Preventing Health Defects in Children

A vitamin supplement composed of several different forms of folate may help prevent or even treat the brain defect hydrocephalus in children, according to a study conducted by researchers from the universities of Lancaster and Manchester, England, and published in the Journal of Neuropathology and Experimental Neurology.

“Hydrocephalus can cause severe disability and learning difficulties, so the possibility of prevention through a specific vitamin supplement is exciting,” said Andrew Russell, head of the Association for Spina Bifida and Hydrocephalus.

In hydrocephalus, cerebrospinal fluid abnormally gathers in the brain’s cavities, placing pressure on the tissues and leading to neurological dysfunction. Symptoms include an unusually large head, irritability, sleepiness, vomiting, drooping eyes, verbal aggression, hyperactivity and other abnormal behavior, and even seizures.

There is currently no cure for the condition, which is normally treated by installing shunt to divert the fluid from the brain to the heart or abdomen. These shunts must be cleaned with several surgeries throughout a lifetime, however, to prevent blockage and infection.

In the current study, researchers found that a folate mixture led to significant reductions in the rates of fluid buildup in the brains of hydrocephalic rats. They also found that the symptom’s conditions might come less from pressure caused by cerebrospinal fluid, and more from its chemical composition.

“Cerebrospinal fluid is not a liquid which simply cushions the brain and carries chemicals around it,” lead researcher Jaleel Miyan said. “It is actively produced and transported and plays an essential biological role in developing the brain.”

The researchers are now seeking to partner with a pharmaceutical company that can make the supplement into a pill, which can then be used in human clinical trials.

Folic acid, the naturally occurring form of folate, is known to prevent against neural tube defects such as spina bifida but has not proven effective in preventing hydrocephalus.

“There are so few things we can currently do to decrease the incidence of birth defects so these findings are really to be welcomed,” said Imogen Montague of the United Kingdom’s Royal College of Obstetricians and Gynecologists.
It’s official: Vitamin D deficiency is so widespread in U.S. children that it poses a huge threat to the future health of an entire generation. A new study published in the journal Pediatrics paints a disturbing picture of vitamin D deficiency across the population of children aged 1 through 21. Three-fourths of young African American children, for example, are deficient in vitamin D. Much the same pattern holds true for Mexican American children. Even white kids, with their fairer skin and greater vitamin D production, hit the charts with 50% – 60% deficiency, depending on the age group.

Of course, in classic medical doublespeak style, health researchers don’t actually call it “deficiency.” (Because that would trigger a whole new urgency to correct the problem.) Instead, they call it “vitamin D insufficiency,” while reserving the term “deficiency” for children who have virtually no vitamin D in their blood whatsoever.

Of course, “insufficient” means “deficient” in the real world, since kids who are now labeled as “insufficient” in vitamin D are, of course, actually quite deficient in the nutrient. And keep in mind that these frighteningly common vitamin D deficiencies exist even when the accepted standards of vitamin D levels in the blood are artificially low to begin with. If you use real numbers of the vitamin D levels required for peak human performance, the truth is that as many as 90 percent of U.S. children are chronically deficient in vitamin D.

“It’s astounding,” said Michal L. Melamed of the Albert Einstein College of Medicine in New York, in a Washington Post report (source below). “At first, we couldn’t believe the numbers. I think it’s very worrisome.” But why are American kids so deficient in vitamin D in the first place?
The answer, of course, is because kids are sunlight deficient. And that’s due to a few reasons: First, too many kids today spend most of their hours in front of computers, televisions or gaming consoles. The live almost like vampires, staying awake all night, sleeping during the day, living off the flesh of other creatures (beef jerky and hamburgers…).

Many of their parents, too, are part of the problem. Today’s moms seem terrified that their kids might actually experience “the outdoors” for more than a few moments. They wait with air-conditioned cars at the school bus stops, then hustle their kids into pre-cooled cars to drive the quarter mile back to their artificially air-conditioned homes. Sunlight almost never touches these kids (they might turn to dust).

