Winter Maladies: Natural Approaches
June Russell's Health Facts
Health and Politics
[Endorsements for Sale] [Influence on Government] [Influence on Science] [Breast Cancer Statistics?] [Attempts to Discredit MCS] [No Profits in Natural Treatments?]
"Do not let either the medical authorities or the politicians mislead you. Find out what the facts are, and make your own decisions about how to live a happy life and how to work for a better world."
---- Linus Pauling {http://www.cforyourself.com} Editor's comment: The real politics of medicine is not who is going to pay for the $1 trillion annual health care bill but why are we not using the many alternatives that can be less expensive, as well as effective and safer?
The public rarely questions the findings reported by medical science because it is perceived as helping to improve the public's well-being. It will come as a surprise to many to find how many studies of diet and heart disease were poorly designed and conducted, how many did not produce the results that have been claimed, and how many have been quoted irrelevantly or misleadingly; and how many published studies exist whose results seriously question or contradict the diet-heart idea but are never acknowledged or quoted. Some of these tactics are not only just misleading but also sometimes amount to scientific fraud. Statins produce cancer in animals and we do not know if statin treatment will lead to an increased rate of cancer in the coming decades. The only groups that are willing to spend several hundred million dollars for trials are the drug companies. Supportive trials are cited with the tendency to exaggerate the trivial effects of their treatment and minimize the negative effects.
{from the book, "The Cholesterol Myths," Uffe Ravnskov, M.D., Ph.D., 2000}
Endorsements for Sale:
Industry Influence on Endorsements by Professional Health Associations
--- The American Hearth Association Example ---
The American Heart Association has certified Florida grapefruit and grapefruit as a part of a heart-healthy diet, however, this is true about many other fruits and vegetables. What's different about Florida grapefruit? Florida farmers paid the Heart Association $450,000 for the exclusive right, among U.S. grapefruit growers, to promote its certification in their ads. However, something in grapefruit juice neutralizes the enzyme that partly inactivates certain drugs as they are being absorbed, which allows more of the drug to be absorbed. The Lancet reported that grapefruit juice can boost the absorption of a blood pressure medication three-fold.
{"Grapefruit, Just the Facts," Nutrition Action Healthletter, Jan./Feb. 1997}
The American Heart Association endorsed, for a fee, a variety of food products and the Arthritis Foundation endorsed a brand of aspirin that was manufactured by a company that donated $1 million annually to the foundation, but government regulators put a stop to these two. However, charities and do-gooder nonprofits sell their logos to commercial products all the time; for example, the American Cancer Society's $1 million deal with the Florida citrus growers, as well as to the makers of Nicoderm nicotine patches; and the American Dental Association's Seal of Approval, first for Crest, and now for 1,300 products including 65 brands of toothpaste. The AMA was going to lend its logo to Sunbeam (for a price), but it was so severely criticized it withdrew. Advertisers love advertorials because readers are liable to mistake them for objectively reported news.
{"Endorsements for Sale," The U.S. News & World Report, Sept. 1, 1997}
The American Heart Association (AHA) accepts funds from the National Cattlemen's Beef Association to promote lean beef, hardly a heart-healthy food. And the only aspirin AHA endorses is Bayer, a company that is said to give them more than $500,000 a year.
{"The Sources of Information," Center for Science in the Public Interest, Women's Health Letter, Nan Fuchs, Ph.D., Feb. 2002}
--- The American Academy of Pediatric Dentistry Example ---
The American Academy of Pediatric Dentistry (AAPD), the not-for-profit membership organization representing the specialty of pediatric dentistry, announced a collaborative research and education partnership with the Coca-Cola Foundation. The AAPD will receive a $1 million research grant from Coco-Cola, whose products the CSPI says causes tooth decay, obesity, and other health problems in children. It will make it unlikely that AAPD will support ventures that go against Coca-Cola’s interest, such as removing soft-drink machines from schools.
