Disease Proof : Disease Proof : Health & Nutrition News & Commentary : Dr. Joel Fuhrman

This is fitting. Amidst the Maple Leaf deli meat killing spree The Cancer Project has released a TV commercial attacking hotdogs as a cancer-risk. See for yourself:

 

Finally, a gutsy ad! Hotdogs are not your friend. In fact, Dr. Fuhrman considers processed meats one of the WORST meat options—along with red meat. Dr. Neal Barnard, president of the PCRM and head of The Cancer Project, defends the commercial. Via CBS News:

Check the label of a name-brand hot dog, and chances are fat provides around 80 percent of total calories, more than double what's often advised. What's more, saturated fat and trans fat - the fats most strongly linked with artery-clogging - are common ingredients, in some cases providing at least half the fat content.

The hot dog council called the new ad an alarmist scare tactic, but the promoters, a group called The Cancer Project, defend their campaign.

Dr. Neal Barnard, president of the Physicians Committee for Responsible Medicine, called the ad "a way to raise appropriate concern about a deadly concern." Barnard also heads The Cancer Project, an offshoot of his anti-meat advocacy group.

Hot dogs may be considered as American as apple pie, but Barnard said it's time to change that tradition.

"Children are born with no traditions whatsoever," he said. "You or I might think a hot dog, that just goes with baseball ... We can always change our traditions to be healthful."

The new ad is based on an analysis of five studies in adults by scientists working with cancer research groups not affiliated with Barnard's.

Their report last November said eating 50 grams a day of processed meats for several years increases colorectal cancer risk by 21 percent. That equals about one hot dog a day or two deli slices of bologna or five slices of bacon.

There’s a hotdog council! I’d love to see their cholesterol numbers. Now, despite the wiener consortiums self-preservation exclamations, processed meats DON’T support health and DO increase cancer-risk, but don’t take my word for it. Remember this post: News from The Cancer Project.
 

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This is amazing. California’s large-scale efforts to curb smoking have saved the state $86 BILLION in healthcare costs. And the kicker is, they only invested $1.8 billion in the program. Here's more, via Reuters:

The benefits of the program accrued very quickly and are very large," Stanton Glantz, director of the University of California San Francisco Center for Tobacco Control Research and Education, said in a statement.

Unlike many programs which center on teens, the California program focuses its tobacco-control efforts on adults through an aggressive media campaign and changes in public policy, such as promoting smoke-free environments.

"When adults stop smoking, you see immediate benefits in heart disease, with impacts on cancer and lung diseases starting to appear a year or two later," said Glantz, whose findings appear in the Public Library of Science journal PLoS Medicine.

According to the study, the program prevented the sale of 3.6 billion packs of cigarettes -- worth $9.2 billion to the tobacco industry -- between 1989 and 2004.

The report may help persuade states to step up funding for such large-scale efforts to counteract the tobacco industry's $13 billion annual spending on smoking-related advertising and promotions.

Pretty cool! Actually, anti-smoking efforts and bans are showing promise. New search in the American Journal of Public Health has determined that banning smoking in the home helps kids develop negative attitudes towards smoking and deters them from experimenting—from Reuters.

Oh, and no incense either! They just found that incense-burning is linked to lung cancers. Moral of the story, smoke plus lungs equals bad.

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The Society of Chemical Industry (SCI) has concluded that organic fruits and vegetables do NOT contain more nutrients cheaper non-organic produce. Wow, no conflict of interest there! The study appears in SCI’s Journal of the Science of Food and Agriculture.

Here’s report, No Evidence to Support Organic is Best, via SCI’s press office:

The first cultivation method consisted of growing the vegetables on soil which had a low input of nutrients using animal manure and no pesticides except for one organically approved product on kale only.

The second method involved applying a low input of nutrients using animal manure, combined with use of pesticides, as much as allowed by regulation.

Finally, the third method comprised a combination of a high input of nutrients through mineral fertilizers and pesticides as legally allowed.

The crops were grown on the same or similar soil on adjacent fields at the same time and so experienced the same weather conditions. All were harvested and treated at the same time. In the case of the organically grown vegetables, all were grown on established organic soil.