The sunscreen industry also shares some blame in all this, as it thrives on the silly idea that sunlight is bad for children and that all kids need to be smothered in sunscreen lotions before venturing outdoors. (Of course, they never admit their own sunscreen products are filled with cancer-causing chemicals in the first place…) Above all, the medical establishment is to blame for vitamin D deficiency. Rather than teaching parents and children about the importance of vitamin D, they seem to have declared a blackout on most useful information about the nutrient, preferring instead to prescribe toxic pharmaceutical drugs to treat the symptoms of vitamin D deficiency. Osteoporosis drugs, in particular, are made virtually obsolete by vitamin D alone. That’s why you don’t see any drug companies talking about vitamin D — it would destroy osteoporosis drug sales!
The entire “sick care” industry (including Big Pharma) actually depends on widespread nutritional deficiencies in order to create repeat business. Vitamin D deficiency, of course, figures prominently in this equation: It promotes cancer, bone loss, obesity, depression and heart disease. It’s no coincidence that these are some of the biggest profit earners for drug companies.
I wonder what the statistics are for Asian children? It might be a good idea for parents to get healthy before they have children.

be well

Dr Sundardas

http://www.naturaltherapies.com/cell rejuvenation program.htm

Protecting the Male Reproductive System

The Food and Drug Administration (FDA) issued a warning a few years ago that pregnant women taking the selective serotonin reuptake inhibitor (SSRI) antidepressant paroxetine risk giving birth to infants with major birth defects, including heart abnormalities Now comes word that the same drug (sold as Paxil, Paxil CR, Seroxat, Pexeva, and generic paroxetine hydrochloride) carries another danger that could keep babies from being born in the first place. A new study just published in the online edition of the journal Fertility and Sterility concludes as many as fifty percent of all men taking the antidepressant could have damaged sperm and compromised fertility.

New York Presbyterian Hospital and Weill Cornell Medical Center researchers followed 35 healthy male volunteers who took paroxetine for five weeks. Then sperm samples from the men were studied using an assay called terminal deoxynucleotidyl transferase dUTP nick end labeling (TUNEL) to evaluate whether there were missing pieces of genetic code in the sperm DNA. This condition, know as DNA fragmentation, is associated with reproductive problems.

The results? The percentage of men with abnormal DNA fragmentation soared from less than 10 percent to 50 percent while taking the antidepressant. This is a crucial finding because DNA fragmentation has long been known to correlate with an increased risk of birth defects, poor fertility and unsuccessful pregnancy outcomes — even when high tech, extraordinarily expensive fertility enhancing techniques such as in vitro fertilization and intracytoplasmic sperm injection are used.

The study, one of the first scientific investigations into the effect of SSRIs on sperm quality, also confirmed that paroxetine impairs sexual function. More than a third of the research subjects reported significant changes in erectile function and about half had difficulty ejaculating.

“It’s fairly well known that SSRI antidepressants negatively impact erectile function and ejaculation. This study goes one step further, demonstrating that they can cause a major increase in genetic damage to sperm,” Dr. Peter Schlegel, the study’s senior author and chairman of the Department of Urology and professor of reproductive medicine at Weill Cornell Medical College, explained in a statement to the media. “Although this study doesn’t look directly at fertility, we can infer that as many as half of men taking SSRIs have a reduced ability to conceive. These men should talk with their physician about their treatment options, including non-SSRI depression medications.”

The scientists could not identify the exact way the SSRI caused the DNA fragmentation, but the evidence strongly suggests the drug slows sperm as it moves through the male reproductive tract from the testis to the ejaculatory ducts. When this happens, the sluggish sperm grows old and its DNA becomes damaged. “This is a new concept for how drugs can affect fertility and sperm. In most cases, it was previously assumed that a drug damaged sperm production, so the concept that sperm transport could be affected is novel,” Dr. Schlegel stated.

The study contains some good news for men currently on Paxil and related drugs who may be concerned about their fertility. All the changes the researchers found appeared to be totally reversible. Specifically, normal levels of sexual function and DNA fragmentation both returned to normal one month after discontinuation of the drug.

A higher dietary intake of omega-3 fatty acids may protect men from prostate cancer even if they have a genetic predisposition to the disease, researchers have found.

