February 2010 Health in the News Archive

[ Monthly Index of New Briefs ]

Oprah and Walgreens promote diabetes testing

February 28, 2010

Talk show diva Oprah Winfrey teamed up with Walgreens pharmacies to encourage people to get tested for type 2 diabetes. Oprah and her team encouraged viewers to get a free blood glucose reading that will tell them whether they could be at risk for type 2 diabetes.

"Diabetes is a ticking time bomb. It's a silent killer," Winfrey said during a taping of the February 4th show. She expressed particular concern for African Americans, who are 80% more likely to be diagnosed with diabetes than non-Hispanic whites.

Walgreens spokesman Jim Cohn says that the pharmacy chain would have nurse practitioners on hand February 4 through the 18th at select stores to give the tests to those over 18.

Neither The Oprah Winfrey Show nor Walgreens is reporting how many people took advantage of the offer.

Dr. Grout's Comment:

Nearly 24 million Americans have diabetes, an estimated 6 million are undiagnosed, and and another 57 million have prediabetes (called Metabolic Syndrome). According to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, one in three children born in the United States in 2000 will develop type 2 diabetes at some point in their lives.

Bringing attention to diabetes is a worthy thing. But something is very odd about how this was done.

First, if you look at the fine print on the consent form you had to sign, you saw that Walgreens is entitled to share your information. Judging from the list of sponsors on the Walgreens website, everyone who took the “free” test will be known to Bayer, Merck, Sanofi Aventis, and Pfizer, and other pharmaceutical companies. Drugs can stimulate the pancreas to release more insulin. But they do not repair beta cells; they actually force them to work harder which speeds up the day when they break down and become dysfunctional.

Second, as people walked to the pharmacy counter, they walked past rows of potato chips and other junk food, and rows of cosmetics full of toxic chemicals. What kind of message does it send when drug store isles are laden with such things?

The best prevention for diabetes is to have an honest national dialogue about food, politics, and money.

Popular diabetes drug Avandia causes heart attacks and death

February 22, 2010

The New York Times obtained confidential government reports showing that if every diabetic now taking Avandia were instead given a similar pill named Actos, about 500 heart attacks and 300 cases of heart failure would be averted every month. Avandia, intended to treat Type 2 diabetes, is known as rosiglitazone and was linked to 304 deaths during the third quarter of 2009. The FDA's numbers show 83,000 heart attacks were caused by this drug between 1999 and 2007.

Avandia was once one of the biggest-selling drugs in the world. Driven in part by a multimillion-dollar advertising campaign, sales were $3.2 billion in 2006. But a 2007 study by a Cleveland Clinic cardiologist suggesting that users of Avandia faced a 43 percent higher risk of a heart attack or other cardiovascular events forced the F.D.A. to issue a warning, and sales plunged.

GlaxoSmithKline said that it had studied Avandia extensively and that "scientific evidence simply does not establish that Avandia increases" the risk of heart attacks.

FDA is in the midst of a debate over what to do about Avandia. Some agency officials want the drug withdrawn because they believe there is a safer alternative; others insist that studies of the drug provide contradictory information and that Avandia should continue to be an option for doctors and patients. In a December 2009 internal memorandum, Dr. Janet Woodcock, director of the F.D.A.'s drug center, wrote that "there are multiple conflicting opinions" about Avandia within the agency, and she ordered officials to assemble another advisory committee, expected this summer, to reconsider whether the drug should be sold.

Meanwhile, a bipartisan multiyear Senate investigation sharply criticizes GlaxoSmithKline, saying it failed to warn patients years earlier that Avandia was potentially deadly.

Dr. Grout's Comment:

The Avandia case is an example of what happens at the FDA when those who study drugs for safety report to those who approved the drug in the first place and have an interest in defending that decision.

This case is also a crystal clear example of how the FDA fails to warn doctors and patients about problem drugs. In November 2003, for instance, the company completed study showed diabetics given Avandia had far more heart problems than those given placebos. Two months later, the World Health Organization sent the company an alert linking Avandia to heart ailments. But the FDA did not issue a warning until 2007.

