“After careful consideration, the company decided not to proceed with the study,” Pfizer spokesperson Gwendolyn Fisher said.

Fisher said that although the company had taken “preparatory steps” toward the trial, it had decided to abandon the study in order “to meet regulatory timelines.” No patients were enrolled.

Pfizer is seeking FDA approval to market Geodon for the treatment of bipolar disorder in children between the ages of 10 and 17. An FDA panel already rejected this use once in 2009 by a vote of 10-7, expressing concern that large numbers of participants had failed to complete clinical trials of the drug. The FDA asked Pfizer for further information on the drug’s safety in children, and the company responded by launching pediatric trials of the drug.

In April, the FDA warned the company that researchers in charge of the trials were engaging in “significant violations,” including “widespread overdosing” caused by inadequate company oversight.

Five months earlier, Pfizer had agreed to pay $2.3 billion to settle a collection of federal and state criminal and civil charges that it had improperly marketed Geodon and three other drugs.

Geodon, which made Pfizer $1 billion in 2009, is already approved for the treatment of bipolar disorder and schizophrenia in adults. Its competitors AstraZeneca and Eli Lilly have already secured FDA approval to use their respective antipsychotics Seroquel and Zyprexa to treat bipolar disorder in children.

Treatment of children with antipsychotics remains a controversial practice amid growing concern over major side effects such as severe metabolic changes and weight gain.

Although Geodon’s most recent safety trial has been canceled, the company made it clear that it still plans to secure FDA approval for pediatric use of the drug.

Are you drugging your child unknowingly?

Be well

Dr Sundardas

“Regarding your comments on claims made for homeopathy: criticisms centered around the vanishingly small number of solute molecules present in a solution after it has been repeatedly diluted are beside the point, since advocates of homeopathic remedies attribute their effects not to molecules present in the water, but to modifications of the water’s structure.

Simple-minded analysis may suggest that water, being a fluid, cannot have a structure of the kind that such a picture would demand. But cases such as that of liquid crystals, which while flowing like an ordinary fluid can maintain an ordered structure over macroscopic distances, show the limitations of such ways of thinking. There have not, to the best of my knowledge, been any refutations of homeopathy that remain valid after this particular point is taken into account.”

A related topic is the phenomenon, claimed by Jacques Benveniste’s colleague Yolene Thomas and by others to be well established experimentally, known as “memory of water.” If valid, this would be of greater significance than homeopathy itself, and it attests to the limited vision of the modern scientific community that, far from hastening to test such claims, the only response has been to dismiss them out of hand.

Following his comments Josephson, who is an emeritus professor of Cambridge University in England, was asked by New Scientist editors how he became an advocate of unconventional ideas. He responded:

I went to a conference where the French immunologist Jacques Benveniste was talking for the first time about his discovery that water has a ‘memory’ of compounds that were once dissolved in it — which might explain how homeopathy works. His findings provoked irrationally strong reactions from scientists, and I was struck by how badly he was treated.

Josephson went on to describe how many scientists today suffer from “pathological disbelief;” that is, they maintain an unscientific attitude that is embodied by the statement “even if it were true I wouldn’t believe it.”

Even more recently, Josephson wryly responded to the chronic ignorance of homeopathy by its skeptics saying, “The idea that water can have a memory can be readily refuted by any one of a number of easily understood, invalid arguments.”

In the new interview in Science, Montagnier also expressed real concern about the unscientific atmosphere that presently exists on certain unconventional subjects such as homeopathy, “I am told that some people have reproduced Benveniste’s results, but they are afraid to publish it because of the intellectual terror from people who don’t understand it.”

Montagnier concluded the interview when asked if he is concerned that he is drifting into pseudoscience, he replied adamantly: “No, because it’s not pseudoscience. It’s not quackery. These are real phenomena which deserve further study.”

It is remarkable enough that many skeptics of homeopathy actually say that there is “no research” that has shows that homeopathic medicines work. Such statements are clearly false, and yet, such assertions are common on the Internet and even in some peer-review articles. Just a little bit of searching can uncover many high quality studies that have been published in highly respected medical and scientific journals, including the Lancet, BMJ, Pediatrics, Pediatric Infectious Disease Journal, Chest and many others. Although some of these same journals have also published research with negative results to homeopathy, there is simply much more research that shows a positive rather than negative effect.

