A UTOPIA OF COTTON WOOL

More recently, psychiatrist Seymour Rosenblatt in 1981 was prepared to visualise the next step in drug-taking evolution:

"Consider some of the possibilities currently being promoted by serious scientists: In the next twenty years [i.e., by the year 2001], it has been conjectured, we will be able to control people's feelings and emotions. Madness will go the way of smallpox, and mental institutions will become as rare as monasteries. Everyone will be able to get a night's sleep. Senility will be arrested by a pill or injection. Our memories will be extended beyond their present capacities, and both drug addiction and alcoholism will become things of the past.

Sex offenders will be controlled by medication. Our system of penology will be in the purview of chemistry. Steel bars will be replaced by pharmacological agents, leaving criminals to roam free but restricted from harming people.

We will have jamais vu [never seen] drugs that create feelings of novelty and déjà vu [already seen] drugs to breed familiarity. Both boredom and anxiety will be alleviated, and our sex lives will be enhanced and intensified.

Blood cells will be harnessed to become the psychiatrist's allies. They will become like beasts of burden, hauling drugs throughout our bodies. There will be no side-effects, no nausea, no liver damage.

Finally we shall emerge into a drug-free society in which genetic engineering precludes mental illness. The substances produced by our biochemists will exactly match those endowed to us by nature."

Well, here we are, Rosenblatt's twenty years on. What's wrong with his picture, with the benefit of hindsight? Can we not see the lie to one beatific view of man's near future? The drug carnage we face today, if one re-reads Rosenblatt's envisioned utopia, is as shocking as it is condemnatory.

THE LIQUID LOBOTOMY
Nazi-occupied Paris saw the development of a new drug to treat allergies. Soon researchers found that the drug "produced a previously unknown type of central nervous system effect." After the war, French scientists found that they could engineer an offshoot of this drug which could produce "maximum behavioural disruption." French psychiatrist C Quarti tried the drug on herself. She later recorded her experiences one hour after taking it: "I began to have the impression that I was becoming weaker. That I was dying. It was very painful and agonising." An hour after that: "I felt incapable of being angry about anything."

The new drug reached America in 1954 and was marketed by Smith, Klein and French. It was known as 'Thorazine'.

Bill Mandel, a San Francisco Examiner columnist, decided to find out what a day's dose (50mg) of Thorazine would do: "Simply put, Thorazine made me stupid. Because Thorazine and related drugs are called 'liquid lobotomy' in the mental health business, I'd expected a great grey cloud to descend over my faculties. There was no great grey cloud, just small, unsettling patches of fog.

My mental gears slipped. I had no intellectual traction. It was difficult, for example, to remember simple words. I'd start to describe something and find myself unable to remember such terms as 'screwdriver' and 'volume'."

Significantly, a 1977 California study revealed that 29 patients in four state hospitals were being prescribed in excess of 800mg a day, 16 times the amount experienced by Bill Mandel. One can but imagine the massive debilitating effects the drug would have had on its recipients.

CHEMICAL STRAITJACKETS
More and more, drugs have come to be viewed as chemical straitjackets in institutions, prisons, nurseries, old people's homes and now in open society. Such was psychiatry's growing faith in drugs that in 1963, America saw the implementation of the Community Mental Health Centers Act, which saw psychiatric patients 'deinstitutionalised' and turned onto the streets, drugged up and more than a few homeless. Psychiatrist Dr Thomas Szasz remarks: "The insane person could now be controlled with a chemical, instead of a mechanical straitjacket. The restraint could be put in him, instead of on him."

Within twenty years, the program showed itself to be an unqualified failure. Many discharged patients were unable to cope with the harsh rigours of life on the streets and would turn to crime, violence and street drug addiction. By 1991, the New York Times was calling 'deinstitutionalisation' "…a cruel embarrassment, a reform gone terribly wrong."

Today, many cities around the world, which adopted their own versions of deinstitutionalisation, have been paying the social penalty for this catastrophic wrong turn. Few administrations are willing to shoulder the unpopular and costly responsibility of putting such a difficult problem right. And so the abuse continues. The public sees a deranged person on the street, believing them to be insane, or 'not right in the head', yet how many of these unfortunates are simply doped up with drugs that have been prescribed 'to keep them out of trouble'?

The use of psychiatric drugs to make the elderly more manageable in care homes is of course commonplace. A 1986 study of 2,000 US pharmacies discovered that 76% of prescriptions written for nursing home residents over 65 were tranquillisers. 60% of these called for heavy tranquillisers such as Thorazine. This is all the more appalling when one learns that 73,000 US elderly die every year from adverse drug reactions, interactions and medication errors.

Seen as more socially acceptable, drugs replaced the need for applying the high-profile and reputation-destroying electroshock and psychosurgical alternatives to control the custodial cases. A global paradigm shift had occurred in society with the advent of new psychotropic substances. Gone now was the centuries-old, moral barrier that prevented society from solving its problems with mind-bending drugs. Now it was OK to prescribe psychotropics to patients with a free conscience. After all, this was cutting-edge medicine. And the patients had been diagnosed 'mentally ill' by professionals.

OVER THE RAINBOW
At the same time Thorazine was being trumpeted to the world as the answer to man's cerebral woes, another substance was being investigated in a laboratory. The compound was first synthesised by Swiss chemist Albert Hoffman of Sandoz Laboratories in 1938, who was studying the hallucinogenic properties of the rye fungus 'ergot'. Hoffman's revolutionary new kaleidoscopic trip was to skew the perceptions of an entire generation to come.

Ergot had been investigated for its role in the medieval mass delusions, referred to as 'St Anthony's Fire', which would periodically blanket unsuspecting villages and towns, and madness would reign for several days. In Salem, Massachusetts, the famous 'bewitching' episodes resulted in the lynchings and deaths of 'witches', who had apparently caused the episodes with their vindictive spells. Was this another example of ergot poisoning?

After some non-conclusive testing, Hoffman shelved his substance, until in 1943, he accidentally absorbed a minute dose through his fingertips:

"Soon [I] felt a remarkable but not unpleasant state of intoxication, characterised by an intense stimulation of the imagination and an altered state of awareness of the world…. As I lay in a dazed condition with eyes closed, there surged up from me a succession of fantastic, rapidly changing imagery of a striking reality and depth, alternating with a vivid, kaleidoscopic play of colours. This condition gradually passed off after about three hours."

Hoffman named the 25th permutation of the series 'lysergic acid diethylamide', or LSD-25.

Werner Stoll, president of Sandoz, was the first to consider the compound for psychiatric use, even the compound was already known to produce 'a transitory psychotic disturbance' in normal subjects. It wasn't long before psychiatrists were obtaining samples of the drug for their own experimentation, combining psychoanalysis with LSD to get their patients to 'open up'. The CIA too began to take an interest in "…psychiatric reports suggesting that LSD could break down familiar behaviour patterns, for this raised the possibility of reprogramming or brainwashing."

Extensive funding was made available by the Agency to these psychiatric researchers to continue their work. One institution involved was the federal Addiction Research Center in Lexington, Kentucky. Under the guidance of Dr Harris Isbell, inmates were offered the choice of reduced custodial sentences or 'recreational' drugs. Most chose Isbell's drugs, expecting to get the usual heroin or morphine. What none realised was that Isbell was also giving them the highly experimental LSD. According to John Marks, author of The Search for the Manchurian Candidate, Isbell kept seven men on LSD trips for 77 days straight. One teenager reported later that he had tried the drug just once and had hallucinated and suffered with nightmarish, demonic visions for 17 hours. Isbell is also reported to have tested other unproven drugs from the CIA and National Institute for Mental Health upon inmates ignorant of the name or probable side-effects of the chemicals. The later head of the National Institute of Mental Health, Robert Felix, had, perhaps coincidentally, served at the Lexington research centre before the war.

Canada's Dr Ewen Cameron, former President of the American Psychiatric Association, was particularly taken with the potential of 'acid', regularly using LSD, in combination with electroshock, in his attempts to 'depattern' his paying patients. Cameron had ironically been one of the psychiatric consultants working for the Nuremberg war tribunal and its much-publicised new Nuremberg Code, which he would later cynically violate with his bizarre and dangerous mind-control experimentations.

The Eli Lilly Company, manufacturer of today's Prozac, allegedly obtained the formula for LSD with the help of the CIA and boasted that the drug would soon be available in tonnage quantities. LSD, according to researcher Beverly Eakman, became something of a lark for CIA staff:

"At one dinner for Agency colleagues, Dr Sidney Gottlieb, head of MK-ULTRA, is said to have announced to the guests that he had slipped something special in the dessert. One of those guests, Dr Frank Olsen, had to be hospitalized and hurled himself from his hospital window. A 1954 memo surfaced from the internal security department quite seriously requesting that Agency staff stop putting LSD in the punch bowl at the office Christmas party."

UCLA psychiatrist Louis Jolyon 'Jolly' West was hired by the CIA as part of MK-ULTRA. West was to become notorious with his own experimentation, earning the infamous reputation of being the only person to kill an elephant with LSD.

But it was in the realm of open society that LSD, along with other psychiatric drugs, would have their most devastating and lasting impact. When Harvard psychologist and pop-culture guru Timothy Leary, a devoted follower of the infamous Crowley, publicised his own use of LSD with drug mystic Aldous Huxley in the early 1960's to expand 'self' and reign as one with the universe, an endlessly curious, 'newly-liberated' society listened with rapt fascination as Leary invited them to "tune in, turn on and drop out." LSD became a favourite in the arts. Pop artists such as Donovan, Paul McCartney, Keith Richards, Eric Clapton and others were introduced to the drug. Key musical events, later popularised around the world, were flooded with LSD. Among the crowds at the 1967 Monterey California Pop Festival and 1969's Woodstock, the pushers went quietly about their work, enthusiastically urging their customers to 'live life to the full' and 'trip out'. Life magazine even ran articles promoting LSD after the magazine's publisher, Henry Luce, experimented with the drug. One March 1963 article had even claimed LSD was "…derived from a natural product."

