Watchman News

Medical experts and health leaders share insights on important issues affecting your health and well-being.

Medical experts and health leaders share insights on important issues affecting your health and well-being.

The celery juice phenomenon is often attributed to Anthony William, who considers himself the originator of the Global Celery Juice Movement.1 The movement has received both social media and major media attention in The New York Times2 and LA Times3 among others.

You can easily grow your own organic celery at home when you keep it cool, give it an unfailing supply of water and plant it in good soil.4 It’s important to choose organically grown celery as it’s one of the more contaminated vegetables available at the grocery store.
Choose Organic Celery for Your Table

Each year the Environmental Working Group (EWG),5 a nonprofit organization aimed at protecting health and the environment, publishes a guide to pesticides in produce. This document is called “The Dirty Dozen;” celery usually makes an appearance on the list.
In 2012, it was No. 2 on the list and the one most likely to contain multiple pesticides, with 96% of the samples testing positive and nearly 90% retaining more than one pesticide.6 By 2019, celery had dropped to number 11, having been overtaken by strawberries, spinach and kale.7
Before testing the fruits and vegetables, the produce was washed and peeled as consumers may be expected to at home.8 The Shopper’s Guide, which the EWG has published since 2004, ranks contamination in 47 fruits and vegetables based on more than 40,900 samples.9 Carla Burns, EWG Research Analyst, commented:10

“The main route of pesticide exposure for most Americans who do not live or work on or near farms is through their diet. Studies have shown that eating fruits and vegetables free of pesticides benefits health, and this is especially important for pregnant women and children.”

The American Academy of Pediatrics11 emphasizes children’s exposure should be limited. Pesticide exposure is linked with poor mental development, pervasive developmental disorders and attention deficit hyperactivity disorder. Their data also suggest an association with physical birth defects, fetal death and neurodevelopmental effects.
The EWG evaluated the U.S. Department of Agriculture’s tests, which found 225 different pesticides on fruits and vegetables.12 Dr. Philip Landrigan is director of the Global Public Health Initiative at Boston College and one of the writers of the 1993 National Academy of Sciences study, “Pesticides in the Diets of Infants and Children.”13
He underscores the implications of pesticide exposure and stresses that when possible, steps should be taken to lower a child’s exposure while continuing to offer a diet full of fresh produce.14
The dangers of pesticide exposure continue into adulthood. The Pesticide Action Network reports long-term toxicity at low doses has been associated with Parkinson’s disease, depression, anxiety, asthma and certain cancers.15
Celery Juice Trending: Rising Cost Is a Perfect Storm

Michael Karsch is the CEO of a New York chain of juice bars, Juice Press,16,17 and he tracks juice trends. In 2018 he noticed a rise in celery juice interest and decided to offer a 12-ounce, one ingredient drink for $7. Karsch spoke to The New York Times about the shortage and his take on the future, saying:18

“Within a few days, it was our third best selling beverage, which is astonishing for a one-ingredient offering. I have been historically unimpressed by celery. It’s not vibrant. It’s got a ton of water and a ton of a fiber … Three months ago where we couldn’t provide enough celery juice for about 4 days … Five years ago it was organic almonds, there was kale maybe 7 years ago. Usually what happens is it corrects.”

Vandana Sheth,19 spokesperson for the Academy of Nutrition and Dietetics, finds these trends are often driven by social media and may be enticing because she believes many people are looking for a quick fix for their health.
She noted moving back and forth between different trending eating plans may be dangerous, and said:20 “I’m seeing a lot more of a disordered way of eating in my practice. It’s not sustainable long-term.”
Sammy Duda,21 senior vice president of Duda Farm Fresh Foods, one of the largest celery growers in the world, spoke to The New York Times about his family’s familiarity with the supply and demand issue when celebrities endorse a specific type of vegetable juice. Out of 10 items listed on their products page, three of those are packaged celery and one is fresh celery.22
The cost not only is affected by demand from the juice trend, but also by the weather. The New York Times23 reports a warm, dry fall in Palm Beach, Florida, where some of the crop is grown, and a cold, wet winter on the west coast where other fields are located, have affected growth and harvest.
The crop on Duda Farm was also impacted by a soil-borne disease, which together added up to a shorter than normal supply in an environment with a greater than normal demand.
Phytonutrients Promote Health Benefits

Although there’s been a push to promote celery as a cure for many different health conditions, scientific evidence supports a more limited number. One cup of raw celery contains 40% of your daily value of vitamin K.24 In addition to this it contains 11% of your daily value of molybdenum,25 a trace mineral your body uses for the detoxification of heavy metals.
Some of the larger threats from heavy metal are associated with cadmium, mercury, arsenic and lead.26 Long-term exposure may result in neurological damage, skin cancers, kidney damage and bone fractures.
Toxicity will depend on several factors including the route of exposure and duration.27 You can read more about how molybdenum functions in heavy metal detoxification in my past article, “The Three Pillars of Heavy Metal Detoxification.”
Celery also contains measurable amounts of folate, potassium and vitamin B2. Celery stalks are a great source of antioxidants, phytosterols, flavanols and flavones, many of which provide anti-inflammatory benefits.28 But, one of the more advantageous compounds found in celery may be apigenin, gaining interest for its potential to fight cancer.29
Apigenin is a flavonoid found in several fruits and vegetables and some Chinese medicinal herbs. It has strong anti-inflammatory, antibacterial and antiviral properties and is now being reported as subduing different forms of cancer. This has been found in vitro and in vivo by initiating apoptosis and autophagy, as well as stimulating an immune response.30
Apigenin is associated with stimulating the growth of nerve cells. One animal study demonstrated learning and memory improvements when apigenin was injected or taken orally.31 Studies have also linked apigenin with activating AMP-activated protein kinase (AMPK) in human skin cells.
The results suggest that “one of the mechanisms by which apigenin exerts its chemoprotective action may be through activation of AMPK and induction of autophagy in human keratinocytes.”32 In another published study, scientists looked at the anticarcinogenic properties on the regulation of oxidative stress and DNA damage. They wrote:33

“One of the most well-recognized mechanisms of apigenin is the capability to promote cell cycle arrest and induction of apoptosis through the p53-related pathway. A further role of apigenin in chemoprevention is the induction of autophagy in several human cancer cell lines.”