{“Physicians & Dentists Partner With Coke???” American Academy of Pediatric Dentistry, March 3, 2003, on mercola.com - March 2003} Dr. Mercola’s comment: “This is the equivalent of the American Lung Association being funded by Phillip Morris.”
Industry Influence on Government and Government Agencies
There is no lobby in Washington as large, as powerful or as well financed as the pharmaceutical lobby, and according to a report from Public Citizen, more than half of the drug industry's 625 registered lobbyists are either former members of Congress or former Congressional staff members and government employees.
{New York Times, Nov. 4, 2001} Author's comments: When wanting funds for a disease, the government creates a crisis, distorts and manipulates figures and facts and gives them to the media. They flood the media with the dangers of obesity and the result is an increase in the purchase of pills. Soon even the medical personnel are quoting that 'media factoid' (material that is repeated in the media so often that it becomes an established fact simply because of its repetition, and not truth). The 1 in 9 breast cancer statistics actually refer to a woman only when in her 90's, but figures were manipulated to get the public's attention. We are now calling the detection of a disease process "prevention," when the definition of 'prevention' is actually preventing the disease process from starting. A mammogram is not 'prevention.'
Loopholes in the current FDA draft guidelines on pharmaceutical company promotional practices permit companies to hide marketing activities behind fronts like the International Committee and the Foundation. This masquerades as science and fools many physicians into dangerous prescribing practices.
{"When is a Medical Journal not a Medical Journal?" Outrage of the Month, Public Citizen's Health Research Group Health Letter, Feb. 1994}
Some claim that the FDA is biased against alternative healing and natural products, and according to an FDA document, "its job is to ensure that the existence of dietary supplements on the market does not act as a disincentive for drug development." Other evidence suggesting possible FDA bias turned up in a study revealing that 37 of the 49 top FDA officials who left the agency moved into high corporate positions with the company they had regulated. Over 100 FDA officials
owned stock in the drug companies they were assigned to manage.
{Based on facts presented in: Townsend Letter for Doctors, Nov. 1992. In Spectrum magazine, Jan/Feb. 1995}
Pharmaceutical firms are taxed 11% less despite charging higher prices for drugs in this country than overseas. It is unfair for the taxpayer to subsidize drug companies that do this, says Rep. Fortney "Pete" Stark, D-California.
{AP, The Daily Progress newspaper, Charlottesville, Virginia, Dec. 26, 1999}
Industry Influence on Scientific Studies
The World Health Organization evaluates the cancer-causing potential of chemicals, and when saccharin recently received a favorable evaluation, the Center for Science in the Public Interest (CSPI) said the evaluation was unscientific. CSPI claimed it was corrupted by industry influence because over half the participants in the meeting were tied to industry. One of them was a key member, Samuel Cohen, whose studies were relied on heavily by the International Agency for Research on Cancer (IARC), and whose research had been partially funded by The International Life Sciences Institute (ILSI). ILSI is an industry group whose sponsors include Cumberland Packing (maker of Sweet 'N Low saccharin products), Coca-Cola, and PepsiCo. The executive director of CSPI said the review was rigged and a 'sham' that puts consumers at risk. The committee inappropriately ignored or dismissed all the evidence that causes cancer in humans and animals, except for the well-accepted link to bladder cancer in male rats which they said was irrelevant for humans. Now will we be seeing other cancer-causing chemicals considered safe for humans?
{"Saccharin Review Corrupted By Industry Influence, Charges CSPI, ww.cspinet.org - June 1999}
The big Pharma (the industry in general) is engaged in the deliberate seduction of the medical profession, country by country, worldwide. It is spending a fortune on influencing, hiring and purchasing academic judgment to a point where, in a few years' time, unbought medical opinion will be hard to find if it goes unchecked.