ALDOUS HUXLEY
Aldous Huxley, who had 'obtained' a professorship at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT), wrote prolifically of his trip experiences on LSD. Huxley's hallucinogenic experiences with Dr Humphrey Osmond became the basis of the former's book, The Doors of Perception, believed to have been the inspiration behind the name of Jim Morrison's band 'The Doors'. Huxley later tripped with former US Treasury Agent and Mafia confidante Alfred 'Cappy' Hubbard. Their experiences were reported in Huxley's widely acclaimed Heaven and Hell. Hubbard had obtained 6,000 bottles of LSD from Sandoz Laboratories which he handed out to friends and family members. One bottle ended up with Los Angeles psychiatrist Dr Oscar Janiger, who found a great reception for it with the Hollywood set.

The drug experiences Huxley, Crowley, Jung and other 'mystics' had described were popularised in cheap paperback editions of their works which found their way into the countercultures of Berkeley and Stanford Universities and into the hippie communes all over the world. In spite of Huxley perishing while 'tripping' in 1963, the new drug culture had arrived to stay. And psychiatry had been the one to introduce it.
[to be continued….]

Mind Games 'Answer' To Alzheimer's
By John Ezard

Relatively simple self-help measures and treatment by doctors have been shown by research to reduce or remove the risk of Alzheimer's and other dementias, a leading authority on the disease told the Guardian Hay Festival last night. Among these measures are physical exercise, such as walking, taking fish oil and playing cards, the festival heard.

There is no need to wait for years for the discovery of miracle drugs to fight the predicted epidemic of "many more millions" of Alzheimer's cases as the aged population grows, according to Lawrence Whalley, professor of mental health at Aberdeen University. He was addressing one of the sessions on science and medicine held as part of the nine-day book and arts festival at Hay-on-Wye, Powys, which ends on Sunday night.

In a lecture on scientific progress in "defying dementia" Prof Whalley - whose acclaimed book The Ageing Brain is regarded as a standard work - outlined a range of steps which recent worldwide research, including his own, highlights as promising. These included: The "fairly simple step" of adding the vitamins B12 and folate to the diet of everyone over 50. They should take 2.5 micrograms of B12 daily, he said, and brain-stimulating activities such as newspaper-reading, card games, puzzles and draughts. These had been shown in "the best study of the problem so far" to lower the risk of dementia.

In urging this, Prof Whalley was challenging the widespread conventional wisdom that intelligence - as in the case of the novelist Iris Murdoch - and use of the mind are no protection against Alzheimer's. He declared: "The greater the mental activity at the beginning of the study, the lower the risk of dementia."

Staying physically active as long as possible. "Women who walk" - healthy, physically active older women - had especially emerged from another long-term study of 6,000 women as "less likely to become demented". This was regardless of whether they had poor health, had done badly at school or smoked - factors which are usually regarded as important by Alzheimer's researchers.

Taking fish oil supplements, already a habit among possibly 5% of people, Prof Whalley told his audience, that about "100 grams of oily fish, taken two or three times a week is sufficient for an average adult".

"The health benefits of fish oil are firmly established on the results of carefully controlled clinical trials," he told the festival. "These have most emphatically established fish oil consumption as protective against blood vessel disease and with strong links to reduction of risk of death following a heart attack. There are no clinical trials to support additional health benefits on brain function or stroke. However, it is very likely that maintenance of healthy blood vessel functions in tissues outside the brain also extends to blood vessels inside the brain."

Prof Whalley was giving the festival a preview of a chapter in the next edition of his book, first published last November. The advice in the chapter was compiled in response to questions at public meetings from relatives of dementia sufferers. B12 and folate, he said, were in a group of vitamins important to cell growth. Lack of them led to congenital defects of the nervous system.

"Recent studies have confirmed what has been long suspected: old people need an assured supply of these vitamins if they are to stay healthy. The ageing brain is particularly vulnerable to deficiencies in folate and B12. These may, in turn, be implicated in the development of some types of mental decline in late life and contribute importantly to the risks of Alzheimer's disease. These vitamins are absorbed from food. When the stomach lining is diseased, vitamin B12 is no longer absorbed as efficiently. Among old people this disorder of the stomach lining is relatively common and contributes importantly to low blood concentrations of B12. Currently, there are firm grounds to believe that, starting at about aged 50, older people may no longer effectively absorb B12 and should add B12 as an oral supplement to their diet."

Prof Whalley cited important research findings by the Oxford Project to Investigate Memory and Ageing, which, he said were soon replicated by other researchers. The project found that "a naturally occurring amino acid" - homocysteine - was increased in dementia sufferers and this deficit could be linked to their mental decline. Homocysteine builds up in the body when there is insufficient vitamin B12 and folate to convert homocysteine to methionine.

A Massachusetts study of more than 1,000 people, all initially without Alzheimer's, had shown that homocysteine was likely to be involved in the processes that occurred before the onset of dementia and Alzheimer's. The people were studied for up to 12 years. By the end, 111 had developed dementia.

"The risk of dementia in those with the highest homocysteine concentrations was about double the risk in all other subjects," Prof Whalley said. Achieving even slight delays in the onset of the disease could have a significant impact in reducing numbers of new cases and the huge predicted costs of care. Summing up his analysis of up-to-date research, he said:

"I concluded that whatever your doctor tells you is good for your heart is probably good for your head."
The Guardian, 6th June 2002

PHILLIP DAY'S COMMENT: In my new book The Mind Game, we examine Alzheimer's and dementia. There is a tremendous amount folks can do to stave off the problem, usually brought on by a number of factors, which can include atherosclerosis, malnutrition, food allergies and toxins. As Prof. Whalley so correctly states, also keeping the mind active is a tremendous advantage for the elderly. Personally I am against the concept of retirement, if to do so causes the person's mental agility to atrophy through idle time. A person who stays productive and active as well as concentrating on optimum nutrition is the person who is stacking the deck in their favour for their future peace of mind.

AUSTRALIA: EPIDEMIC OF ERRORS KILLS AGED
by John Kerin

A silent epidemic of errors in surgery and treatment in teaching hospitals is claiming lives of the elderly. A new study suggests as many as one in five patients over 75 who have unscheduled operations are subjected to errors either in surgery or in post-operative treatment. A further 14 per cent die because of such mistakes. The highest error rate was associated with heart surgery, at 20 per cent, while the lowest was plastic surgery with an error rate of 9.6 per cent.

"In our view there is a silent epidemic which requires urgent and systematic attention," says study author Rinaldo Bellomo, director of intensive care research at the Austin and Repatriation Medical Centre in Melbourne.

Dr Bellomo's team looked at 1,125 patients who had undergone in-patient surgery at the centre between December 1998 and March 1999. In this group, the researchers found 190 patients experienced 414 mistakes leading to outcomes such as cardiac arrest, respiratory failure and acute kidney failure. 80 of the patients died as a result of errors.

The study found the incidence of errors was particularly high among the over 75s. Out of 262 patients over the age of 75 where there was no admission to an intensive care unit, 59 - or 22.5 per cent - experienced an error and 37 - or 14 per cent - died. And of 135 patients over 75 years having unscheduled surgery, 27 - or 20 per cent - died as a result. Six our of nine patients over 92 years of age having hip surgery also died.

"Our study could not address the cause of the serious adverse events (with the factors) likely to be extremely complex," Dr Bellomo says. "Our findings suggest there is much scope for improving care in our tertiary hospitals."

The study says adverse events are common among patients having in-patient surgery in a teaching hospital.

"They are particularly common in the elderly and in those having unscheduled surgery."

But Australian Medical Association vice-president Trevor Mudge said the findings should be treated with caution: "It doesn't mean we don't have to continue to strive to reduce errors and adverse events in hospitals, but you have to be careful about studies in the elderly because almost by definition the death rate will be high," Mr Mudge said. "Complications from hip replacement surgery and pneumonia are common causes of death among the elderly."
The Australian, 4th March 2002

PHILLIP DAY'S COMMENT: The continuing toll wrought by Western healthcare on its patients is continually announced in the media. Strangely however, we see no desire by the medical establishment, beyond uttering the usual predictable pontifications, of changing the way in which it approaches medical practice, in order to avoid the problems associated with these tragic deaths. In my book Health Wars, we examine the phenomenon of iatrogenia, or 'death by doctoring', and suggest the great ways this can be overcome using a back-to-basics approach to healthcare. In Steven Ransom's new book Great News on Cancer in the 21st Century, the author also deals with the unsettling subject of 'death by doctoring', as it relates to cancer diagnosis and treatment. If you are not familiar with how dangerous many conventional drugs and treatments can be, please become educated so you find yourself in the best position to make informed decisions that can quite literally save your life.

Latest fluoride plans given the brush off
by Gayle Evans

Health bosses have been attacked over fresh plans to add fluoride to the town's water supply, reopening a controversial 38-year-old debate. A Bolton MP and councillor have criticised the move by regional health bosses to make fluoridation of the North-west's tap water a priority.

They claim there are still serious question marks over the use of the chemical and it should only be added to supplies if the public asks for it in a referendum.

The last time the town voted, in 1968, a massive 82 per cent said no to the plans. Bolton was the only town in the country to hold such a vote.

Health bosses say mass medication is the only way to reduce tooth decay in children under five by half.

The Greater Manchester Health Authority knows it faces a battle. It said that it would need to "overcome substantial barriers prior to successful implementation."

It is waiting for the results of a medical research study, with the outcome expected in three months time. If the dossier recommends that further research is required, the region will be put forward as an "obvious candidate" for a pilot programme.

But the news has caused anger among campaigners against fluoridation, including Bolton North East MP David Crausby.

Mr Crausby said: "It is not up to the Greater Manchester Health Authority to make this decision. I will be asking questions in parliament and will be pushing for a referendum in Bolton. There should be widespread consultation with the public, not just people who regard themselves as speakers for the public. If they say attitudes have changed, then test it - hold another referendum, then we will know for sure. Let the people decide."

Derek Schoular, chairman of Bolton's dental committee, welcomes plans for fluoride to be added to the water. He said most dentists wanted to see a reduction in tooth decay, which he described as "rife" in Bolton, with most five-year-olds having an average of three bad teeth.

In fluoridated Birmingham, children have only one bad tooth by the time they are five, claims Mr Schoular. He added: "The Local Dental Committee fully support fluoride in the
water. We want to see the end of tooth decay on the scale that we are seeing it in Birmingham."

Bolton Council is part of the North West Councils Against Fluoridation. Liz Vaughan, from the campaign, said: "The people of Bolton will want to fight this. There is stacks of evidence to suggest that fluoride damages our health."