“We detected strong protective associations between increasing intake of long-chain omega-3 polyunsaturated fatty acids and more advanced prostate cancer,” said lead researcher John S. Witte. “These fatty acids are primarily from dark fish such as salmon.”

“And the decrease in risk may be even more pronounced if one has a high-risk genetic variant,” he said.

In a study published in the journal Clinical Cancer Research, Witte and colleagues compared the diets and genetic profiles of 466 men suffering from aggressive prostate cancer with those of 478 healthy men of similar age and ethnic distribution. Average participant age was 65, and cancer patients were recruited an average of 4.7 months after diagnosis. Healthy controls were recruited from among men undergoing standard annual health checkups.

The researchers focused only on aggressive tumors because these represent the most dangerous form of the disease. Many men with non-aggressive, slow-growing tumors die of other causes before ever experiencing any cancer symptoms.

Researchers had all participants fill out food frequency questionnaires, classifying their intake of various kinds of fish as “never,” “one to three times per month,” or “one or more times per week.” All men were screened for nine different mutations of the cox-2 gene. These variables were then analyzed for their relationship with prostate cancer, adjusting for other known risk factors such as smoking, obesity, family cancer history and prior prostate screening results.

The study was conducted by researchers from the Institute for Human Genetics, University of California and University of Southern California, and funded by the National Institute of Health and a dean’s grant from Laval University McLaughlin.

The researchers found that men with cancer had a significantly higher intake of calories, fat and linoleic acid (an omega-6) than healthy men. They had a significantly lower intake of omega-3s, shellfish and dark fish.

Men who ate dark fish one to three times a month had a 36 percent lower chance of developing an aggressive prostate cancer than those who ate it rarely or never, while those who ate such fish once a week or more had a 63 percent lower risk.

“The strongest effect was seen from eating dark fish such as salmon one or more times per week,” Witte said.

The researchers found that men with a particular cox-2 gene variant, rs4647310, had 5.5-times the risk of aggressive prostate cancer as men without that variant. This elevated risk was not seen, however, among men with a high omega-3 intake.

“Men with low intake of dark fish and the high-risk variant had a substantially increased risk of more advanced prostate cancer,” Witte said.

Omega-3s are believed to decrease the risk of cardiovascular disease, cancer, and autoimmune disorders, and to improve cognitive health. The mechanisms for these benefits are not well understood, but are believed, in some cases, to be linked to reduced inflammation.

The cox-2 gene is known to play a role in prostate inflammation, a risk factor for prostate cancer.

For many years, we have been doing a Natural Fertility Program for couples who are delighted with the results.

Be well

Dr Sundardas

http://www.naturaltherapies.com/nfp.htm

Toxic Vaccines

To most people, vaccines sound medically harmless. “They’re good for you!” say the doctors and drug companies, but they never really talk about what’s in those vaccines. There’s a good reason for that: If people knew what was really in those vaccines, they would never allow themselves to be injected with them.

Vaccine production is a disgusting procedure. To begin, one must first acquire the disease germ — a toxic bacterium or a live virus. To make a “live” vaccine, the live virus must be attenuated, or weakened for human use. This is accomplished by serial passage — passing the virus through animal tissue several times to reduce its potency. For example, measles virus is passed through chick embryos, polio virus through monkey kidneys, and the rubella virus through human diploid cells — the dissected organs of an aborted fetus! “Killed” vaccines are “inactivated” through heat, radiation, or chemicals.

The weakened germ must then be strengthened with adjuvants (antibody boosters) and stabilizers. This is done by adding drugs, antibiotics, and toxic disinfectants to the concoction: neomycin, streptomycin, sodium chloride, sodium hydroxide, aluminum hydroxide, aluminum hydrochloride, sorbitol, hydrolyzed gelatin, formaldehyde, and thimerosal (a mercury derivative).

Aluminum, formaldehyde, and mercury are extremely toxic substances with a long history of documented hazardous effects. Studies confirm again and again that microscopic doses of these substances can lead to cancer, neurological damage, and death. Yet, each of them may be found in childhood vaccines.