This case also shows the ugly power of Big Pharma. In 1999, the first year Avandia was sold, Dr. John Buse, a professor of medicine at the University of North Carolina, gave presentations at scientific meetings suggesting that Avandia had heart risks. GlaxoSmithKline executives complained to his supervisor and hinted of legal action against him, according to the Senate inquiry. Dr. Buse eventually signed a document provided by GlaxoSmithKline agreeing not to discuss his worries about Avandia publicly.

Avandia works to control blood sugar by increasing the body's sensitivity to insulin. It replaced Rezulin, a Type 2 diabetes drug banned because it caused liver problems. But Avandia can cause low blood sugar which causes seizures, and fluid retention which can lead to or worsen congestive heart failure.

At the Arizona Center for Advanced Medicine, we treat diabetes by repairing some of the damage to the insulin mechanism. We look first at the diet – the fuel given to the body. Then we look at the metabolism, to see where processes may be distorted – are there kinks in the fuel line? For those with a stubborn weight issue – that hard to lose belly fat that drives chronic inflammation – we use the hCG weight loss program. It is a medically managed program that will cause you to shed the weight, safely. We also make use of FirstLine Therapy to easily transition you to a new way of eating for a lifetime, with emphasis on lower blood sugar levels. We modify the diet, to include lots of "clean" meats, fruits and vegetables, and eliminate the high inflammatory foods – sugars, starches, additives, colorings and chemicals.

Half of all American children have a chronic illness

February 19, 2010

More than half of all US children will suffer from chronic health conditions during their childhood, according to a new study whose findings were published in the Journal of the American Medical Association February 17. The study paints a portrait of an essentially unhealthy child population and also suggests a rapid deterioration in childhood health over the past two decades.

Common conditions include obesity, asthma, attention-deficit hyperactivity disorder (ADHD), diabetes, and allergic conditions.

"This is just another study emphasizing what many already knew. And, if we don't eradicate the root causes, such as bad eating and little exercise, we'll continue to see a lot more morbidity in children," said study author Dr. Jeanne Van Cleave, a pediatrician with MassGeneral Hospital for Children in Boston. "I'm seeing more and more kids with high cholesterol and insulin resistance that already have blood vessel damage in them. They're already like a 45-year-old in terms of blood vessel health. We need a basic change in how we live and how we eat. Prevention is key."

The study analyzed about 5,000 children as they grew from the ages of two until eight years old in three different cohorts, from 1988 to 1994, from 1994 to 2000, and from 2000 until 2006. It defines a chronic health problem as one lasting for more than 12 months that requires extended treatment or disrupts a child's capacity to carry out behaviors and actions typical of their age.

Dr. Grout's Comment:

We know that chronic illnesses are mostly related to diet and environment. That means they are preventable. Problem is, the powers that be have not decided to shift our system of medicine away from disease management to one that stresses prevention. The issue is money – dollars flow when patients use drugs and medical interventions. Notice that McDonalds is a sponsor of the 2010 winter Olympics. Notice that the makers of apples, avocados, grass fed beef, and other healthy foods are not sponsors; they don't have the money.

Money also influences the messages put out by groups like the American Heart Association and the American Diabetes Association. The corn oil industry and the aspartame manufacturers respectively have given generous "donations" so that these groups endorse their product despite the fact corn oil is inflammatory (promotes heart disease) and aspartame is a neurotoxin.

That leaves us with… the FDA? Well, the revolving door between that agency those it is supposed to regulate – especially drug companies and Monsanto – is well documented.

So, it's up to you to look behind the marketing hype, and learn how food and environment make you sick or keep you healthy. We are awash in information today, but that is not the same thing as knowledge. Information is there to influence our spending; knowledge is not brought to you by corporate sponsors.

Sweeping new rules for organic dairies

February 16, 2010

organic dairies

Last Friday, the FDA passed what some are calling the most sweeping rewrite of federal organic standards since their inception in 2002. The ruling, called Access to Pasture, closes several loopholes that mega-dairies have been using to exploit the organic market with milk from farms that hardly resemble the farms that inspired the now $24.6 billion organic industry. The image of cows grazing on sun-kissed fields of grass was often just that – a marketing image divorced from reality.