Large Amounts May Interfere With Kidney Function

Although not high in oxalates, celery has between 11 and 20 mg for every 3 1/2 ounces of the vegetable. Oxalates are found in plant and animal foods with some of the more concentrated sources including spinach, almonds and beet greens.34 Oxalates are related to kidney stone formation and calcium absorption.
Your gut bacteria play a role in how available oxalate will be for absorption. A combination of oxalate and nonoxalate-containing foods will also impact how much soluble oxalate gets absorbed from the digestive tract.35
Calcium oxalate kidney stones are among the more common types of stones. However, it’s not high amounts of calcium that cause the stones but, rather, oxalate.36 Oxalates are compounds that protect plants from predators.37 The oxalic acid binds with calcium to make it less bioavailable and insoluble, increasing the risk of kidney stones.
Oxalates are broken down by gut bacteria, but when your microbiota are compromised the compounds enter the bloodstream and get stored in the kidneys. While 11 to 20 mg of oxalate in one 3 1/2-ounce serving of celery is minor, drinking 16 ounces of celery juice each day may not be.
One 16-ounce glass of celery juice requires one large bunch of celery,38 which often contains 10 stalks39 and weighs about 16 ounces or more.40 Drinking this much celery juice is roughly equivalent to 90 mg of oxalates every day. In addition to other foods, including chocolate, berries, nuts, legumes and grains,41 this may increase your risk for kidney stones. 
Soothing Chamomile Tea — An Option With Similar Benefits

Herbal teas are a rich source of polyphenols and flavonoids with antioxidant and anti-inflammatory properties. One of the most soothing is chamomile tea, belonging to the Asteraceae family42 containing a large number of herbs, shrubs and trees.43
In addition to being used as a tea, chamomile has been praised for many health benefits, including those in the volatile oils found in the flowers. One of the major constituents in the flower is apigenin, primarily found as a glycoside.44
Adults can use the volatile oils from the flower in a bath, as a cream for flaky skin, as an inhalant or tincture to relieve menstrual cramps and to improve sleep. For more information about the benefits of chamomile and how to make a tincture at home, see my past article, “What Are the Benefits of Chamomile?”

During the summer months many take to the local swimming pools to cool off and enjoy time with family and friends. Families may spend time teaching their youngsters the life-saving skill of swimming1 or just hours splashing around and playing games in the water. However you spend your time in or near water, you don’t have to leave with more than you arrived with.
Unfortunately, public swimming pools and hot tubs may be hotbeds of unwanted activity. The Children’s Hospital of Philadelphia warns children may acquire impetigo, pseudomonas dermatitis and athlete’s foot from swimming in pools.2 The EHA Consulting Group adds exposure to Escherichia coli, cryptosporidium (crypto) and shigella to the group.3
The parasites and bacteria in the list — Escherichia coli, cryptosporidium, and shigella — trigger infectious diarrhea,4 which may be fatal in those who are immunocompromised.5,6 In particular, the CDC warns cryptosporidium is the leading cause of diarrhea outbreaks linked to water and the third linked to animal contact.7
Cryptosporidium outbreaks rising — third leading cause of diarrhea

In June 2019 the CDC8 reported that cryptosporidium outbreaks increased, on average, 13% each year between 2009 and 2017. During this period, 444 cryptosporidiosis outbreaks were recorded, in which 7,465 cases were found in 40 states and Puerto Rico.
The CDC9 defines an outbreak as two or more infections linked to a common source by location and time. These reports of cryptosporidium are voluntarily made to the CDC through the National Outbreak Reporting System. The first outbreak recorded was in 2009 and was the first year for NORS reporting. Of the reported infections, 287 were hospitalized and one person died.10
The most frequently recorded outbreaks associated with recreational water infections were from pools and water playgrounds.11 Of the 444 outbreaks, 35% were linked to treated swimming water; 15% were linked to contact with cattle (in particular, nursing calves); 13% were linked to child care settings and 3% were associated with drinking unpasteurized milk or apple cider.12
As with any food product, it is possible for raw milk to harbor microorganisms. When cattle are raised in concentrated feeding operations the milk must be pasteurized to reduce the possibility of foodborne illness, although it does not eliminate it.13,14,15
A recent study revealed the rate of outbreak in raw milk has effectively decreased by 74% since 2005,16 while leafy greens account for 46% of all foodborne illnesses, according to CDC data.17
Your risk of exposure to cryptosporidium is introduced by swallowing the parasite from contaminated water or uncooked foods. You can also come in contact with it from touching surfaces like bathroom fixtures, changing tables and diaper pails and then touching your hand to your mouth.18
Although not normally serious in those who have strong immune systems, it may be life-threatening for those who are immunocompromised. Those at higher risk19 include people with HIV/AIDS, those with inherited diseases affecting the immune system or cancer and transplant patients taking medications which suppress the immune system.
The CDC warns20 exposure during the peak summer season from a treated recreational water source may result in hundreds or thousands of cases, since one infected swimmer may excrete up to 108 oocysts in one diarrheal incident. The oocysts survive seven days or longer, even in the presence of recommended concentrations of chlorine. Considering that swimmers may use multiple pools, the risk is multiplied even further.
How does cryptosporidiosis develop?

Cryptosporidium begins life as a sporulated oocyst that enters the environment through the stool of an infected host.21 The oocysts are resistant to chlorine treatment and may be found in drinking water supplies. They may also withstand freezing temperatures.
After a suitable host has ingested the spores and the spores enter the intestinal tract, the oocyst releases sporozoites, the motile asexual form of the parasite, which develops inside the oocyst.22 The sporozoites dig into the epithelial lining of the lungs (if the spores were inhaled) or the intestines when the spores were ingested. The cells then undergo asexual reproduction leading to a sexual reproductive stage.23
After fertilization, the resulting zygote develops into one of two types of oocysts. A thick-walled oocyst exits the host into the environment or a thin-walled oocyst will autoinfect the host.24 The infectious thick-walled oocysts are passed through the feces of the host and the cycle begins again.
What are the symptoms of cryptosporidiosis?

