Over 25 million Americans will suffer from an ulcer at some point during their lifetime, according to the Center for Disease Control.
If you think, like many medical experts once thought, that bacterium cannot live in the acidic juices of the stomach, think again.
Drs. Barry Marshall and Robin Warren of Australia discovered that helicobacter pylori could actually survive, and thrive, in the lining of the stomach as well as the upper duodenum... and more important, this tiny bacteria could be the "trigger" for an ulcer -- not stress, anxiety, low immune system or diet as once believed by the medical community.
After much ridicule from the scientific and medical community, both doctors perservered in proving their findings and have finally received the top award -- the Nobel Prize in Medicine.
Their work has stimulated research into microbes as possible reasons for other chronic inflammatory conditions, such as Crohn's disease, ulcerative colitis, rheumatoid arthritis and atherosclerosis, the Nobel assembly said in its citation.
What Is Helicobacter Pylori?
Here is some general information from the Helicobacter Foundation Website
Helicobacter pylori is a spiral shaped bacterium that lives in the stomach and duodenum (section of intestine just below stomach). It has a unique way of adapting in the harsh environment of the stomach.
The inside of the stomach is bathed in about half a gallon of gastric juice every day. Gastric juice is composed of digestive enzymes and concentrated hydrochloric acid, which can readily tear apart the toughest food or microorganism. Bacteria, viruses, and yesterdays steak dinner are all consumed in this deadly bath of chemicals. It used to be thought that the stomach contained no bacteria and was actually sterile, but Helicobacter pylori changed that.
The stomach is protected from its own gastric juice by a thick layer of mucus that covers the stomach lining. Helicobacter pylori takes advantage of this protection by living in the mucus lining.
Urea hydrolysis: urea is broken down to ammonia and carbon dioxide
Once H. pylori is safely ensconced in the mucus, it is able to fight the stomach acid that does reach it with an enzyme it possesses called urease. Urease converts urea, of which there is an abundant supply in the stomach (from saliva and gastric juices), into bicarbonate and ammonia, which are strong bases. This creates a cloud of acid neutralizing chemicals around the H. pylori, protecting it from the acid in the stomach. The reaction of urea hydrolysis is important for diagnosis of H.pylori by the breath test.
Gram stain of H. Pylori
Another defense H. pylori has is that the body's natural defenses cannot reach the bacterium in the mucus lining of the stomach. The immune system will respond to an H. pylori infection by sending white cells, killer T cells, and other infection fighting agents. However, these potential H. pylori eradicators cannot reach the infection, because they cannot easily get through stomach lining. They do not go away either, though, and the immune response grows and grows. Polymorphs die, and spill their destructive compounds (superoxide radicals) on stomach lining cells. Extra nutrients are sent to reinforce the white cells, and the H. pylori can feed on this. within a few days, gastritis and perhaps eventually a peptic ulcer results. It may not be H. pylori itself which causes peptic ulcer, but the inflammation of the stomach lining; i.e. the response to H. pylori.
H. Pylori causing a neutrophil reaction (active chronic gastritis) in the lining (mucosa) of the stomach
H. pylori is believed to be transmitted orally. Many researchers think that H, pylori is transmitted orally by means of fecal matter through the ingestion of waste tainted food or water. In addition, it is possible that H. pylori could be transmitted from the stomach to the mouth through gastro-esophagal reflux (in which a small amount of the stomach's contents is involuntarily forced up the esophagus) or belching, common symptoms of gastritis. The bacterium could then be transmitted through oral contact.
Saturday, October 15, 2005
Tuesday, October 11, 2005
Food Recall Alerts
Three food recalls top the list this month, as follows:
USA - Minnesota - Ready-Made Dole Salad Packs (3 types)
A potential outbreak of E. coli O157:H7 in Minnesota has resulted in three of the popular Dole Salads landing on the food recall list -- Classic Romaine, American Blend and Greener Selection, all of which contained three common ingredients: romaine lettuce, carrots and red cabbage.
And in the UK - Two Confectionary Products
Bassett's was forced to recall all of its milky babies confectionery range after small pieces of plastic were found in some packs. With the product being aimed at young children, the company saw no option other than a total recall due to the potential choking hazard. (This recall does not affect other Bassett's products.)
Meanwhile, Sainsburys is recalling its Basics plain chocolate owing to undeclared milk proteins that were found. The recall was essential because of the risk to anyone allergic or intolerant to milk who might have inadvertently bought the chocolate.
USA - Minnesota - Ready-Made Dole Salad Packs (3 types)
A potential outbreak of E. coli O157:H7 in Minnesota has resulted in three of the popular Dole Salads landing on the food recall list -- Classic Romaine, American Blend and Greener Selection, all of which contained three common ingredients: romaine lettuce, carrots and red cabbage.
And in the UK - Two Confectionary Products
Bassett's was forced to recall all of its milky babies confectionery range after small pieces of plastic were found in some packs. With the product being aimed at young children, the company saw no option other than a total recall due to the potential choking hazard. (This recall does not affect other Bassett's products.)
Meanwhile, Sainsburys is recalling its Basics plain chocolate owing to undeclared milk proteins that were found. The recall was essential because of the risk to anyone allergic or intolerant to milk who might have inadvertently bought the chocolate.
Tuesday, October 04, 2005
Nutrition News - brain food, learning power, tasty food wraps and more
It's time for some great news on the nutrition front. Here's a short collection of news items that have surfaced recently in areas of nutrition:
Keeping Our Brains Sharp Through Aging
Friedman Nutrition Notes - September/October 2005:
According to a recent report in the American Journal of Clinical Nutrition, folate, a B vitamin found in foods like leafy green vegetables and citrus fruit, may protect against cognitive decline in older adults. The research team, led by Katherine L. Tucker, PhD, was conducted by scientists at the Jean Mayer USDA Human Nutrition Research Center on Aging at Tufts University.
Tucker and her colleagues found that men who obtained more folate in their diets showed significantly less of a decline in verbal fluency skills over the course of three years than did men with lower dietary folate intake. High folate levels, both in the diet and in the blood, also appeared to be protective against declines in another category of cognitive skills known as spatial copying.
Enhance Your Learning Power With -- Breakfast!
Colorado State University Cooperative Extension, September 9, 2005:
What simple practice seems to have one of the greatest effects on how well children do in school? The answer is: Eating breakfast.
Study after study has shown that children and adult students who eat breakfast do more and better work in school than those who don't. Those who don't eat breakfast tend to tire more quickly, be more irritable and react less quickly than those who do eat breakfast.
In a recent study conducted in the United Kingdom, school children were randomly given one or four breakfasts on four consecutive days, then tested for cognitive skills (attention, working memory and episodic memory) throughout the morning. The breakfasts consisted of wheat cereal and milk, oat cereal and milk, a sugar-based beverage or nothing at all. The children scored significantly better on the days following the two cereal-based breakfasts than when they had no breakfast or only a sugar-based beverage for breakfast.
USDA Adding New Zing To Sushi-Style Delicacies?
USDA Website - July 2005 News
Agricultural Research Service (ARS) scientists at Albany, Calif., and research partner Origami Foods, LLC, based in Pleasanton, Calif., are experimenting with dozens of delicious, attractively colored wraps made from familiar vegetables and fruits. For example, they've tested a bright-orange carrot-based wrap to encircle a cucumber, garlic and rice filling, and a deep-red tomato and basil wrap to hold a spicy tuna and rice filling.
Wholesome, colorful sushi wraps made from vegetables, fruits and spices enhance the flavor of traditional and novel sushi fillings, according to Origami Foods and ARS. In addition to two spinach sushi-style wraps, nine others were being tested in July of this year, including: apple-cinnamon, red bell pepper, mango-orange, carrot-ginger, tomato-basil, broccoli, soybean, strawberry and peach.
Yummy!
It's Pumpkin Season -- And Check Out How GREAT They Are!
Pumpkin Power! Calculating the Carotenoids in a Fall Favorite - ARS Oct. 2005
With the exception of pure juice made from a certain strain of goji berry (believed to be the most dense source of carotenoids on the planet) -- those cans of cooked, pureed pumpkin on your pantry shelf probably have more of a healthful phytonutrient called beta-carotene than any other food in your cupboard.
Our bodies can convert beta-carotene, a carotenoid and antioxidant, into vitamin A -- a nutrient essential for good eyesight and proper growth, according to ARS. Until now, there hasn’t been a fast, simple, and environmentally friendly way to precisely measure the beta-carotene and other carotenoids in pumpkin, but a new study may change this.
Why do we need to measure carotenoids more precisely?
These natural plant compounds, responsible for the orange hues of pumpkins and carrots and the deep reds of tomatoes, continue to capture the attention of nutrition and public health researchers worldwide. That's because these specialists are eager to discover more about carotenoids' health benefits.
"Some carotenoids are thought to help reduce incidence of cataracts, cardiovascular disease, and particular kinds of cancer," explains ARS chemist Betty J. Burri. And although beta-carotene is still the most studied type, the importance of other carotenoids, such as cryptoxanthin, lutein, and lycopene -- and the amounts in which they occur -- may become clear as more is learned about them.
Today, the exact sequence of steps that our bodies use to take up beta-carotene and convert it to vitamin A remains mostly mysterious. But it's thought that other carotenoids may play a role.
Besides being the star of that traditional pie dessert favored by many at Thanksgiving dinners, pumpkin can add a pleasing taste and texture to everything from appetizers to soups, stews, and even chili.
Enjoy it with zest, knowing how much it could be doing for YOU!
Keeping Our Brains Sharp Through Aging
Friedman Nutrition Notes - September/October 2005:
According to a recent report in the American Journal of Clinical Nutrition, folate, a B vitamin found in foods like leafy green vegetables and citrus fruit, may protect against cognitive decline in older adults. The research team, led by Katherine L. Tucker, PhD, was conducted by scientists at the Jean Mayer USDA Human Nutrition Research Center on Aging at Tufts University.
Tucker and her colleagues found that men who obtained more folate in their diets showed significantly less of a decline in verbal fluency skills over the course of three years than did men with lower dietary folate intake. High folate levels, both in the diet and in the blood, also appeared to be protective against declines in another category of cognitive skills known as spatial copying.
Enhance Your Learning Power With -- Breakfast!
Colorado State University Cooperative Extension, September 9, 2005:
What simple practice seems to have one of the greatest effects on how well children do in school? The answer is: Eating breakfast.