Cllr Bob Ronson said fluoride was highly toxic and mistakes could be made. He said: "The water board have refused to put it in the water because the Government will not cover them if there is any possible damage. I think that says it all."
Bolton Evening News, 14th May 2002

OPINION -
Here we go again. The debate about adding fluoride to the water supply is about to receive another airing. Our letters postbag is set for another bashing now that the Great Manchester Health Authority has announced that it wants to make fluoridation of the North-west's tap water a priority.

It is convinced that mass medication is the only way to achieve a 50 per cent reduction in tooth decay among the under fives. Organisations like Bolton's dental committee agree entirely, but this view has been contested vigorously in Bolton for more than 30 years and you can bet that the anti-campaigners will be active once more.

The regional health authority is looking forward to the results of a medical research study due to be published in three month's time. If it recommends that further research is required, the region will be put forward for a pilot programme.

Should this be suggested, Bolton - which voted against fluoridation in a 1968 referendum - can be expected to resist the idea strongly. Bolton Council is part of the North West Councils Against Fluoride body and supports the view that there is a great deal of evidence to suggest that fluoride can be damaging to health.

This newspaper, over the years, has been against compulsory medication and sees no reason to change its mind at this stage. It looks as though the medical establishment is embarking on new efforts to convince us that the experts know best.

But even it is wins the argument - and there are plenty who say it will not - the obstacles to mass fluoridation are pretty steep. Bolton North-east MP David Crausby is already calling for a new referendum in Bolton and there could be a similar scenario in some of the other North-west towns which could be affected.

But the biggest problem blocking the way for the fluoride lobby is the fact that a privatised water company, United Utilities, would be responsible for adding the chemical. It clearly has to look after the interests of its shareholders and will take some convincing that implementation costs - and possible compensation claims - are worth the risk.

NOTE FROM THE NATIONAL PURE WATER ASSOCIATION (NPWA): Following the York Review Report in October 2002, a disappointed Government asked the Medical Research Council "to see what further research is required to strengthen the evidence base." It was due to report last year. See Dr Paul McCormick's letter to the MRC in August 2002 - http://www.npwa.freeserve.co.uk/mccormick_letter.html.

See also the "Request for Assistance" from the US Environmental Protection Agency in April this year - http://www.epa.gov/ORD/NRMRL/wswrd/rfa-fluoride.pdf

Jane Jones, Campaign Director. www.npwa.freeserve.co.uk

CTM COMMENT: And so the fluoride controversy continues, this time in England. CTM subscribers are encouraged to get involved with worthy organisations which oppose mandatory fluoridation on the grounds that this dangerous practice is mass medication without consent, dangerous, and completely unnecessary. For Britain, we recommend the above National Pure Water Association, under the capable leadership of Jane Jones.

Those families wishing to have sterling dental health and reduced incidence of cavities should immediately begin avoiding foods that contain sucrose, refined flour and refined rice. (see Toxic Bite by dentist Bill Kellner-Read. www.credence.org).

Subscribers living in other parts of the world also combating fluoridation, please do not hesitate to send the CTM editorial team your battle-plans and organisation details, so we can rally others to your cause.

GlaxoSmithKline Investigated for Bribing Doctors

Some 3,500 doctors in several German towns are currently being investigated for alleged undue financial advantages and corruption after aggressive marketing by a drugs company. The district attorney's office in Munich, which is carrying out the investigation, said that suspicions were raised over excessive marketing activities by SmithKline Beecham, the company which merged in 2000 with Glaxo Wellcome to form GlaxoSmithKline.

From 1997 to 1999 SmithKline Beecham invited hospital doctors and their spouses to conferences in Germany and abroad. An additional 5800 payments of up to 25,000 each (£15,477; $22,051) were made, in some cases for travel costs, conferences, studies, lectures, or expert consulting. In other cases, books, personal computers and donations were given. When SmithKline Beecham held a conference on its new ACE inhibitor drug, doctors were invited to visit the final of the football world championship or a formula one race nearby.
British Medical Journal, 2002;324:693 (23 March) News

Great News on Cancer in the 21st Century
by Steven Ransom

"Excellent and well researched. Congratulations! I will certainly be directing all my cancer patients to your book." Dr Bill Reeder

Cancer... what is it? Such fear surrounds it. The conventional approach to cancer treatment advocates either surgical removal or toxic treatments such as chemotherapy or radiation. But the success rates for these treatments are abysmally low and none address the primary cause of the cancer. More and more people are realising this and are beginning to search out alternative cancer treatments.

However, when told by their physicians that there are a lot of quacks out there pushing false hope, many of these people then find themselves torn between complying with their doctor and listening to others whisper in their ear about someone who overcame cancer with some alternative treatment. It is at this point that people can soon become lost in the cancer jungle. At such a critical time in your life, who do you trust?

Great News on Cancer in the 21st Century tells us there is time to consider the options! In these pages is everything you need to know about a whole range of cancer treatments, before taking that next step. Clear choices are made available. The book is divided into two very informative and easily readable sections.

Part one looks at the reality of conventional cancer treatment today and includes vital information on the following topics:

Ø chemotherapy and radiation treatments. What are the dangers? A concise summary of the best and latest research. Gives you all the information you need to make an informed choice.

Ø the dynamics of the doctor/patient relationship. Discover some of the reasons why we so readily submit to the conventional regime.

Ø fraud and vested interests at all levels of the conventional cancer industry. From the pharmaceutical companies to the cancer charities and from the research laboratories to the local surgery, just how 'independent' and 'trustworthy' is the advice being given to us by our doctors? Where does their information come from? This book leaves us in no doubt that at many levels, we are being seriously mis-led.

Ø the latest research into genetics and cancer. Our current hope is that genetic research will provide the answer to cancer. Enormous salaries, lots of promises and lots of headlines. But where's the real progress? Are we looking at another $billion drain and no gain?

Ø cancer research generally. What goes on in these $multi-million laboratories? Read some shocking industry admissions.

Ø the money we're giving every year to cancer research - where exactly does it all go? You might never want to give to another conventional cancer charity again.

Ø breast cancer and mammography. The little-discussed inaccuracies and dangers in the breast cancer diagnosis procedure.

Ø mis-diagnosis and over-diagnosis. Discover how women are being pressured into unnecessary ''routine' screening which can then lead to breast cancer mis-diagnosis. How do you double-check that your diagnosis is correct?

Ø radiation dangers from routine mammography. Learn from well-qualified scientists who have been warning us for years that screening itself can heighten susceptibility to breast cancer.

Ø did you know that simple breast self-examination can be just as effective as mammography x-rays and is also a whole lot safer? The only 'problem' with self-examination is that you don't need an expensive machine or a profitable screening programme to carry out this little exercise! Find out the best way to carry out breast self-examination.

Ø conventional breast cancer drugs. How safe are they? What you are not told and what you need to know.

Ø are some doctors knowingly withholding vital medical information? Discover how easy it is for doctors to find themselves intellectually and morally compromised by the rigid, conventional 'healthcare' system.

Part two of this book looks at a whole range of successful alternative cancer treatments including:

Ø the great news on the non- toxic treatment known as Vitamin B17 metabolic therapy and a simple explanation of its anti-cancer properties and action.

Ø the unsuccessful attempts by the conventional cancer industry to suppress all positive information on Vitamin B17 metabolic therapy.

Ø powerful testimonies of people who are being helped tremendously with this treatment. Stories of doctors unable to believe the disappearance of supposedly incurable cancers!

Ø other successful treatments in the non-conventional medicine cabinet including

Ø Vitamin C - arguably one of nature's most amazing substances. Discover just a few of its wonderful healing properties.

Ø Essiac treatment - the amazing anti-cancer treatment brought to wider attention by nurse Rene Caisse.

Ø Hoxsey's treatment - an inspiring story of perseverance and hope and of establishment suppression of the highest order.

Ø the importance of the bowel and colon - the often neglected area when it comes to successful cancer recovery.

Ø the importance of diet and nutrition. What foodstuffs contain natural anti-cancer properties and what foods are best avoided.

Ø the latest news on the EU directive to control mineral and vitamin supplements and what positive steps you can take to make a stand against this move.

Ø Expert voices on all the above and much, much more!

You have a right to informed choice. The new Credence release by Steven Ransom gives you the essential information you need to know about conventional cancer treatments and the effective non-conventional alternatives.

Great News on Cancer in the 21st Century
by Steven Ransom
Credence Publications
Due out: July 2002
Order now from www.credence.org

"Informative and empowering. This book should be required reading for anyone who values his or her health." John J Moelaert - author of The Cancer Conspiracy

"Dear Steve, thank God you wrote this book! Thank you, thank you, thank you." Edie Matthews

"Dear Steve, I must blame you for a sleepless night. Just brilliant! I have been immersing myself in all of this information for a while now but never have I found it written so well! " Ledonna James

Money and Madness

A child who doesn't like doing math homework may be diagnosed with the mental illness developmental-arithmetic disorder (No.315.4). A child who argues with her parents may be diagnosed as having a mental illness called oppositional-defiant disorder (No.313.8). And people critical of the legislation now snaking through Congress that purports to "end discrimination against patients seeking treatment for mental illness" may find themselves labelled as being in denial and diagnosed with the mental illness called noncompliance-with-treatment disorder (No.15.81).

The psychiatric diagnoses suggested above are no joke. They represent a few of the more than 350 "mental disorders" listed in the American Psychiatric Association's (APA) Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders (DSM-IV), the billing bible for mental disorders which commingles neurological diseases with psychiatric diagnoses. Whether the described diagnoses are real diseases or subjective speculation, science is at the heart of the debate about whether lawmakers will require employers and insurers to cover mental illness on the same level as physical disease.

Advocates of the Mental Health Equitable Treatment Act of 2002 (S 543), and its sister proposal in the House (HR 4066), are seeking to expand the 1996 "mental-health parity" legislation. It mandates employers with more than 50 employees and that offer mental-health coverage to provide insurance benefits equal to those of standard health care, such as surgery and physician visits.

The pending proposals would expand the 1996 legislation to require that caps, or limitations on coverage, be the same for mental illnesses as those provided for medical illnesses, in the name of so-called mental-health parity. When it comes to "mental illness" and "medical illness" however, there is no scientific parity between the two schools of thought. That is, only one is based in physical science.