"We've been trying to get the pasture rule clarified and educate consumers about the organic frauds going on," said Honor Schauland, of the Organic Consumers Association. "This is a big victory for us. There's no longer this gray area of ‘what is the requirement'. The next step is enforcement."

Since 2000, all organic dairy farms must use organic feed, without antibiotics or hormones. This new regulation requires that dairy cows graze during the grazing season, for a minimum of 120 days, as opposed to the previous rules that were vague and required only access to pasture, but not necessarily the use of it.

This is a huge blow to certain mega dairies that for years had taken advantage of the "access to pasture." This famously ambiguous phrase was often interpreted along the lines of a barn door opening to a muddy side yard. Two corporate operations, Aurora Organic (which makes the private label milk for Costco) and Horizon (owned by Dean Foods) received negative attention for the lack of grass feed, and the confinement of animals in pens, even though they were technically following the organic standards.

The majority of organic dairy brands in the United States are produced by small farming operations, but the Wisconsin-based Cornucopia Institute estimates corporate operations hold a 30 to 40 percent market share in organic milk in the U.S. "Cheap organic milk flowing from the illegitimate factory farms has created a surplus that is crushing ethical family farm producers," said Mark Kastel, Senior Farm Policy Analyst at the Cornucopia Institute.

There is no regulation requiring conventional farmers to grass-feed their herds.

The ruling also leaves wide open a huge question on feeding restrictions - or lack thereof - for organic beef cattle. A 60-day comment period is open until April 19. The USDA wants to know what consumers think about "finishing" or fattening up organic beef cattle for four months in factory farm-style feedlots.

Studies show that cattle confined and fed grain in feedlots are prone to E. coli 0157H contamination, whereas healthy organic cattle grazing on grass are typically free of this dangerous pathogen. The meat from grass-fed beef is also healthier and more nutritious than beef that's been "marbleized" in the feedlot.

Dr. Grout's Comment:

This comes after 10 years of lobbying by family farmers and consumers. We can hope that the new rule will put an end to the abuses.

"Access to Pasture" tightens up several other cracks in the definition of organic. It expands and strengthens the language prohibiting antibiotics in organic feed, requires that any edible bedding (like straw or corn cobs) be certified organic, and mandates that pasture be managed as a crop - as in, to produce abundant forage.

Want to know how your brand of milk rates? Check out the Cornucopia Institute's scorecard. Private label brands of milk from Albertson's, Costco, Kroger, Safeway, and Trader Joe's all scored in the lowest category meaning "questionable commitment to organics."

Whole Foods' CEO Mackay in hot water again

February 9, 2010

The Weston A. Price Foundation is crossing swords with John Mackay, CEO of Whole Foods. The chain has launched a nationwide "Health Starts Here" marketing scheme that endorses a low-fat, vegetarian diet. Customers now receive a pamphlet urging them to adopt a low-fat, plant-based diet and to cut back or completely eliminate animal foods. Many Whole Foods stores no longer sell books advocating consumption of meat, eggs and dairy products. The plan will feature new Aggregate Nutrient Density Index (ANDI) labels for foods in the store; the index is designed to make plant foods to appear "nutrient dense" by favoring various phytonutrients in plants and ignoring many vitamins and minerals essential to health.

"Mackay has stated that eating animal fats amounts to an addiction. But in fact, animal fats are essential for good health," says Sally Fallon Morell, president of the Weston A. Price Foundation. "Animal foods like meat, liver, butter, whole milk and eggs contain ten to one hundred times more vitamins and minerals than plant foods. Plant foods add variety and interest to the human diet but in most circumstances do not qualify as 'nutrient-dense' foods. The nutrients in animal fats, such as vitamins A, D and K, arachidonic acid, DHA, choline, cholesterol and saturated fat, are critical for brain function. In the misguided war against cholesterol and saturated fat, we have created an epidemic of learning disorders in the young and mental decline in the elderly.