An infection with cryptosporidium may result in a variety of symptoms, the most characteristic of which is diarrhea.25 In an immunocompetent individual, the diarrhea is self-limiting and usually resolves within three weeks. The illness may be associated with fever or fatigue, and while the small intestine is chiefly affected, cryptosporidiosis has been found in the pulmonary and biliary tracts.26
Specifically, the diarrhea is watery and may become explosive.27 Explosive diarrhea is a severe form of the condition during which the individual passes liquid and gas when the rectum fills with more than it may hold.28
Normally, the large intestine is the last stop for waste products traveling through the gastrointestinal tract and is where excess fluid is absorbed. However, during a diarrheal process, the intestines move too quickly for the large intestine to absorb fluid.29
Use precautions at the pool

It is important to use precautions before going into a public or private swimming pool. Diarrheal illnesses in swimmers may be passed through pool water. Anyone who currently has diarrhea or who may have been sick with in the last two months will risk contaminating the pool with bacteria or parasites.30 Microscopic feces may contaminate an entire pool or hot tub, making other swimmers sick if they ingest the water.31
While many public and private pool owners seek to maintain a healthy pool environment, it’s important to remember sporulated cryptosporidium are able to withstand the chlorine treatment. Giardia is another that may survive for up to 45 minutes in chlorinated pools.32
Precautions33 everyone should take before getting into the water include showering to remove as much dirt and bacteria before entering a pool. Importantly, don’t pee or poop in the water and don’t swallow the water. The CDC34 recommends taking children on bathroom breaks every hour, changing diapers away from the pool area and drinking plenty of fluids to stay hydrated.
The first line of defense is to keep those with any illness out of a swimming pool, public or private. While it is difficult to stop children from drinking pool water, it is considerably easier to prevent them from using toys like cups and buckets that might encourage them to put water in their mouth.
Test the water and report your symptoms

Another step you may take is to check inspection scores posted by the health department. This is similar to the way restaurants post scores of their sanitation practices. While many public pools are subject to testing, private pools usually are not. To test yourself, consider getting inexpensive test strips at big box stores.
In a survey conducted for the Water Quality and Health Council (WQHC), it was reported that 25% of adults said they would swim within one hour of having diarrhea, 50% never shower before going into a pool and 60% said they’ve swallowed pool water.35 The same survey reported that 72% of adults said they were unaware crypto was a parasite often spread by water.
In a press release from the CDC36 in 2016, the agency released inspection data collected in 2013 from five states with the most recreational water venues, including public pools and hot tubs. Data on 84,187 routine inspections found 1 in every 8 resulted in an immediate closure because of serious violations, while almost 80% identified at least one violation. The most common violations were improper pH, safety equipment issues and problems with disinfectant concentration.37
The CDC recommends38 that when visiting swimming pools you should complete your own inspection for some of the more common health and safety problems, including using test strips to determine chlorine and bromine concentrations. Make sure the drain at the bottom of the deep end is visible and check that the drain covers are secure and in good repair.
If a lifeguard is not on duty, make sure there is safety equipment nearby, such as a rescue ring.39 Since cryptosporidium may remain in the small intestine for as long as two months, during which you may pass the infection,40 if you’ve been sick with diarrhea, it is important to stay out of the pool and report your symptoms to the local or state health department, which reports to the CDC.41
Avoid hyperchlorination of your private pool or hot tub

Following an outbreak of cryptosporidium in Ohio,42 during which multiple cases were identified and linked to one swimming pool, researchers reported the offending pool was subsequently hyperchlorinated. A case-control study was launched to find the source of the outbreak; 150 confirmed and probable cases were identified and associated with the swimming pool.
Researchers found through this investigation that proactive measures may decrease transmission and prevent an outbreak. However, while hyperchlorination was used in this situation, there are dangerous compounds that form when chlorine is mixed with carbon-based compounds such as urine, poop and dirt.43
In one study,44 researchers mixed uric acid derived from human urine with chlorine and discovered it created two highly toxic detergent byproducts (DBPs): cyanogen chloride and trichloramine. Cyanogen chloride is classified as a chemical warfare agent with known pulmonary, heart and central nervous system toxicity.45 Trichloramine has been linked to lung damage in pool workers.46
The combination of chlorine and carbon compounds creates more than these two DBPs. In one study,47 researchers found spending just 40 minutes in a chlorinated pool was linked to DNA damage by these chemicals. The cancer risk of the DBPS is greater from skin exposure than from drinking water.48
Lack of cryptosporidium awareness may increase risk

Cryptosporidium has become one of the most common causes of waterborne disease.49 The parasite may be found throughout the U.S. and the world.50 Washing your hands thoroughly after using the bathroom or changing diapers becomes more urgent as you become aware that diseases are caused by a parasite that’s basically spread through exposure to feces.51
The parasite spreads when you touch your mouth with contaminated hands. Your hands become contaminated after touching objects that were perhaps first touched by infected hands.52 Objects such as stair railings, elevator buttons, door knobs and baby toys are all fair game.
You’re not always able to tell by looking if something has been in contact with fecal matter since only a minute amount is necessary to pass cryptosporidium spores. To reduce the spread of the parasite it’s important for you help to spread the word to friends and family and share why showering before entering the pool is one preventive step they may take.53
The parasite is notorious for being impervious to chlorine.54 In order to kill or inactivate it in drinking water, the water must be brought to a rolling boil for one minute. If you live at elevations above 6,500 feet, the water must be boiled for three minutes.55 The water should then be cooled and stored in a clean, sanitized glass container with a tight cover in the refrigerator.

Bayer has come up zero for 3 in the first lawsuits alleging that Roundup herbicide caused cancer, with the latest verdict ordering the chemical giant to pay $2 billion to its victims.
The verdict came from the third case, heard before the Alameda County Superior Court of California, in which a married couple, Alva and Alberta Pilliod, claim they both developed Non-Hodgkin lymphoma after regular use of Roundup. The pair had been using Roundup since the 1970s, stopping only a few years ago.
The jury heard 17 days of testimony and deliberated for less than two days before deciding in the Pilliods’ favor. Bayer, which is the largest seed and pesticide company in the world due to its $63 billion purchase of Monsanto in 2018, must now pay $2 billion in punitive and compensatory damages.
Bayer to Pay $2 Billion, Guilty of ‘Malice, Oppression or Fraud’