Proponents of mental-health parity believe, and have for the most part successfully convinced lawmakers, that the mental illnesses described in the DSM-IV are medical diseases. For example, obsessive-compulsive disorder (OCD) is considered medically equivalent to, say, measles or anaemia. But critics patiently explain that the psychiatric "mental illness" as described in the DSM-IV is a subjective diagnosis that lies in the eye of the beholder rather than in proved medical science. How this issue is decided, these critics say, likely will determine whether millions of American families will be priced out of health insurance.

Fred Baughman, a San Diego neurologist and leading critic of the alleged mental illness called attention-deficit/hyperactivity disorder (ADHD) (see picture profile, Feb. 18), tells Insight the question that must be answered before a mental illness can qualify as a disease is this: "Where is the macroscopic, microscopic or chemical abnormality in any living patient or at death/autopsy?" Baughman explains: "No one is justified in saying anyone is medically abnormal/diseased until such time as they can adduce some such abnormality. This, by the way, would apply to a person suspected of having diabetes or cancer."

The fact is, Baughman adds, "There is no psychiatric diagnosis for which any part of this question can be answered in the affirmative. In other words: no abnormality; no disease. There is no confirmation of abnormality in the brain in life or at autopsy for any of the psychiatric diagnoses. And they [in the psychiatric community] don't say this because it's part of the propaganda campaign to make patients out of normal people. The findings at autopsy would be very specific and would reveal whether it is a diseased brain and, if so, which disease it is. There is no proof in life or at autopsy of any of the alleged psychiatric mental illnesses, including schizophrenia, psychosis, depression, OCD or ADHD."

Here is Baughman, an internationally respected neurologist, denying there is any such thing as an authentic diagnosis of psychiatric disease at precisely the same time that Congress appears to be getting ready to mandate equal and comparable coverage of psychiatric and medical diseases as the same thing. Perhaps lawmakers haven't asked for the supporting science, or perhaps it has just been withheld from them.

To try to find out which, Insight sent carefully prepared questions about mental illness to the APA and the National Institute of Mental Health (NIMH), the two leading advocates of mental-health parity. Here are those questions:
· How many disorders that are listed in the DSM-IV are curable?
· What documentable, confirmatory, diagnostic, physical abnormality is found in schizophrenia, ADHD and depression?
· What confirmatory, diagnostic tests are available and currently utilized to detect a chemical imbalance?

The APA would not respond to the questions and the NIMH, which claimed not to get involved in policy issues, deferred to a psychiatrist who refused to speak on the record. Both groups did, however, suggest reviewing the 1999 Surgeon General's Report on Mental Health, which Insight promptly read. The report contained the remarkable statement that, "in the United States, mental disorders collectively account for more than 15 percent of the overall burden of disease from all causes and slightly more than the burden associated with all forms of cancer."

But nowhere in the surgeon general's report was there any reference to a single confirmatory, diagnostic test that proves any physical abnormality in any psychiatric diagnosis. More importantly, several chapters into the report the surgeon general admits what Baughman and other neurologists have been saying for years: "The diagnosis of mental disorders is often believed to be more difficult than diagnosis of somatic or general medical disorders since there is no definitive lesion, laboratory test or abnormality in brain tissue that can identify the illness" [emphasis added].

Naturally, one might assume, it would be difficult to diagnose a mental illness if there were no confirming physical evidence that one exists. And one might even ask the surgeon general how he could make the statement that "mental disorders collectively account for more than 15 percent of the overall burden of disease" when he admits later in the report that there is no physical proof thus far of mental disease in any of the psychiatric diagnoses.

More important, critics say, is his honest admission that there is no proof of any physical abnormality that causes any psychiatric mental disorder. This begs the question: If there is no way to prove that a single psychiatric mental illness exists in life or death, how does one diagnose something that doesn't exist and then require insurance companies to pay for treatment?

While the observations of the nation's top medicine man seem crystal clear - and are, in fact, a carbon copy of what critics such as Baughman long have been saying about mental disorders - apparently the sponsors of the pending legislation missed the surgeon general's report. According to Allison Dobson, communications director for Sen. Paul Wellstone (D-Minn.), a cosponsor of the Senate bill, "We know that mental illness is valid based on the volumes of science that have been presented to the senator. The mental illness thing has pretty much been proved by science."

Sen. Pete Domenici (R-N.M.), the biggest cheerleader for requiring mental-health parity, didn't respond to Insight's calls. But Michael Zamora, the policy adviser for Rep. Patrick Kennedy (D-R.I.), a cosponsor of the House parity legislation, tells Insight: "We've had a number of specialists from NIMH who have talked about what they're doing. While they don't have any diagnostic criteria developed yet, they are making advances and starting to document the linkages between the physical and mental. But they haven't necessarily been able to establish yet exactly how these are working."

Indeed, says Kennedy's spokesman, "I'm pretty confident and trusting that the science base of the National Institute of Health, the surgeon general and Nobel laureates have researched this stuff when they say there is a science base behind mental illness. I know that the congressman is confident that the surgeon general and our premier medical-research facility, NIMH, is not full of quacks." But that's not the issue, critics say. It's whether as-yet medically proved illness ought to be paid for by insurance companies, employers and patients at the same levels as diseases science physically has confirmed.

Neither former surgeon general David Satcher (author of the 1999 Surgeon General's Report on Mental Health) nor former NIMH director Steven Hyman would agree to an interview to discuss these matters. Given the official admission by former surgeon general Satcher it is tempting to speculate why the interviews were denied. What is unclear is why lawmakers continue to push for mental-health parity with medical disease when, to date, there is no physical proof that any of the psychiatric mental disorders can be confirmed as abnormalities of the brain.

As recently as late May sponsors of the House parity legislation, Marge Roukema (R-N.J.) and Kennedy, continued the push to "end discrimination against patients seeking treatment for mental illness." In a "Dear Colleague" letter to members of the House of Representatives entitled "The Truth About The Impact of Mental Health Parity," Roukema and Kennedy attempted to "eliminate any confusion about the DSM." The authors sought to give credence to the APA's diagnostic manual, explaining that, "for 50 years, DSM has been widely recognized as the 'international standard' system for classifying mental disorders," and the "DSM is the state of the art of the knowledge base."

The "Dear Colleague" advocacy letter closed by observing: "There will always be those who oppose ending insurance discrimination. … While we strongly disagree with them, we look forward to a debate on the facts." Perhaps so. But nowhere did the letter so much as mention that none of the psychiatric diagnoses in the DSM are based in physical science such as abnormalities of the brain found in life or death. Meanwhile, independent groups representing businesses and other insurers say they are alarmed about the financial burden the proposed legislation is certain to produce. It is widely estimated that nearly 45 million Americans already are without health insurance and there is little doubt that mandating expanded coverage of undefined "mental disease" will run up costs and premiums still further. No one knows how much, but consider these guesstimates:

In 2001 the Business Journal estimated the likely increase in costs would be as high as 40 percent; the National Association of Health Underwriters suggests insurance premiums likely would increase by 11.4 percent.
· The National Federation of Independent Businesses (NFIB) conducted a study among its 600,000 members that indicates even existing state benefit mandates could increase premiums by as much as 30 percent.
· An April 2002 PricewaterhouseCoopers report estimates that government mandates and regulations, which increased 25-fold from 1970 to1996, will add $10 billion to the overall increase in health premiums.
· Charles N. Kahn III, president of the Health Insurance Association of America (HIAA), testified before Congress in 1999 that coverage for psychiatric hospital stays alone already had increased premiums by 12 percent.
· In Maryland, a 1992 Blue Cross/Blue Shield Association study documented "the most expensive individual benefits were estimated to be substance-abuse and mental-health-care services." Outpatient mental-health-care visits increased more than 78 percent once mandates were expanded - from 448,000 in 1983 to 800,000 in 1986.

The NFIB, the National Association of Manufacturers, the U.S. Chamber of Commerce and the HIAA are among the many organizations opposed to the parity legislation. According to Randy Clerihue, a spokesman for HIAA, "We don't like this bill because it's going to raise the cost of health care. It's not that we don't think mental-health services aren't important, but we don't think government should be mandating the kind of insurance employers purchase on behalf of their employees. The problem comes when you have a mandate that forces everyone to pay for something whether they want it or not. We're headed in the direction of mandating everyone out of health insurance."

Each of the many business and insurance groups with which Insight spoke expressed similar sentiments and each was aware of a little-discussed fact: While lawmakers seem prepared to force private insurers to pay for the increase in insurance premiums for mental disorders, which then will be passed along to employees in the form of higher costs and lost take-home pay, the federal government itself is not included - neither Medicare nor Medicaid are included in the mandate. Imagine the uproar if payments for these had to be increased 40 percent or so!

Bruce Wiseman, U.S. national president of the Citizens Commission on Human Rights, a non-profit organization committed to ending abuses in psychiatry, tells Insight: "The government won't include Medicare and Medicaid in parity legislation because they know the taxpayers couldn't afford it - it would break the bank. And even excluding those programs it will break the bank because mental illness is subjective."

According to Wiseman, "Numerous studies show psychiatrists tend strongly to use health-insurance benefits up to the point that they are exhausted, at which point the patient is declared cured. For instance, a person is found to have anxiety disorder up to the insurance cap, whereupon the psychiatrist tells them they no longer have it. This kind of diagnosing would milk the system dry. In this legislation, the government is saying that if there's a million-dollar cap on treating a patient's cancer then there has to be a million-dollar cap on treating shyness when it is called social-anxiety disorder. So once the person gets 'treated,' the bill reaches the cap and they're pronounced cured. Such diagnoses will run insurance costs into the stratosphere. Parity legislation is ripe for abuse if for no other reason than bogus diagnosis."

The former surgeon general, however, might put an end to the debate if he were to testify before Congress about what he wrote in the 1999 report - that there is no known abnormality in the brain as a marker for any of the psychiatric diagnoses. Meanwhile, the critics say, they will continue to insist that until a physical cause of mental disorder is identified it is not comparable to medical disease and there should be no government mandate that insurance companies treat them the same.
Posted June 3, 2002 by Kelly Patricia O'Meara who is an investigative reporter for Insight magazine.