After harvest, results showed that there were no differences in the levels of major and trace contents in the fruit and vegetables grown using the three different methods.

Produce from the organically and conventionally grown crops were then fed to animals over a two year period and intake and excretion of various minerals and trace elements were measured. Once again, the results showed there was no difference in retention of the elements regardless of how the crops were grown.

This is awkward. Clearly, the CHEMICAL SOCIETY has some vested interests here—fogging the credibility of this work. Especially since previous studies have shown the opposite, that organic fruits and vegetables DO contain more nutrients.

Now, Dr. Fuhrman prefers organic—reduces pesticide exposure and tastes better—but other experts cite climate change as a GREAT reason to go organic. Here’s what the Soil Association had to say. Jessica Daly of CNN reports:

In 2006 the UK's Manchester Business School assessed the environmental impacts of food production and consumption and concluded that there isn't a clear cut answer to whether the environmental impact is greater on a trolley full of organic food compared to a trolley full of non-organic food.

Not so, was the response from the Soil Association. Do you believe organic food is more nutritional?

It countered that: "Overall, organic farming is better for tackling climate change than industrial agricultural methods. As well as lower average energy use, organic farming also avoids the very large nitrous oxide emissions from fertilizer manufacture."

"Additionally, organic farming builds up soil carbon, removing it from the atmosphere. Organic farming also supports more local food marketing, reducing food miles."

While the jury might still be out about whether organic farming is, on the whole, better for the environment, there is little doubt that it's a booming industry which is starting to catch on in other parts of the world.

Take this research by The Society of Chemical Industry with a grain of salt, I’d put more stock in it if were conducted by a third party—although nowadays that’s getting harder and harder to find.

Even still, local organic farming is catching on, like these folks from Los Angeles and some Londoners too! Personally, I do my best to stay organic. I belong to a CSA, grow my own tomatoes and buy organic bananas. So, how organic are you?

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What the heck is Patrick Swayze doing? The dude is labeled a “cancer miracle” and he’s STILL smoking! Talk about looking a gift horse in the mouth, surely he knows pancreatic cancer almost always kills.

NFL Players Association Executive Director and Hall of Fame Oakland Raider Gene Upshaw just lost his battle with pancreatic cancer, I bet he’d have some choice words for Swayze and his smoking—GEEZ!

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New research by Johns Hopkins University has determined that repeated exposure to small amounts of Arsenic found in drinking water is strongly associated with the development of type-2 diabetes. Andrew Stern of Reuters explains:

Dr. Ana Navas-Acien and colleagues at Johns Hopkins University in Baltimore found a "relatively strong" association between commonly found levels of arsenic in urine and type 2 diabetes in a study of American adults.

"It seems there is may be no safe level of arsenic," Navas-Acien said in a telephone interview.

"Worldwide it's a huge problem," she said. "As water becomes a scarce resource, we need additional sources."

Arsenic raises the risk for cancers of the bladder, lung, kidney, skin and, possibly, the prostate, Navas-Acien said.

The 20 percent of nearly 800 study participants who had the most arsenic in their bodies, a tolerable 16.5 micrograms per liter of urine, had 3.6 times the risk of developing late-onset diabetes than those in the bottom 20 percent, who had 3 micrograms per liter.

Levels of arsenic were 26 percent higher in people with late-onset, or type 2, diabetes than those without the disease, the study found.

The research appears in the Journal of the American Medical Association. Now, this isn’t the only study linking toxins to diabetes. Pesticides and PCBs have also been associated with diabetes-risk.

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I’m not the only urbanite growing his own organic produce. More and more people are making good use of the free space around their homes, like these L.A. residents who transformed a seedy cinder-block wall into a cascade of strawberries, tomatoes, herbs, and vegetables. Cara Mia DiMassa of The Los Angeles Times reports:

The first time they tried planting vegetables, in a couple of wooden bins on the rooftop of their building, their novice status meant that plants weren't watered and cared for properly.

"Everything died," said Chris Owens, the group's de facto leader.