Misstatements and misinformation on homeopathy are predictable because this system of medicine provides a viable and significant threat to economic interests in medicine, let alone to the very philosophy and worldview of biomedicine. It is therefore not surprising that the British Medical Association had the sheer audacity to refer to homeopathy as “witchcraft.” It is quite predictable that when one goes on a witch hunt, one inevitable finds “witches,” especially when there are certain benefits to demonizing a potential competitor (homeopathy plays a much larger and more competitive role in Europe than it does in the USA).

Skeptics of homeopathy also have long asserted that homeopathic medicines have “nothing” in them because they are diluted too much. However, new research conducted at the respected Indian Institutes of Technology has confirmed the presence of “nanoparticles” of the starting materials even at extremely high dilutions. Researchers have demonstrated by Transmission Electron Microscopy (TEM), electron diffraction and chemical analysis by Inductively Coupled Plasma-Atomic Emission Spectroscopy (ICP-AES), the presence of physical entities in these extreme dilutions. (24) In the light of this research, it can now be asserted that anyone who says or suggests that there is “nothing” in homeopathic medicines is either simply uninformed or is not being honest.

Because the researchers received confirmation of the existence of nanoparticles at two different homeopathic high potencies (30C and 200C) and because they tested four different medicines (Zincum met./zinc; Aurum met. /gold; Stannum met./tin; and Cuprum met./copper), the researchers concluded that this study provides “concrete evidence.”

Although skeptics of homeopathy may assume that homeopathic doses are still too small to have any biological action, such assumptions have also been proven wrong. The multi-disciplinary field of small dose effects is called “hormesis,” and approximately 1,000 studies from a wide variety of scientific specialties have confirmed significant and sometimes substantial biological effects from extremely small doses of certain substances on certain biological systems.

A special issue of the peer-review journal, Human and Experimental Toxicology (July 2010), devoted itself to the interface between hormesis and homeopathy. (25) The articles in this issue verify the power of homeopathic doses of various substances.

In closing, it should be noted that skepticism of any subject is important to the evolution of science and medicine. However, as noted above by Nobelist Brian Josephson, many scientists have a “pathological disbelief” in certain subjects that ultimately create an unhealthy and unscientific attitude blocks real truth and real science. Skepticism is at its best when its advocates do not try to cut off research or close down conversation of a subject but instead explore possible new (or old) ways to understand and verify strange but compelling phenomena. We all have this challenge as we explore and evaluate the biological and clinical effects of homeopathic medicines.

Be well

Dr Sundardas

Most clinical research conducted on homeopathic medicines that has been published in peer-review journals have shown positive clinical results, especially in the treatment of respiratory allergies, influenza, fibromyalgia, rheumatoid arthritis, childhood diarrhea, post-surgical abdominal surgery recovery, attention deficit disorder, and reduction in the side effects of conventional cancer treatments. In addition to clinical trials, several hundred basic science studies have confirmed the biological activity of homeopathic medicines. One type of basic science trials, called in vitro studies, found 67 experiments (1/3 of them replications) and nearly 3/4 of all replications were positive.

In addition to the wide variety of basic science evidence and clinical research, further evidence for homeopathy resides in the fact that they gained widespread popularity in the U.S. and Europe during the 19th century due to the impressive results people experienced in the treatment of epidemics that raged during that time, including cholera, typhoid, yellow fever, scarlet fever, and influenza.

Montagnier, who is also founder and president of the World Foundation for AIDS Research and Prevention, asserted, “I can’t say that homeopathy is right in everything. What I can say now is that the high dilutions (used in homeopathy) are right. High dilutions of something are not nothing. They are water structures which mimic the original molecules.”

Here, Montagnier is making reference to his experimental research that confirms one of the controversial features of homeopathic medicine that uses doses of substances that undergo sequential dilution with vigorous shaking in-between each dilution. Although it is common for modern-day scientists to assume that none of the original molecules remain in solution, Montagnier’s research (and other of many of his colleagues) has verified that electromagnetic signals of the original medicine remains in the water and has dramatic biological effects.

Montagnier has just taken a new position at Jiaotong University in Shanghai, China (this university is often referred to as “China’s MIT”), where he will work in a new institute bearing his name. This work focuses on a new scientific movement at the crossroads of physics, biology, and medicine: the phenomenon of electromagnetic waves produced by DNA in water. He and his team will study both the theoretical basis and the possible applications in medicine.