{"The Nation," New York, interview with John Le Carre, Apr. 9, 2001}
--- Dying to Know the Truth ---
This is extracted from a radio talk show, featured in Phillip Day's Cancer, Why We Are Still Dying To Know The Truth:
Radio host Laurie Lee: "So this is verified, that laetrile (B-17) can have this positive effect?"
Dr. Ralph Moss: "We were finding this and yet, we in Public Affairs were told to issue statements to the exact opposite of what we were finding scientifically."
At the time, Ralph Moss was former Assistant Director of Public Relations at Memorial Sloan-Kettering, NY, a leading American conventional cancer research facility. Laetrile (B-17) is not approved by the FDA, but not because it isn't beneficial - it is, but because it has been leaned on. That's the way it goes in the self-preserving, self-serving, conventional cancer business. Another example of conflicts of interests and double standards is appreciated when one learns that sodium fluoride is also not approved by the FDA due to its toxicity, and yet drug giant Proctor and Gamble and others can market the stuff in their toothpaste with complete impunity.
--- Influence of Industry on Science ---
Bill Moyers Speech at the National Press Club
"We are facing a never-ending battle," says Bill Moyers in a speech given at the National Press Club Luncheon on March 22, 2001, referring to efforts by the chemical industry to delay and dilute an important study by the National Academy of Sciences on the effects of pesticide residues on children. This study was to be in a documentary to be aired on Frontline (PBS). Even the American Cancer Society sent to its 3,000 local chapters a critique of the yet unfinished documentary (8 days before the broadcast aired), claiming wrongly that the documentary exaggerated the hazards. It turned out that the Porter Novelli public relations firm, which had worked for several chemical companies, also did pro bono work for the American Cancer Society, and it was found out that the firm was to cash in some of the good will from that pro bono work to persuade the staff, the communications staff of the American Cancer Society, to issue some harsh talking points about our documentary. The talking points had been supplied by, but not attributed to, Porter Novelli.
None of us should have been surprised at this, for this is the industry that 30 years ago had mounted a blitzkrieg designed to destroy Rachel Carson's credibility as soon as the New Yorker published the first of her three-part condensation of Silent Spring. Rachel Carson was accused of a communist plot to cripple American industry. One chemical company threatened to sue Carson and to withhold advertising from magazines and weekly supplements if they published favorable reviews of Silent Spring. The industry invested millions of dollars in public relations that paid off in support articles in the New York Times, Time, Sports Illustrated and Reader's Digest. Then, like the American Cancer Society in our time, the AMA criticized Carson's book as a serious threat to the continued supply of wholesome, nutritious food. Rachel Carson was dying of cancer at the time, but events totally vindicated her, and within a year, 40 state legislatures had passed regulations concerning pesticides.
{Excerpts from a speech given at the National Press Club Luncheon on March 22, 2001 - After Trade Secrets, "The Never-Ending Battle," by Bill Moyers, Our Toxic Times, May 2001}
Breast Cancer Statistics ("1 in 9") — Don't be Deceived
Whatever the technology's merits, there can be little question that a powerful lobby is pushing screening mammography: radiologists, anti-cancer organizations and companies that manufacture the equipment and film used in mammography. Also in 1992, Joann Schellenback of the American Cancer Society told the New York Times that the Society's much touted 1 in 9 women getting breast cancer in their lifetime was "meant to be a jolt." This figure was developed by calculating a U.S. woman's cumulative lifetime risk of breast cancer between birth and age 85 (even though a woman's life expectancy, were she to be born today, is 80). The risk in any one year is much lower (never greater than 0.4%) and only starts to rise significantly after the age of 55.
{"What's New in Screening Mammography," Public Citizen Health Research Group, Jan. 2002}
You don't have the full story of the 1 in 9 risk. A study in the Journal of the National Cancer Institute (June 2, 1993), specifies the varying risks for varying ages: at age 20 — 1 in 2,500; at age 30 — 1 in 233; at age 40 — 1 in 63; at age 50 — 1 in 41; at age 60 — 1 in 28; at age 70 — 1 in 24; at age 80 — 1 in 16; and at 95 — 1 in 8. The risk of dying of breast cancer hasn't increased by a great deal in the last 20 years. In 1970 the risk of dying of breast cancer in the course of one's lifetime was 1 in 30. Today it is 1 in 28.