The second time, things went better. Members of the group paid special attention to the sprouts they planted, watering and pruning with care. And under their vigilant tending, corn stalks pushed upward. Watermelons appeared on vines.

Many residents were surprised by the way gardening united them, in an area where it sometimes seems best to mind your own business and keep to yourself.

"It brings us together as a group, kind of like therapy, to see something growing and flourishing," Jannie Burrows said.

"We're trying to feed our bodies with better nutrients," Lance Shaw said. "But more than anything, we like getting together."

The modest initial success led the Rainbow group to the nonprofit Urban Farming, which helped the group install the green wall last week as part of its Food Chain project. Urban Farming also erected "edible" walls at the Los Angeles Regional Foodbank, the Miguel Contreras Learning Center and the Weingart Center.

The Food Chain project, said Urban Farming founder Taja Sevelle, enables residents in some of the city's poorest areas to grow food in underused spaces at a time when food prices are soaring. The walls, she said, "get people to think outside the box. You can plant food in so many different places."

And Londoners are becoming expert backyard farmers too—via National Geographic News. Now, in case you can’t grow your own fruits and veggies. Christine McKinney of Eight Right, Stay Well shares a great shopping tip, Produce: The Dirtiest and the Cleanest. Actually, Christine’s list is very similar to Dr. Fuhrman’s chart of the least and most contaminated produce.

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Energy drinks. Catchy names, exaggerated claims. They’re bad news, especially for kids, not to mention teenagers, and now an Australian study claims Red Bull increases stroke-risk—as little as one can! Reuters reports:

One hour after they drank Red Bull, (their blood systems) were no longer normal. They were abnormal like we would expect in a patient with cardiovascular disease," Scott Willoughby, lead researcher from the Cardiovascular Research Centre at the Royal Adelaide Hospital, told the Australian newspaper.

Red Bull Australia spokeswoman Linda Rychter said the report would be assessed by the company's head office in Austria.

"The study does not show effects which would go beyond that of drinking a cup of coffee. Therefore, the reported results were to be expected and lie within the normal physiological range," Rychter told Reuters.

Willoughby and his team tested the cardiovascular systems of 30 young adults one hour before and one hour after consuming one 250ml can of sugar-free Red Bull.

The results showed "normal people develop symptoms normally associated with cardiovascular disease" after consuming the drink, created in the 1980s by Austrian entrepreneur Dietrich Mateschitz based on a similar Thai energy drink.

Red Bull is banned in Norway, Uruguay and Denmark because of health risks listed on its cans, but the company last year sold 3.5 billion cans in 143 countries. One can contains 80 mg of caffeine, around the same as a normal cup of brewed coffee.

The only way I’d drink Red Bull is if it ACTUALLY gave you wings. Now, the bad news isn’t over yet. That’sFit passes along some research in General Dentistry, suggesting energy drinks damage teeth and gums. So, you want energy? Eat some fruit!

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Last month the Environmental Health Sciences and the National Cancer Institute linked pesticides with diabetes-risk and now a study in Diabetes Care has determined high exposure to PCBs may be tied to diabetes too. Reuters explains:

Dr. Yueliang Leon Guo, from the National Taiwan University in Taipei, and colleagues examined the incidence of type 2 diabetes among 378 Taiwanese "oil disease" victims and 370 of their neighbors who had not been poisoned.

They found that women who had been exposed to the PCB-laced oil were twice as likely as other women to develop type 2 diabetes over 24 years. And women who had been most severely affected by the PCB exposure had a more than five-times higher diabetes risk.

There were no similar risks seen in men, however.

Other studies have found that people with diabetes tend to have relatively higher levels of organic pollutants, such as PCBs, in their blood. In comments to Reuters Health, Guo said that since "everyone" has detectable PCB levels in his or her body, it's possible that exposure to such pollutants has helped feed the widespread rise in diabetes in recent decades.

"The public health implication of these findings can be huge," Guo added, "considering the burden of diabetes and its multiple long-term complications."

And another study in Diabetes Care demonstrates that the incidence of heart disease increases right along with diabetes and obesity—via Reuters. Try avoiding it all together! Dr. Fuhrman’s prescription, try healthy dosages of fresh fruits, vegetables, nuts, seeds, and legumes.
 

