Archive for the ‘Health’ Category

« Older Entries

Chemicals in Our Food, and Bodies

Sunday, March 28th, 2010

newyorktimes.com

By NICHOLAS D. KRISTOF
Published: November 7, 2009

Your body is probably home to a chemical called bisphenol A, or BPA. It’s a synthetic estrogen that United States factories now use in everything from plastics to epoxies — to the tune of six pounds per American per year. That’s a lot of estrogen.

More than 92 percent of Americans have BPA in their urine, and scientists have linked it — though not conclusively — to everything from breast cancer to obesity, from attention deficit disorder to genital abnormalities in boys and girls alike.

Now it turns out it’s in our food.

Consumer Reports magazine tested an array of brand-name canned foods for a report in its December issue and found BPA in almost all of them. The magazine says that relatively high levels turned up, for example, in Progresso vegetable soup, Campbell’s condensed chicken noodle soup, and Del Monte Blue Lake cut green beans.

The magazine also says it found BPA in the canned liquid version of Similac Advance infant formula (but not in the powdered version) and in canned Nestlé Juicy Juice (but not in the juice boxes). The BPA in the food probably came from an interior coating used in many cans.

full text here

  • Share/Bookmark

Posted in BPA | No Comments »

UNICEF Nigerian Polio Vaccine Contaminated with Sterilizing Agents Scientist Finds

Thursday, March 25th, 2010

lifesitenews.com

Scientist says things discovered in vaccines are “harmful, toxic”

KADUNA, Nigeria, March 11, 2004 (LifeSiteNews.com) – A UNICEF campaign to vaccinate Nigeria’s youth against polio may have been a front for sterilizing the nation. Dr. Haruna Kaita, a pharmaceutical scientist and Dean of the Faculty of Pharmaceutical Sciences of Ahmadu Bello University in Zaria, took samples of the vaccine to labs in India for analysis.

Using WHO-recommended technologies like Gas Chromatography (GC) and Radio-Immuno assay, Dr. Kaita, upon analysis, found evidence of serious contamination. “Some of the things we discovered in the vaccines are harmful, toxic; some have direct effects on the human reproductive system,” he said in an interview with Kaduna’s Weekly Trust. “I and some other professional colleagues who are Indians who were in the Lab could not believe the discovery,” he said.

A Nigerian government doctor tried to persuade Dr. Kaita that the contaminants would have no bearing on human reproduction. “…I was surprised when one of the federal government doctors was telling me something contrary to what I have learned, studied, taught and is the common knowledge of all pharmaceutical scientists — that estrogen cannot induce an anti-fertility response in humans,” he said. “I found that argument very disturbing and ridiculous.”

full text here

  • Share/Bookmark

Posted in Family, Vaccines | No Comments »

Dutch pull Pfizer vaccine batch after infants die

Thursday, March 25th, 2010

Reuters

110,000 doses of anti-infection drug Prevenar quarantined after deaths

AMSTERDAM – Dutch authorities say they have banned use of a batch of Pfizer’s Prevenar, or Prevnar, after three infants died within two weeks of receiving the anti-infection vaccination.

“On average about 5 to 10 deaths are reported annually after babies get vaccines,” said a spokeswoman for the Dutch health institute RIVM.

“We now have three cases in a short period, that is unusual and the reason for suspending the batch.”

She said RIVM was investigating the cause of the infants’ deaths. Other batches of Prevenar, known as Prevnar in the United States, will continue to be used.

full text here

  • Share/Bookmark

Posted in Vaccines | No Comments »

WHO backs findings on Tamiflu for seasonal flu

Thursday, March 25th, 2010

Study finds no proof flu dose helps healthy people

reuters.com

By Stephanie Nebehay

GENEVA, Dec 11 (Reuters) – The World Health Organisation on Friday endorsed findings that there is no clear evidence the antiviral Tamiflu prevents complications such as pneumonia in otherwise healthy people with seasonal flu.

But the WHO continues to recommend that Tamiflu, made by Swiss drugmaker Roche (ROG.VX), be used immediately in people infected with the separate H1N1 virus who are at high risk of complications or whose symptoms persist for three days or worsen.

The WHO also said pandemic influenza has peaked in North America, most of Western Europe except France, and possibly in Russia as well, the WHO said in a weekly statement.

In a weekly update, it said swine flu outbreaks are still on the rise in Japan, as well as in Hong Kong and Taiwan, where peaks had previously been recorded. The virus is also circulating across most of Africa.

An updated review of past clinical trial results for Tamiflu by researchers from the Cochrane Review, published by the British Medical Journal on Tuesday, found there was insufficient data to know if the drug cut complications from flu in otherwise healthy patients.

full text here

  • Share/Bookmark

Posted in H1N1 Virus, Vaccines | No Comments »

Vitamin D better than vaccines at preventing flu, report claims

Thursday, March 25th, 2010

Vitamin D could cut the risk of flu infection in children by half, the report claims. (Richard Cannon/The Times)

timesonline.co.uk

The risk of children suffering from flu can be halved if they take vitamin D, doctors in Japan have found. The finding has implications for flu epidemics since vitamin D, which is naturally produced by the human body when exposed to direct sunlight, has no significant side effects, costs little and can be several times more effective than anti-viral drugs or vaccine.

Only one in ten children, aged six to 15 years, taking the sunshine vitamin in a clinical trial came down with flu compared with one in five given a dummy tablet. Mitsuyoshi Urashima, the Japanese doctor who led the trial, told The Times that vitamin D was more effective than vaccines in preventing flu.

Vitamin D was found to be even more effective when the comparison left out children who were already given extra vitamin D by their parents, outside the trial. Taking the sunshine vitamin was then shown to reduce the risk of flu to a third of what it would otherwise be.

full text here

  • Share/Bookmark

Posted in Health, Vaccines | No Comments »

« Older Entries