The guilty verdict against Bayer includes a $1 billion payout to Alberta, who developed Non-Hodgkin lymphoma brain cancer in 2015. Another $1 billion is owed to Alva, who was diagnosed with Non-Hodgkin lymphoma, which has spread from his bones to his spine and pelvis, in 2011. A total of $55 million in damages was awarded for past and future medical bills and pain and suffering.1
In order to award punitive damages, U.S. Right to Know reported, “The jury had to find that Monsanto ‘engaged in conduct with malice, oppression or fraud committed by one or more officers, directors or managing agents of Monsanto’ who were acting on behalf of the company.”2
The plaintiffs’ attorney, Brent Wisner, also stated, “From day one, Monsanto has never had any interest in finding out whether Roundup is safe.”3 Wisner based his request for punitive damages on the $892 million in gross profits Monsanto reported in 2017, and this was just from its agricultural chemicals division.
Bayer plans to appeal the verdict, and the damages may ultimately be reduced, as it’s generally upheld that punitive damages shouldn’t be more than 10 times higher than compensatory damages. Still, the $2 billion verdict sent a shockwave through the system.
Bayer shares have fallen about 45 percent since the Monsanto purchase, and dropped as much as 5% when the third verdict was announced.4,5 Now, with at least 13,400 lawsuits still looming from people who claim exposure to their glyphosate-containing Roundup herbicide caused them health problems, including cancer, the likelihood of a settlement grows stronger.
Some analysts have suggested settlement costs could exceed $14.6 billion, and while the company, according to Moody’s, may be able to absorb payments of $5.6 billion, if costs reach $22.4 billion it could be a blow to their credit rating.6
Bayer Lawyers Complained About Celebrities at Trial

During the third trial, the plaintiffs’ lawyers presented evidence including internal emails and advertising that showed Monsanto’s lack of regard for safety. One such advertisement showed a man killing backyard weeds while wearing shorts and a T-shirt to the tune of an Old West film, while Monsanto studies have recommended the chemical only be applied while wearing chemical boots and overalls.7
Internal Monsanto emails, meanwhile, mentioned ghostwriting scientific papers and payments to front groups, such as the American Council on Science and Health (ACSH), to promote glyphosate’s safety.
Bayer attorneys, while maintaining that Roundup is safe, tried another tactic: distraction. They brought up completely unrelated “concerns” in front of jurors, like the fact that the plaintiffs’ attorneys had posed for a photo with environmental activists Daryl Hannah and Neil Young.8
The trials have revealed disturbing evidence against the chemical giant, including the fact that Monsanto allocated about $17 million in one year to discredit the International Agency for Research on Cancer (IARC) scientists who spoke out against glyphosate.9
In March 2015, IARC determined glyphosate to be a “probable carcinogen” based on evidence showing the popular weed-killing chemical can cause Non-Hodgkin lymphoma and lung cancer in humans, along with “convincing evidence” it can also cause cancer in animals.
For instance, in 2017, Henry Miller was thoroughly outed as a Monsanto shill during the 2012 Proposition 37 GMO labeling campaign in California. Miller, falsely posing as a Stanford professor, promoted genetically engineered foods during this campaign.
In 2015, he published a paper in Forbes Magazine attacking IARC’s findings after it classified glyphosate as a probable human carcinogen. Later it was revealed that Miller’s work was in fact ghostwritten by Monsanto.
Two Prior Roundup Lawsuits Led to Similar Payouts

In August 2018, a jury ruled in favor of plaintiff Dewayne Johnson in a truly historic case against Monsanto. Johnson — the first of the cases pending against the chemical company — claimed Roundup caused his Non-Hodgkin lymphoma, and the court agreed.
Monsanto was ordered to pay $289 million in damages to Johnson, although the award was later reduced to $78 million. Bayer asked the court to throw out the judgment in April 2019, going so far as to ask for reversal of the damages awarded based on the fact that Johnson is near death.10
In a second case, a judge ruled in favor of the plaintiff, ordering Bayer to pay more than $80 million. The jury agreed that Edwin Hardeman’s repeated exposures to Roundup, which he used to kill weeds on his 56-acre property, not only played a role in his cancer diagnosis but also that the company did not warn consumers that the product carried a cancer risk.11
The case was split into two phases, with jurors first finding the chemical to have caused the cancer on purely scientific grounds and the next phase finding that Bayer is liable for damages.12 Ultimately, Hardeman was awarded $75 million in punitive damages, $5.6 million in compensatory damages and $200,000 for medical expenses.13
The Government Has Bayer’s Back

In the midst of Bayer facing billions in damages due to glyphosate causing cancer, the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA), in their latest review of glyphosate, released a draft conclusion stating the chemical poses potential risks to mammals and birds that eat treated leaves, as well as risks to plants,14 but “no risks of concern” for people and “is not likely to be carcinogenic to humans.”15
It’s not surprising, considering the EPA’s history of siding with and protecting Monsanto. As far back as 1983, when a Monsanto study revealed an increased cancer risk in mice exposed to glyphosate, the EPA asked for further studies, but the company simply refused. They claimed the study wasn’t a concern because one mouse not exposed to glyphosate also developed a tumor, and used this to support its safety.
Johnson’s lawyer, Timothy Litzenburg, told Rolling Stone, “They fought over that one mouse’s kidney for years, spent millions of dollars on experts, instead of just doing the test again. The EPA even offered a compromise — let’s just do a kidney and liver test. Monsanto said ‘no.’ It’s amazing how often they’re able to say no to the EPA.”16
In an opinion piece in The Guardian, Nathan Donley, a scientist at the Center for Biological Diversity, and Carey Gillam, an investigative journalist, ask the question we all should be asking:17

“Precisely because the chemical has been treated as so much safer than other pesticides, over the past 45 years glyphosate has become virtually ubiquitous: residues of the chemical have been documented in food, air, water and soil samples, as well as within the bodies of people who have never used the pesticide. The chemical has even been detected in raindrops.

It all raises this troubling question: if what has been touted as perhaps our ‘safest’ widely used pesticide actually causes cancer, what assurance do we have about the hundreds of other pesticides that the EPA has assured us are safe?”

Bayer’s Shareholders Are Outraged
At Bayer’s annual general meeting in Bonn, Germany, 55.5% of shareholders voted against ratifying the management’s actions, in large part due to the Monsanto acquisition.18 Some are calling the takeover “disastrous,”19 and investors had complained that Bayer was not revealing enough about its strategy for defeating upcoming lawsuits.
The vote was symbolic in nature and won’t legally change anything, but highlights the growing unrest within the company, which will only be heightened with the latest $2 billion verdict.
According to Bloomberg, “Markus Mayer, an analyst at Baader Bank AG, said the ruling increases the probability that Bayer becomes vulnerable to a takeover or a target for more activist investors like Paul Singer’s Elliott Management Corp. pushing for a split between agriculture and health assets.”20
Bayer was even caught making a hit list after French media raised accusations about Monsanto’s 2016 “stakeholder mapping project.” Monsanto had compiled lists of supportive and critical stakeholders, which may have violated both ethical principles and legal regulations. In a bit of damage control, Bayer posted the following:21

“Following an initial review, we understand that this initiative has raised concerns and criticism. This is not the way Bayer seeks dialogue with society and stakeholders. We apologize for this behavior.