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I don’t have kids—I imagine someday I’ll trick a woman into it—but if I did have a couple little ones. I’d want to keep them fit and healthy. Jacki Donaldson of That’sFit passes along four good suggestions:

1. Eat right. If you eat right, your kids are likely to follow suit. That means five servings of fruits and veggies each day, whole grains instead of refined products, and a limited number of red meats and processed foods.
2. Move. Inspire your kids to get 60 minutes of vigorous exercise most days of the week by engaging in your own fitness pursuits. Discuss the value of being active with your kids too.
3. Avoid smoking. Don't smoke, don't hang out around smoke, and chat with your youngsters about the dangers of smoking.
4. Practice skin smarts. Protect your own skin from the sun, and slather your kids too. And teach them this American Cancer Society jingle: Slip! Slop! Slap! Wrap! Slip on a shirt, slop on sunscreen, slap on a hat, and wrap sunglasses around your eyes.

Not bad. Actually Dr. Fuhrman has his own tips for raising healthy kids, check out: The Secrets to Getting Your Children to Eat Healthfully.

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Research by the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention has determined that bad reactions to antibiotics result in 140,000 trips to the emergency room each year. Maggie Fox of Reuters reports:

The findings offer another reason for doctors to limit their use of the drugs, which are overused in the United States, the team at the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention said.

"This number is an important reminder for physicians and patients that antibiotics can have serious side effects and should only be taken when necessary," said the CDC's Dr. Daniel Budnitz, who led the study.

For the first report ever done on adverse reactions to antibiotics in the United States, the researchers used the National Electronic Injury Surveillance System-Cooperative Adverse Drug Event Surveillance project, a sample of 63 U.S. hospitals, between 2004 and 2006.

They found more than 6,600 emergency visits were due to an adverse reaction to an antibiotic. They used formulas to extrapolate this to the whole country and estimated that 142,000 such emergency visits are made every year.

"Systemic antibiotics (pills or injections as opposed to creams) were implicated in 19.3 percent of all emergency department visits for drug-related adverse events," they wrote in the September 15 issue of Clinical Infectious Diseases.

It hasn’t been a good stretch of weeks for antibiotics. Take this post for example: Doctors Should Go Easy on Antibiotics...

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• British kids’ report cards are about to include another grade, they’re weight. Laurie Goering of The Chicago Tribune reports:

With 23 percent of British children now considered overweight or obese, parents have increasing difficulty judging whether their own child is too heavy and most consider their overweight children normal, Ivan Lewis, the British health minister, warned. The letters home are designed as an early wake-up call, aimed at helping kids avoid later health problems, including diabetes and heart disease.

Starting next month, about 1.2 million British kindergartners and children in their last year of primary school will be weighed and notes about their weight mailed home, school and health officials said.

To avoid stigma, all parents—not just those of the overweight—will get an assessment of their child. And to avoid offense, the letters will avoid the use of "obese" or "fat," substituting instead "overweight" or "very overweight."

• According to Reuters, a Nebraska firm has recalled 1.2 millions of pounds of beef that may be contaminated with E. coli. Look:

The recall is of beef prepared for shipment to retailers but not yet cut up in supermarket sized portions.

The recall is "Class 1," meaning there is a "reasonable probability" that eating the beef "will cause serious, adverse health consequences or death," the USDA said. It is the most dangerous level of the three classes of recall.

USDA's Food Safety and Inspection Service said the beef was sent to processing establishments and retail stores across the United States and had been produced June 17, June 24 and July 8.

The recall is of primal and subprimal cuts that are larger sections of cows, such as chuck and rib, that can be cut down for individual or family-sized packaging. It also is of "boxed beef" or carcasses that have been partially disassembled for shipping.

• California is considering legislation that would only allow “trace amounts” of the toxic of chemical BPA in plastic baby products. Via the Associated Press:

There is little dispute that bisphenol A can disrupt the hormonal system, but scientists differ on whether the very low amounts found in food and beverage containers can be harmful.