{People's Medical Society newsletter, Oct. 1993} Editor's comment: Consider that the risks would be much less for those who: follow a healthy lifestyle; watch their diet (eliminating alcohol and including five servings of vegetables and fruits daily), do not use tobacco, get adequate sleep, exercise regularly, eliminate or lessen chemical exposure to toxins in food and drink (as well as those in the home and yard), use various methods to lessen emotional and mental stress (meditation, bio-feedback, self-hypnosis, etc.), maintain a healthy weight, etc.
--- Breast Cancer Rate: Artifacts and Benign Abnormalities ---
Breast cancer rates are indeed going up, but at least some of this is due to what some scientists refer to as artifacts. One of these is that with mammography, some of the cancers found are really 'pre-cancers' that would, in the absence of mammography, have stayed in some women's breasts all their lives until they died of something else. With widespread screening, doctors are picking up those tumors that in former years would have eventually surfaced, but they are also picking up a large number of pre-cancers, making the number of people diagnosed with cancer seem larger without their necessarily being more cancer. Besides making it appear that cancer is increasing, this phenomenon makes it appear that cure rates are up, since pre-cancers are easily 'cured.' Another is that more women are living longer, and since the risk of getting breast cancer increases with age, more women are getting cancer. This phenomenon accounts not only for some of the increase in the number of people diagnosed with cancer, but also for some of the increase in people dying of cancer.
Mammograms detect other ultimately benign abnormalities doctors feel they must check out, resulting in anguish and unnecessary surgery expense. Radiation induced cancer, for example, in a women who starts to get mammograms at age 40 or 50 is not felt to be high. The risk of a woman starting in her 20's will be much higher.
{from the book "Disease Mongering," by Lynn Payer, a medical journalist for 20 years, a 1992 book}
Industry Attempts to Discredit Multiple Chemical Sensitivities Syndrome (MCS)
In 1990, the Chemical Manufacturers Association (now the American Chemistry Council) vowed to work to prevent the recognition of MCS (Multiple Chemical Sensitivities) out of concern for potential loss profits and increased liability if MCS were to become widely acknowledged {American Chemistry Council, Member companies - http://www.cmahq.com/cmamembers.nsf - 9/24/00}. It specifically committed to work through physicians and medical associations to accomplish this, stating that it was critical to keep physicians from legitimizing MCS. Many physicians work for industry as high-paid expert witnesses, although their financial ties are usually not disclosed in their journal articles, interviews or speaking engagements. Therefore, many people, including those in the health care profession, are often lead to believe that these physician's opinions reflect an honest appraisal of MCS rather than the chemical industry's agenda. What has been said about the tobacco industry could easily be applied to the chemical industry regarding MCS, that is, "the only diversity of opinion comes from the authors with . . . industry affiliations." {Bero LA, Barnes, D., Industry Affiliations and Scientific Conclusions, letter, JAMA 1998} Like the tobacco industry, the chemical industry often uses nonprofit front groups with pleasant sounding names, neutral-appearing third-party spokespeople, and science-for-hire studies to try to convince others of the safety of their products. Some industries, including the tobacco industry, have paid authors up to $10,000 to publish letters in high-profile scientific journals. {letters, JAMA 1999 and Science 1998} Make no mistake about it — the anti-MCS movement is driven by the chemical manufacturers.