Study after study has shown that children and adult students who eat breakfast do more and better work in school than those who don't. Those who don't eat breakfast tend to tire more quickly, be more irritable and react less quickly than those who do eat breakfast.
In a recent study conducted in the United Kingdom, school children were randomly given one or four breakfasts on four consecutive days, then tested for cognitive skills (attention, working memory and episodic memory) throughout the morning. The breakfasts consisted of wheat cereal and milk, oat cereal and milk, a sugar-based beverage or nothing at all. The children scored significantly better on the days following the two cereal-based breakfasts than when they had no breakfast or only a sugar-based beverage for breakfast.
USDA Adding New Zing To Sushi-Style Delicacies?
USDA Website - July 2005 News
Agricultural Research Service (ARS) scientists at Albany, Calif., and research partner Origami Foods, LLC, based in Pleasanton, Calif., are experimenting with dozens of delicious, attractively colored wraps made from familiar vegetables and fruits. For example, they've tested a bright-orange carrot-based wrap to encircle a cucumber, garlic and rice filling, and a deep-red tomato and basil wrap to hold a spicy tuna and rice filling.
Wholesome, colorful sushi wraps made from vegetables, fruits and spices enhance the flavor of traditional and novel sushi fillings, according to Origami Foods and ARS. In addition to two spinach sushi-style wraps, nine others were being tested in July of this year, including: apple-cinnamon, red bell pepper, mango-orange, carrot-ginger, tomato-basil, broccoli, soybean, strawberry and peach.
Yummy!
It's Pumpkin Season -- And Check Out How GREAT They Are!
Pumpkin Power! Calculating the Carotenoids in a Fall Favorite - ARS Oct. 2005
With the exception of pure juice made from a certain strain of goji berry (believed to be the most dense source of carotenoids on the planet) -- those cans of cooked, pureed pumpkin on your pantry shelf probably have more of a healthful phytonutrient called beta-carotene than any other food in your cupboard.
Our bodies can convert beta-carotene, a carotenoid and antioxidant, into vitamin A -- a nutrient essential for good eyesight and proper growth, according to ARS. Until now, there hasn’t been a fast, simple, and environmentally friendly way to precisely measure the beta-carotene and other carotenoids in pumpkin, but a new study may change this.
Why do we need to measure carotenoids more precisely?
These natural plant compounds, responsible for the orange hues of pumpkins and carrots and the deep reds of tomatoes, continue to capture the attention of nutrition and public health researchers worldwide. That's because these specialists are eager to discover more about carotenoids' health benefits.
"Some carotenoids are thought to help reduce incidence of cataracts, cardiovascular disease, and particular kinds of cancer," explains ARS chemist Betty J. Burri. And although beta-carotene is still the most studied type, the importance of other carotenoids, such as cryptoxanthin, lutein, and lycopene -- and the amounts in which they occur -- may become clear as more is learned about them.
Today, the exact sequence of steps that our bodies use to take up beta-carotene and convert it to vitamin A remains mostly mysterious. But it's thought that other carotenoids may play a role.
Besides being the star of that traditional pie dessert favored by many at Thanksgiving dinners, pumpkin can add a pleasing taste and texture to everything from appetizers to soups, stews, and even chili.
Enjoy it with zest, knowing how much it could be doing for YOU!
Friday, September 30, 2005
Troubles Rising For The UK's FSA Profiling
The UK's Food Standards Agency's (FSA) profiling proposal, developed at the end of July, used zero as a benchmark, with positive scores indicating unhealthy products and minus scores pointing to healthier options, according to NutraIngredients/Europe.
Using this benchmark process has lumped some foods/drinks formerly believed to be quite healthy into the unhealthy category...
For example, using the new FSA benchmark, whole, semi-skimmed and flavoured milk have the same health value as diet fizzy drinks -- they would be no better for you than drinking a Diet Coke. All got a score of zero.
In another example, olive oil is portrayed through this new profiling, to be less healthy than a range of potato crisps, chocolate biscuits and cakes. Olive oil received a score of 20, despite a number of studies showing that a so-called Mediterranean diet, with a high ratio of monounsaturated fatty acids (mostly olive oil) to polyunsaturated fatty acids, has a protective effect on the heart.
The current profiling scheme means that even breast milk would fall into the bad-health category of 'high in saturated fat, salt or sugar' and the positioning of cheese on the 'scorecard' would result in being similarly unsuitable.
Dairy UK was reported to have serious concerns about the FSA's profiling. "We question the omission of micronutrients such as protein quality, minerals such as calcium, phosphorus, potassium and magnesium, as well as vitamins A and B," said Ed Komorowski, Dairy UK's technical director, as part of an FSA consultation period that ended this week.
Don't feel too bad. When the USDA came out with it's ORAC testing/rating system to rate the antioxidant power of foods/juices... the test didn't even acknowledge carotenoids.
Methinks both groups should go back to the drawing board ...but that's just my humble opinion.
Using this benchmark process has lumped some foods/drinks formerly believed to be quite healthy into the unhealthy category...
For example, using the new FSA benchmark, whole, semi-skimmed and flavoured milk have the same health value as diet fizzy drinks -- they would be no better for you than drinking a Diet Coke. All got a score of zero.
In another example, olive oil is portrayed through this new profiling, to be less healthy than a range of potato crisps, chocolate biscuits and cakes. Olive oil received a score of 20, despite a number of studies showing that a so-called Mediterranean diet, with a high ratio of monounsaturated fatty acids (mostly olive oil) to polyunsaturated fatty acids, has a protective effect on the heart.
The current profiling scheme means that even breast milk would fall into the bad-health category of 'high in saturated fat, salt or sugar' and the positioning of cheese on the 'scorecard' would result in being similarly unsuitable.
Dairy UK was reported to have serious concerns about the FSA's profiling. "We question the omission of micronutrients such as protein quality, minerals such as calcium, phosphorus, potassium and magnesium, as well as vitamins A and B," said Ed Komorowski, Dairy UK's technical director, as part of an FSA consultation period that ended this week.
Don't feel too bad. When the USDA came out with it's ORAC testing/rating system to rate the antioxidant power of foods/juices... the test didn't even acknowledge carotenoids.
Methinks both groups should go back to the drawing board ...but that's just my humble opinion.
Wednesday, September 28, 2005
The Top 5 Children's Menu Items As Surveyed By Mintel
In 2002, the Center for Disease Control (CDC) cited that 16 percent of children aged 6-11 were overweight, with the same percentage holding true for 12-19 year olds, according to a recent report by NutraIngredients.
In a recent survey by Mintel, more than 77 percent of adults surveyed cited that parents are to blame for the national crisis -- indicating that most parents/families are time-starved, spending more time commuting from jobs, to schools and activities leaving less and less time for sitting down to well-balanced home-cooked nutritious family meals. Approximately 42 percent of Mintel's respondents surveyed identified someone in their households as being overweight.
However, a whopping 93% of surveyed respondents felt that junk food continues to play a strong role in childhood obesity issues.
"Children's eating habits are suffering due to the lack of structured meal time, and this is as big a challenge as the lack of balanced meals," said Amanda Archibald, analyst and registered dietitian for Mintel. "Compressed schedules and cramped time availability for both children and parents may play a more important role than previously thought in making healthy food choices."
Then, when you add television into the mix -- of the estimated 40,000 television commercials children view a year, 32 percent are for candy, 31 percent for cereal, and 9 percent for fast food.
According to Mintel's Menu Insights, a menu-tracking system, more than 47 percent of children's menu items were fried. Here's a look at the top five menu items (listed in order of most often eaten) for what most children are eating these days:
1. Chicken fingers
2. Grilled cheese sandwiches
3. Burgers
4. Macaroni and cheese, and
5. Hot dogs
Any of those items sound familiar on your child's menu?
I have a confession to make -- they also top the list of our son's favorite foods. Our family doesn't get home-cooked well-balanced meals as often as we should -- even though both my husband and I only work part time, not commuting like many other parents, but from home running our businesses by phone and through the Internet. I can't even imagine how poor our diets would be if we had to commute like so many other parents are forced to do these days.
It's one of the main reasons we go through 3 cases of Goji Juice per month in our home... because I know our 5 year old son is at the very least, getting the benefits of the 4 "master" LPB polysaccharides and the nutritional value from the juice that we can't get through our irregular eating schedule.
Considering the poor condition of "fresh" produce in our area, it's doubtful a well-balanced meal could even give us what we need.
Both my son and I are quite slim ...and my husband's large frame maybe could stand to lose a pound (or three)... but it isn't anywhere near the weight problems that seem to exist in our area.
It's not our diets keeping us slim. Is it the Goji Juice?
Who knows for certain. I'm just happy our son prefers Goji Juice way above any of the sugary soda's and other far inferior juice products flooding the market these days. The convenience of grabbing a delicious glass of goji whenever we feel the need for a boost in our day also makes it so easy to fit into our often hectic unstructured lifestyle. For us, at least, it appears to be working well.
In a recent survey by Mintel, more than 77 percent of adults surveyed cited that parents are to blame for the national crisis -- indicating that most parents/families are time-starved, spending more time commuting from jobs, to schools and activities leaving less and less time for sitting down to well-balanced home-cooked nutritious family meals. Approximately 42 percent of Mintel's respondents surveyed identified someone in their households as being overweight.
However, a whopping 93% of surveyed respondents felt that junk food continues to play a strong role in childhood obesity issues.
"Children's eating habits are suffering due to the lack of structured meal time, and this is as big a challenge as the lack of balanced meals," said Amanda Archibald, analyst and registered dietitian for Mintel. "Compressed schedules and cramped time availability for both children and parents may play a more important role than previously thought in making healthy food choices."
Then, when you add television into the mix -- of the estimated 40,000 television commercials children view a year, 32 percent are for candy, 31 percent for cereal, and 9 percent for fast food.
According to Mintel's Menu Insights, a menu-tracking system, more than 47 percent of children's menu items were fried. Here's a look at the top five menu items (listed in order of most often eaten) for what most children are eating these days:
1. Chicken fingers
2. Grilled cheese sandwiches
3. Burgers
4. Macaroni and cheese, and
5. Hot dogs
Any of those items sound familiar on your child's menu?
I have a confession to make -- they also top the list of our son's favorite foods. Our family doesn't get home-cooked well-balanced meals as often as we should -- even though both my husband and I only work part time, not commuting like many other parents, but from home running our businesses by phone and through the Internet. I can't even imagine how poor our diets would be if we had to commute like so many other parents are forced to do these days.