The National Toxicology Program, a partnership of federal health agencies, said in a recent draft report that there is "some concern" that the chemical can cause changes in behavior and the brain, and that it may reduce survival and birth weight in fetuses. The conclusion was based on animal studies.

However, the Food and Drug Administration's associate commissioner for science, Dr. Norris Alderson, told Congress in June that there was no reason for consumers to stop using products that contain the chemical.

Despite the uncertainty, consumer concern has prompted some governments and retailers to act.

• Tara Parker-Pope of Well talks about new research claiming most mothers breastfeed for a little while, but then give up on it. Here’s a bit:

A report from Brigham Young University shows only 36 percent of babies are breast-fed through six months. The American Academy of Pediatrics recommends breast-feeding through the first year.

The data are based on a weighted sample of more than 60,000 children, collected from national immunization surveys compiled by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. Although the data are focused on childhood immunization rates, questions also were asked about breast-feeding, giving the researchers a representative sample of nursing patterns in the United States.

The researchers found that children who were most likely to be breast-fed for more than six months typically had mothers with higher levels of education and income. Married women and those who lived in Western states were also more likely to breast-feed. Hispanic women and women born in other countries were also more likely to breast-feed.

Returning to work, being a smoker or living in the Northeast decreased the likelihood of long-term breast-feeding. Notably, low-income women who participated in the subsidized Women, Infants and Children program, which provides food, milk and formula to mothers and young children, were also more likely to stop breast-feeding sooner.

• Well, I doubt you’ll catch me doing it, but apparently pole dancing is a great workout. Judy Fortin of CNN explains:

Wright is not an exotic dancer in a strip club. She's a 38-year-old mother of two from Atlanta, Georgia, looking to get in a decent workout.

"It works the abs, oh my goodness, muscles I didn't even know I had," Wright chuckled.

On this night, Wright is among more than a dozen women of all shapes and sizes -- no men allowed -- attending a beginner class at PoleLaTeaz, an Atlanta dance studio owned by Angela Edwards.

"We get preachers' wives, teachers, nurses, accountants, lawyers, anyone between the age of 18 and 70," Edwards said. "It's not boring...you get to wear fun clothes, listen to good music...and release your inner sexpot."

If online listings across the country are an indication, the popularity of pole dancing is spreading across the country from Southern California to Chicago to the Bible Belt.

• Gina Kolata of The New York Times investigates how necessary it is to stretch before exercising. Check it out:

Researchers say those strong feelings pro and con show in themselves that it will take a large study to see what, if anything, stretching really accomplishes. If stretching were remarkably effective, athletes would notice its effects right away and everyone would agree on when to stretch and what stretching does.

The study in Norway was the inspiration of Dr. Andy Oxman, a senior scientist at the Norwegian Knowledge Center for the Health Services. He had just completed what he calls a public clinical trial. It was a sort of reality show on public television that asked whether the nutritional supplement Valerian helped with insomnia; 405 people signed up to receive Valerian or a placebo and reported on their sleep by logging onto a Web site. Some participants insisted that because they slept so well they were taking Valerian. Or they said they knew they had taken the placebo because their sleep didn’t improve.

Then, the results were announced on the TV show and published: Valerian had little or no effect on sleep. Some who maintained they had the supplement actually had the placebo and vice versa.

• Steven Reinberg of HealthDay News takes a look at research suggesting low vitamin D boosts death-risk. Take a look:

Yet many people are not getting enough vitamin D, which the skin makes naturally when exposed to sunlight. A nationwide survey found that 41 percent of men and 53 percent of women in the United States were not getting enough of this vital nutrient.

"The importance of vitamin D may be underappreciated," said lead author Dr. Michal Melamed, a clinical fellow at Johns Hopkins University. "There are studies that link low vitamin D levels to the development of heart disease, peripheral arterial disease, diabetes, hypertension and different cancers," she said.

The report was published in the Aug. 11 online edition of the Archives of Internal Medicine.

For the study, Melamed's team collected data on more than 13,000 men and women who took part in the Third National Health and Nutrition Examination Survey. Levels of vitamin D were collected in 1988 and 1994, and the participants were followed through 2000.

