients might imagine. A survey of Chicago-area physicians found that 45 per cent report they have given a patient a placebo at least once, according to a study published in this month’s Journal of General Internal Medicine, The Globe and Mail reports. Past surveys of Israeli and Danish doctors revealed that 60 per cent and 85 per cent, respectively, admit they’ve relied on the “placebo effect” to heal patients.
Massachusetts' Mandatory Mental Health Screening
The State of Massachusetts is embarking on what strikes me as an excessive social experiment. As of Jan. 1 annual checkups for about 500,000 kids and teens on the state's Medicaid program will have to include a mental health screening, regardless of whether there's a reason to suspect mental health issues in the patient or not, reports the Boston Globe. Doctors are required to do this with each patient, although parents and children are not legally required to comply. But then most people are utterly in thrall to doctors and I doubt many would tell their doctor to back off.
Who's Behind the Bible of Mental Illness
The American Psychiatric Association will spend the next five years producing a new edition of the psychiatrist's "bible," the official guidebook for diagnosing mental problems. The Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders, as it is known, is hugely influential because it determines what is and is not a mental disorder. In turn, it is responsible for much of the sales growth in prescription drugs.The most recent edition of the DSM, published in 1994, drew controversy because it turned what had once been a thin guidebook into an 886-page tome that significantly expanded the definition of mental illness. Traits once associated with shyness, for example, became symptoms of "social anxiety disorder." And drug companies went on to spend millions promoting medicines for those problems. Eyebrows were further raised in 2006 when a study showed that more than half of the researchers who worked on the manual had at least one financial tie to the drug industry.
Antipsychotics Offer No Benefit
A multi-site international study tracked 86 adults with low IQ for over a month during which they were treated with either, Johnson & Johnson's antipsychotic, Risperdal, or the older antipsychotic, Haldol, or a placebo. The study was led by Dr. Peter J. Tyrer, a professor of psychiatry at Imperial College London. Caregivers tracked the behavior of the subjects. After a month, people in all three groups had settled down, losing their temper less often and causing less damage when they did. The findings, published in The Lancet: "the placebo group showing the greatest change in the modified aggression scale score after 4 weeks...
Methadone even at therapeutic levels can kill
Methadone is a possible cause of sudden cardiac death even when it isn’t overdosed but is taken at therapeutic levels primarily for relief of chronic pain or drug addiction withdrawal, a new study by Oregon Health & Science University researchers suggests.
DEATH RUSH: Poppers & AIDS
Death Rush is John Lauritson's 64-page book published by Pagan Press in 1986. Its purpose was to warn gay men about the dangers of the nitrite inhalants or alkyl nitrites (amyl nitrite, butyl nitrite, isobutyl nitrite, etc). Although Death Rush: Poppers & AIDS has been out-of-print for many years now, the medical information is still valid. The toxicities of these drugs have not changed. The nitrite inhalants are still powerfully mutagenic; they still cause anemia; they are still immunosuppresive.
WHAT “HIV” IS NOT: IT’S NOT SEXUALLY TRANSMITTED
But that probability of 1 per 1000 applies only when one of the sex partners is already HIV-positive. UNAIDS puts the average global infection rate at about 1%: on average, if you choose your sexual partner at random, you have 1 chance in 100 of getting an HIV-positive one. So your overall risk is 1 in 100 multiplied by 1 in 1000, in other words 1 in 100,000. That, Fauci would have us believe, is capable of producing 5,000,000 new infections in the world each year. And all that sexual activity Fauci conjures up somehow fails to spread gonorrhea or syphilis while disseminating something that is 100 times less infective. So, I suggest, don’t believe everything that Dr. Anthony Fauci says, even about matters on which he is supposed to be expert.
AIDS: FOOD IS GOOD FOR CHILDREN
The emphasized phrase, that HIV-positive and HIV-negative children die from largely the same conditions whether or not they are HIV-positive, is once again consistent with stress theory (HOW TO TEST THEORIES…, 7 January 2008): HIV-positive is in these cases a marker of the degree of severity of the particular condition.The study notes that “Young children who were both severely malnourished and anaemic had high mortality regardless of CD4 values, particularly those aged 1-2 years” and that “Prevention and treatment of malnutrition and anaemia is integral to HIV paediatric care and could improve survival.”
Supreme Court Reaffirms Monsanto's Power to Prevent Farmers from Saving Seeds
The Supreme Court on Monday let stand, without comment, a lower court ruling that punished a Mississippi farmer for re-using Monsanto Co.'s patented, genetically modified soybeans. St. Louis-based Monsanto sued Homan McFarling in 1999 for violating its patents by planting biotech seeds that he saved from a previous year's crop. The company won $375,000 in damages, which McFarling's lawyers also challenged as excessive.Since the late 1990s, Monsanto has pursued similar lawsuits against almost 100 farmers, according to the Center for Food Safety, which opposes the suits and urged the court to take McFarling's case.
Controlling the world's food supply - your friendly Monsanto corporation...
A cold spell soon to replace global warming
The real reasons for climate changes are uneven solar radiation, terrestrial precession (that is, axis gyration), instability of oceanic currents, regular salinity fluctuations of the Arctic Ocean surface waters, etc. There is another, principal reason—solar activity and luminosity. The greater they are the warmer is our climate.Astrophysics knows two solar activity cycles, of 11 and 200 years. Both are caused by changes in the radius and area of the irradiating solar surface. The latest data, obtained by Habibullah Abdusamatov, head of the Pulkovo Observatory space research laboratory, say that Earth has passed the peak of its warmer period, and a fairly cold spell will set in quite soon, by 2012. Real cold will come when solar activity reaches its minimum, by 2041, and will last for 50-60 years or even longer.
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More information out there...There is much I cannot cover but other sources for this kind of information exist and are active.
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The Alternative Medicine Yahoo Group is another great place to get information on what is happening in the world of nutrition and other natural health options.
For the influence of electromagnetic waves from radio, mobile phones and other radio emitting devices, check out the emfrefugee group on Yahoo.
If you are interested in a different take on the news that isn't health centered but is certainly fun, check out Robin Good TV News.
Some more sites to keep up to date with the other side of world affairs, the stuff you won't find on tv:
http://www.whatreallyhappened.com
http://www.commondreams.org
http://www.vialls.com/
http://www.globalresearch.ca/
http://rawstory.com/
http://www.truthout.org/And remember ...
"The individual is supreme and finds its way through intuition."
posted by Sepp Hasslberger on Sunday January 13 2008
updated on Wednesday August 15 2012URL of this article:
http://www.newmediaexplorer.org/sepp/2008/01/13/death_by_avandia_placebo_as_a_cure_newsgrabs_13_january_2008.htm