It's one of the main reasons we go through 3 cases of Goji Juice per month in our home... because I know our 5 year old son is at the very least, getting the benefits of the 4 "master" LPB polysaccharides and the nutritional value from the juice that we can't get through our irregular eating schedule.
Considering the poor condition of "fresh" produce in our area, it's doubtful a well-balanced meal could even give us what we need.
Both my son and I are quite slim ...and my husband's large frame maybe could stand to lose a pound (or three)... but it isn't anywhere near the weight problems that seem to exist in our area.
It's not our diets keeping us slim. Is it the Goji Juice?
Who knows for certain. I'm just happy our son prefers Goji Juice way above any of the sugary soda's and other far inferior juice products flooding the market these days. The convenience of grabbing a delicious glass of goji whenever we feel the need for a boost in our day also makes it so easy to fit into our often hectic unstructured lifestyle. For us, at least, it appears to be working well.
Tuesday, September 27, 2005
Three Interconnected Crises Facing Our World
It's no secret. In our world today there are 3 interconnected crisis facing us:
"In terms of water, within the 20th Century, global water consumption increased six fold -- twice the rate of population growth.
There's a fair majority of people who will expect, within reasonable circumstances, to still be alive in 2025. Many will have children of their own by 2025 that they don't have now.
But the figures for global water crises suggest that by 2025, in twenty years time, the proportion of people on the planet who will be living in areas of 'significant water stress' will rise from 34% to 63%.
In absolute numbers it's a total sum of about six billion people, which is the entirety of today's world population."
When you stand back and look at the BIG picture of where we are now in our history, and where we will be twenty years from now, the above numbers do NOT look promising.
Consider this: water in its pure form is essential to all known forms of life and is known also as the most universal solvent.
The percent water that makes up the human body (by weight) varies with age, sex, and physical conditioning -- but generally speaking, about 72% of the fat free mass of the human body is made of water. To function properly the body requires between one and seven litres of water per day to avoid dehydration, the precise amount depending on the level of activity, temperature, humidity, and other factors.
Wikipedia states: "Water that humans consume is called potable water. This natural resource is becoming more scarce in certain places as human population in those places increases, and its availability is a major social and economic concern."
When you also consider how important water is to plant life -- specifically agriculture and our food supply -- the picture that is forming shape based on ISIS statististics should cause concern for all of us.
If you are on our customer-only newsletter mailing-list, you'll be receiving your copy in the mail (no, not by email -- by snail-mail) early next week with some additional informtion on this thought-provoking subject.
Until then, stay well and be healthy.
- the crisis in water security,
- the crisis in energy security, and
- the crisis in food security.
"In terms of water, within the 20th Century, global water consumption increased six fold -- twice the rate of population growth.
There's a fair majority of people who will expect, within reasonable circumstances, to still be alive in 2025. Many will have children of their own by 2025 that they don't have now.
But the figures for global water crises suggest that by 2025, in twenty years time, the proportion of people on the planet who will be living in areas of 'significant water stress' will rise from 34% to 63%.
In absolute numbers it's a total sum of about six billion people, which is the entirety of today's world population."
When you stand back and look at the BIG picture of where we are now in our history, and where we will be twenty years from now, the above numbers do NOT look promising.
Consider this: water in its pure form is essential to all known forms of life and is known also as the most universal solvent.
The percent water that makes up the human body (by weight) varies with age, sex, and physical conditioning -- but generally speaking, about 72% of the fat free mass of the human body is made of water. To function properly the body requires between one and seven litres of water per day to avoid dehydration, the precise amount depending on the level of activity, temperature, humidity, and other factors.
Wikipedia states: "Water that humans consume is called potable water. This natural resource is becoming more scarce in certain places as human population in those places increases, and its availability is a major social and economic concern."
When you also consider how important water is to plant life -- specifically agriculture and our food supply -- the picture that is forming shape based on ISIS statististics should cause concern for all of us.
If you are on our customer-only newsletter mailing-list, you'll be receiving your copy in the mail (no, not by email -- by snail-mail) early next week with some additional informtion on this thought-provoking subject.
Until then, stay well and be healthy.
Friday, September 23, 2005
Bird Flu Has Scientists On Alert Around The World
Every now and then I like to take a "virtual trip" around the world to find out what health concerns are floating about. The latest threat isn't floating... it's flying... and it's called Influenza A (H5N1) -- better known as avian influenza or bird flu.
On Sept. 21, 2005 environment and health authorities in Abu Dhabi have placed a large order of four million pills for victims of bird flu, according to Gulf News, a news service in the Middle East. "Ali Al Marzouqi, head of preventive medicine at the General Authority for Health Services (GAHS), said that an order of four million pills for bird flu has been placed to cover 400,000 citizens."
And if you think that's a rather high "prevention" measure, the USA Government has ordered 2 million doses of a new vaccine (which has seemed to have positive results fighting this flu strain) from Sanofi-Aventis (from France) for a national stockpile and is negotiating with the company to order more, according to a Reuters, Washington news release reported in USAToday in August. The vaccine is grown in chicken eggs and production can take months.
U.S. scientists say they have successfully tested a human vaccine against H5N1, but it could be several more months before it is approved for manufacture and distribution here.
On August 30, 2005, "Voice Of America" reported that Vietnam, the country hardest hit by bird flu, is starting to target the virus at its source by vaccinating its entire poultry population.
The outbreak of avian flu in Vietnam has forced the country to slaughter some 50 million chickens and ducks.
A few months back, the World Health Organization stated that since 2003, at least 112 people have contracted the bird flu in four Southeast Asian countries, and 90 of them have been Vietnamese. The majority of human deaths have occurred in Vietnam.
Other cases have occurred in Thailand, Cambodia and Indonesia. Tens of millions of chickens and other birds have died or been culled in Asia because of the virus.
The epidemic devastated Vietnam's chicken farmers last year. The government ordered the culling of chickens in infected areas so they could not pass the virus on to humans, and the economic cost has been estimated at more than 200 million dollars. Vietnam is seeking to control avian flu at the source by injecting chickens and ducks throughout the country with vaccines imported from China.
"The head of the program, Van Dang Ky, chief of epidemiology at the Ministry of Agriculture, says the goal is to have all chickens vaccinated before the winter flu season starts." -- according to the Voice of America article
What health officials around the world fear most is that the H5N1 virus may change to a form that can spread as easily among people as it now does among poultry. If that happens, health experts say, the result could be as deadly as the 1918 Spanish flu pandemic, which killed between 20 and 40 million people. That virus was a highly infectious avian flu much like H5N1.
H5N1 quickly destroys a patient's lungs. Most flu has a fatality rate of less than five percent, but H5N1 has so far killed half the people who contracted it in Southeast Asia.
Public health experts say the virus is mutating and could develop the ability to spread easily from person to person and kill millions in a flu pandemic. The "Nature Weekly Journal of Science" reported in May of this year that the spread of avian flu to, and probably between, humans, has already started across Asia.
There are conflicting reports as to how many people the H5N1 flu has killed ... some sources state more than 60 people have died from it in Asia since 2003, but the actual numbers could be far higher since exact figures have not been fully reported in China, according to "recombinomics" ...however, they have an unofficial report that estimates over 8,000 birds AND ANIMALS have already died from the virus in China. They indicated in June of this year that the machine translated list of animal deaths linked to H5N1 bird flu in and around the Qinghai Lake Nature Reserve in Gangcha County is more than 10 fold higher than the official report of May 21 by China to the World Organisation for Animal Health (OIE).
Since the reserve is a breeding ground for bar-headed geese (Anser indicus) that migrate over the Himalayas, scientists warn the birds could carry the virus to India, Australia, New Zealand and eventually Europe.
"The occurrence of highly pathogenic H5N1 avian influenza virus infection in migrant waterfowl indicates that this virus has the potential to be a global threat," Jinhua Liu of China Agricultural University and colleagues wrote in the journals Science and Nature.
One rumor claims that as many as 120 people have already died of the avian flu in China alone... but this is just a rumor at this time.
About Bird Flu:
(Adapted from The Center For Disease Control Website)
Influenza A (H5N1) -- better known as avian influenza or bird flu -- occurs naturally among wild birds worldwide. The virus is very contagious among birds and can be deadly to them -- especially to domesticated birds like chickens.
15 subtypes of influenza A virus are known to be circulating in bird populations. Many forms of avian flu virus cause only mild symptoms in the birds, or no symptoms at all. However, some of the viruses produce a highly contagious and rapidly fatal disease, leading to severe epidemics, such as the H5N1 strain. These virulent viruses are known as "highly pathogenic avian influenza" and are cause for concern.
About Bird Flu Infection:
The virus doesn't typically infect humans. But in 1997, the first instance of direct bird-to-human infection resulted in six deaths in Hong Kong. Since then, there have been other instances of bird flu infection among humans. Since January 2004 at least 53 people are known to have died of the virus - in Cambodia, Vietnam or Thailand.
Meanwhile, bird flu has claimed the lives of four Indonesians since July of this year, and three children who died this week are suspected of having had the disease. Laboratory test results are expected within days, doctors said, noting that 13 other patients were under observation, according to an Associated Press report earlier today. "With the high human population density, we can expect to see more cases here, more perhaps than even in Vietnam and Thailand," says WHO representative Georg Petersen. Currently Tamiflu tablets are the only treatment so far proven effective against bird flu in humans.
About How Bird Flu Spreads:
Infected birds shed H5N1 in their saliva, nasal excretions and feces. Bird flu viruses spread among birds when the animals come into contact with contaminated excretions. Scientists believe most cases of human (and other animal) infection have resulted from contact with infected poultry or contaminated surfaces.
The virus kills chickens but rarely ducks, according to one source. At the Chinese reserve, it infected wild brown-headed gulls (Larus brunnicephalus) and great black-headed gulls (Larus ichthyaetus), causing symptoms in birds such as tremors, diarrhea, head tilt and paralysis.
Bird flu can cause a range of symptoms in humans. Some patients report fever, cough, sore throat and muscle aches. Others suffer from eye infections, pneumonia, acute respiratory distress and other severe and life-threatening complications.
Athough the World Health Organization claims that so far humans have only contracted bird flu after coming into contact with infected animals, many experts agree that it is possible that H5N1 could merge with a human flu virus and create a new virus that could be easily passed between humans with catastrophic consequences.
There are 2 ways the virus could easily mutate, according to BUPA...