Montagnier’s new research is investigating the electromagnetic waves that he says emanate from the highly diluted DNA of various pathogens. Montagnier asserts, “What we have found is that DNA produces structural changes in water, which persist at very high dilutions, and which lead to resonant electromagnetic signals that we can measure. Not all DNA produces signals that we can detect with our device. The high-intensity signals come from bacterial and viral DNA.”

Montagnier affirms that these new observations will lead to novel treatments for many common chronic diseases, including but not limited to autism, Alzheimer’s disease, Parkinson’s disease, and multiple sclerosis.

Montagnier first wrote about his findings in 2009, and then, in mid-2010, he spoke at a prestigious meeting of fellow Nobelists where he expressed interest in homeopathy and the implications of this system of medicine.

French retirement laws do not allow Montagnier, who is 78 years of age, to work at a public institute, thereby limiting access to research funding. Montagnier acknowledges that getting research funds from Big Pharma and certain other conventional research funding agencies is unlikely due to the atmosphere of antagonism to homeopathy and natural treatment options.

Montagnier’s new research evokes memories one of the most sensational stories in French science, often referred to as the ‘Benveniste affair.’ A highly respected immunologist Dr.Jacques Benveniste., who died in 2004, conducted a study which was replicated in three other university laboratories and that was published in Nature. Benveniste and other researchers used extremely diluted doses of substances that created an effect on a type of white blood cell called basophils.

Although Benveniste’s work was supposedly debunked, Montagnier considers Benveniste a “modern Galileo” who was far ahead of his day and time and who was attacked for investigating a medical and scientific subject that orthodoxy had mistakenly overlooked and even demonized.

be well

Dr Sundardas

Exciting new research conducted at the Creighton University School of Medicine in Nebraskahas revealed that supplementing with vitamin D and calcium can reduce your risk of cancer by an astonishing 77 percent. This includes breast cancer, colon cancer, skin cancer and other forms of cancer. This research provides strong new evidence that vitamin D is the single most effective medicine against cancer, far outpacing the benefits of any cancer drug known to modern science.

The study involved 1,179 healthy women from rural Nebraska. One group of women was given calcium (around 1500 mg daily) and vitamin D (1100 IU daily) while another group was given placebo. Over four year, the group receiving the calcium and vitamin D supplements showed a 60 percent decrease in cancers. Considering just the last three years of the study reveals an impressive 77 percent reduction in cancer due to supplementation.

Note that these astonishing effects were achieved on what many nutritionists consider to be a low dose of vitamin D. Exposure to sunlight, which creates even more vitamin D in the body, was not tested or considered, and the quality of the calcium supplements was likely not as high as it could have been (it was probably calcium carbonate and not high-grade calcium malate, aspartate or similar forms). What does all this mean? It means that if you take high-quality calcium supplements and get lots of natural sunlight exposure or take premium vitamin D supplements (such as those made from fish oil), you could easily have a greater reduction than the 77 percent reduction recorded in this study.

This research on vitamin D is such good news that the American Cancer Society, of course, had to say something against it. An ACS spokesperson, Marji McCullough, strategic director of nutritional epidemiology for the American Cancer Society, flatly stated that nobody should take supplements to prevent cancer.

If it seems surprising to you that the American Cancer Society — which claims to be against cancer — would dissuade people from taking supplements that slash their cancer risk by 77 percent, then you don’t know much about the ACS. In my opinion, the ACS is an organization that actually prevents prevention and openly supports the continuation of cancer as a way to boost its power and profits. The ACS is the wealthiest non-profit in America and has very close ties to pharmaceutical companies, mammography equipment companies and other corporations that profit from cancer. Notice the name, too: It isn’t the American Anti-Cancer Society, it’s the American Cancer Society!

This research on vitamin D is a huge threat to the cancer industry profit mongers because it reveals a way to prevent cancer for free — by seeking natural sunlight exposure and letting your skin manufacture your own powerful anti-cancer medicine (vitamin D). The idea that the cancer industry could lose 80% of its patients due to widespread education about vitamin D and sunlight scares the living daylights out of the cancer industry. Billions of dollars in cancer profits are at stake here, so the pro-cancer groups have to do everything they can to discredit vitamin D by creating doubt and confusion. The degree of dishonesty at work here is almost unbelievable to those who don’t really know what’s happening in the cancer industry.