Currently, we have no indication that the preparation of the lists under discussion violated any legal provisions. Bayer will ask an external law firm to investigate the project Monsanto commissioned and evaluate the allegations.

The law firm will also inform all of the persons on the lists of the information collected about them. Bayer will fully support the public prosecutor’s office in France in its investigations.”

Glyphosate Is Still Being Sprayed With Abandon

Nearly 300 million pounds of glyphosate are used in the U.S. each year, with usage being heaviest in the Midwest due to extensive production of genetically engineered (GE) corn and soy. In fact, more than 90 percent of corn and soy grown in the U.S. is genetically engineered, and these ingredients are common in processed foods.22
The chemical was detected in more than 90 percent of pregnant women tested living in Central Indiana, and levels of the chemical were associated with shortened pregnancy lengths.23 Aside from cancer, in 2017, separate research revealed that daily exposure to ultra-low levels of glyphosate for two years led to nonalcoholic fatty liver disease (NAFLD) in rats.24
What’s more, glyphosate is in fact patented as an antibiotic, and when broken down, the word antibiotic means “anti-life.” In addition to promoting antibiotic resistance by priming pathogens to more readily become resistant to antibiotics,25 Roundup causes disturbances to a soil fungus called Aspergillus nidulans26 and may be causing serious damage to non-target plants.
Glyphosate is also a popular tool for desiccating (or accelerating the drying out) crops like wheat and oats. In testing done by Friends of the Earth (FOE), 100 percent of oat cereal samples tested positive for residues of glyphosate.27 If you want to avoid this chemical as much as possible, choose organic or biodynamic foods, and install a filter on your drinking water.
If you’re curious how much glyphosate is in your body, the Health Research Institute (HRI) in Iowa developed the glyphosate urine test kit, which will allow you to determine your own exposure to this toxic herbicide.
Ordering this kit automatically allows you to participate in the study and help HRI better understand the extent of glyphosate exposure and contamination. In a few weeks, you will receive your results, along with information on how your results compare with others and what to do to help reduce your exposure. We are providing these kits to you at no profit in order for you to participate in this environmental study.

It may surprise you to learn that celery is part of the same family of plants, called Apiaceae, as carrots and parsley, but it’s probably not a surprise that it’s also related to celeriac, a root vegetable.
Most people think of celery as a pleasingly crunchy veggie that goes well with carrots and radishes on party platters. But recent studies have revealed the pale green stalks, aka Apium graveolens, also have a substantial array of health benefits, as do the tiny seeds and even the juice, in spite of the fact that the stalks are fully 95 percent water.
Celery juice, it turns out, is touted as one of the latest super beverages, and according to The Guardian,1 as of October 2018, it’s quadrupled in sales compared to kale juice, which apparently is so 15 minutes ago. In fact, sales in the U.S. have recently increased by 454 percent, and the craze is moving to Britain.
The Celery Juice Phenomenon

The phenomenon is attributed to Anthony William, who calls himself the originator of the Global Celery Juice Movement since he’s successfully managed to market it as “a healing tool for every symptom and condition imaginable.”2 William says the most benefits come from drinking it in the morning on an empty stomach, not mixing it with other substances and waiting 15 minutes to eat anything else.
The benefits he lists extend to “autoimmune conditions, acne, eczema, psoriasis, migraines, acid reflux, addictions, anxiety, depression, fatigue, weight issues, bloating (and) constipation.”3
Scientists believe celery has benefits for your digestive tract and cardiovascular system, and the seeds have been used as a natural pain reliever. One of the most advantageous compounds in celery is apigenin, a molecule that is gaining interest for possible cancer-fighting properties.4
Apigenin is a flavonoid found in many herbs, including parsley, thyme and chamomile. One reason it’s so significant is because it enhances the neurons in your brain. In fact, one study5 showed that when apigenin was applied to a petri dish containing human stem cells, 25 days later the stem cells had turned into neurons.
Further, the synapses connecting the neurons were “stronger and more sophisticated,” something that didn’t occur without the apigenin. The upshot is that stronger neurons bolster several aspects of your brain function. In addition to growing new brain cells, apigenin has been associated with fighting cancer, particularly breast cancer.6
This compound has also been linked to reduced damage to your body due to inflammation. Eating celery and other foods with apigenin on the ingredients list was observed in a study published in PloS One to restore immune balance even in the presence of inflammation, the study explains:

“Apigenin inhibits LPS (lipopolysaccharide)-induced inflammatory response through multiple mechanisms in macrophages. These results provided important scientific evidences for the potential application of apigenin as a therapeutic agent for inflammatory diseases.”7

According to the Online Textbook of Bacteriology,8 lipopolysaccharides are associated with the outer membrane of E. coli, salmonella, shigella and other gram-negative pathogens. In short, apigenin reduces the toxic effects, and “Exert[s] effective anti-inflammatory activity in vivo by reducing LPS-induced expression … thereby restoring immune balance,” an Ohio State University study9 shows.
Health Benefits of Eating Celery

There’s a healthy dose of vitamin K in celery, necessary to provide healthy blood clotting and to help prevent arterial calcification, and providing 37 percent of the dietary reference intake (DRI) in a single cup. The next highest nutrient celery provides is 11 percent of the molybdenum, a trace mineral that’s critical for the detoxification of heavy metals. I’ve written before about how molybdenum functions as a cofactor for four crucial enzymes:

Sulfite oxidase

Xanthine oxidase 

Aldehyde oxidase 

Mitochondrial amidoxime reducing component (mARC)

Other nutrients in celery include vitamins A and C, folate and potassium, and it’s a rich source of antioxidants, phenolic acids, phytosterols, flavones and flavonols, along with several more obscure phytonutrients.
Again, not only is eating celery good for you, the seeds are, too. Studies indicate that while celery may be a simple food, it has a complex chemical makeup with components able to produce a relaxing, dilating effect to help lower your blood pressure.10 The featured study explains:

“Celery seed extracts have antihypertensive properties, which appears to be attributable to the actions of its active hydrophobic constitutes such as NBP (n-butylphthalide) and can be considered as an antihypertensive agent in chronic treatment of elevated BP.”11