Morell says Whole Foods has stacked the deck against animal foods by choosing ANDI parameters that do not include a host of key nutrients, "such as vitamins A, D and K, DHA, EPA arachidonic acid, taurine, iodine, biotin, pantothenic acid, and vital minerals like sodium, chloride, potassium, sulfur, phosphorus, copper, manganese, boron, molybdenum and chromium. Many of the phytochemicals that Fuhrman includes in the index he developed for Whole Foods play no essential role in the body and may even be harmful."

Others are concerned that the new Whole Foods program will encourage more consumption of soy. "The growing emphasis on plant-based diets deficient in animal protein also serves to promote soy foods as both meat and dairy substitutes," says Kaayla T. Daniel, PhD, CCN, author of The Whole Soy Story: The Dark Side of America's Favorite Health Food. "Soy is not only one of the top eight allergens but has been linked in more than sixty years of studies to thyroid dysfunction, digestive distress, reproductive disorders including infertility, and even cancer, especially breast cancer."

Another concern is the new emphasis on a low-fat diet. "Low-fat patients are my most unhealthy patients," says John P. Salerno, MD, a board certified family physician from New York City. "The reason we are spiraling into diabetes and obesity is because of the low-fat concept developed by the U.S government decades ago. Low-fat diets have a low nutrient base, and phytonutrients in vegetables cannot be properly absorbed without fat."

Dr. Grout's Comment:

The Weston A. Price Foundation, founded in 1999, is dedicated to "restoring nutrient-dense foods to the American diet through education, research and activism." The foundation does not receive funding from the government or the food processing and agribusiness industries; it's funding comes largely from organic farmers and membership dues.

John Mackay stepped down as chairman of the company's board of directors, a position he's held since the inception of Whole Foods in 1978. He maintains his role as CEO. He has caused upset with outspoken criticism of President Obama's health care plan and what Mackay calls the "false hysteria" about global warming. Some felt Mackay "attempted to capitalize on the brand reputation of Whole Foods to champion his personal political views but has instead deeply offended a key segment of Whole Foods consumer base."

He's going to offend a whole bunch more people with his low-fat, vegetarian stand. I liked much of what he had to say about health care reform, but his take on diet is mis-informed. Sally Fallon Morell's comments are on target.

Children increasingly at risk now for heart disease

February 8, 2010

A recent CDC study found children may now be at risk for premature heart disease because of adolescent obesity.

The heavier teens were, the more likely they were to have high cholesterol but even 14 percent of teens with normal body weight were found to have unhealthy cholesterol levels, the CDC said.

CDC researchers studied data on 3,125 teens collected from the National Health and Nutrition Examination Survey for 1999 through 2006.

They found that 20.3 percent of young people aged 12 to 19 and more boys than girls had unhealthy cholesterol levels. That means one in five American teens has unhealthy cholesterol levels.

Dr. Grout's Comment:

This is a crystal clear example of the disease management paradigm of medicine that drives up health costs and does little to make people healthier.

The CDC is using obsolete information to forecast the amount of future heart disease based on high cholesterol. The high cholesterol myth has been debunked by everyone except those who find it handy to sell statin drugs.

Your CRP level is much more important. CRP measures inflammation in your body. Chronic inflammation and infection drive heart disease, not high cholesterol.

Inflammation comes from stress or damage to your blood vessels. Let's say we eat too many greasy fats fried in inflammatory vegetable oils and not enough good fats like avocados and grass fed meats, so the integrity of our red blood cells decreases. The cells get hard and sticky, and when they shuttle quickly through the blood vessels, the red blood cells nick the walls. The body calls upon cholesterol, Nature's BandAid, to lay a salve over the wound. So forget cholesterol, it's about the chronic inflammation and chronic infection and stiff cell walls.

The Northern Manhattan Study, reported last month, showed that the extent of people's exposure to infectious diseases may contribute to their development of carotid plaque. Previous research showed that the burden of infectious disease is related to stroke risk. The current findings suggest that atherosclerosis may be the mechanism underlying this link.

Today's kids eat more processed food than any prior generation, and we've traded robust outdoor pursuits for wiggling our thumbs to manipulate a PDA screen. As long as the CDC pins the problem of heart disease on high cholesterol, then there appear to be few answers other than drugs. That's not very helpful – or healthy.