In humans - if a person who already has flu is comes into close contact with birds who have highly pathogenic avian flu, there is a tiny chance that the person could become infected with the avian flu virus. If this happens, the person would now be carrying both the human flu virus and the avian flu virus. The two viruses could meet in the person's body and swap genes with each other. If the new virus had the avian flu's genes that made it rapidly fatal and the human flu's genes to allow it to be passed from person to person, a flu pandemic could result.
In pigs - pigs are susceptible to both human and bird flu viruses. If a pig became infected with both viruses at the same time, it could act as a "mixing vessel", allowing the two viruses to swap genes and produce a new virus.
There is no evidence that H5N1 has mutated yet, however every time an avian flu virus jumps from a bird to a person or animal, the risk of a new flu virus being produced increases.
On Sept. 21, 2005 environment and health authorities in Abu Dhabi have placed a large order of four million pills for victims of bird flu, according to Gulf News, a news service in the Middle East. "Ali Al Marzouqi, head of preventive medicine at the General Authority for Health Services (GAHS), said that an order of four million pills for bird flu has been placed to cover 400,000 citizens."
And if you think that's a rather high "prevention" measure, the USA Government has ordered 2 million doses of a new vaccine (which has seemed to have positive results fighting this flu strain) from Sanofi-Aventis (from France) for a national stockpile and is negotiating with the company to order more, according to a Reuters, Washington news release reported in USAToday in August. The vaccine is grown in chicken eggs and production can take months.
U.S. scientists say they have successfully tested a human vaccine against H5N1, but it could be several more months before it is approved for manufacture and distribution here.
On August 30, 2005, "Voice Of America" reported that Vietnam, the country hardest hit by bird flu, is starting to target the virus at its source by vaccinating its entire poultry population.
The outbreak of avian flu in Vietnam has forced the country to slaughter some 50 million chickens and ducks.
A few months back, the World Health Organization stated that since 2003, at least 112 people have contracted the bird flu in four Southeast Asian countries, and 90 of them have been Vietnamese. The majority of human deaths have occurred in Vietnam.
Other cases have occurred in Thailand, Cambodia and Indonesia. Tens of millions of chickens and other birds have died or been culled in Asia because of the virus.
The epidemic devastated Vietnam's chicken farmers last year. The government ordered the culling of chickens in infected areas so they could not pass the virus on to humans, and the economic cost has been estimated at more than 200 million dollars. Vietnam is seeking to control avian flu at the source by injecting chickens and ducks throughout the country with vaccines imported from China.
"The head of the program, Van Dang Ky, chief of epidemiology at the Ministry of Agriculture, says the goal is to have all chickens vaccinated before the winter flu season starts." -- according to the Voice of America article
What health officials around the world fear most is that the H5N1 virus may change to a form that can spread as easily among people as it now does among poultry. If that happens, health experts say, the result could be as deadly as the 1918 Spanish flu pandemic, which killed between 20 and 40 million people. That virus was a highly infectious avian flu much like H5N1.
H5N1 quickly destroys a patient's lungs. Most flu has a fatality rate of less than five percent, but H5N1 has so far killed half the people who contracted it in Southeast Asia.
Public health experts say the virus is mutating and could develop the ability to spread easily from person to person and kill millions in a flu pandemic. The "Nature Weekly Journal of Science" reported in May of this year that the spread of avian flu to, and probably between, humans, has already started across Asia.
There are conflicting reports as to how many people the H5N1 flu has killed ... some sources state more than 60 people have died from it in Asia since 2003, but the actual numbers could be far higher since exact figures have not been fully reported in China, according to "recombinomics" ...however, they have an unofficial report that estimates over 8,000 birds AND ANIMALS have already died from the virus in China. They indicated in June of this year that the machine translated list of animal deaths linked to H5N1 bird flu in and around the Qinghai Lake Nature Reserve in Gangcha County is more than 10 fold higher than the official report of May 21 by China to the World Organisation for Animal Health (OIE).
Since the reserve is a breeding ground for bar-headed geese (Anser indicus) that migrate over the Himalayas, scientists warn the birds could carry the virus to India, Australia, New Zealand and eventually Europe.
"The occurrence of highly pathogenic H5N1 avian influenza virus infection in migrant waterfowl indicates that this virus has the potential to be a global threat," Jinhua Liu of China Agricultural University and colleagues wrote in the journals Science and Nature.
One rumor claims that as many as 120 people have already died of the avian flu in China alone... but this is just a rumor at this time.
About Bird Flu:
(Adapted from The Center For Disease Control Website)
Influenza A (H5N1) -- better known as avian influenza or bird flu -- occurs naturally among wild birds worldwide. The virus is very contagious among birds and can be deadly to them -- especially to domesticated birds like chickens.
15 subtypes of influenza A virus are known to be circulating in bird populations. Many forms of avian flu virus cause only mild symptoms in the birds, or no symptoms at all. However, some of the viruses produce a highly contagious and rapidly fatal disease, leading to severe epidemics, such as the H5N1 strain. These virulent viruses are known as "highly pathogenic avian influenza" and are cause for concern.
About Bird Flu Infection:
The virus doesn't typically infect humans. But in 1997, the first instance of direct bird-to-human infection resulted in six deaths in Hong Kong. Since then, there have been other instances of bird flu infection among humans. Since January 2004 at least 53 people are known to have died of the virus - in Cambodia, Vietnam or Thailand.
Meanwhile, bird flu has claimed the lives of four Indonesians since July of this year, and three children who died this week are suspected of having had the disease. Laboratory test results are expected within days, doctors said, noting that 13 other patients were under observation, according to an Associated Press report earlier today. "With the high human population density, we can expect to see more cases here, more perhaps than even in Vietnam and Thailand," says WHO representative Georg Petersen. Currently Tamiflu tablets are the only treatment so far proven effective against bird flu in humans.
About How Bird Flu Spreads:
Infected birds shed H5N1 in their saliva, nasal excretions and feces. Bird flu viruses spread among birds when the animals come into contact with contaminated excretions. Scientists believe most cases of human (and other animal) infection have resulted from contact with infected poultry or contaminated surfaces.
The virus kills chickens but rarely ducks, according to one source. At the Chinese reserve, it infected wild brown-headed gulls (Larus brunnicephalus) and great black-headed gulls (Larus ichthyaetus), causing symptoms in birds such as tremors, diarrhea, head tilt and paralysis.
Bird flu can cause a range of symptoms in humans. Some patients report fever, cough, sore throat and muscle aches. Others suffer from eye infections, pneumonia, acute respiratory distress and other severe and life-threatening complications.
Athough the World Health Organization claims that so far humans have only contracted bird flu after coming into contact with infected animals, many experts agree that it is possible that H5N1 could merge with a human flu virus and create a new virus that could be easily passed between humans with catastrophic consequences.
There are 2 ways the virus could easily mutate, according to BUPA...
In humans - if a person who already has flu is comes into close contact with birds who have highly pathogenic avian flu, there is a tiny chance that the person could become infected with the avian flu virus. If this happens, the person would now be carrying both the human flu virus and the avian flu virus. The two viruses could meet in the person's body and swap genes with each other. If the new virus had the avian flu's genes that made it rapidly fatal and the human flu's genes to allow it to be passed from person to person, a flu pandemic could result.
In pigs - pigs are susceptible to both human and bird flu viruses. If a pig became infected with both viruses at the same time, it could act as a "mixing vessel", allowing the two viruses to swap genes and produce a new virus.
There is no evidence that H5N1 has mutated yet, however every time an avian flu virus jumps from a bird to a person or animal, the risk of a new flu virus being produced increases.
Wednesday, September 21, 2005
Postmenopausal Women Have One More Reason To Cheer About Soy
Other studies have shown a link between soy products and bone mineral density but a new research study conducted by Dr Xiao-Ou Shu and colleages published Sept. 12, 2005 in the "Archives of Internal Medicine" (vol 165, pp1890-1895) is the first large study to investigate the association between soy consumption and the risk of fracture.
Even after accounting for age, calorie intake, socioeconomic status, other nutrients, and osteoporosis risk factors, higher soy protein consumption was significantly associated with lower risk of fracture in postmenopausal women participating in the Shanghai Women's Health Study.
They added that the inverse association was more pronounced among women in early menopause. For women within ten years of menopause onset the risk of fracture was reduced by 48 per cent among those with the highest intake of soy protein intake compared to those in the lowest consumption. For women who had been menopausal for more than ten years, the risk reduction was 29 per cent.
Ladies ... are you ready to find out how great Ultimate Soy Shakes taste?
Have a healthy and happy day!
Even after accounting for age, calorie intake, socioeconomic status, other nutrients, and osteoporosis risk factors, higher soy protein consumption was significantly associated with lower risk of fracture in postmenopausal women participating in the Shanghai Women's Health Study.
They added that the inverse association was more pronounced among women in early menopause. For women within ten years of menopause onset the risk of fracture was reduced by 48 per cent among those with the highest intake of soy protein intake compared to those in the lowest consumption. For women who had been menopausal for more than ten years, the risk reduction was 29 per cent.
Ladies ... are you ready to find out how great Ultimate Soy Shakes taste?
Have a healthy and happy day!
Tuesday, September 20, 2005
Resigning From The FDA For Ethical Reasons?
The latest resignation from the FDA comes as quite a surprise when the reasons for resigning were stated. Before I go into the details and an excerpt from the actual resignation letter, I'd like to state for the record:
1. I'm not really a total fan of the OBGYN website (where I found the news article) mainly because they do seem to push a LOT of drugs and don't seem too concerned with "natural" alternatives for women in many cases, or at least that's my perception based on all the links to buy drugs on their site. (Kinda makes me wonder if the drug companies are sending them royalties/kickbacks too, like many doctors across our nation are getting.)
2. Let's face it, the more women that require OBGYN medical help, the more money they make... so I'm not entirely positive that all their research is really in the best interests of women's health since there are other potential motives here. I mean it's not like asian healers who get paid if you stay healthy... here, healers get paid if you get sick. I'm not being skeptical --- just realistic that there may be other motives at play and considering the high incidence of unnecessary historectomies in the USA, it's possible my skepticism is justified. Who knows for sure?
However, they have been strong supporters of moving women's health issues forward through science and research ... so my skepticism might be unjustified.
With that being said, here's the scoop on the latest resignation at the FDA.
Susan Wood, Ph.D., resigned yesterday as Food and Drug Administration (FDA) assistant commissioner for women’s health and director of the FDA’s Office of Women’s Health. Her resignation was prompted by the FDA’s recent decision to delay action on deciding whether to approve the Plan B emergency contraceptive for over-the-counter use. Below is a copy of Dr. Wood’s resignation letter (as posted on the OBGYN website).
