McCain Bill Threatens Access to Dietary Supplements

Beware of Senator John McCain's freedom-destroying dietary supplement regulatory bill. McCain described his bill as a “no-brainer.” For libertarians, it’s a “no-brainer” that it should be rejected for the dictatorial, power-grabbing, choice-limiting attack on the nutritional marketplace and individual freedoms that it is.

Senator John McCain (R-Arizona) has introduced a new bill called The Dietary Supplement Safety Act (DSSA) of 2010 (S. 3002), that, if enacted, would severely curtail free access to dietary supplements. Cosponsored by Senator Byron Dorgan (D-North Dakota), the bill would essentially give the FDA full control over the supplement industry.

Most of the industrialized world has incredibly restrictive laws governing supplements. People worldwide often purchase supplements from the U.S. because they are freely available at low costs.

All of this could change, however, if DSSA passes. DSSA would change key sections of the Federal Food, Drug, and Cosmetic Act (FD&C), undoing protections in the Dietary Supplement Health and Education Act (DSHEA) of 1994, effectively eliminating free access to supplements. Read more

Vitamin D: Miracle Nutrient for Your Immune System

Crohn’s disease is a chronic condition that causes inflammation of your gastrointestinal (GI) tract. The cause of Crohn’s is thought to be impairment in the way your immune system handles intestinal bacteria. Vitamin D is the miracle nutrient for your immune system.

A new study has found that Vitamin D can counter the effects of Crohn's disease.

Researchers found that Vitamin D acts directly on the beta defensin 2 gene, which encodes an antimicrobial peptide, and the NOD2 gene that alerts cells to the presence of invading microbes.

Both beta defensin and NOD2 have been linked to Crohn's disease. If NOD2 is deficient or defective, it cannot combat invaders in the intestinal tract. Read more

20 Anti-Aging Herbs and Spices to Add to Your Diet Now

Aging is inevitable; however, there are many herbs and spices that can support overall health and may leave you feeling younger than your years, according to Dr. Eric Braverman.

Among other things, the holidays are a time of national dysnutrition: the disease of excess. Dysnutrition happens even in the most developed countries when food is plentiful but the overall diet is based on eating all the wrong balance of foods. Sound familiar? The typical American diet that is high in simple carbohydrates -- white flour, white salt, and processed food -- is aging us. We are getting all the bulk without the nutrients, plus adding to our propensity for developing real food cravings. So whether you are a vegetarian or an omnivore, you can start to reverse aging by simply choosing to eat the right foods to keep you full of vim, vigor, and vitality, especially over the holidays.

The easiest way to make sure you are getting more nutrients into every meal, even when you are grazing at the office cocktail party or the neighborhood potluck dinner is by choosing foods that are loaded with spices. Every time you flavor your meals with herbs or spices you are literally "upgrading" your food without adding a single calorie. You are taking something ordinary and turning it into something extraordinary by adding color, flavor, vitamins, and often medicinal properties. Here's why: Read more

Iodine for Health

Iodine is not commonly taken as a dietary supplement, but people who do take iodine supplements report that they have a greater sense of well-being, increased energy, and a lifting of brain fog. They feel warmer in cold environments, need somewhat less sleep, improved skin complexion, and have more regular bowel movements.

There is growing evidence that Americans would have better health and a lower incidence of cancer and fibrocystic disease of the breast if they consumed more iodine. A decrease in iodine intake coupled with an increased consumption of competing halogens, fluoride and bromide, has created an epidemic of iodine deficiency in America.

People in the U.S. consume an average 240 micrograms (µg) of iodine a day. In contrast, people in Japan consume more than 12 milligrams (mg) of iodine a day (12,000 µg), a 50-fold greater amount. They eat seaweed, which include brown algae (kelp), red algae (nori sheets, with sushi), and green algae (chlorella). Read more

Vitamin D: How to Determine Your Optimal Dose

Vitamin D has recently been recognized as being necessary for humans to maintain optimal health and wellness to the point at which some consider vitamin D to be a “miracle substance” that prevents a number of diseases, including various cancers, coronary heart disease, diabetes and multiple sclerosis, as well as several autoimmune and neurological diseases. The recommended daily allowances are useless, so how do you determine your optimal dose?

In the wide world of supplements, vitamin D is the superstar. For the last few years, this humble nutrient has been featured prominently in allopathic and alternative circles alike. It has basked in the rays of media publicity, and has survived an onslaught of scientific scrutiny. And while such widespread publicity is often good cause for skepticism in the realm of health and medicine, vitamin D appears to be the real deal. Whether we`re talking about heart disease, cancer, diabetes, multiple sclerosis, or Alzheimer`s disease, the "sunshine vitamin" delivers benefits unseen before our time (1).

Given the remarkably powerful benefits of vitamin D, many find themselves wondering how to actually go about obtaining it. We know that vitamin D is good for us, but how much do we need, and where do we get it? Most people know that sunlight is somehow involved in vitamin D production, but is sunlight alone sufficient to produce the incredible results demonstrated by recent vitamin D research? What about supplements? There are so many different preparations - with doses ranging from 400 IU to 50,000 IU - that it can get a little confusing. Are such supplements necessary, and if so, how much should we be taking? Read more

When NOT to Take Vitamins

If you exercise strenuously and then go home and take some vitamins, those supplements may undo some of the benefits of your workout.