A friend of ours who successfully turned around his kids' dietary habits did it by playing a game: If the food in question comes from the old-fashioned farm, it's good. If it comes from a factory farm or factory building, it's bad. That's a simple way to get at it, and it works surprisingly well.

Dr. Andrew Wakefield rebuked by Lancet medical journal

February 6, 2010

Last week, the highly regarded medical journal, The Lancet, retracted a much debated 1998 study that had linked the measles, mumps and rubella vaccine to autism.

Dr. Wakefield

The study was retracted after concerns about ethical breaches by one of the study authors, Dr. Andrew Wakefield. In addition, 10 of the 13 co-authors have disavowed the study's conclusions. "We fully retract this paper from the published record," The Lancet editors said in a statement.

In the 1998 paper, Dr. Wakefield and his colleagues described 12 children with gastrointestinal problems. Eight experienced symptoms that were thought to be related to the MMR vaccine, according to their parents or a doctor, and nine of the 12 children exhibited autistic behaviors.

Dr. Wakefield has been outspoken about his concern about the measles vaccine. He has continually pushed the view that the vaccine caused autism.

An excerpt from a response by Generation Rescue's Jenny McCarthy and Jim Carrey:

It is our most sincere belief that Dr. Wakefield and parents of children with autism around the world are being subjected to a remarkable media campaign engineered by vaccine manufacturers reporting on the retraction of a paper published in The Lancet in 1998 by Dr. Wakefield and his colleagues.

Despite rampant misreporting, Dr. Wakefield's original paper (http://www.generationrescue.org/pdf) regarding 12 children with severe bowel disease and autism never rendered any judgment whatsoever on whether or not vaccines cause autism, and The Lancet's retraction gets us no closer to understanding this complex issue.

Dr. Wakefield is one of the world's most respected and well-published gastroenterologists. He has published dozens of papers (http://www.thoughtfulhouse.org/publ...) since 1998 in well-regarded peer-reviewed journals all over the world.

For the past decade, parents in our community have been clamoring for a relatively simple scientific study that could settle the debate over the possible role of vaccines in the autism epidemic once and for all: compare children who have been vaccinated with children who have never received any vaccines and see if the rate of autism is different or the same.

Few people are aware that this extremely important work has not only begun, but that a study using an animal model has already been completed exploring this topic in great detail.

Dr. Wakefield is the co-author, along with eight other distinguished scientists from institutions like the University of Pittsburgh, the University of Kentucky, and the University of Washington, of a set of studies that explore the topic of vaccinated versus unvaccinated neurological outcomes using monkeys.

The first phase of this monkey study was published three months ago in the prestigious medical journal Neurotoxicology, and focused on the first two weeks of life when the vaccinated monkeys received a single vaccine for Hepatitis B, mimicking the U.S. vaccine schedule. The results, which you can read for yourself here (http://fourteenstudies.org/pdf/prim...), were disturbing. Vaccinated monkeys, unlike their unvaccinated peers, suffered the loss of many reflexes that are critical for survival.

Dr. Wakefield and his scientific colleagues are on the brink of publishing their entire study, which followed the monkeys through the U.S. childhood vaccine schedule over a multi-year period. It is our understanding that the difference in outcome for the vaccinated monkeys versus the unvaccinated controls is both stark and devastating.

The press has been deeply misled in the way The Lancet retraction, and Dr. Wakefield's mock trial, have been characterized. Led by the pharmaceutical companies and their well-compensated spokespeople, Dr. Wakefield is being vilified through a well-orchestrated smear campaign designed to prevent this important new work from seeing the light of day. Why now, after 12 years of inaction, did The Lancet and GMC suddenly act? Is it coincidence that the monkey study is currently being submitted to medical journals for review and publication?

The U.S. vaccine schedule has grown from 10 vaccines given to our children in the 1980s to 36 today, perfectly matching the dramatic rise in autism. The work of Dr. Wakefield and his colleagues deserves to be shared with the world to further, rather than censor, scientific progress.

Pandemic of Vitamin D Deficiency

February 2, 2010

According to a paper in the current British Medical Journal, "more than 50% of the adult population (in Great Britain) had insufficient levels of vitamin D and 16% had severe deficiency during winter and spring". Another recent study found that an alarming 69 percent of pregnant women and 78 percent of women who aren't pregnant are vitamin D deficient. Indeed, it is estimated that 77 percent of the U.S. population suffers from vitamin D deficiency.