“Dear Friends and Colleagues,
I regret to tell you that I am leaving the FDA, and will no longer be serving as the Assistant Commissioner for Women's Health and Director of the FDA Office of Women's Health. The recent decision announced by the Commissioner about emergency contraception, which continues to limit women's access to a product that would reduce unintended pregnancies and reduce abortions is contrary to my core commitment to improving and advancing women's health. I have spent the last 15 years working to ensure that science informs good health policy decisions. I can no longer serve as staff when scientific and clinical evidence, fully evaluated and recommended for approval by the professional staff here, has been overruled. I therefore have submitted my resignation effective today.”
What is the Plan B emergency contraceptive referred to in her letter and above?
I'll do some serious digging and see what I come up with. Be sure to stay tuned to BLV Health Watch for subscriber-only future editions.
Until then... have a wonderful healthy day!
PS: we've fixed the AOL subscriber problem by changing newsletter services. If you subscribed to the old service, you might not be getting new editions. You might want to hop over to our subscribe page to renew your subscription now.
1. I'm not really a total fan of the OBGYN website (where I found the news article) mainly because they do seem to push a LOT of drugs and don't seem too concerned with "natural" alternatives for women in many cases, or at least that's my perception based on all the links to buy drugs on their site. (Kinda makes me wonder if the drug companies are sending them royalties/kickbacks too, like many doctors across our nation are getting.)
2. Let's face it, the more women that require OBGYN medical help, the more money they make... so I'm not entirely positive that all their research is really in the best interests of women's health since there are other potential motives here. I mean it's not like asian healers who get paid if you stay healthy... here, healers get paid if you get sick. I'm not being skeptical --- just realistic that there may be other motives at play and considering the high incidence of unnecessary historectomies in the USA, it's possible my skepticism is justified. Who knows for sure?
However, they have been strong supporters of moving women's health issues forward through science and research ... so my skepticism might be unjustified.
With that being said, here's the scoop on the latest resignation at the FDA.
Susan Wood, Ph.D., resigned yesterday as Food and Drug Administration (FDA) assistant commissioner for women’s health and director of the FDA’s Office of Women’s Health. Her resignation was prompted by the FDA’s recent decision to delay action on deciding whether to approve the Plan B emergency contraceptive for over-the-counter use. Below is a copy of Dr. Wood’s resignation letter (as posted on the OBGYN website).
“Dear Friends and Colleagues,
I regret to tell you that I am leaving the FDA, and will no longer be serving as the Assistant Commissioner for Women's Health and Director of the FDA Office of Women's Health. The recent decision announced by the Commissioner about emergency contraception, which continues to limit women's access to a product that would reduce unintended pregnancies and reduce abortions is contrary to my core commitment to improving and advancing women's health. I have spent the last 15 years working to ensure that science informs good health policy decisions. I can no longer serve as staff when scientific and clinical evidence, fully evaluated and recommended for approval by the professional staff here, has been overruled. I therefore have submitted my resignation effective today.”
What is the Plan B emergency contraceptive referred to in her letter and above?
I'll do some serious digging and see what I come up with. Be sure to stay tuned to BLV Health Watch for subscriber-only future editions.
Until then... have a wonderful healthy day!
PS: we've fixed the AOL subscriber problem by changing newsletter services. If you subscribed to the old service, you might not be getting new editions. You might want to hop over to our subscribe page to renew your subscription now.
Thursday, September 15, 2005
Shocking Info from the Sustainable World Conference
On July 14-15/2005, a quiet gathering took place in the UK Parliament in Westminster, London. Independent scientists from four continents joined national politicians and many interested individuals and groups to discuss strategies for changing agriculture worldwide to a diversity of locally-based sustainable systems that can provide food sovereignty and security to all and protect the earth from the ravages of global warming.
It was the Sustainable World Global Initiative's first-ever International Conference, organised by the Institute of Science in Society [ISIS].
The first shocking info was about WATER:
Alan Simpson MP warned that by the year 2025, 6 billion people will suffer water stress, causing ‘water wars' ...and he states decades of overproduction by agribusiness is a major cause of water depletion.
I didn't have to search very far online to uncover some startling evidence that would appear to support his claims. Check out this article regarding nitrate contamination of an Aquifer in Southwestern Spain.
The article starts out with the statement: "Inappropriate farming techniques and 4 years of drought (1992–1995) produced conditions for high nitrate concentration in an aquifer located in the Province of Seville (Southwest Spain)." And it's backed by an 8.9 Mb .pdf clinical study document following a thorough study of the problem.
The second piece of shocking info was about WEATHER:
Sure, many have heard about the value to our ecosystem that the Amazon rainforests present, but here's something I didn't know.
"The Sahara and Amazon Basins are connected by weather systems that are the inverse of each other and the circulation is recharged by the Amazon, which is now failing, turning it into a carbon source instead of a sink. The oceans are losing the ability to regulate terrestrial temperature, and that too, will affect climate irreversibly."
And then I read the shocking info about NUTRITION:
It was the Sustainable World Global Initiative's first-ever International Conference, organised by the Institute of Science in Society [ISIS].
The first shocking info was about WATER:
Alan Simpson MP warned that by the year 2025, 6 billion people will suffer water stress, causing ‘water wars' ...and he states decades of overproduction by agribusiness is a major cause of water depletion.
I didn't have to search very far online to uncover some startling evidence that would appear to support his claims. Check out this article regarding nitrate contamination of an Aquifer in Southwestern Spain.
The article starts out with the statement: "Inappropriate farming techniques and 4 years of drought (1992–1995) produced conditions for high nitrate concentration in an aquifer located in the Province of Seville (Southwest Spain)." And it's backed by an 8.9 Mb .pdf clinical study document following a thorough study of the problem.
The second piece of shocking info was about WEATHER:
Sure, many have heard about the value to our ecosystem that the Amazon rainforests present, but here's something I didn't know.
"The Sahara and Amazon Basins are connected by weather systems that are the inverse of each other and the circulation is recharged by the Amazon, which is now failing, turning it into a carbon source instead of a sink. The oceans are losing the ability to regulate terrestrial temperature, and that too, will affect climate irreversibly."
And then I read the shocking info about NUTRITION:
Quoted From Sustainable World Coming:
Hywel Davies MD of Weston A Price Foundation from Switzerland gave an account of the relationship between early coronary artery disease and the lack of nutrient dense food in the western diet.
Autopsies on children who died of accidents showed thickening of tissue inside arterial muscle laminae due to multiplication of cells and large deposits of calcium phosphate. These, he said, derived from an excess of vitamin D and other additives present in large quantities in babies' feeding formula and many common foods. They contain supplements to compensate for nutrition removed by food processing, but cause problems that can only be remedied by understanding the importance of natural nutrients to our health and well being.
For this reason, we must grow the food that meets these requirements.
There's more... much more. Maybe it's time for all of us to take another look at the BIG picture. Go ahead, check out the notes from the Conference here.
Also, our new articles will be up at BLV Health Watch Online by midnight tonight. You can check them out on Friday here.
Health and Wellness Blogs
Wednesday, September 14, 2005
The Confusion Surrounding Clinical Studies
Before I dive into this article, keep in mind that I'm not a fan of the flimsy ORAC scale --- a relatively inexpensive test performed by some manufacturers on their own products in order to elevate their products' perceived health benefits (anti-oxidant content).
You see... if the manufacturers have no way of standardizing their product, meaning they can't guarantee the same health values/content in each and every bottle/package (like we do with our Goji Juice), then the results of their testing remains suspect at the very least --- and completely unreliable at worst --- since results will vary depending on the quality/nature of the sample used to perform the test. (Added to the fact, that the ORAC test itself is weak in what it is capable of reporting, but that's another full-length article coming your way soon.)
Scientists only really respect studies published in peer-reviewed journals. There are 65 such peer-reviewed published studies completed thus far on goji (lycium barbarum) following rigorous clinical testing by independent 3rd parties (not our company)... with many more such studies underway.
Essentially, there is nothing wrong with companies carrying out their own research and communicating their findings in their marketing efforts....
...BUT...
Companies should never take advantage of their target audience's respect for science by using poor methodology or over-emphasizing/tweaking unremarkable results. Rather, they need to carry out the research as rigorously as if the consumer had all the know-how of the leading scientist in their field.
For example, Connecticut-based beverage company SoBe - South Beach Beverage Company - paid a $219,000 penalty earlier this year for falsely claiming that its drinks protect against colds and other illnesses and increase energy levels. SoBe, which was bought by PepsiCo in 2001, was pulled up by the Connecticut attorney general's office and department of consumer protection over the claims on advertising and packaging.
In a separate incident, PepsiCo also had to change the labeling on two of its fruit-flavored Tropicana beverages to reflect the fact that they actually contain little or no fruit juice.
In another example, PepsiCo-owned Tropicana Products reached a settlement with the US Federal Trade Commission earlier this year over claims that its Healthy Heart orange juice could reduce blood pressure, cholesterol and homocysteine levels. The FTC alleged that there was no clinical data to back up these claims.
What surprises me is that the company could even make those claims in the first place, with the current FDA legislations regarding marketing and advertising. After all, there are 34 known and clinically proven health benefits for the lycium barbarum bloodline we use in Goji Juice, and yet only 4 of them are we legally entitled to use in our advertising with links to their related peer-reviewed clinical studies.
Chances are... based on the historical evidence in our industry... if we were to advertise publicly all 34 health benefits for goji, we'd be shut down in a heart-beat. However, the soft-drink industry giant gets away with a relatively small fine/settlement (in comparison to revenues and percieved "healthy image" publicity this form of advertising was able to generate for them).
It's a juice --- far better than orange juice with a much wider range of nutrition and health benefits and far more delicious, too in my personal humble opinion --- and yet, I can't tell anyone what the full 34 third-party peer-reviewed clinically proven health benefits are for the berry we use to make Goji Juice, unless someone asks me. (Sure, go ahead and ask me through our contact form at BestLiquidVitamins.com. I'll be happy to send a list of the 34 benefits to you.)
So, ummmmm... what's up?
Is it because we're a supplement supplier producing products designed to help everyone live longer, healthier, happier lives ... and NOT a multi-billion-dollar general food or soft-drink producer?
If you are a subscriber to our "customer-only private newsletter" you'll be finding out some of the answers soon.