Ten questions to ask yourself about the cancer industry:

#1: Why does the cancer industry refuse to educate people about cancer prevention?

#2: If people keep donating money for the “search” for a cancer cure, why won’t drug companies pledge to “open source” their patents on cancer drugs to benefit the people whose donations funded them in the first place? In other words, why do people donate money for cancer research but then get charged for cancer drugs?

#3: Why does the entire cancer industry so strongly dissuade people from using sunlight exposure to dramatically reduce their cancer risk? (Hint: Follow the money to the sunscreen industry…)

#4: Why have all the really good cancer supplements, clinics and naturopaths been banned, arrested or run out of the country? (Look up the FDA’s oppression of Lane Labs over MGN-3 for a fascinating review of this…)

#5: The U.S. has poured billions of dollars into the cancer industry over the last three decades. Cancer cures were promised in the 1970′s. Why are cancer rates still essentially the same today as they were in the 1970′s?

#6: Why does the cancer industry continue to use chemotherapy, radiation and other toxic procedures to “kill tumors” when the latest science clearly shows that cancer tumors are only the symptoms, not the cause, of cancer? Chemotherapy destroys immune function and causes permanent damage to the heart, brain and liver…

#7: The World Health Organization says that 70% of all cancers are easily preventable through dietary and lifestyle changes. This latest research shows that sunlight and low-cost calcium supplements can slash cancer risk by 77% in women. Why won’t conventional medicine embrace this low-cost, safe and highly effective method for preventing cancer?

#8: The cancer industry routinely attacks anti-cancer herbs, superfoods and supplements. Why is the cancer industry opposed to anti-cancer nutrition? Why does it believe that only man, not nature, can manufacture anti-cancer medicines?

#9: Dark skin pigmentation blocks ultraviolet radiation, meaning that people with black skin need far more time under the sun to generate the same amount of vitamin D as someone with white skin. Not surprisingly, black women suffer extremely high rates of breast cancer while black men show similarly high levels of prostate cancer. The white-dominated medical industry pretends to be “mystified” by all this. Why won’t conventional medicine simple tell black people the truth about vitamin D, skin pigmentation and cancer? Why do oncologists try to keep black people ignorant about their vitamin D deficiencies?

#10: Why is it illegal for nutritional supplement manufacturers to tell the truth about the anti-cancer effects of their products? Broccoli, garlic, onions and sprouts all have powerful anti-cancer effects, as do dozens of rainforest herbs (Cat’s Claw, for example), Chinese herbs and Western herbs. But the FDA threatens and censors any company that dares to mention cancer prevention on its supplement products. Why is the FDA enforcing a policy of nutritional ignorance with U.S. consumers? Why does the federal government want people to remain ignorant of methods for preventing or treating cancer?

Be well

Dr Sundardas

The most common method for early detection is mammography. A mammogram is an X-ray picture of your breast that can reveal tumor growths otherwise undetectable in a physical exam. Like all x-rays, mammograms use doses of ionizing radiation to create this image. Radiologists then analyze the image for any abnormal growths. Despite continuous improvements and innovations, mammography has garnered a sizable opposition in the medical community because of an error rate that is still high and the amount of harmful radiation used in the procedure.

Is mammography an effective tool for detecting tumors? Some critics say no. In a Swedish study of 60,000 women, 70 percent of the mammographically detected tumors weren’t tumors at all. These “false positives” aren’t just financial and emotional strains, they may also lead to many unnecessary and invasive biopsies. In fact, 70 to 80 percent of all positive mammograms do not, upon biopsy, show any presence of cancer.

At the same time, mammograms also have a high rate of missed tumors, or “false negatives.” Dr.Samuel S. Epstein, in his book, The Politics Of Cancer, claims that in women ages 40 to 49, one in four instances of cancer is missed at each mammography. The National Cancer Institute (NCI) puts the false negative rate even higher at 40 percent among women ages 40-49. National Institutes of Health spokespeople also admit that mammograms miss 10 percent of malignant tumors in women over 50. Researchers have found that breast tissue is denser among younger women, making it difficult to detect tumors. For this reason, false negatives are twice as likely to occur in premenopausal mammograms.