Studies indicate that 3nB is identified as a compound useful in managing brain-based vascular diseases, including stroke and vascular dementia.12 There have been studies that suggested viable blood pressure reduction in rats, such as one published in the Journal of Medicinal Food,13 but subsequent human studies have shown that celery seed extract does indeed reduce hypertension levels.
Case in point: For the 30 study participants with mild to moderate hypertension who took the prescribed 75 milligram (mg) doses of celery seed extract twice a day for six weeks, the results were measurable: Mean blood pressure baseline measurements dropped 8.2 mm Hg systolic and 8.5 diastolic from baseline. However, to realize a similar benefit, you’d have to eat about 50 pounds or 530 celery stalks.14
Celery Compounds That Combat Cancer and Stimulate Neurogenesis

Regarding neurogenesis, apigenin may also stimulate the growth and development of nerve cells in mice and improve their learning and memory capabilities, as well as be useful for the treatment of neurological diseases, disorders and injuries, according to a study15 conducted at the Dublin City School of Biotechnology in Ireland.
Besides apigenin in celery, there’s also the flavonoid luteolin, which has been shown to have anticancer properties. This takes place, the study authors explain,16 because the presence of luteolin renders cancer cells more vulnerable to therapy agents. Apigenin was also shown to inhibit growth in four pancreatic cancer cell lines.17
Additionally, researchers in 2017 found that luteolin may also be effective in reducing women’s’ risk of developing metastasis from triple-negative breast cancer. Salman Hyder, professor in tumor angiogenesis and biomedical sciences at the College of Veterinary Medicine and Dalton Cardiovascular Research Center, tested cells in petri dishes and explained:

“Triple-negative breast cancers are cancer cells that lack three receptors targeted by current chemotherapy regimens. Because of this lack of receptors, common cancer drugs can’t ‘find’ the cells, and doctors must treat the cancer with extremely aggressive and highly toxic treatment strategies.
Women with this type of breast cancer also frequently develop metastatic lesions that originate from drug-resistant cells … (They’re) highly mobile in the body, which helps them metastasize to other organs throughout the body. We found that luteolin inhibits that migration and also can kill cancer cells.”18

Other benefits are suggested by historical literature in regard to the effectiveness of celery. Its compounds may soothe your nervous system, alleviate pain and treat an array of maladies such as arthritis, gout, water retention, muscle spasms, colds and flu, although scientists say more evidence is needed to verify these uses.
Digestive Tract Advantages From Celery

Celery has long been known to be a great snack because it’s not only crunchy and has a mild flavor, but because the fiber it offers is substantial. Live Science asserts:

“Fiber is well-known for its digestive benefits. It helps keep your bowel movements regular, thereby reducing constipation; helps keep your bowels healthy, and aids in weight maintenance … One cup of celery provides about 6 percent of your daily fiber needs. Some recent research suggests that the antioxidants in celery could also help improve stomach lining and reduce the risk of gastric ulcers.”19

Things To Be Aware of Regarding Celery Consumption

When eating celery, there are some things to be aware of. First, celery is a healthy snack and/or food eaten raw, but how it’s cooked can affect its nutritional attributes. Studies show it loses between 38 percent and 41 percent of its antioxidants when boiled or blanched, which is a significant amount, but when it’s steamed for about 10 minutes, it retains between 83 percent and 99 percent of its antioxidant nutrients.20
Medical News Today notes that celery belongs to a small group of foods that can cause a severe allergic reaction, and this can lead to a potentially fatal condition known as anaphylactic shock, and that “those who are allergic to the celery should be cautious and check food labels, as even small traces of celery can cause a reaction.”21
Many natural foods have toxic elements if eaten raw in very large quantities and all at one time, and celery is one of them. In fact, it could cause goiters, which are swellings on the neck that could lead to breathing problems and even hypothyroidism.
“Celery can act as a goitrogen if eaten in very large quantities, especially if it’s not cooked … This is because great amounts of uncooked celery can interfere with the process of iodine functioning in the thyroid,” SF Gate noted.22
In addition, many plants contain natural compounds known as psoralens that could increase your sensitivity to ultraviolet light, and celery is one that may cause a skin reaction or rash if you should get drops of celery juice on your skin and go out into the sun within 12 to 36 hours.
In fact, the rash or hyperpigmentation could cause a burning sensation and last three to five days, or even months, according to a Baylor University Medical Center Proceedings article published in 2000.23
One more thing: Pesticides have become a big business and, unfortunately, substances such as glyphosate, among other pesticides, are applied by farmers to the tune of nearly 5 billion pounds worldwide, and 300 million pounds applied on U.S. farmland. A class of pesticides called organophosphates (OPs) also has been implicated for brain-destroying health risks, such as attention and memory deficits, autism and lower IQs.
Unfortunately, celery is No. 10 on the Environmental Working Group’s notorious Dirty Dozen List24 of the fruits and vegetables with the most pesticide residue. Organic foods are always preferred over the conventionally grown and sold at your local supermarket due to the use of harmful pesticides.
If organic celery is not available or you’re just not sure, washing your fruits and vegetables before eating them is recommended, even if they will be peeled before it’s eaten. Better yet, grow your own celery, organically.

Scientists around the world have been keenly studying the attributes of a root plant known as rhodiola, which is a tough perennial that produces beautiful, chrysanthemum-like flowers. Beyond its attractive appearance, though, rhodiola has a number of highly valuable qualities for health.
Rhodiola thrives in cold mountainous regions and barren sea cliffs such as those in Northern Asia, Europe and North America. Closely related species also used in traditional medicine include Rhodiola imbricata, Rhodiola algida and Rhodiola crenulata.
Because its history harkens as far back as the Vikings, rhodiola has several different monikers. Besides the scientific name Rhodiola rosea, it’s also known as golden root, rose root, king’s crown and hóng jǐng tiān, depending on where it’s found.
For millennia, people familiar with the plant used its extracts to improve strength and virility. For instance, Siberian brides were given rhodiola sprigs to increase their physical endurance to face long, sub-zero winters, fend off anxiety and depression, and increase fertility.1
A renowned Greek text known as De Materia Medica, written in 77 A.D., describes numerous medicinal properties from the plant’s stem. According to Swedish Medical Center,2 rhodiola was long ago integrated into the traditional medicines of Sweden, Norway, Iceland and Russia.
Recent history supports many of even the most ancient claims. Introduced to a body that’s flagging due to prolonged or higher-than-normal stress, rhodiola has been proven to relieve both physical and mental fatigue, soothe frazzled nerves and even improve the ability to concentrate.3
Wide-Ranging Benefits of Rhodiola Impact Your Body and Mind

Rhodiola boasts an extensive list of vitality-boosting abilities found in the stem, roots and leaves of the plant, such as boosting your immunity from disease, positively impacting brain, organ, nerve, sexual4 and neurological functions, and helping to prevent damage to all of the above.5,6,7,8,9 Some studies suggest it can even increase your lifespan.10 One study notes:

“Studies on isolated organs, tissues, cells and enzymes have revealed that Rhodiola preparations exhibit adaptogenic effect including, neuroprotective, cardioprotective, antifatigue, antidepressive, anxiolytic, nootropic, life-span increasing effects and CNS (central nervous system) stimulating activity.