Until then, live long and be healthy!
More Blogs On Health and Wellness
You see... if the manufacturers have no way of standardizing their product, meaning they can't guarantee the same health values/content in each and every bottle/package (like we do with our Goji Juice), then the results of their testing remains suspect at the very least --- and completely unreliable at worst --- since results will vary depending on the quality/nature of the sample used to perform the test. (Added to the fact, that the ORAC test itself is weak in what it is capable of reporting, but that's another full-length article coming your way soon.)
Scientists only really respect studies published in peer-reviewed journals. There are 65 such peer-reviewed published studies completed thus far on goji (lycium barbarum) following rigorous clinical testing by independent 3rd parties (not our company)... with many more such studies underway.
Essentially, there is nothing wrong with companies carrying out their own research and communicating their findings in their marketing efforts....
...BUT...
Companies should never take advantage of their target audience's respect for science by using poor methodology or over-emphasizing/tweaking unremarkable results. Rather, they need to carry out the research as rigorously as if the consumer had all the know-how of the leading scientist in their field.
For example, Connecticut-based beverage company SoBe - South Beach Beverage Company - paid a $219,000 penalty earlier this year for falsely claiming that its drinks protect against colds and other illnesses and increase energy levels. SoBe, which was bought by PepsiCo in 2001, was pulled up by the Connecticut attorney general's office and department of consumer protection over the claims on advertising and packaging.
In a separate incident, PepsiCo also had to change the labeling on two of its fruit-flavored Tropicana beverages to reflect the fact that they actually contain little or no fruit juice.
In another example, PepsiCo-owned Tropicana Products reached a settlement with the US Federal Trade Commission earlier this year over claims that its Healthy Heart orange juice could reduce blood pressure, cholesterol and homocysteine levels. The FTC alleged that there was no clinical data to back up these claims.
What surprises me is that the company could even make those claims in the first place, with the current FDA legislations regarding marketing and advertising. After all, there are 34 known and clinically proven health benefits for the lycium barbarum bloodline we use in Goji Juice, and yet only 4 of them are we legally entitled to use in our advertising with links to their related peer-reviewed clinical studies.
Chances are... based on the historical evidence in our industry... if we were to advertise publicly all 34 health benefits for goji, we'd be shut down in a heart-beat. However, the soft-drink industry giant gets away with a relatively small fine/settlement (in comparison to revenues and percieved "healthy image" publicity this form of advertising was able to generate for them).
It's a juice --- far better than orange juice with a much wider range of nutrition and health benefits and far more delicious, too in my personal humble opinion --- and yet, I can't tell anyone what the full 34 third-party peer-reviewed clinically proven health benefits are for the berry we use to make Goji Juice, unless someone asks me. (Sure, go ahead and ask me through our contact form at BestLiquidVitamins.com. I'll be happy to send a list of the 34 benefits to you.)
So, ummmmm... what's up?
Is it because we're a supplement supplier producing products designed to help everyone live longer, healthier, happier lives ... and NOT a multi-billion-dollar general food or soft-drink producer?
If you are a subscriber to our "customer-only private newsletter" you'll be finding out some of the answers soon.
Until then, live long and be healthy!
More Blogs On Health and Wellness
Saturday, September 10, 2005
What's The Weather Like On The Moon?
On Wednesday, September 7/2005, the sun unleashed one of the largest solar flares on record, according to CNET News.
The National Oceanic and Atmospheric Agency (NOAA) said the powerful flare that emerged from region 808 on the sun Wednesday afternoon rated the fourth-largest in the last 15 years. Intense radio emissions were associated with the flare.
Here on earth, our planet's thick atmosphere and magnetic field protects us from protons and other forms of solar radiation coming at us from the sun when larger solar flares occur.
The Moon is a different story.
"The Moon is totally exposed to solar flares," explains solar physicist David Hathaway of the Marshall Space Flight Center. "It has no atmosphere or magnetic field to deflect radiation." Protons rushing at the Moon simply hit the ground --- or whoever might be walking around outside.
If an astronaut were to be caught outside on the moon's surface when such a storm hits, at first he'd feel fine, but a few days later symptoms of radiation sickness would appear: vomiting, fatigue, low blood counts. These symptoms might persist for days.
One rem, short for Roentgen Equivalent Man, is the radiation dose that causes the same injury to human tissue as 1 roentgen of x-rays. A typical diagnostic CAT scan, the kind you might get to check for tumors, delivers about 1 rem [ref].
To die, you'd need to absorb, suddenly, 300 rem or more.
The key word is suddenly, according to NASA. You can get 300 rem spread out over a number of days or weeks with little effect. Spreading the dose gives the body time to repair and replace its own damaged cells. But if that 300 rem comes all at once ... "we estimate that 50% of people exposed would die within 60 days without medical care," says Francis Cucinotta, NASA's radiation health officer at the Johnson Space Center.
Such doses from a solar flare are possible. For example, the large solar storm of August 1972. A large sunspot appeared on August 2, 1972, and for the next 10 days it erupted again and again... Researchers have been studying it ever since.
Cucinotta estimates that a moonwalker caught in the August 1972 storm might have absorbed 400 rem.
An Apollo command module with its aluminum hull would have attenuated the 1972 storm from 400 rem to less than 35 rem at the astronaut's blood-forming organs. That's the difference between needing a bone marrow transplant ... or just a headache pill, according to Cucinotta.
Back in January 20th of 2005, a giant sunspot named "NOAA 720" exploded. The blast sparked an X-class solar flare, the most powerful kind, and hurled a billion-ton cloud of electrified gas (a "coronal mass ejection") into space. Solar protons accelerated to nearly light speed by the explosion reached the Earth-Moon system minutes after the flare --- the beginning of a days-long "proton storm."
A powerful solar flare on July 14/2000 triggered an ongoing radiation storm around our planet. The eruption also sent a fast-moving coronal mass ejection toward Earth.
As for last Wednesday's solar flare, what happened here on earth?
"This event created a complete blackout of high-frequency communications on the day-lit side of Earth, which included the entire U.S. and basically anywhere the sun was shining at this time," Larry Combs, solar forecaster at the NOAA Space Environment Center, said referring to Wednesday's solar flare in a prepared statement.
"Communications used by emergency services along the Gulf Coast may have experienced problems due to this flare. Low-frequency navigation systems may also have experienced a period of significant degradation," he added.
It rated an R-4, or severe, on NOAA's space weather scale for radio blackouts.
Who faces the most health risk when solar flares/storms occur? Both astronauts and high-altitude airline pilots/crew. Airline pilots that fly at great altitude, and especially near the poles, are exposed to more radiation from solar storms reaching our atmosphere. The same goes for astronauts. This results in a higher incidence of cancer among airline pilots and cabin crew. Astronauts have even reported seeing flashes of light because of high energy protons hitting their eyes.
Last Wednesday's solar flare is not the end for this year... more are expected. Click this link to see the current Space Weather Alerts directly from NOAA.
CNET News Trackback
Technorati Health And Wellness Blogs
The National Oceanic and Atmospheric Agency (NOAA) said the powerful flare that emerged from region 808 on the sun Wednesday afternoon rated the fourth-largest in the last 15 years. Intense radio emissions were associated with the flare.
Here on earth, our planet's thick atmosphere and magnetic field protects us from protons and other forms of solar radiation coming at us from the sun when larger solar flares occur.
The Moon is a different story.
"The Moon is totally exposed to solar flares," explains solar physicist David Hathaway of the Marshall Space Flight Center. "It has no atmosphere or magnetic field to deflect radiation." Protons rushing at the Moon simply hit the ground --- or whoever might be walking around outside.
If an astronaut were to be caught outside on the moon's surface when such a storm hits, at first he'd feel fine, but a few days later symptoms of radiation sickness would appear: vomiting, fatigue, low blood counts. These symptoms might persist for days.
One rem, short for Roentgen Equivalent Man, is the radiation dose that causes the same injury to human tissue as 1 roentgen of x-rays. A typical diagnostic CAT scan, the kind you might get to check for tumors, delivers about 1 rem [ref].
To die, you'd need to absorb, suddenly, 300 rem or more.
The key word is suddenly, according to NASA. You can get 300 rem spread out over a number of days or weeks with little effect. Spreading the dose gives the body time to repair and replace its own damaged cells. But if that 300 rem comes all at once ... "we estimate that 50% of people exposed would die within 60 days without medical care," says Francis Cucinotta, NASA's radiation health officer at the Johnson Space Center.
Such doses from a solar flare are possible. For example, the large solar storm of August 1972. A large sunspot appeared on August 2, 1972, and for the next 10 days it erupted again and again... Researchers have been studying it ever since.
Cucinotta estimates that a moonwalker caught in the August 1972 storm might have absorbed 400 rem.
An Apollo command module with its aluminum hull would have attenuated the 1972 storm from 400 rem to less than 35 rem at the astronaut's blood-forming organs. That's the difference between needing a bone marrow transplant ... or just a headache pill, according to Cucinotta.
Back in January 20th of 2005, a giant sunspot named "NOAA 720" exploded. The blast sparked an X-class solar flare, the most powerful kind, and hurled a billion-ton cloud of electrified gas (a "coronal mass ejection") into space. Solar protons accelerated to nearly light speed by the explosion reached the Earth-Moon system minutes after the flare --- the beginning of a days-long "proton storm."
A powerful solar flare on July 14/2000 triggered an ongoing radiation storm around our planet. The eruption also sent a fast-moving coronal mass ejection toward Earth.
As for last Wednesday's solar flare, what happened here on earth?
"This event created a complete blackout of high-frequency communications on the day-lit side of Earth, which included the entire U.S. and basically anywhere the sun was shining at this time," Larry Combs, solar forecaster at the NOAA Space Environment Center, said referring to Wednesday's solar flare in a prepared statement.
"Communications used by emergency services along the Gulf Coast may have experienced problems due to this flare. Low-frequency navigation systems may also have experienced a period of significant degradation," he added.
It rated an R-4, or severe, on NOAA's space weather scale for radio blackouts.
Who faces the most health risk when solar flares/storms occur? Both astronauts and high-altitude airline pilots/crew. Airline pilots that fly at great altitude, and especially near the poles, are exposed to more radiation from solar storms reaching our atmosphere. The same goes for astronauts. This results in a higher incidence of cancer among airline pilots and cabin crew. Astronauts have even reported seeing flashes of light because of high energy protons hitting their eyes.