Many critics of mammography cite the hazardous health effects of radiation. In 1976, the controversy over radiation and mammography reached a saturation point. At that time mammographic technology delivered five to 10 rads (radiation-absorbed doses) per screening, as compared to 1 rad in current screening methods. In women between the ages of 35 and 50, each rad of exposure increased the risk of breast cancer by one percent, according to Dr. Frank Rauscher, then-director of the NCI.

According to Russell L. Blaylock, MD, one estimate is that annual radiological breast exams increase the risk of breast cancer by two percent a year. So over 10 years the risk will have increased 20 percent. In the 1960s and 70s, women, even those who received 10 screenings a year, were never told the risk they faced from exposure. In the midst of the 1976 radiation debate, Kodak, a major manufacturer of mammography film, took out full-page ads in scientific journals entitled About breast cancer and X-rays: A hopeful message from industry on a sober topic.

Despite better technology and decreased doses of radiation, scientists still claim mammography is a substantial risk. Dr.John W. Gofman, an authority on the health effects of ionizing radiation, estimates that 75 percent of breast cancer could be prevented by avoiding or minimizing exposure to the ionizing radiation. This includes mammography, x-rays and other medical and dental sources.

Since mammographic screening was introduced, the incidence of a form of breast cancer called ductal carcinoma in situ (DCIS) has increased by 328 percent. Two hundred percent of this increase is allegedly due to mammography. In addition to harmful radiation, mammography may also help spread existing cancer cells due to the considerable pressure placed on the woman’s breast during the procedure. According to some health practitioners, this compression could cause existing cancer cells to metastasize from the breast tissue.

Cancer research has also found a gene, called oncogene AC, that is extremely sensitive to even small doses of radiation. A significant percentage of women in the United States have this gene, which could increase their risk of mammography-induced cancer. They estimate that 10,000 A-T carriers will die of breast cancer this year due to mammography.

The risk of radiation is apparently higher among younger women. The NCI released evidence that, among women under 35, mammography could cause 75 cases of breast cancer for every 15 it identifies. Another Canadian study found a 52 percent increase in breast cancer mortality in young women given annual mammograms. Dr. Samuel Epstein also claims that pregnant women exposed to radiation could endanger their fetus. He advises against mammography during pregnancy because “the future risks of leukemia to your unborn child, not to mention birth defects, are just not worth it.” Similarly, studies reveal that children exposed to radiation are more likely to develop breast cancer as adults.While the number of deaths caused by breast cancer has decreased, the incidence of breast cancer is still rising. Since 1940, the incidence of breast cancer has risen by one to two percent every year. Between 1973 and 1991, the incidence of breast cancer in females over 65 rose nearly 40 percent in theUnited States.

According to Steingraber, the rise in breast cancer predates the introduction of mammograms as a common diagnostic tool. In addition, the groups of women in whom breast cancer incidence is ascending most swiftly – blacks and the elderly – are also least likely to get regular mammograms.

The majority of health experts agree that the risk of breast cancer for women under 35 is not high enough to warrant the risk of radiation exposure. Similarly, the risk of breast cancer to women over 55 justifies the risk of mammograms. The statistics about mammography and women between the ages of 40 and 55 are the most contentious. A 1992 Canadian National Breast Cancer Study showed that mammography had no positive effect on mortality for women between the ages of 40 and 50. In fact, the study seemed to suggest that women in that age group are more likely to die of breast cancer when screened regularly.

While screening is an important step in fighting breast cancer, many researchers are looking for alternatives to mammography. Burton Goldberg totes the safety and accuracy of new thermography technologies. Able to detect cancers at a minute physical stage of development, thermography does not use x-rays, nor is there any compression of the breast. Also important, new thermography technologies do not lose effectiveness with dense breast tissue, decreasing the chances of false-negative results.

Be well

Dr Sundardas

This paper concludes that thimerosal, the mercury-based preservative used in vaccines around the world, has no statistically significant link to autism. It is one of the key papers used by vaccination proponents who argue that thimerosal is safe to inject into young children. That Poul Thorson’s credibility is now being called into question by a federal indictment of fraud and money laundering will, of course, have ripple effects throughout both the vaccine industries and autism support groups (more about that below).

According to the official announcement of the indictment, Thorsen was awarded grant money by the CDC as far back as the 1990s. He arranged for the grant money to be awarded to an entity in Denmark, where he provided “input and guidance” for the research projects.