This is a matter of urgent concern, according to the Alliance for Natural Health (ANH). "Way back in 2003, the journal Clinical Epidemiology called vitamin-D deficiency an unnecessary pandemic. So why are public-health officials not jumping on the crisis and its remedy?"

ANH points out that 17 different cancers have been linked, at least in part, to vitamin D deficiency. The lower one's vitamin D status, for example, the higher the risk of breast cancer and colon cancer. Vitamin D deficiency is also associated with strokes, asthma, autoimmune disorders, Parkinson's disease, bone disorders, chronic pain, unsteadiness, poor balance and weakened immunity. Vitamin-D deficiency has been linked to a higher risk of heart disease among American children.

John Jacob Cannell, MD, of the Vitamin D Council, cites the connection between vitamin D deficiency and influenza infection. According to Cannell, the majority of in-patients are vitamin D deficient.

Dr. Grout's Comment:

Dr. Cannell also makes a compelling case with his vitamin D theory of autism. For some parents, he has clarified the mystery of why a treatment for autism in the summer seems effective, then fades. The success is often simply due to spring sun exposure.

Cannell doesn't get the exposure he deserves in the autism community. "The ‘all autism is caused from vaccinations' crowd cannot accept the Vitamin D possibility as it threatens their core beliefs," he says. "They simply cannot change their minds."

One common source of vitamin D deficiency is statin drugs, the best selling drugs on the market. Statins inhibit the body's natural process of making cholesterol, and cholesterol is required to synthesize vitamin D. This leads many to speculate that statin drug users do not have enough cholesterol to process vitamin D.

Add to the list of cancers and other diseases linked to vitamin D deficiency - poor brain function. A new study just published in the Journal of Geriatric Psychology and Neurology reveals that vitamin D deficiency leads to significant mental decline as people age.

This deficiency is easy to fix. Be out in the sun or take a good quality supplement.

Your purse could be made with poisonous lead

February 1, 2010

The Center for Environmental Health went to 100 of the nation's top retailers -- including Target, Macy's, Wal-Mart and Kohl's – and bought purses.

The group had the bags tested for lead at an independent lab. Some bags were wiped to see how much, if any, lead would simply rub off the material. The bags also were tested for the total lead content of the products. Nearly all of the bags tested were manufactured in China.

The tests came back showing disturbingly high levels of lead, the Center for Environmental Health said. In some tests, bags had levels 30 to 100 times higher than the federal limit for lead in all children's items. That limit is the only federal limit on the books for lead in consumer products, other than paint.

Lead can be found in many bags made of polyvinyl chloride, or PVC. Some manufacturers find it useful in items like synthetic handbags, because it makes material pliable. It also can be found in some pigments because it makes bright colors last longer.

Lead can rub off of the purse and end up on people's hands, or on children's hands and then into their mouths. Lead has been implicated in a laundry list of health concerns, including learning disabilities and high blood pressure, and some have even linked childhood lead exposure to Alzheimer's later in life.

The Center for Environmental Health told ABC News it is in discussion with more than 60 major retailers and suppliers working toward agreements for tougher standards.

Dr. Grout's comment:

Body burden testing by the CDC and cord blood testing by Johns Hopkins University both reveal that the vast majority of Americans are contaminated with heavy metals - lead, mercury, cadmium, and others. Heavy metals are very toxic to the body. They trigger chronic inflammation which is the primary catalyst that feeds many chronic conditions.

Chelation is a time-honored method for reducing the level of heavy metals in the body. At the Arizona Center for Advanced Medicine, we use both intravenous and oral chelation, depending upon the amount of metals deposited in the body.

© Copyright 2007 - 2012. All Rights Reserved. Arizona Center for Advanced Medicine.
Serving the Phoenix metro area including Scottsdale, Mesa, Glendale, Chandler, Tempe,
Paradise Valley, Peoria, Cave Creek, Carefree, Fountain Hills, Ahwatukee, Queen Creek