Last Wednesday's solar flare is not the end for this year... more are expected. Click this link to see the current Space Weather Alerts directly from NOAA.
CNET News Trackback
Technorati Health And Wellness Blogs
Friday, September 09, 2005
Benefits of Soy Protein in the News Again - New Study!
By now we all know about the benefits of soy protein for the heart and cholesterol... but a new study appears to suggest it may also have benefits for the liver.
In a new study conducted at the Instituto Nacional de Ciencias Médicas y Nutrición in Mexico and published in the Journal of Lipid Research, the researchers set out to investigate whether soy protein may also regulate the transcription factors involved in lipid metabolism, and thus prevent the development of fatty liver.
Although further research is needed on the subject, particularly insofar as it relates to humans since the study was conducted using rats, the researchers believe that their results indicate that consumption of soy protein could reduce insulin resistance, renal damage and fatty liver.
Disclaimer: These statements have not been evaluated by the FDA. Products on this site are not intended to diagnose, treat, cure, or prevent any disease. Information presented in our news articles and elsewhere on this website are presented for educational purposes.
In a new study conducted at the Instituto Nacional de Ciencias Médicas y Nutrición in Mexico and published in the Journal of Lipid Research, the researchers set out to investigate whether soy protein may also regulate the transcription factors involved in lipid metabolism, and thus prevent the development of fatty liver.
Although further research is needed on the subject, particularly insofar as it relates to humans since the study was conducted using rats, the researchers believe that their results indicate that consumption of soy protein could reduce insulin resistance, renal damage and fatty liver.
Disclaimer: These statements have not been evaluated by the FDA. Products on this site are not intended to diagnose, treat, cure, or prevent any disease. Information presented in our news articles and elsewhere on this website are presented for educational purposes.
Tuesday, September 06, 2005
He Who Controls The Food Supply, Controls The Earth?
Gravity existed before Newton "discovered" it and the Earth revolved around the sun for hundreds of thousands of years before Galileo.
And plants on our tiny blue planet 3rd from the sun have existed for... well, that would depend on which theory of "existance" you subscribe to... but certainly it's somewhere near the beginning of life on our planet, right?
Then it makes enquiring minds like mine wonder why, in recent years, certain companies have been acting like they invented the process of growing plants.
The investigations I've been doing to uncover who owns what in the food supply chain has all the ingredients of a fiction thriller novel ...filled with conspiracy theories, hype, half-truths, lies, and even bribery.
You don't want to miss this first article in a serious of articles:
Who Controls The Food Supply, Controls The Earth?
Be sure to subscribe to BLV News for more on this subject. You might be as shocked as I was at some of the information I've been uncovering.
And plants on our tiny blue planet 3rd from the sun have existed for... well, that would depend on which theory of "existance" you subscribe to... but certainly it's somewhere near the beginning of life on our planet, right?
Then it makes enquiring minds like mine wonder why, in recent years, certain companies have been acting like they invented the process of growing plants.
The investigations I've been doing to uncover who owns what in the food supply chain has all the ingredients of a fiction thriller novel ...filled with conspiracy theories, hype, half-truths, lies, and even bribery.
You don't want to miss this first article in a serious of articles:
Who Controls The Food Supply, Controls The Earth?
Be sure to subscribe to BLV News for more on this subject. You might be as shocked as I was at some of the information I've been uncovering.
Friday, September 02, 2005
Health Risks Lurking After Katrina Disaster
What outbreaks of communicable disease could occur in the wake of hurricane Katrina? A plethora of health concerns have been raised following the hurricane Katrina disaster, including injuries, outbreaks of disease spread through sewage contamination of drinking water, spoiled food, insects, and bites from snakes and other animals.New Orleans in particular is "a potentially toxic bathtub" as described by one Associated Press article.
If you are wondering about:
- Risks Of Rare and Deadly Exotic Diseases
- Water Health Risks In The Wake Of Katrina
- Food Health Risks Following The Katrina Disaster
- Other Health Risks Attributed To Hurricane Katrina
- What Types Of Communicable Disease Outbreaks Could Occur?
The above issues are covered and more in our latest article: "Health Risks Lurking After Katrina Disaster"
To assist with Katrina Disaster Relief, here is a link to reputable charities in urgent need of support.
International Blogging for Disaster Relief Day
Thursday, September 01, 2005
Second-Hand Smoke and Benefits of Fruits and Soy Fiber
"A new study finds early life exposure to second-hand smoke can produce life-long respiratory problems. The study of 35,000 adult non-smokers in Singapore found that those who lived with a smoker during childhood had more respiratory problems, including chronic cough.
Study participants who reported eating more fruit and soy fiber as adults seemed to be protected against some of the negative health effects often associated with early tobacco exposure."
Visit through this link to read the entire NIEHS press release.
Study participants who reported eating more fruit and soy fiber as adults seemed to be protected against some of the negative health effects often associated with early tobacco exposure."
Visit through this link to read the entire NIEHS press release.
Here's How You Can Help Hurricane Katrina Victims
Some are calling it the worst natural disaster in our country's history... an entire city flooded, coastlines wiped out... loved ones lost, homes lost and more.
For a number of different charities seeking donations and volunteers to help vicitims of Hurricane Katrina, visit here.
Also note, beginning September 1/2005, we are donating $10 for every case of Himalayan Goji Juice purchased through Best Liquid Vitamins website to charities helping in the long road to recovery in the Gulf states.
For a number of different charities seeking donations and volunteers to help vicitims of Hurricane Katrina, visit here.
Also note, beginning September 1/2005, we are donating $10 for every case of Himalayan Goji Juice purchased through Best Liquid Vitamins website to charities helping in the long road to recovery in the Gulf states.
Thursday, August 25, 2005
Secrets of Salmonella Food Poisoning Exposed
Researchers at the UK's Institute of Food Research (IFR) claim to have unlocked the key secrets of success for the salmonella pathogen responsible for a raft of food poisoning outbreaks.
Carried in eggs, poultry, raw milk and chocolate the salmonella bacteria can cause bloody diarrhea, abdominal cramps and in extreme cases kidney failure. Incidents are a major problem in most countries across the globe, leading to hefty costs for the public and private sector.
One hundred million years ago Salmonella evolved from E. coli bacteria that lived freely in the environment. Salmonella developed the ability to parasitise animals by losing many genes and gaining new ones from other bacteria, explains the IFR.
Learn what secrets the IFR have discovered in our current health and wellness news through this link.
Carried in eggs, poultry, raw milk and chocolate the salmonella bacteria can cause bloody diarrhea, abdominal cramps and in extreme cases kidney failure. Incidents are a major problem in most countries across the globe, leading to hefty costs for the public and private sector.
One hundred million years ago Salmonella evolved from E. coli bacteria that lived freely in the environment. Salmonella developed the ability to parasitise animals by losing many genes and gaining new ones from other bacteria, explains the IFR.
Learn what secrets the IFR have discovered in our current health and wellness news through this link.
Wednesday, August 24, 2005
Fun Facts - Science And Foods In Space
At zero gravity (space conditions) the body demineralises, resulting in bone and muscle loss. For astronauts this happens fast, as much as 1 per cent a month, compared to on Earth where bone loss occurs when we grow old. Between 50 and 60 years of age we experience 10 per cent of bone loss.
A few innovative food manufacturers have come up with unique formulations for food products that can stand up to harsh conditions in space, yet still taste at least marginally good. Here are just a few of the latest.
Nissin Food Products announced that its newly developed instant noodle product Space Ram was loaded on the space shuttle Discovery and went into space last month. Space Ram – available in soy sauce, miso, curry and pork bones - was co-developed with the Japan Aerospace Exploration Agency. The soup powder has been made with increased viscosity and can be cooked in water at 70 degrees Celsius.
Danish food firm Arla Food Ingredients, working with US food technologists at the Johnson Space Centre, recently developed a new yoghurt for consumption by NASA's astronauts. When the expedition 11 crew took off to the International Space Station in mid-April, Arla's fruit flavoured yoghurts were on board.
Arla Food Ingredients has also come up with ‘milk bites' for astronauts which are essentially a chewy, bite-size protein bar that gives the space travellers a dose of calcium and protein.
A NASA space food competition held in spring of 2004 resulted in a vegetable spread called Veg@eez, a red, white and green mix of tomatoes, carrots, potatoes, sweet potatoes and radishes, as the winning entry. It was created by U.S. students from Penn State University who won the year's NASA Food Technology Commercial Space Center competition.
Astronauts' tastes in food changes when they are in space. In space the zero gravity means that bodily fluids move up towards the head. It's like having a stuffed nose. People's perception of food changes, and most astronauts tend to go for spicy foods in space.
In July 2001 it was reported that the European Space Agency started building a recycling system that will convert astronauts' waste into food, oxygen and water.
The Micro-Ecological Life Support Alternative (MELISSA) system could enable future astronauts to travel to Mars and back, an epic voyage that would take three years to complete. It could also be a vital feature of space bases on other planets.
The miniature ecosystem will be divided into five interconnected compartments. The first three are being constructed at universities across Europe and are designed to break down waste through a number of fermentation processes.
The fourth, being built at the University of Guelph, will contain plants and algae that grow to produce oxygen, water and food, fed by the decomposed waste. The fifth compartment will contain the astronauts themselves and will be constructed at the project headquarters in Barcelona, Spain.
During the development of the system, rats will be used in place of astronauts to test the system. ESA says that the complete facility will be assembled in Barcelona by 2005.
Recycling is already an important part of space travel. Systems used aboard Mir and the International Space Station allow astronauts to breath air converted from carbon dioxide and drink water purified from waste. The new system performs the more complicated task of recycling food.
The next step in food science? It may be "Micro-M.R.E.'s," meal tablets with enough calories to sustain a soldier in the battlefield for 24 hours. According to Air Force 2025, a study of future military concepts conducted by the Air University at Maxwell Air Force Base, M.R.E.'s are being developed.
Also in the works: transdermal patches that will allow soldiers to feed themselves through their skin. The "transdermal nutrient delivery system" is currently being studied by the Department of Defense Combat Feeding Program.
Sources:
NewScientist - Space toilet key to conquering final frontier
ABC News/Australia - New food for happy little astronauts
FoodQualityNews - Soup rockets to space on new formulation
RetroFuture - Spacefood
A few innovative food manufacturers have come up with unique formulations for food products that can stand up to harsh conditions in space, yet still taste at least marginally good. Here are just a few of the latest.