A number of clinical trials demonstrate that repeated administration of R. rosea extract SHR-5 exerts an antifatigue effect that increases mental performance (particularly the ability to concentrate in healthy subjects), and reduces burnout in patients with fatigue syndrome.

Encouraging results exist for the use of Rhodiola in mild to moderate depression, and generalized anxiety. Several mechanisms of action possibly contributing to the clinical effect have been identified for Rhodiola extracts.”11

One way the compounds in rhodiola are beneficial is that they support your body’s ability to stave off another type of stress: oxidative. It also helps fight infection and burn energy, while simultaneously helping to decrease inflammation, increase energy, prevent fat buildup, protect your heart and lungs, reduce pain and improve your mood.
The latter benefit explains why rhodiola is known as a nootropic, described as a substance that enhances brain function. Rhodiola has its own benefits in this regard, as it stimulates brain activity and has been found to be directly responsible for activating four important neurotransmitters:

Norepinephrine
Serotonin
Dopamine
Acetylcholine

Each of these is significant as depression is strongly linked to low dopamine. Studies note that working together, these neurotransmitters are important for memory, concentration and learning.12 Rhodiola also improves wakefulness and reduces both physical and mental fatigue, as well as anxiety.
Further, rhodiola may be a possible safe alternative to SSRIs (selective serotonin reuptake inhibitor drugs)13 or antidepressants such as sertraline, also known as Zoloft.14
The Powerful Benefits of the Rhodiola Compound Salidroside

Where do all these incredible benefits come from? The rose-like fragrance is due to the presence of geraniol essential oil, but more than 140 different and powerful organic compounds related to health have been identified in rhodiola. Three of the most important, noted for having adaptogenic properties (meaning they can provide different effects depending on what your body needs) are:

Salidroside, also known as rhodioloside, considered by many experts to be the plant’s most important bioactive molecule, and likely responsible for its protective and stimulant effects on the brain.15
Rosavin, which has many of the same properties and mechanisms as salidroside, but requires a higher dose to produce the same effect.16
Tyrosol, which is one of the antioxidant elements in rhodiola extracts, but while it may contribute to its benefits, it often goes unlabeled on commercial supplements.17

One study shows salidroside helps restore the balance between free radicals and antioxidants, and protects your brain against poor blood flow and subsequent stroke (aka ischemia).18
Due to its antibacterial strength, salidroside has also been used successfully to treat acne. While standard acne treatments can trigger antibiotic resistance and even worse problems, salidroside can get rid of the thin, slimy layer of bacterial cells known as biofilm that is difficult to eradicate.19
Its antioxidant activity may help fight aging, although the mechanisms are not well-studied in humans. It is well-known, though, that high oxidative stress underlies many chronic diseases and age-related health problems.20 
Pathways and Mechanisms Connected to Salidroside

How does it manage all these benefits? It turns out that salidroside is responsible for the activation of several crucial pathways to exert many of the rhodiola plant’s most important benefits.
One is the Nrf2 pathway, a genetic pathway that turns on protective genes, increases antioxidant proteins and protects cells, leading the authors of one study to posit that salidroside may be useful in treating ischemic stroke.21 Rhodiola also activates AMPK, which boosts antioxidant protein production, prevents insulin resistance, reduces inflammation, controls your blood sugar and prevents fat buildup in your liver.22,23
Cytokines are signaling molecules secreted by certain immune system cells, which affect other cells, including those in relation to inflammation and immunity. Referred to as the “bad guys” that are high in chronic inflammation, in acute infections, the right balance of cytokines are needed to mount a successful attack. However, Th1 dominance may occur for people with chronic inflammation and/or autoimmune diseases when this pathway is over-activated.
Certain inflammatory cytokines may be selectively decreased when rhodiola extracts are applied, such as when one study showed that mice injected with E. coli, then given a large dose of rhodiola extract, experienced “significantly” lower kidney and brain inflammation.24
Rhodiola’s Effects on Stress

Here’s one way rhodiola can be worth its weight in gold for the way it boosts your energy and allows you to thrive even in the midst of stress:

“Stress may allow the body more energy at the moment, but this is not a sustainable energy solution. After prolonged periods of stress, the very processes and neurochemicals needed for efficient energy are compromised.

For example, dopamine and serotonin keep the mind focused and positive for hours on end and fight off tension and impulsiveness. Stress robs the body of these neurotransmitters essential to extended thought processing.

It also interferes with the thyroid and its stimulating hormones and decreases the body’s metabolism. Try and be productive without the body’s energy assimilation process in proper function — you won’t last long.”25

Salidroside also acts on the HPA axis — the hypothalamus, pituitary gland and adrenal gland — comprising a system of glands that control many of the body’s stress responses — such as the release of cortisol, another study notes.26
Salidroside is an example of an adaptogen that facilitates the expression of Hsp70, a “heat-shock protein” that helps cells adapt to repeated exposure to the same stressors.27 It may also increase tolerance to both emotional and physical stress, decrease Hsp70 expression in stomach cancer cells, specifically related to its effect on colon cancer cells, as the extract also:

“Inhibits cell proliferation and induces cell apoptosis in various cells and cell lines, including human urinary bladder cancer cell lines, breast cancer cell lines, colorectal cancer cells, gastric cancer cells, glioma cells, lung cancer cells, and sarcoma.”28

For example, osteoporosis, a disease that causes bone density to decrease, is partially caused by oxidative stress. Salidroside’s antioxidant effects may help prevent osteoporosis and maintain bone health later in life. Salidroside’s antioxidant effects may even augment future bone health.29
Rhodiola Caveats, Disclosures and Supplementation

Use caution in combining rhodiola with certain prescription medications. Monoamine oxidase inhibitors shouldn’t be combined with substances that increase dopamine or norepinephrine.30
Don’t take rhodiola with SSRIs, drugs for high blood pressure, diabetes CYP2C9 substrates, phenytoin and warfarin or antidepressants without the advice of your physician. At least one study has found that rhodiola may reduce chronic fatigue symptoms at doses of 400 milligrams (mg) day, with few or no side effects.31
Rhodiola rosea supplements come in the form of caplets, tea or liquid extracts, but high-quality extracts should contain at least 3 percent rosavins and 1 percent salidroside. Other species of rhodiola, such as R. crenulata, might have much higher concentrations of salidrosides.32