HEALTHY AT 100! with Phillip Day

Perth - Adelaide - Melbourne - Canberra - Sydney - Darwin - Brisbane - New Zealand
(and everywhere in-between)

After his highly successful and mammoth, no-holes-barred Antipodean Health Wars tour of 2001, internationally acclaimed health researcher, and world-class lecturer Phillip Day is once again turning his sights on Australia and New Zealand. Phillip's hugely popular health presentations, known and loved around the world, come together in a blockbuster lecture set for the forthcoming tour which will also contain explosive material from his new book, The Mind Game.

Phillip is author of Health Wars, World Without AIDS, Food For Thought, Cancer: Why We're Still Dying To Know The Truth and The Mind Game. Famous for dealing with awkward subjects and explaining solutions in his own unique style, Phillip is currently undertaking a monster 166-date tour of the UK and Ireland ("We even got helicoptered out to the Scilly Isles in a Force 8 gale!"). Phillip has decided to compact his current NINE-HOUR, THREE-SESSION extravaganza of incredible, uplifting and empowering health and wellness information into a one-evening blockbuster Australians and New Zealanders are going to remember for the rest of their lives. The title of the talk? HEALTHY AT 100.

For those new to the Phillip Day experience:

"My subject is Life Management: all the things we should have been taught at school about how to survive in the outside world, but weren't. How many of us are dying unnecessarily? How many of us are not living, but just existing? How many are crippled with the misery of illnesses to which we know the answers? How many enslaved by debt when a simple strategy can move us through the woods to the green pastures beckoning? Who among us is terrified by what is happening in the world today? How many are fearful of violence, fearful of what our nations have become, fearful of losing our security.… How many are just plain fearful?

This is a wake-up call to all the ordinary, decent citizens out there who want to take their precious country back from the violence, the sleaze, the pop-pornography, the fiscal rape of the tax-payer and from a healthcare system still following the wrong course with the maximum of precision. If you feel outraged over what your nation has become, do you know that millions of people think the same way you do, but have stayed silent over issues our grandfathers took for granted? These millions are now stirring and are determined to say 'Enough!' Come along and discover how you can join us and make a difference."

THE WORKSHOP - (Bring a notepad and a sharp pencil!)
Come prepared! Use Phillip's famously unique, hilarious, poignant and intelligent insights to learn and master the tools and skills you can use IMMEDIATELY to make incredible, positive and lasting changes in your life. WHATEVER YOU DO, don't miss this chance to hear the talk that has been educating and ENTHRALLING AUDIENCES EVERYWHERE. This information can literally change your life!

DON'T PANIC IF YOU CANNOT WRITE FAST ENOUGH! BOOKS AND TAPES WILL BE AVAILABLE FOR SALE AT THE MEETING VENUES.

SO WHAT'S IT ALL GOING TO BE ABOUT?

Find out the SIX ASTOUNDINGLY SIMPLE REASONS why the Karakorum, Abkhasians and Hunzakuts are routinely LIVING TO A HEALTHY AND MOBILE 100+ in the absence of Western healthcare, and how you can too!

Why are 1 in 2 over 70 years of age expected to get Alzheimer's disease and other 'mental impairment problems'? WHAT CAN YOU DO to prevent this? How does the liver play a vital role?

What are the twelve foods you must AVOID LIKE THE PLAGUE?

Find out the ten ways you can BURN BODY FAT RAPIDLY!

How can the number one killer, heart disease, BE SO EASILY AND CHEAPLY PREVENTED? Why is this life-saving information, researched to the highest levels of biochemistry, NOT BEING CIRCULATED?

What can you do naturally to PREVENT AND TREAT CANCER, according to leading experts? Why is the public deliberately denied this life-saving protocol?

Discover the HARMFUL TOXINS we innocently allow into our bedrooms and bathrooms that are contributing to our misery, physical handicap and early death.

Why are women today SUFFERING an astonishing increase in hormonal problems, breast cancer, cysts, fibroids and gynaecological problems? WHAT CAN BE DONE simply to remove this misery from so many lives?

How is psychiatry behind the DAMAGING OF OUR SOCIETIES today? Why can this branch of 'medicine' justifiably be labelled A CRIME AGAINST HUMANITY?

Who are the 'Dark Gods' of psychiatry, who spawned two world wars, have revolutionised the educational system TO PREVENT CHILDREN LEARNING CORRECTLY, introduced political correctness, LEGALLY REPLACED PARENTS as the arbiters of the family, maimed and brain-damaged HUNDREDS OF THOUSANDS OF TRUSTING PATIENTS with drugs, psychosurgery and electrocution, and today preside over the DOPING UP OF OUR SCHOOLKIDS AND ELDERLY, the destruction of our RELIGIOUS INSTITUTIONS, the non-effectiveness of our political and legal systems and THE SUBVERTING OF OUR LAWS? What can be done to expose them and GET SOCIETY BACK ON TRACK?

What's really behind 'mental illnesses', such as ADD/ADHD, Aspbergers, autism, schizophrenia, over-eating, epilepsy, addictions, depression, insomnia, anxiety, anorexia, bulimia, Alzheimer's, Parkinson's, ALS (motor neuron) and others? Are there SIMPLE AND STRAIGHT-FORWARD MEASURES you can use for yourself to help or reverse these conditions?

What about AIDS, multiple sclerosis, arthritis, osteoporosis, asthma, heartburn, diabetes, Crohn's, vaccination mania, stroke, foot and mouth disease, mad cow and other ailments afflicting our societies today? What is the GREAT NEWS we can bring to bear to eradicate these from our own bodies, our families and our nations?

Why do people do what they do? Why are some MOTIVATED AND SUCCESSFUL and some aren't? Why are some POPULAR and some aren't? Why do people get addicted to moods and destructive behaviour in relationships and business? What can be done to coach ourselves to avoid these painful blights on our lives and set ourselves on the road to peace, laughter and progress? What can we do TODAY to TURN THE CORNER, climb out of the rut and enjoy a healthier, wealthier, happier, fulfilling and LONGER life and RECLAIM OUR NATIONS?

Phillip Day: "My job for the past 17 years has been to understand human behaviour and assist people to develop the TOOLS AND SKILLS to HELP THEMSELVES, regardless of the condition in which I found them. My message to you for 2002 is simple: Whether you are sick, unhealthy, depressed, demotivated, disliking your job, fed up with a relationship, broke, fearful, beset by feelings of doom or just plain, flat-out BORED WITH YOUR EXISTENCE, if you do only ONE POSITIVE THING for 2002, start the revolution in your life and your nation with a visit to any one of my meetings for a complete mental and physical 60,000-MILE SERVICE! Let's get you up on the rack, change your oil and get the wheel nuts off to see WHAT CAN BE DONE. Get ready for some action and let's have some fun!"

Ticket sales are at: http://www.credence.com.au/tour/

The tour schedule is being constantly updated, so please check regularly

Please note: Admission will only be granted to those in possession of a valid ticket.
Please arrive in time to ensure that you secure a suitable seat.
No recording devices are permitted without express permission from Credence Events Management. All net door proceeds will go towards the Campaign for Truth in Medicine and Cancer Prevention Coalition, assisting these two worthy organisations in their missions to press for real medical and scientific reform.

PROZAC, SUICIDE AND DR HEALY

Dr David Healy of the Department of Psychological Medicine at the University of Wales in the UK is hardly a household name in the United States and that is a shame. One of the world's leading research psycho-pharmacologists, Healy's expert testimony in last year's Paxil civil trial was one of the deciding factors in the plaintiff's jury victory in that case. Wyoming resident Donald Schell, 60, killed his wife, daughter and granddaughter and then himself with a gun in 1998 after only two days on Paxil. Schell's surviving family members sued Paxil manufacturer UK-based GlaxoSmithKline (GSK), the world's largest pharmaceutical manufacturer, and won.

The decisive factor in the case was the company's own internal data demonstrating that they knew Paxil could cause agitation and suicidal ideation in research subjects. A month after the June verdict in the case, GSK caved in to the British Medicines Control Agency's request to put a suicide warning on Paxil. The fact that a jury verdict in a civil trial here in the United States has led to a suicide warning being put on labels for a popular psychiatric drug in another country has hardly been headline news.

Two weeks after the verdict in the Paxil trials, Houston area mother and convicted murderer Andrea Yates drowned her five children while she was on not one, but two antidepressant drugs with strong stimulant profiles.

What could have been an opportunity for the mass media to educate the public about the dangers of antidepressant drugs, instead has been a non-stop awareness campaign for the mental health industry about the need for my psychiatric 'treatment'.

The real story that has been missed in the Yates case is the fact that it is a story about psychiatric treatment failure. Yates had been getting antidepressant drugs for her post partum depression for years. She was on high doses of two antidepressant drugs at the time she drowned her children but went ahead and did what the drugs are supposed to prevent anyway.

Meanwhile, Dr Healy hasn't shied away from linking Prozac, Paxil and the other SSRIs to suicide. He figures at least 250,000 people have attempted suicide worldwide because of Prozac alone and that at least 25,000 have succeeded.

He was offered a job at the University of Toronto-affiliated Centre for Addiction and Mental Health (CAMH) in 2000. Healy was making arrangements for moving his family to Toronto when he gave a lecture at the CAMH on November 30th, 2000 where he reiterated his position on Prozac and suicide.

He also made a lot of other statements, backed up by statistical data, that are politically unpopular with many of his psychiatric colleagues. Such as the fact that psychiatrists have more patients in their care then ever before. Healy was unceremoniously turned down for the CAMH job. Speculation has it that Prozac manufacturer Indianapolis-based Eli Lilly may have had a hand in Healy's firing.

An international controversy has ensued about Healy's case and the implications it has for academic freedom in academic medicine. Healy filed a multi-million dollar breach of contract lawsuit against the CAMH and the University of Toronto on September 24 of last year.

A summary of the entire David Healy affair can be read on the internet on http:/www.pharmapolitics.com.
Rick Giombetti, 20th March 2002

PHILLIP DAY'S COMMENT: In 1997 in New Jersey, USA, Sam Manzie, 15, attacked and raped 11-year-old Eddie Werner, who had called on the Manzie home selling items door-to-door for the local PTA. Sam strangled Eddie with an electrical cord after the assault, photographing him with the cord still wrapped around his neck. He then threw away his victim's clothes and possessions in a rubbish bin next to the psychiatric facility where he had been receiving regular treatments, including the drug Paxil. His mother reports that Sam had told her: "I wasn't killing that little boy, I was killing [my psychiatrist] because he didn't listen to me."