From 2000 to 2009, the CDC awarded $11 million in grant money to two Denmark government agencies to study, among other things, the possible link between vaccines and autism. In 2002, Thorsen moved to Denmark and became the “principal investigator” for the grant money, responsible for administering the research money that the CDC awarded.

But here’s where things get interesting: According to the Dept. of Justice, Thorsen began allegedly stealing grant money by submitting fraudulent expense documents that were supposedly related to the Danish study. These fraudulent expense documents were given to the Danish government, Aarhus University and Odense University Hospital, the institutions involved in the research.

From February 2004 through June 2008, says the DOJ indictment, Thorsen allegedly submitted over a dozen fraudulent invoices requesting reimbursement for expenses that were fabricated. Interestingly, these allegedly fraudulent invoices were signed by a laboratory section chief at the CDC, indicating that someone inside the CDC was either duped by Thorsen or potentially involved in the alleged fraud.

What was Thorsen claiming in these allegedly fraudulent invoices requesting reimbursement? He claimed that a CDC laboratory had conducted work in conjunction with the research and was owed funds out of the grant money. These invoices were then handed over to Aarhus University, where Thorsen held a faculty position. Aarhus then transferred “hundreds of thousands of dollars to bank accounts held at the CDC Federal Credit Union in Atlanta,” says the DOJ.

But here’s the clever part: Those bank accounts were not official CDC accounts at all. They were allegedly private bank accounts belonging to none other than Dr. Poul Thorsen.

Once the money was transferred into Thorsen’s private accounts, Thorsen “allegedly withdrew it for his own personal use, buying a home in Atlanta, a Harley Davidson motorcycle, and Audi and Honda vehicles, and obtaining numerous cashier’s checks, from the fraud proceeds,” says the DOJ.

According to government documents, Dr. Poul Thorsen, one of the key researchers in “disproving” any link between vaccines and autism, allegedly defrauded the scientific research community of over one million dollars.

More details are revealed through a statement issued in January by Aarhus University, which sought to sever its ties with Thorsen. This letter goes on to state that Dr Thorsen was essentially hoodwinking others into thinking he was still a faculty member at Aarhus University:

In March 2009, Dr. Thorsen resigned his faculty position at Aarhus University. In the meantime, it has come to the attention of Aarhus University that Dr Thomsen has continued to act in such a manner as to create the impression that he still retains a connection to Aarhus University after the termination of his employment by the university. Furthermore, it has come to the attention of Aarhus University that Dr Poul Thorsen has held full-time positions at both Emory University and Aarhus University simultaneously. Dr Thorsen’s double Full-time employment was unauthorised by Aarhus University, and he engaged in this employment situation despite the express prohibition of Aarhus University.

Today, Thorsen is facing 13 counts of wire fraud and 9 counts of money laundering.
Thorsen now faces up to 260 years in prison from the wire fraud charges, and up to an additional 90 years in prison for the money laundering charges, plus a total of $22.5 million in possible fines. In addition, the federal indictment also contains a so-called “forfeiture provision” which seeks the forfeiture of the personal property Dr. Thorsen allegedly purchased with money he stole from the CDC’s grant activities: A house in Atlanta, two cars and a Harley Davidson motorcycle.

Are your children safe being vaccinated?

Be well

Dr Sundardas

Any woman wanting to avoid breast cancer or its recurrence needs to be aware of the real risk factors. These are not the factors you hear about from the typical oncologist who is interested in pushing drugs. Imbalances in the body are the real risk factors that explain why women get breast cancer, not lack of drugs. The only way to avoid cancer or its recurrence is to address these imbalances. Two minerals, zinc and selenium, are key in maintaining balance in the body and keeping cancer away. Lack of zinc has been implicated not only in the initiation of breast cancer, but also in the transition, progression, and metastasis of the disease. When zinc is deficient, cellular functioning in the breast is compromised. (Genes and Nutrition, April 2)

In a recent study done at the University of Washington, scientists investigated the signaling pathways modulated by selenium. They compared global gene expression profiles in mammary tissues from pubescent female rats maintained on a selenium (3ppm) diet with those on a standardized diet. The selenium-enriched diet altered the steady-state levels of genes involved in various cellular functioning, the most dramatic of which was the changes in the expression of multiple genes that regulate circadian rhythm.