Taking vitamins after exercise may undo some of the beneficial effects of the workout, research suggests.

Some advocate taking antioxidants like vitamin C and E to help protect the body from harmful chemical by-products it creates in breaking into a sweat.

But German scientists now believe these "free radicals" may actually be good for us and even buffer against diabetes, PNAS reports.

And mopping them up with antioxidants may do more harm than good. Read more

Men Who Take Vitamin C Less Likely to Develop Gout

Men who take vitamin C supplements are less likely to develop gout, according to new research.

... Researchers at the University of British Columbia, in Vancouver, Canada, found that men with higher intakes of vitamin C were less likely to develop the condition than men with lower levels. Read more

The Inquisition over Vitamin Pills Begins

A National Institutes of Health (NIH) survey shows that 60% of Americans take dietary supplements or use alternative therapies. The NIH, in league with the drug companies, doesn’t like Americans spending $40 billion a year on alternative care. So the NIH is issuing "Time To Talk" kits to doctors, encouraging patients to "confess" to taking dietary supplements.

Oh, it was a bad week for modern medicine. But Tara Parker Pope of the New York Times didn’t think so. She wrote an article entitled "News Keeps Getting Worse For Vitamins." (Nov. 20, ‘08 NYT) But then again, we could slip a fast one by Tara any day since she doesn’t know how to read the pseudo-science now being used to denigrate dietary supplements. Hey, Tara, you didn’t say whether YOU take vitamins pills. Never mind surveys show the most educated are more likely to take vitamin pills, or other studies which show the typical American diet leaves most Americans deficient in vitamins C, D, E, B12 and folic acid.

Breast cancer cooking machines

The zinger was the report showing breast cancers just disappear if you leave them alone, stop clamping breasts in mammogram machines, stop zapping women’s breasts with radiation machinery (mammography) and stop lancing breasts with biopsy needles. (Archives Internal Medicine Nov. 24, ’08). Yep, the body’s immune system just engulfs these developing tumors. Read more

Get Your Antioxidants from the Grocer

For your consideration: according to a study published in the Journal of the American Medical Association some supplements are worthless at fighting disease. Of course, other recent studies indicate that vitamins C and D in particular have great benefits.

I've noticed that studies which show that dietary supplements are worthless or dangerous tend to come out right before a big push to restrict the public's access to them. Doctors and pharmaceutical companies don't much like the idea of self-care and health freedom. In their view, that's lost profit they could be pocketing. Nevertheless, the point that you should eat a healthful diet and not strictly rely on supplements for your nutrition is valid.

How to Protect and Heal Your Liver

The liver can do 500 functions. This is one powerful organ, the one organ in the body that is capable of regenerating itself. The liver controls your health and longevity and your ability to bounce back from infection. Alan Graham and Alfred Lehmberg discuss the foods to eat, the foods to avoid, and the supplements to take to protect and heal your liver.

... Milk-Thistle, while we're here, is nothing less than extraordinary, considering it can detox your liver while it stimulates the production of new liver cells (for all you ex-drinkers, like me) and about a dozen other things to include being a powerful, immune-enhancing Cancer-fighter.

Silymarin, the group of active ingredients in Milk-Thistle, has been used by Medical Doctors in Germany for almost 60 years to treat all forms of liver disease like hepatitis & cirrhosis. Those Teutons drink a lot of beer & wine. Gee, Zorba lectures all over the world to other MD's... don't they share info? Does Zorba hear a different drummer? Uh, like Merck, you think?

FOODS to eat and foods to avoid: Read more

What to Do If You Have Used Aspartame

Aspartame is a dangerous chemical food additive. After more than twenty years of aspartame use, the number of its victims is rapidly piling up, and people are figuring out for themselves that aspartame is at the root of their health problems. Once you have taken the important first step of not using aspartame, how do you take the next step of detoxification?

The most important starting point of any detoxification program is to stop exposure to the toxin or toxins. This means avoiding even small amounts, since once sensitized to the toxin even minute amounts can produce full-blown toxicity. This is especially so with accumulative toxins, such as aspartame. It has been shown conclusively that the metabolic products of methanol breakdown, formaldehyde in particular, accumulates on the DNA and cellular proteins.

Once you have cleansed your diet of the toxin, removal of the toxin and its metabolic products from your system will begin. Central to this process is the body's detoxification system, which exist in all cells of the body, with the bulk of detoxification taking place in the liver. The detoxification system is divided into two components called phase I and phase II, which work in tandem. Toxins pass through phase I and then pass to phase II where they are further detoxified and made water-soluble for eventual disposal. It is now known that you can significantly enhance the body's ability to detoxify these substances through the judicious use of specific supplements. Of the two systems phase II is most important and most often impaired.

The following is a list of nutrients that enhance detoxification: Read more