Nissin Food Products announced that its newly developed instant noodle product Space Ram was loaded on the space shuttle Discovery and went into space last month. Space Ram – available in soy sauce, miso, curry and pork bones - was co-developed with the Japan Aerospace Exploration Agency. The soup powder has been made with increased viscosity and can be cooked in water at 70 degrees Celsius.
Danish food firm Arla Food Ingredients, working with US food technologists at the Johnson Space Centre, recently developed a new yoghurt for consumption by NASA's astronauts. When the expedition 11 crew took off to the International Space Station in mid-April, Arla's fruit flavoured yoghurts were on board.
Arla Food Ingredients has also come up with ‘milk bites' for astronauts which are essentially a chewy, bite-size protein bar that gives the space travellers a dose of calcium and protein.
A NASA space food competition held in spring of 2004 resulted in a vegetable spread called Veg@eez, a red, white and green mix of tomatoes, carrots, potatoes, sweet potatoes and radishes, as the winning entry. It was created by U.S. students from Penn State University who won the year's NASA Food Technology Commercial Space Center competition.
Astronauts' tastes in food changes when they are in space. In space the zero gravity means that bodily fluids move up towards the head. It's like having a stuffed nose. People's perception of food changes, and most astronauts tend to go for spicy foods in space.
In July 2001 it was reported that the European Space Agency started building a recycling system that will convert astronauts' waste into food, oxygen and water.
The Micro-Ecological Life Support Alternative (MELISSA) system could enable future astronauts to travel to Mars and back, an epic voyage that would take three years to complete. It could also be a vital feature of space bases on other planets.
The miniature ecosystem will be divided into five interconnected compartments. The first three are being constructed at universities across Europe and are designed to break down waste through a number of fermentation processes.
The fourth, being built at the University of Guelph, will contain plants and algae that grow to produce oxygen, water and food, fed by the decomposed waste. The fifth compartment will contain the astronauts themselves and will be constructed at the project headquarters in Barcelona, Spain.
During the development of the system, rats will be used in place of astronauts to test the system. ESA says that the complete facility will be assembled in Barcelona by 2005.
Recycling is already an important part of space travel. Systems used aboard Mir and the International Space Station allow astronauts to breath air converted from carbon dioxide and drink water purified from waste. The new system performs the more complicated task of recycling food.
The next step in food science? It may be "Micro-M.R.E.'s," meal tablets with enough calories to sustain a soldier in the battlefield for 24 hours. According to Air Force 2025, a study of future military concepts conducted by the Air University at Maxwell Air Force Base, M.R.E.'s are being developed.
Also in the works: transdermal patches that will allow soldiers to feed themselves through their skin. The "transdermal nutrient delivery system" is currently being studied by the Department of Defense Combat Feeding Program.
Sources:
NewScientist - Space toilet key to conquering final frontier
ABC News/Australia - New food for happy little astronauts
FoodQualityNews - Soup rockets to space on new formulation
RetroFuture - Spacefood
Tuesday, August 23, 2005
A Quick Test - Do You Trust The Food You Buy?
The test is simple: would you rate a product as healthy if you were given all the facts?
For example, it's ridiculous to claim a cereal is healthy if you later discover it is super high in salt and sugar content. Similarly, I don't want to be misled into believing a yoghurt is made with organic ingredients because it is branded as ‘Bio', or discover that a fruit drink contains very little fruit juice.
Remember the article I wrote about how PepsiCo is changing the labeling on two of its fruit-flavored Tropicana beverages to reflect the fact that they actually contain little or no fruit juice?
Well, what you might not be aware of is the fact that in July of this year the FDA urged the soft drink industry to review the ingredient statements on their soft drink labels following the withdrawal of a proposed “and/or” ruling on sweeteners. Beverage makers now have to ensure that the sweetening ingredients used in products are listed accurately. Up to that point, there had been continuous demand from the soft drinks industry for “and/or” sweetener labeling for over two decades.
Why not just be honest and label their products with what is REALLY inside?
Go back to an article I wrote in April of this year regarding the new reduced sugar cereals, most of which carry BIG BOLD LABELS about LESS SUGAR blazing across the box, as though to imply they are now so much healthier for you. The Associated Press asked nutrition experts at five universities to review the new reduced-sugar cereals to see how they stacked up with the regular versions. The nutrition scientists found that while the new cereals do have less sugar, the calories, carbohydrates, fat, fiber and other nutrients are almost identical to the full-sugar cereals.
In other news, food makers in the USA are scrambling to meet the January 1 2006 deadline for the new trans fats labeling requirements, and the debate over Country of Origin (COOL) labeling - whether it should be voluntary or mandatory - rumbles on.
Meanwhile, Nestle UK has found a way to refer to the calcium content in its cheesecake without it being considered a health claim, according to Dominique Patton, reporting for FoodQualityNews. The company used a cartoon of a woman to advertise its Little Notions Cheesecake, superimposing on her hair the following text: "Lemon Cheesecake's made with cheese. Cheese is full of calcium. Calcium makes bones strong. If I don't eat cheesecake I'll fall over." Now that's a pretty sad use of subliminal advertising, in my humble opinion.
If a tasty food can't really be healthy, and a healthy food is not tasty, manufacturers would do better to concentrate on being real about which category it honestly falls into rather than disappoint us on both.
I sincerely believe companies that take the high road, with fair labeling, will do better than those who create a wake of suspicion by deliberately writing around products' vices.
Whether its aspartame, soya, GM foods or high fructose corn syrup, in today's information-driven world, pressure groups quickly move to raise public awareness of missing, or conflicting, scientific evidence. Wouldn't it be nice if manufacturers took a more proactive role in replacing foods where the doubts cannot be laid to rest?
Even more important, ingredients should be of the highest possible quality.
Let's face it... health risks are as worrying to producers as consumers, and only where ingredients are the finest available, will food manufacturers be deserving of our trust.
Sure, our Himalayan Goji Juice is more expensive than some of the kool-aid-type knock-offs appearing lately (ever since this remarkable berry started popping up in the media) --- and for good reason. We ONLY USE goji berries that are GUARANTEED SCREENED using our proprietary spectral signature process to be the most potent containing ALL the health benefits in perfect balance with the most important 4 master molecules not found in any other food on our planet.
The truth is, we reject more goji berries than we accept in order to produce a premium product that will deliver consistent results that compound over time the longer you drink it.
There is no other goji juice on the market --- and there never will be one --- that can deliver the powers of the original bloodline for lycium barbarum quoted in ancient Asian medical texts. Our spectral signature seal is our guarantee that you are getting the highest quality with the best of the best goji berries in every single bottle.
In a perfect world, other manufacturers would bend over backwards to ensure their products also meet such exacting standards in production, formulation and delivery.
Sidenote: And if you knew what we know about drinking Himalayan Goji Juice everyday, you would be crazy not to add it to your daily diet.
For example, it's ridiculous to claim a cereal is healthy if you later discover it is super high in salt and sugar content. Similarly, I don't want to be misled into believing a yoghurt is made with organic ingredients because it is branded as ‘Bio', or discover that a fruit drink contains very little fruit juice.
Remember the article I wrote about how PepsiCo is changing the labeling on two of its fruit-flavored Tropicana beverages to reflect the fact that they actually contain little or no fruit juice?
Well, what you might not be aware of is the fact that in July of this year the FDA urged the soft drink industry to review the ingredient statements on their soft drink labels following the withdrawal of a proposed “and/or” ruling on sweeteners. Beverage makers now have to ensure that the sweetening ingredients used in products are listed accurately. Up to that point, there had been continuous demand from the soft drinks industry for “and/or” sweetener labeling for over two decades.
Why not just be honest and label their products with what is REALLY inside?
Go back to an article I wrote in April of this year regarding the new reduced sugar cereals, most of which carry BIG BOLD LABELS about LESS SUGAR blazing across the box, as though to imply they are now so much healthier for you. The Associated Press asked nutrition experts at five universities to review the new reduced-sugar cereals to see how they stacked up with the regular versions. The nutrition scientists found that while the new cereals do have less sugar, the calories, carbohydrates, fat, fiber and other nutrients are almost identical to the full-sugar cereals.
In other news, food makers in the USA are scrambling to meet the January 1 2006 deadline for the new trans fats labeling requirements, and the debate over Country of Origin (COOL) labeling - whether it should be voluntary or mandatory - rumbles on.
Meanwhile, Nestle UK has found a way to refer to the calcium content in its cheesecake without it being considered a health claim, according to Dominique Patton, reporting for FoodQualityNews. The company used a cartoon of a woman to advertise its Little Notions Cheesecake, superimposing on her hair the following text: "Lemon Cheesecake's made with cheese. Cheese is full of calcium. Calcium makes bones strong. If I don't eat cheesecake I'll fall over." Now that's a pretty sad use of subliminal advertising, in my humble opinion.
If a tasty food can't really be healthy, and a healthy food is not tasty, manufacturers would do better to concentrate on being real about which category it honestly falls into rather than disappoint us on both.
I sincerely believe companies that take the high road, with fair labeling, will do better than those who create a wake of suspicion by deliberately writing around products' vices.
Whether its aspartame, soya, GM foods or high fructose corn syrup, in today's information-driven world, pressure groups quickly move to raise public awareness of missing, or conflicting, scientific evidence. Wouldn't it be nice if manufacturers took a more proactive role in replacing foods where the doubts cannot be laid to rest?
Even more important, ingredients should be of the highest possible quality.
Let's face it... health risks are as worrying to producers as consumers, and only where ingredients are the finest available, will food manufacturers be deserving of our trust.
Sure, our Himalayan Goji Juice is more expensive than some of the kool-aid-type knock-offs appearing lately (ever since this remarkable berry started popping up in the media) --- and for good reason. We ONLY USE goji berries that are GUARANTEED SCREENED using our proprietary spectral signature process to be the most potent containing ALL the health benefits in perfect balance with the most important 4 master molecules not found in any other food on our planet.The truth is, we reject more goji berries than we accept in order to produce a premium product that will deliver consistent results that compound over time the longer you drink it.
There is no other goji juice on the market --- and there never will be one --- that can deliver the powers of the original bloodline for lycium barbarum quoted in ancient Asian medical texts. Our spectral signature seal is our guarantee that you are getting the highest quality with the best of the best goji berries in every single bottle.
In a perfect world, other manufacturers would bend over backwards to ensure their products also meet such exacting standards in production, formulation and delivery.
Sidenote: And if you knew what we know about drinking Himalayan Goji Juice everyday, you would be crazy not to add it to your daily diet.
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