In my new book, The Mind Game, I include research that clearly demonstrates not only the catastrophic failure of psychiatric drugs, such as Paxil, Prozac and Ritalin, to reverse the underlying causes of the 'mental disorders' they were prescribed to combat, but their now well-known propensity for provoking serious and life-threatening side-effects, most notably psychosis, violence and suicide. Millions of unsuspecting members of the public around the world today are prescribed SSRI or benzodiazapine drugs to combat everything from dyslexia to schizophrenia. As Rick Giombetti's article discusses, the public is now awakening to this highly organised drug threat in its midst, and has begun to take action against the pushers. I applaud CTM's stance for 2003 in assisting my organisation Credence in educating the public about the serious issues surrounding this wanton drug prescribing. I look forward also to seeing an educated and empowered public moving against those corporations whose lies and half-truths about their products have done so much damage to the people who trusted them.

Riots in Algeria as Vaccine Kills Seven Babies

Riots swept through the Algerian town of Oued el Abtal after the deaths of seven babies who had received measles vaccinations. Residents fought police and set fire to government buildings when the town's prefect arrived to attend the children's funerals. Police fired warning shots in an attempt to disperse the crown in the town near Mascara, about 225 miles west of Algiers.

The seven victims were between 3 and 18 months old. Three died immediately after receiving the injections last week as part of a vaccination campaign and four others died within an hour, witnesses said. Dozens more were taken to hospital in a serious condition. Local doctors claimed that the vaccine had passed its expiry date, but health authorities later denied this and said the vaccination had been administered incorrectly.
Daily Mail, May 2002

Study: Cancer Cases to Double by 2050
by Erin McClam

ATLANTA (May 13) - The number of Americans diagnosed annually with cancer will double over the next 50 years, from 1.3 million to 2.6 million, according to a new study that warns of an intense burden on the health care system.

The expected boom reflects a population that will be larger and live longer - rather than suggesting that cancer itself will become more menacing.

Government and private researchers analysed census data and applied it to newly compiled cancer statistics to make the projections, which appear Wednesday in the journal Cancer.

The so-called cancer population will get older as it gets larger, according to the study. By 2050, more than 1.1 million people 75 and older will be diagnosed each year, up from about 400,000 today.

The increase in older cancer patients will require more cancer specialists who can treat them, the study warns. There are already shortages in many of those professions.

The figures "underscore a critical need for expanded and co-ordinated cancer control efforts to serve an aging population and reduce the burden of cancer in the elderly,'' said Dr. Richard Hodes, director of the National Institute on Aging.

The study is the result of analysis by the National Cancer Institute, the American Cancer Society, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention and the North American Association of Central Cancer Registries.

The researchers found a steady decline in the U.S. death rate from all types of cancer in the 1990s. That figure dropped an average of about 1 percent each year from 1993 to 1999, the latest year for which figures are available.

The four major killer cancers - lung, colorectal, breast and prostate - accounted for 53 percent of all cancer deaths in the United States from 1995 to 1999, the study found.

Lung cancer was by far the leader, accounting for more than one-fourth of the deaths - and nearly one-third in men alone. But death rates for all four leading killers fell in the 1990s.

While cancer death rates slowly dropped, the rate of cancer cases overall stabilized in the 1990s after rising in the 1970s and 1980s, the report found.

Using new statistical analysis, the researchers estimated 8.9 million people were living with cancer in the United States at the beginning of 1999. About 60 percent of those were 65 or older.
The Associated Press, 13th May 2002

CTM COMMENT: For as long as CTM has been active, we have stressed the alternative approaches to cancer in its prevention and treatment. Phillip Day's organisation, Credence, is all over this very worthy information. If you are new to this information, please visit the Credence site at www.credence.org for more information.

TB OR NOT TB? THAT IS THE QUESTION

The TB health official at ground level genuinely believes that his diagnosis is above question. And, as his patients, so do we. His diagnosis carries no intentionally scurrilous motive. He is merely acting upon the teachings he has received at medical school. Unfortunately, the term 'being taught what to think but not how' is no better exemplified than in our conventional schools of science and medicine. In so many areas of conventional health, rote learning has taken place - learning which, in turn, is passed on to us as patients during the course of our surgery and hospital consultations. Official wisdom is always above question. We underlings must never dissent. Full story at www.whatareweswallowing.freeserve.co.uk/tb.htm

The Shadow of Soy or,
How I stopped loving and learned to worry about the bean
by Sean Carson

You've joined an army of thousands committed to being all you can be. You rise at dawn to pound the pavement, or climb the Stairmaster to heavenly buttocks, while listening to Deepak Chopra on your Walkman. Or, maybe you contort yourself into yoga asanas in rooms hotter than a Korean chutney. You drink only purified water as you toss a handful of the latest longevity pills into your mouth. You're hungry, hungry for health, and no doubt about it, you're no stranger to soy.

Faster than you can say "isoflavone," the humble soybean has insinuated itself into a dominant position in the standard American diet. And that shouldn't be a surprise. Cheap, versatile, and karma-free, soy in the 1990s went from obscurity as vegan-and-hippie staple to Time magazine. With mad cows lurking between whole wheat buns, and a growing distrust of conventionally-produced dairy products, soy seemed like the ideal choice, the perfect protein. But like all seemingly perfect things, a shadow lurked. By the final years of the last decade, a number of soy researchers began to cry foul. Soy Good? Soy Bad?

As the soy industry lobbied the FDA for a cardiovascular health claim for soy protein, two senior FDA scientists, Daniel Sheehan and Daniel Doerge - both specialists in oestrogen research - wrote a letter vigorously opposing such a claim. In fact, they suggested a warning might be more appropriate. Their concern? Two isoflavones found in soy, genistein and daidzen, the same two promoted by the industry for everything from menopause relief to cancer protection, were said to "demonstrate toxicity in oestrogen sensitive tissues and in the thyroid." Moreover, "adverse effects in humans occur in several tissues and, apparently, by several distinct mechanisms." Sheehan also quoted a landmark study (Cassidy, et al. 1994), showing that as little as 45mg of isoflavones could alter the length of a pre-menopausal woman's menstrual cycle. The scientists were particularly concerned about the effects of these two plant oestrogens on foetuses and young infants, because "development is recognised as the most sensitive life stage for oestrogen toxicity."

It wasn't the first time scientists found problems with soy, but coupled with a Hawaiian study by Dr. Lon White on men, the controversy ended up on national television. While industry scientists criticized both the White study and the two FDA researchers (who are now disallowed from commenting publicly on the issue), other researchers weighed in on the anti-soy side. The tofu'd fight had begun.

What about Asia?
One of the favourite mantras of soy advocates is that the ubiquitous bean has been used "safely by Asians for thousands of years." With many soy "experts" (often with ties to the soy industry) recommending more than 250 grams of soy foods - and in some cases, more than 100mg of isoflavones each day - it's easy to get the impression that soy plays a major role in the Asian diet. If you saw it on TV or read it in a magazine, it must be true, right? Well, not exactly.

Sally Fallon, president of the Weston A. Price Foundation (www.westonaprice.org) and author of Nourishing Traditions, responds that the soy industry and media have spun a self-serving version of the traditional use of soy in Asia. "The tradition with soy is that it was fermented for a long time, from six months to three years and then eaten as a condiment, not as a replacement for animal foods," she says. Fallon states that the so-called Asian diet - far from centering around soy - is based on meat. Approximately 65% of Japanese calorie intake comes from fish in Japan, while in China the same percentage comes from pork. "They're not using a lot of soy in Asia - an average of 2 teaspoons a day in China and up to a quarter cup in some parts of Japan, but not a huge amount."

Contrast that with modern America, home of "if a little is good for you, more must be better." Walk into any grocery store, especially the health-oriented variety, and you'll find the ever-present bean. My recent, limited survey of Marin food stores found soy in dozens and dozens of items: granola, vegetarian chilli, a vast sundry of imitation animal foods, pasta, most protein powders and "power" bars, and even something called "nature's burger," which, given the kind of elaborate (and often toxic) processing that goes into making soy isolate and TVP, would make Mother Nature wince. There's even a bread - directly marketed to women - containing more than 80mg of soy isoflavones per serving, which is more than the daily dose in purified isoflavone supplements. All of this, in addition to the traditional soy fare of tempeh, tofu, miso, and soy sauce. It's no wonder that Californians are edamame dreaming.

So, while Asians were using limited to moderate amounts of painstakingly prepared soy foods - the alleged benefits of which are still controversial - Americans, especially vegetarians, are consuming more soy products and isoflavones than any culture in human history, and as one researcher put it, "entering a great unknown."

Oddly, nowhere in industry promotion does anyone differentiate between traditional, painstakingly prepared "Asian" soy foods and the modern, processed items that Fallon calls "imitation food." And therein lies the rub. Modern soy protein foods in no way resemble the traditional Asian soy foods, and may contain carcinogens like nitrates, lysinoalanine, as well as a number of anti-nutrients which are only significantly degraded by fermentation or other traditional processing.

"People need to realise that when they're eating these soy foods - and I'm not talking about miso or tofu - but soy "burgers," soy "cheese," soy "ice cream," and all of this stuff, that they are not the real thing. They may look like the real thing and they may taste like the real thing, but they do not have the life-supporting qualities of real foods," Fallon says.

There's No Business like Soy Business
"The reason there's so much soy in America is because they started to plant soy to extract the oil from it and soy oil became a very large industry," says lipid specialist and nutritionist Mary Enig, PhD. "Once they had as much oil as they did in the food supply they had a lot of soy protein residue left over, and since they can't feed it to animals, except in small amounts, they had to find another market."

According to Enig, female pigs can only ingest it in amounts approximating 1% during their gestational phase and a few percent greater during their lactation diet, or else face reproduction damage and developmental problems in the piglets. "It can be used for chickens, but it really has limitations. So, if you can't feed it to animals, than you find gullible human beings, and you develop a health claim, and you feed it to them."

In a co-written article, Enig and Fallon state that soybean producers pay a mandatory assessment of ½ to 1 percent of the net market price of soybeans to help fund programs to "strengthen the position of soybeans in the marketplace and maintain and expand foreign markets for uses for soybeans and soy products." They also cite advertising figures - multi-million dollar figures - that soy-oriented companies like Archer Daniels Midland or ADM spend for spots on national television. Money is also used to fund PR campaigns, favourable articles, and lobbying interests. A relaxation of USDA rules has lead to an increase in soy use in school lunches. Far from being the "humble" or "simple" soybean, soy is now big business - very big business. This is not your father's soybean.