In addition to the deliberately planned additives, unanticipated matter may contaminate the shots. For example, during serial passage of the virus through animal cells, animal RNA and DNA – foreign genetic material — is transferred from one host to another. Because this biological matter is injected directly into the body, researchers say it can change our genetic makeup.

Undetected animal viruses may jump the species barrier as well. This is exactly what happened during the 1950s and 1960s when millions of people were infected with polio vaccines that were contaminated with the SV-40 virus undetected in the monkey organs used to prepare the vaccines. SV-40 (Simian Virus #40 — the 40th such virus detected since researchers began looking), is considered a powerful immunosuppressor and trigger for HIV, the name given to the AIDS virus. It is said to cause a clinical condition similar to AIDS, and has been found in brain tumors, leukemia, and other human cancers as well. Researchers consider it to be a cancer-causing virus.

The Food and Drug Administration (FDA) Modernization Act of 1997 called for the FDA to review and assess the risk of mercury containing food and drugs. In line with this review, U.S. vaccine manufacturers responded to a December 1998 and April 1999 FDA request to provide more detailed information about the thimerosal content of their preparations which include this compound as a preservative. Thimerosal has been used as an additive to biologics and vaccines since the 1930’s.Some but not all of the vaccines recommended routinely for children in the United States contain thimerosal. As a result.some children could be exposed to a cumulative level of mercury over the first six months of life that and there is the riskof neuro-developmental effects

The Public Health Service, the American Academy of Pediatrics, and vaccine manufacturers agree that thimerosal-containing vaccines should be removed as soon as possible. Similar conclusions were reached in 1998 in a meeting attended by European regulatory agencies, the European vaccine manufacturers, and the US FDA which examined the use of thimerosal-containing vaccines produced or sold in European countries.

A 1994 study found that children diagnosed with asthma (a respiratory ailment not unlike SIDS) were five times more likely than not to have received pertussis vaccine. Another study found that babies die at a rate eight times greater than normal within three days after getting a DPT shot. The three primary doses of DPT are given at two months, four months, and six months. About 85% of SIDS cases occur at one through six months, with the peak incidence at age two to four months.

In a recent scientific study of SIDS, episodes of apnea (cessation of breathing) and hypopnea (abnormally shallow breathing) were measured before and after DPT vaccinations. “Cotwatch” (a precise breathing monitor) was used, and the computer printouts it generated (in integrals of the weighted apnea-hypopnea density — WAHD) were analyzed. The data clearly shows that vaccination caused an extraordinary increase in episodes where breathing either nearly ceased or stopped completely. These episodes continued for months following vaccinations. Dr. Viera Scheibner, the author of the study, concluded that “vaccination is the single most prevalent and most preventable cause of infant deaths.”

In another study of 103 children who died of SIDS, Dr. William Torch, of the University of Nevada School of Medicine at Reno, found that more than two-thirds had been vaccinated with DPT prior to death. Of these, 6.5 percent died within 12 hours of vaccination; 13 percent within 24 hours; 26 percent within three days; and 37, 61, and 70 percent within one, two, and three weeks, respectively He also found that SIDS frequencies have a bimodal-peak occurrence at two and four months — the same ages when initial doses of DPT are administered to infants.
Aside from the dangerous ingredients many people already know about (like squalene or thimerosal), one of the key ingredients used in flu vaccines (including the vaccines being prepared for the swine flu pandemic) is the diseased flesh of African Green Monkeys. This is revealed in U.S. patent No. 5911998 – Method of producing a virus vaccine from an African green monkey kidney cell line. (http://www.patentstorm.us/patents/5…)

As this patent readily explains, ingredients used in the vaccine are derived from the kidneys of African Green Monkeys who are first infected with the virus, then allowed to fester the disease, and then are killed so that their diseased organs can be used make vaccine ingredients. This is done in a cruel, inhumane “flesh factory” environment where the monkeys are subjected to a process that includes “incubating said inoculated cell line to permit proliferation of said virus.” Then: “harvesting the virus resulting from step (c); and… (ii) preparing a vaccine from the harvested virus.”
Vaccines anyone?

be well
Dr Sundardas