The primary gene protecting women from breast cancer, p53, is thought to be the most frequently mutated or altered gene in the development of cancer. This gene requires zinc, and if it is missing, the gene becomes mutated, resulting in it becoming inactivated or suppressed. Dysfunction of p53 is well documented in the development of breast cancer, indicating that a zinc deficiency is a risk factor for breast cancer independent of the levels of boron, copper and calcium. In France, scientists report that estrogen receptor expression in breast cancers is associated with differentiated tumors and a more favorable prognosis. The greater the resemblance of cancerous breast cells to non-cancerous breast cells, the less threatening is the disease. Although the exact mechanism underlying the protection ERs play against cancer progression remains to be researched, these scientists studied the actions of ER alpha, and documented that one of the ways this ER inhibits invasion is though its first zinc finger. A zinc finger is a group of proteins organized around a zinc ion that can bind to DNA and influence gene regulation. (Advances in Experimental Medicine and Biology, 2008)

The relationship between selenium status and intake among breast cancer patients was studied by scientists in Kuala Lumpur. 64 women with breast cancer and 127 matched controls were interviewed to obtain information on their habitual dietary intakes, demographic data, and medical history. Selenium status was determined from toenail and hair analysis. The researchers found that total energy and protein intake was significantly higher among controls than among the breast cancer cases. The selenium intake among the women with breast cancer was significantly lower than the controls. Breast cancer risk decreased with the increasing quartiles of selenium intake. Selenium in hair did not differ among breast cancer cases and controls, but selenium status in the nails of controls was significantly higher compared to the breast cancer cases. (Singapore Medical Journal, March 2009).

Drink your minerals ladies

Be well

Dr Sundardas

Once upon a time health food stores did not carry products containing sugar. Today what we think of as a “health food store” is often a type of hybrid resulting from the cross breeding of true health food stores with traditional grocery retailers. These new stores are trying to capitalize on having a healthy image, while their shelves are stocked with products containing processed sugar, often listed by one of its other names.

However, both evaporated cane juice and white sugar are both sucrose, and both contain 400 calories in 100 grams. Both evaporated cane juice and white cane sugar have been heavily processed to remove the molasses content. During this processing the vitamins, minerals, fiber, amino acids, and trace elements that make molasses nutritious have been striped away, leaving one of the purest chemicals ever manufactured. Only tiny amounts of vitamin A and calcium remain in evaporated cane juice. Following processing, evaporated cane juice is 99.5 percent sucrose, and white sugar is 99.9 percent sucrose. Turbinado sugar  is 99 percent sucrose.

Whether sugar is eaten in the form of white sugar, evaporated cane juice, turbinado, or any of the other names for it, its effect on the body is the same. When eaten in large amounts, or eaten without fat or protein, each of them will produce the same sort of insulin spike, weight gain, immune system suppression, and increased chance for diabetes. It has been implicated in Syndrome X and heart disease as well.

The big difference between evaporated cane juice and granulated sugar is the price, which runs about 8 to 10 dollars a pound for evaporated cane juice compared to about 1 to 3 dollars a pound for white sugar. If manufacturers are willing to spend the extra money to put the words evaporated cane juice on their labels, it means they know the public is seriously trying to avoid eating sugar and needs to be tricked into eating it anyway.

Our collective sweet tooth goes back to the days when we lived in caves and life was a physical event rather than a mental one, as it is now. We needed to eat foods high in nutrients in order to have energy to get through the physical challenges of the typical day. Sweets eaten back then were primarily berries and other fruits that contained beneficial nutrients, enzymes and many phytochemicals to keep us going strong. Back then, a sweet tooth was not a bad thing. But sugar craving still exists for the purpose of compelling people to seek high energy nutrition. Until that nutrition is obtained, sugar craving continues, leaving today’s people in that vicious circle where more nutrient depleted sweets are eaten, and more sugar craving signals are sent. For many people, sugar has almost completely replaced nutrient dense foods, with obesity and health issues as the results. Next time you want something sweet, eat some fruit.

Be well

Dr Sundardas

That reign of toxicity ended  in June 2008. Thanks to the tireless, multi-year efforts of people like Charles Brown, National Counsel for Consumers for Dental Choice (www.ToxicTeeth.org), the FDA was forced to acknowledge a fact so fundamental that, by any measure of honest science, it should have adopted the position decades ago. What position is that? Simply that mercury is toxic to humans.