There's been such a rush to market isoflavones that the before-mentioned multinational corporation, ADM, in 1998, petitioned the FDA for GRAS (generally recognized as safe) status for soy isoflavones. For those who don't know GRAS, the designation is used for foods, and in some case, food additives, that have been used safely for many years by humans. For those who didn't know - like a number of protesting scientists - that soy isoflavones had been widely used by generations of Americans before the late 1950s, it was a revelation indeed. Ahem.

Dr. Sheehan, in his 1998 letter to the FDA referenced earlier, states "that soy protein foods are GRAS is in conflict with the recent return by CFSAN to Archer Daniels Midland of a petition for GRAS status for soy protein because of deficiencies in reporting the adverse effects in the petition. Thus GRAS status has not been granted." And what about those safety issues?

Requiem for a Thyroid
One of the biggest concerns about high intake of soy isoflavones is their clearly defined toxic effect on the thyroid gland. You don't have work too hard to convince Dr. Larrian Gillespie of that. Dr. Gillespie, author of The Menopause Diet, in the name of scientific empiricism, decided to run her own soy experiment - on herself. She notes that she fits the demographic soy isoflavones are most marketed to: borderline hypothyroid, menopausal females.
"I did it in two different ways. I tried the (isoflavone) supplements (at 40mg), where I went into flagrant hypothryoidism within 72 hours, and I did the 'eat lots of tofu category,' and it did the same thing, but it took me five days with that. I knew what I was doing but it still took me another 7-10 days to come out of it."

In the current issue of the Whole Earth Review, herbalist Susan Weed tells the story of Michael Moore - no, not that Michael Moore, but the founder of the Southwest School of Herbal Medicine. In an e-mail to Weed, Moore declares that "soy did me in." Weed describes how Moore, in his own experiment, ate a large amount of manufactured soy products - protein powders, "power" bars, and soy drinks, over a period of three weeks. Weed writes that Moore ended up in a cardiac care unit because the action on his thyroid had been so pronounced.

Harvard-trained medical doctor Richard Shames, MD, a thyroid specialist who has had a long time practice in Marin, says that "genistein is the most difficult for the metabolic processes of people with low thyroid, so when you have that present in high enough concentrations, the result is an antagonism to the function of thyroid hormone." Far from being an isolated problem, Shames says that recent data tags twenty million Americans being treated for thyroid problems, another thirteen million who ought to be treated if they would get a TSH (thyroid stimulating hormone) test, and another thirteen million who would show up normal on a TSH test but would test positive on another, more specific test. All in all, Shames believes that low thyroid conditions - many due to exposure to oestrogen-mimicking chemicals like PCBs and DDT in environment - are the mother of most modern health epidemics.

That's a lot of thyroid problems. Some estimate the number to be as high as one in ten. Shames says that 8 of 10 thyroid sufferers are women - often older women - like Dr. Gillespie. The same demographic the soy industry has set its targets on. "If you're a normal person, and one in ten are not normal, the effect [of 50mg of soy isoflavones] may be fairly insignificant, but even a normal person can have problems at levels greater than that," says Shames.

Dr. Gillespie says the daily amount to cause thyroid problems may be as low as 30mg, or less than a serving of soymilk. A number of soy proponents say the thyroid concerns are exaggerated and that if dietary iodine is sufficient, problems won't likely happen. Not so, says Shames: "Iodine is a double-edged sword for people with thyroid problems, and for those people, more is going to increase their chance for an autoimmune reaction... throwing iodine at it is not going to be the protective solution." Shames recommends limiting soy foods to a few times a week, preferably fermented or well cooked.

Birth Control Pills for Babies?
Environmental toxicologist Mike Fitzpatrick, PhD says he doesn't have it out for soy. His original concern was for babies: "They were getting more soy isoflavones, at least on a body weight basis, than anybody else," he notes. "It wasn't so much that I knew what that would do, but that I didn't know what that would do." Fitzpatrick, who is also webmaster of ... Soy Online Services (www.soyonlineservice.co.nz), a website devoted to informing people about the potential problems with soy, stresses the potential dangers for the developing human body: "Any person with any kind of understanding of environmental endocrine disruptors, compounds {like isoflavones} that are not in the body normally and can modify hormones and the way they work in the body, any expert will say that infants need to avoid these things like the plague."

Fitzpatrick was quoted - and misquoted - worldwide a few years ago when he suggested that the isoflavones in soy formula were the equivalent of birth control pills. "When I first did my review, I did compare the estrogenic equivalents of the contraceptive pill with how much soy infants and adults would be consuming," he says. "It's at least the equivalent of one or two oestrogen pills a day, on an oestrogenic basis. I've been criticised that it's not the same form of oestrogen, but in terms of oestrogenicity, it's a crude but valid and alarming statistic."

The typical response by industry experts has been to downplay the uniqueness of soy isoflavones, stating - accurately - that isoflavones of various kinds are prevalent in most fruits, vegetables, and legumes.

Is it time to toss out the apple sauce?
"No, you're not going to do that because you get exposure from all kinds of things, but the exposure you get from soy is way, way higher," Fitzpatrick says. "Soy formula is going to give babies a real whack, far in excess of what you might find in apples. Soy is a very rich source of isoflavones - that's how the industry markets its product. You don't see an apple extract to help women deal with menopause." You've got to wonder how the industry can market soy isoflavones as a form of oestrogen replacement therapy for menopausal women (and a host of other health claims) and still claim that soy formula is safe for infants. And while the mechanism for biological activity is clearly defined, the industry keeps repeating the same tune: "no credible evidence exists."

But credible for whom? Says Fitzpatrick: "We're not talking about little studies here but long-term effects on infants and adults, and that's what concerns me. It's very trite. They (the industry) give half-baked answers. What you really need is long-term studies." Likewise, "no credible evidence" is not good enough for Dr. Naomi Baumslag, professor of paediatrics at Georgetown University Medical School. She joined a host of others in criticizing a recent article in JAMA that was purported to be the definitive study on soy formula safety. "It was not an acceptable epidemiological study - you can take it to any decent epidemiologist and hear what they think about it, and they use it to say that soy is safe," says Baumslag. "It's totally unsubstantiated."

Manganese Madness
Besides the dangers of prematurity and other reproductive problems posed by isoflavones, Baumslag mentions the high levels of the mineral manganese (no, not magnesium) often found in soy formula. The problem of manganese is so serious that even one soy manufacturer put warning labels on its soymilk. The company's president, in a press release, states that "there is mounting evidence of a correlation between manganese in soy milk (including soy-based infant formula) and neurotoxicity in small infants." With manganese toxicity known for producing behavioural disorders, the press release even goes further stating, "If research continues, showing that the current epidemic levels of ADHD in children, as well as impulsivity and violence among adolescents, are connected with the increase in soy-based infant formula use, our industry could suffer a serious setback by not dealing with the issue upfront."

With all the potential problems with soy formula, Baumslag notes that formula is also missing key immunological factors only found in mother's milk, the lack of which could give a child a life sentence of chronic health problems. She links soy-pushing to corporate profits and the PR campaigns that they fund. "There's been so much PR in regards to soy formula and I think you also have to ask yourself why it's so much cheaper for them to make, which means there's more profit. How come only 1% in the UK are on formula, where it's closer to 30% in the United States? I don't know why it's so important for them to push soy, they should push breast-feeding." Perhaps it's because breast milk for babies isn't as lucrative as milking the soybean for profits.

Caveat Emptor
As a former vegan - and big soy-eater - I'm disturbed by the vast array of modern, processed soy products that have come on the market in the last few years, without any recognition of potential pitfalls. Safe bet: If it hasn't been eaten safely for thousands of years, you probably shouldn't put it at the centre of your diet. We've been sold a bill of goods that says "soy is good for you", but it doesn't tell you what kind of soy or how much, or even definitively if soy really is what makes Asians so supposedly healthy.

It's well known that the Japanese also eat a very large amount of omega 3 fatty acids from fish each day - substances which have been clearly shown to have anti-cancer and anti-heart disease effects. So, is it the soy or is it the fish? As the industry spends millions and millions of dollars to find something that isoflavones are good for, some health claim to justify their unprecedented presence in the American diet, I have to ask: why are they trying so hard? Why is there such a push to push soy?

Soy isoflavones are clearly biologically active - they affect change in your body. It's no longer acceptable for the industry to see no bad, hear no bad, and speak no bad. Legitimate concerns need to be studied - and not studies funded by the industry, conducted by soy scientists. In the meantime, I've located a wonderful, old miso company on the north coast. They age their miso for three years in wood barrels and sell it in glass jars. It's rich, earthy, and real. I enjoy a teaspoon in a glass of hot water a few times a week after dinner. It tastes lively and feels good. I no longer get the "urge" to eat soy "dogs" or soy "burgers," though I now suspect that urge didn't come from my own instinct, but from the lofty dictates of the soy experts. But why wait years, while ignorant armies clash over this and that isoflavone and studies that say one thing or another? Perhaps the safest way to use soy, if you choose to use soy, is the way it's been used by Asians for thousands of years: fermented, in moderation, as a condiment. In short, colour me cautious.
Pacific Sun, Mill Valley, California.

CTM Comment; It is important to distinguish between fermented soy, such as soy sauce, miso and tempeh, and the soy additives and 'soy protein' found in so many foods. The fermentation process removes most of the potentially harmful compounds that are found in more modern types of soy additives and non-fermented soy products. For a more direct examination of soy, see our article entitled 'Soy Story' which appeared in Eclub December 15th 2001.