The pharmaceutical industry is intimately linked to the chemical industry as many companies that make medications also manufacture pesticides, the chemicals that are implicated in causing MCS. The pharmaceutical industry has spread misinformation about MCS and has limited the amount of accurate information received by physicians and other health care providers through its financial influence over medical journals, conferences, and research. Because the physicians do not receive appropriate and accurate information on MCS during their training or from medical journals, continuing education courses, physicians have been largely unprepared to deal with chemically sensitive patients. As a result, their responses to MSC patients have tended to range from dismissive to blatantly hostile.
One example of the pharmaceutical industry's direct attempt to present anti-MCS information at a medical conference, was at the meeting of the American College of Allergy and Immunology. Sandoz (now Novartis) was scheduled to sponsor a one-day workshop that characterized people with MCS as mentally ill. {American College of Allergy & Immunology, Environmental illness, multiple chemical sensitivities, diagnostic and treatment strategies, Nov. 9, 1990, San Francisco, CA, brochure} Medical journals rely on pharmaceutical advertisements for funding, and they are not likely to publish positive MCS articles. The leading opponent of MCS is unquestionably the Environmental Sensitivities Research Institute (ESRI), which was founded in 1995 specifically to combat MCS, serving the needs of industries affected by MCS litigation. The goal is to cast doubt on the existence of Multiple Chemical Sensitivities, but attempts to ignore or silence the millions of people with MCS, and the growing number of people who daily become chemically sensitive is doomed to fail.
The Americans with Disabilities Act does allow for the consideration of MCS as a disability, and the Department of Housing and Urban Development stated that persons suffering from MCS can seek protection under Federal Housing discrimination laws. MCS is a condition that is widely accepted in the environmental medicine community. There are over 600 articles on MCS and related conditions in the published medical literature, the majority of which supports a physiological rather than psychological basis for MCS (in a ratio of two to one). MCS is a clinical diagnosis that does not rely on tests. One of the most unjust aspects of the anti-MCS movement is that many expert witnesses are paid $500 an hour to testify against people disabled with MCS who are seeking that much money to live on per month. Many of those with MCS have lost everything — their health, homes, careers, savings, and families, and they struggle to obtain the basic necessities of life such as food, water, clothing housing and automobiles they can tolerate. Finding a house that is not contaminated with pesticides, perfume, cleaning products, cigarette smoke residues, new carpets or paint, and formaldehyde-containing building products, is especially difficult. Among MCS sufferers you will find physicians, nurses, teachers, computer consultants, lawyers and other skilled workers who were once productive members of society who can no longer support themselves, or contribute their skills to society.
{"Multiple Chemical Sensitivities Under Siege," by Ann McCampbell, M.D., reprinted from Townsend Letter for Doctors & Patients, Our Toxic Times, March 2001}
No Big Profits for Industry in Natural Treatments
There is no money in natural treatments for the big drug companies. Profit comes before human health. Doctors are fabricating research results to win grants and advance their careers, but the medical establishment is failing to protect the public from the menace of these scientific frauds, said a committee of medical doctors in the "Independent News, Dec. 2000."
{"They Say That Vitamin C can Increase the Risk of Cancer. Oh, yes? And who's "they?" Mercola.com - July 2001}
CATCH 22! If you are going to be selling any herbs, don't do the science! If you do, then the FDA can call it a drug and can stop the company from making it. An example: a company in China started marketing Pharmonex a couple of years ago, and selling it as a food supplement, cholestin. They did the science to find the ingredient that helped lower cholesterol, and found it was the 'lovastatin' (which yeast naturally makes), so the FDA restricts its sale now because it is a drug. This is the same ingredient found in the prescription drug, Mevacor (but in a higher dose).
{The People's Pharmacy, public radio, Dec. 7, 1997}
Research grant money is the livelihood of career researchers and the life-blood of the institutions where they work. The biggest source of money is from drug companies. This money sets the standard just as advertising revenue does for magazine publishers. It becomes hard to get this money if interest is shown in an alternative (non-drug) treatment. The public has to live with the resulting effects on their health care, without knowing where the standards come from.
{Citizen's for Health}