The FDA has to be sued to do its job of protecting consumers. The FDA’s stonewalling on this issue has been nothing less than a circus of politically-motivated denials, much like the Big Tobacco executives swearing under oath that “Nicotine is not addictive.” In similar style, the FDA insisted for decades that “Mercury is not toxic.” Both statements, as any sane person can readily conclude, are the outbursts of lunatics. Sadly, those lunatics somehow remain in charge of America’s food, drugs and cosmetics (and dental care), meaning that any real progress to protect the People must come from outside the FDA.

And that’s exactly what happened. Consumers for Dental Choice teamed up withMoms Against Mercury (www.MomsAgainstMercury.org) and sued the FDA and its commissioner whose name sounds like an evil-minded villian right out of a Marvel comic book: Von Eschenbach. The lawsuit, entitled, Moms Against Mercury et al. v. Von Eschenbach, Commissioner, et al was concluded in June 2008 with a reluctant agreement by the FDA to both change its website on the issue of mercury and to reclassify mercury within one year, following a period of public comment (which the agency will no doubt try to drag out as long as possible in order to avoid actually sticking to the terms of the lawsuit agreement).

Remarkably, the FDA’s website no longer claims mercury is harmless. The language has now been changed in dramatic fashion, reading: “Dental amalgamscontain mercury, which may have neurotoxic effects on the nervous systems of developing children and fetus.”Speaking of people going mad with mercury, that’s the history of the term “as mad as a hatter.” As explained by Wikipedia:
There is scientific evidence behind the meaning of insanity. Mercury was used in the process of curing felt used in some hats. It was impossible for hatters to avoid inhaling the mercury fumes given off during the hat making process. Hatters and other men in working mills died early due to the residual mercury caused neurological damage, as well as confused speech and distorted vision. As the mercury poisoning progressed to dangerously high levels, sufferers could also experience psychotic symptoms, such as hallucinations.

Be well

Dr Sundardas

Women’s bones are greatly influenced by hormonal fluctuations, poor nutritional uptake, diet, childbirth and exercise. Men’s bones are influenced by stress, diet and exercise only. While mild osteoporosis leads to stress fractures only, serious osteoporosis amongst the elderly result in hip fractures. While having bed rest for hip fractures, further bone loss occurs. The bed sores can get infected and gangrenous and they die. Hip bones and the  lumbar spine are particularly prone to fractures.

According to Dr Maurine Tsakok, head and senior consultant ofSingaporeGeneralHospital’s department of obstetrics and gynaecology, women taking soy bean products from dougan to miso soup to legumes like peanuts and beans are naturally increasing their estrogen levels. This is because soya products contained plant estrogens and if sufficient quantities are consumed (which was about three times more soya products a week than normal). In a retrospective study of 98 menopausalSingaporewomen only half were found they needed Hormone Replacement Therapy (HRT). Dr Tsakok also found that two-fifths of the women who did not need HRT exercised regularly compared with about one- tenth of those on HRT.

Phytoestrogens and phytosterols have complex biochemical effects – acting as natural forms of estrogen stimulators (agonist receptor-site action) and protect against higher levels of estrogens by competitive inhibition (antagonist receptor-site action). This dual behaviour results in increasing declining natural estrogen levels as well as providing protection against sites that stimulate breast and uterus cells from becoming cancerous (normally caused by high levels of estrogen production).

Herbs can effectively lessen the effects of menopause and work as estrogen stimulators. The following are commonly used and ones you will find in Menopausal combined-herb formulations:

Black Cohosh – relieves hot flashes and vaginal dryness

Don Quai – relieves hot flashes and improves circulation. Contains beta-sitosterol.

Ginseng – balances stress, improves circulation, stimulates the immune system.

Vitex Agnus-Castus or Chasteberry – affects the pituitary and the stimulation of the three pituitary releasing hormones. Normalizes progesterone levels.

Valerian – natures valium. A calming agent.

Wild Yam – a prohormonal support

Licorice Root – Stimulates the adrenal glands by compensating for “weak adrenal” syndrome. simulating Aldosterone, the major blood pressure hormone (mineralocorticoid).

Be well

Dr Sundardas               www.NaturalTherapies.com,