• The Checkout blogs about how Whole Foods is linked to the recent E. coli-beef recall. Here’s an excerpt:

Nebraska Beef, an Omaha meat packer, has been linked to two separate outbreaks of E. coli O157:H7 in the past two months. The first triggered a ground beef recall by Kroger's supermarkets. The second outbreak kicked off a ground beef recall by Dorothy Lane Market, a small chain in Ohio. The U.S. Department of Agriculture and the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention consider these two separate outbreaks because they involve two genetically distinct strains of O157:H7.

Whole Foods initiated the recall after Massachusetts health officials investigating a cluster of E. coli illnesses discovered all seven victims had bought meat at Whole Foods. The chain pulled ground beef from some of its stores on Wednesday. The Nebraska Beef recall was announced late Friday night.

My colleague Ylan Mui and I have gotten some comments from people who noted that the natural food chain is telling folks no contaminated Whole Foods meat has been found yet and we reported that in our story on Sunday. But before anyone is lulled into some false sense of security, there is other microbiological evidence linking Whole Foods to the outbreak.

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Reuters reports that Britain will allow the sale of over-the-counter oral antibiotics. Anyone older than 16 will be able to buy the azithromycin pill. From the article:

It is designed for use by people who have tested positive for the sexually transmitted infection and have no symptoms. The drug will also be available on an over-the-counter (OTC) basis for their sexual partners.

Up to 70 percent of people who have chlamydia exhibit no symptoms but risk serious long-term health complications, including infertility and ectopic pregnancy.

"Today's move means that symptom-free people diagnosed with chlamydia and their partner will be able to get convenient effective treatment from their local pharmacy," said June Raine, MHRA director of vigilance and risk management of medicines.

The British government has taken a lead in Europe in encouraging self-medication, as a way to increase patient choice and cut state healthcare bills.

The country already allows OTC sales of cholesterol-lowering and migraine drugs, as well as antibiotic eyedrops.

"The MHRA is keen to support the availability of more medicines over-the-counter, where it is safe to do so, and we wish to move on to new areas such as prevention and chronic disease management," Raine said in a statement.

Now, we’ve all read the reports about antibiotic-resistant bacteria and viruses. Wouldn’t over-the-counter antibiotics exacerbate the situation? More from Dr. Fuhrman:

Drug companies are a big part of this problem. They promote the use of their products through widespread advertising and the practice of giving free samples of the more potent, broad-spectrum antibiotics to doctors. The more widely these newer (and often ten times more expensive) antibiotics are used, the greater the chances that the bacteria will develop resistance. Many patients don't think a doctor is doing his job if he doesn't prescribe antibiotics or other medication. If he doesn't prescribe the medication they want, some patients actually will look for another doctor who will. Most doctors perpetuate this problem because they give in to the pressure to prescribe antibiotics. They like to appear that they are offering an important and necessary service by writing prescriptions.

What’s especially troubling is less than a month ago British doctors were urged to cutback on how many antibiotics they prescribe—weird?

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Merck marketed Gardasil as a wonder drug, but more and more articles are blasting the HPV vaccine, like this one by Medscape’s Allison Gandey. She reports on Gardasil’s foreboding side effects. Take a look:

According to the US Food and Drug Administration (FDA), as of June 30, 2008, more than 9700 adverse events have been reported since the vaccine was approved 2 years ago. Of these, 94% were classified as nonserious events and 6% as severe.

Serious Adverse Events

• Nervous system disorders, such as Guillain-Barré syndrome and headache
• Thromboembolic events
• Musculoskeletal and connective tissue problems
• Lymphatic system disorders
• Gastrointestinal problems
• General disorders and administration site conditions
• Immune system problems, including hypersensitivity reactions, bronchospasm, and urticaria

Most Commonly Reported Events

• Fainting
• Pain at the injection site
• Headache
• Nausea
• Fever

Again, this is a tough pill to swallow. For starters, adverse reactions to Gardasil have been shown to kill and—we’ve talked about it numerous times—Gardasil is only effective against 4 of the 100 strains of HPV. Quite the risk for what, 4% protection!

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