TIME MARCHES ON
(A look at aging attitudes)

1970: Long Hair
2000: Longing for hair

1970: The perfect high
2000: The perfect high yield mutual fund

1970: KEG
2000: EKG and ECT

1970: Acid rock
2000: Acid reflux

1970: Moving to Calif. because it's cool
2000: Moving to Calif. because it's warm

1970: Growing pot
2000: Growing pot belly

1970: Trying to look like Marlon Brando or Liz Taylor
2000: Trying NOT to look like Marlon Brando or Liz Taylor

1970: Seeds and stems
2000: Roughage

1970: Popping pills, smoking joints
2000: Popping joints

1970: Killer weed
2000: Weed killer

1970: The Grateful Dead
2000: Dr. Kevorkian

1970: Going to a new, hip joint
2000: Receiving a new hip joint

1970: Rolling Stones
2000: Kidney stones

1970: Being called into the principal's office
2000: Calling the principal's office

1970: Screw the system
2000: Upgrade the system

1970: Disco
2000: Costco

1970: Peace sign
2000: Mercedes logo

1970: Parents begging you to get your hair cut
2000: Children begging you to get their heads shaved

1970: Taking acid
2000: Taking antacid

1970: Passing the drivers test
2000: Passing the vision test

1970: Whatever
2000: Depends

UK VACCINE SEMINAR: The Sanctity of Human Blood

Dr Tim O'Shea, Author of "The Sanctity of Human Blood"

LONDON DATE: Saturday 29th June 2002 (9 am- 5 pm)
Room 224, Regents College, Inner Circle, Regent's Park, London. NW1 4NS

STROUD DATE: Friday 5 Jul 02 - 2 Parts: from 1-5pm and 6-10pm in the Ballroom at Stroud Subscription Rooms, George Street, Stroud, Gloucestershire for tickets telephone the box office, Stroud Tourist Information Centre 01453 760900

Looking at both sides of the story, Dr Tim O'Shea has been researching and lecturing on the "Vaccine Seminar" for 5 years. Known throughout the US and accredited as a professional educator for doctors in 7 states, his knowledge and views have been featured on numerous radio shows, and includes participation to online debates with the FDA. As a mark of his success his acclaimed book, "The Sanctity of Human Blood" is now into its 5th print.

This will be a rare opportunity to see the most current research available about this important topic. Before politics or journalism enters the discussion, the decision whether to vaccinate is fundamentally a scientific one. Vaccination research is not a new subject. It has a long history that involves a number of key issues, each of which must be examined in order to understand the overall effects vaccines bring about. The sources of the information outlined in this seminar are mainstream medicine, science, and law.

In this seminar you will get all the information you need to make a truly informed decision for your child in this thoroughly referenced, clear, and entertaining back-to-school presentation.

This full day multimedia presentation will focus on:
· History: Germ Theory of Disease
· The real causes of disease
· Vaccine production
· Vaccination vs. immunization
· Natural vs. artificial immunity
· The human genome
· Scientific proof of efficacy
· Current laws regarding vaccines
· The role of the FDA.

CURRENT DEBATES
· MMR or single jabs?
· Hepatitis A and the new High Risk Category
· Gulf War Syndrome
· Why there are 40 mandated vaccines for US school children
· The comparison with Europe's required list
· Exemption forms and exemption laws
· The chiropractic position
· Haematology review: blood detox
· Bio-terrorism and vaccines
· Impacts of mercury, aluminium, formaldehyde
· History of the anthrax/Cipro connection
· Congressional hearings on autism, mercury, and anthrax: Rep. Dan Burton
· Reviews from "The San Diego Autism Conference": Dr Andrew Wakefield

NEW VACCINES
· AIDS
· Anthrax
· Smallpox

QUESTIONS SESSION

Admission (London): £35 Spouse: £15

2002 edition of book and Audio CD version of full day seminar now available.

Reservations/book orders: 001 408 298 1800
or by email: O'Shea@thedoctorwithin.com

Other dates: (13 Apr 02, Vacaville CA), (1 Jun 02, Seattle), (18 May 02, Sacramento), (29 July 02,London, England), 6 Jul 02, Stroud, England), (27 Jul 02, San Jose), (10 Aug 02, Orange County CA), (14 Sep 02, Las Vegas), (5 Oct 02, Grand Junction CO), (12 Oct 02, San Diego CA), (9 Nov 02, Chicago), (16 Nov 02, Phoenix)

What Every Women Should Know About the Dangers Of Soy

by Joyce Gross

Hi everyone (especially the women ),

Some of you may remember that last year I was touting soy along with the rest of the medical profession regarding its beneficial effects. I was consuming soy for its phytoestrogen effect to alleviate menopausal symptoms. I was duped like so many other non-suspecting consumers.

I developed Hashimoto's Disease or acute Hashimoto's Thyroiditis which is an acute autoimmune disease that affects the thyroid gland. (In basic terms this means that my thyroid is attacking itself and I can no longer produce thyroid hormone.) My initial symptoms included things like severe joint pain especially in my hands, "trigger" finger(s), carpal tunnel syndrome, excessive weight gain (I gained about 25 lbs. in 3-4 weeks which, of course, when you are a Registered Dietician you can calculate how many calories you are taking in and it just doesn't correlate with the amount of weight one is gaining.), chronic fatigue syndrome, a "brain fog", depression, among others. (Classic symptoms of hypothyroidism are that you gain an unexplained amount of weight in a short period of time and that your hair falls out).

It took almost 4 months before everything was figured out (by me) and it was not really diagnosed properly by my physicians.

About 3-4 months after I initially started the soy supplement I had been taking (now this would also include any soy isoflavone pills you may be taking as well), I developed a "hyper" state, where my resting pulse rate was 125, and I was having 100's of palpitations a day.

Of course, so many of the symptoms I mentioned above can be related to so many other diseases or conditions (especially menopause and when you've never been in menopause before - how does one know what is normal and what is not?) but of course, when the "heart" thing started, this got me to a cardiologist and fast. I didn't know if I was having a heart attack or what. The only thing I could think that I had done differently, as I was waiting for the cardiologist to call me, back was the soy. So I went onto Google (www.google.com), put in "toxic effects of soy", and thyroid disease (especially hypothyroidism) came up. Well, I'm saying to myself, "that doesn't make sense". How can I be hypothyroid with a resting pulse rate of 125! So it's in the back of my mind but I'm thinking it's not feasible.

Anyway, I go to the cardiologist, have all kinds of tests, echocardiogram, Holter monitor on for 24 hours, etc. I am told that "there's nothing wrong with me. Go home and take your oestrogen and you'll feel better." Well, I won't tell you how angry that made me. I insisted that there was something wrong with me and told the doctor to have my labs faxed to me and I would look for another doctor to help me. When my labs came through my fax machine, I almost fainted. They did a TSH (the indicator for thyroid disease) and it was elevated! (which means that I had an under-active thyroid). Later on, after researching this thing to death, I found out that my symptoms of the "hyper" state are sometimes quite common and many women wind up in the emergency room as a result. Apparently, in Hashi's, just before your thyroid stops working completely, it can go "haywire" and put you into a hyper and hypo state.

It has taken 8 months now for me to start feeling better. Adjustments in thyroid medication take some time and I have finally been losing weight, have no more carpal tunnel syndrome, etc.

So, this brings me to my word of caution. If any of you, or your wives, are taking soy products, isoflavone pills or homeopathic-type menopausal products, please be careful. I have since found out that Hashi's can take 8 years to diagnose (we don't build up the antibodies overnight to it) and from an email that I sent out to a few of you the other day, I know that some of you are also hypothyroid. There are tons of websites to go to for more information or email me if you are affected by this and I will be happy to help you find some. The soybean industry is a multi-billion dollar industry in this country so it is are trying to keep this quiet, even though there have been doctors in the FDA who have written position papers regarding the dangers of soy.

Just before I started writing this note to you, I received an email from a woman in the United Kingdom who is interested in my testimonial, along with many others. She is a consumer representative on a government committee which is looking into health concerns over phytoestrogens. I have also been in touch over the past several months with people in New Zealand who are also "on the bandwagon" regarding the dangers of soy. They have several documented animal studies showing the ill effects of soy.

With so many new products coming out containing soy, and the continued "touting" of it as a major benefit, more and more women are going to become hypothyroid. I am currently working as a nutrition expert in treating depression, bi-polar disorder and substance abuse problems. I can't tell you how many of the women who are admitted for depression are also hypothyroid to the point now that the medical doctor automatically first checks their TSH before the psychiatrists even start prescribing their meds. If I hadn't been so adamant about taking over my own health issues last August, I could have very easily wound up being a patient in my own hospital. Menopause doesn't mean that we are supposed to be depressed. Menopause is great, though I used to tell people that was a whole lot of rubbish several months ago.

If you are having any of the symptoms mentioned above, don't assume it's the menopause. It is estimated that there are about 10 million women out there who have hypothyroidism and don't know it. Are you one of them? Have your TSH level checked every few years and if you are taking soy, you may want to give serious consideration to stopping it.

My guess is that a class action suit will eventually develop out of all of this but, of course, the way things work it'll probably take a few years. I am going to be very actively involved in this area over the next several months assisting those groups and individuals who are publicising this health concern.

If any of you are, or have been experiencing any of what I've told you, just go onto 'google' and type in "symptoms of hypothyroidism" for more information regarding the symptoms.
Joyce Gross, M.A.,R.D.,L.D/N.

CTM Comment; It is important to distinguish between fermented soy, such as soy sauce, miso and tempeh, and the soy additives and 'soy protein' found in so many foods. The fermentation process removes most of the potentially harmful compounds that are found in more modern types of soy additives and non-fermented soy products. For a more direct examination of soy, see our article entitled 'Soy Story' which appeared in Eclub December 15th 2001. For more information on the soy issue, please see http://www.thedoctorwithin.com/index24.html

WELCOME MAT

Welcome to E-Club! This bulletin is FREE! If you have received this bulletin in error or wish to unsubscribe, please e-mail us at eclub@campaignfortruth.com and put “Cancel” in the message header. Please note that ptCTM accepts no responsibility if you have received this bulletin from a source other than CTM. If you have received this bulletin unsolicited from someone other than us and do not wish to subscribe, please contact the person who forwarded you the bulletin and request that they take you off their mailing list.

For those receiving this bulletin legitimately for the first time, you are part of an active and daily-growing group interested in the latest advances and news in the realm of alternative healthcare.The purpose of E-Club is to convey the latest and hottest news surrounding alternative health to subscribers by their thousand all over the world at the touch of a button. Have a friend who would be interested? Have them log on to www.campaignfortruth.com/join.htm to subscribe to the greatest alternative health phenomenon on the Internet! Have some great news or testimonies you feel others should know about? Don’t be shy! Send us an e-mail!

Published by Campaign for Truth in Medicine, UK