Cellphones were classified as a Group 2B “possible carcinogen”1 in 2011 by the International Agency for Research on Cancer (IARC), an arm of the World Health Organization and the global gold standard for the classification of toxins.
This classification was based on evidence showing that nonionizing electromagnetic field (EMF) radiation from cellphones can trigger abnormal cell growth and tumors.2,3
In my view, this is a mistake and, just like smoking, I am confident it will be recategorized in the future to a 1A carcinogen.
Earlier this year, preliminary findings of two government-funded animal studies4 were published that further support the notion that cellphone radiation has carcinogenic potential.
The finalized report5 of these two studies — conducted by the National Toxicology Program (NTP), an interagency research program under the auspices of the National Institute of Environmental Health Sciences — was released November 1, 2018. While the preliminary report released in February 2018 significantly downplayed the findings, subsequent peer review upgraded the findings of risk.
Cellphone Radiation Linked to Brain and Heart Tumors
The NTP rates cancer risk based on four categories of evidence: “clear evidence” (highest); “some evidence;” “equivocal evidence;” and “no evidence” (lowest). According to the NTP’s final report, the two studies, done on mice and rats of both sexes, found:6

• Clear evidence for heart tumors (malignant schwannomas) in male rats. These types of tumors started developing around week 70, and are very similar to acoustic neuromas found in humans, a benign type of tumor that previous studies have linked to cellphone use
• Some evidence of brain tumors (malignant gliomas) in male rats. Glial cell hyperplasias — indicative of precancerous lesions — began developing around week 58.
(Incidentally, incidence of glioblastoma multiforme (the deadliest type of brain tumor) more than doubled in the U.K. between 1995 and 2015.7,8 According to the authors of the analysis, the dramatic increase is likely due to “widespread environmental or lifestyle factors,” which would include cellphone usage)
• Some evidence of adrenal gland tumors in male rats, both benign and malignant tumors and/or complex combined pheochromocytoma
• Equivocal or unclear evidence of tumors in female rats and mice of both genders

The studies also found evidence of:

• Low body weight in female rats and newborns exposed to high levels of radiation during pregnancy and lactation
• DNA damage and damage to heart tissue in exposed male and female rats, but not mice
• Prostate, liver and pancreatic tumors in both rats and mice

Are Humans at Risk?
According to The New York Times:9

“‘We believe that the link between radio-frequency radiation and tumors in male rats is real,’ John Bucher, a senior scientist at the National Toxicology Program, said in a statement.

But he cautioned that the exposure levels and durations were far greater than what people typically encounter, and thus cannot ‘be compared directly to the exposure that humans experience’ …

The lowest level of radiation in the federal study was equal to the maximum exposure that federal regulations allow for cellphone users … The highest level was four times higher than the permitted maximum.”

While the NTP insists the exposure — nine hours a day for two years, which is the lifetime of a rodent — is far more extensive than that of heavy cellphone users, I would strongly disagree, seeing how many, especially the younger generation, have their cellphones turned on and near their body 24/7.
Many are literally sleeping with their phone beneath their pillow. What’s more, cellphones are not the sole source of radiofrequency (RF) EMFs. Wi-Fi and Bluetooth-enabled tablets, computers, smart TVs, wireless baby monitors, cordless phones, smart appliances, smart meters and nearby cellular phone basestations are sources of similarly harmful radiation, and most of us are exposed 24/7. So, my guess is that the duration of RF-EMF exposure is actually far greater than the one tested in the study.
Did NTP Minimize Press Coverage of Their Report?
According to Microwave News, the NTP may have purposely minimized press coverage of its final report, which upgraded the risks. “Reporters were given very little notice to join the NTP teleconference on the release of the report. Nor was there much time to prepare a story for publication,” Microwave News reports,10 adding they were not informed of the teleconference via email until 10:45 a.m. October 31.
The conference was held at 2 p.m. that same day. While NTP refused to state how many reporters were on the call, the transcript reveals only eight reporters asked questions, giving the impression that many likely missed the advisory. Editors also had precious little time to assign a reporter to cover the story. Microwave News adds:

“The news that the NTP now believes the cancer link is “real” was under embargo until the next day, November 1. That gave the news media less than 24 hours to prepare their stories, an unusually short time for a technically complex subject. The main reason for embargoes is to give reporters time to do their homework and prepare a clear and accurate write-up …

Even the fact that the report was coming out in less than a day was embargoed by the NTP. It apparently wanted no advance notice of any kind … There was one exception among major media outlets: The New York Times … As it happened, [William] Broad, a long-time member of the science desk, was already working on the story. He was making background calls a week earlier …

There’s a long history of New York Times science reporters — Broad included — downplaying, if not outright dismissing, news of electromagnetic health effects. Anyone wanting to conceal the fact that NTP had found ‘clear evidence’ that cellphone radiation could lead to cancer would likely leak the story to the Times. And the Times delivered.

Here’s the headline from its web site: ‘Study of Cellphone Risks Finds ‘Some Evidence’ of Link to Cancer, at Least in Male Rats’ … [T]here is the obvious error in the headline: NTP found more than ‘some evidence’ — it saw ‘clear evidence’ … The subhead … ‘Many Caveats Apply, and the Results Involve Radio Frequencies Long Out of Routine Use,’ offers additional — unjustifiable — reasons to discount the NTP finding.”

The New York Times also claims the results are out of date due to the fact they used 2G, which is no longer in widespread use, and that 3G, 4G and 5G are “far less successful at penetrating the bodies of humans” due to the higher frequencies. However, there’s no evidence to suggest the newer technologies are safer. Quite the contrary. As noted by Microwave News:

“Two different German labs have exposed mice to 3G. Cancer promotion was found in each case. The lead author of the second study, Alex Lerchl, concluded that 3G signals ‘obviously enhance the growth of tumors’ … The fact is that we don’t know whether the higher G’s are any safer than 2G. Believing so is simply wishful thinking.”

The NTP also downplayed the risks by stressing that “high exposure” was associated with cancer in male rats, when in fact the results in some instances revealed a greater effect at a lower dose.
Such nonlinear dose response was also found in Lerchl’s study, in which a dose 50 times lower than the highest dose resulted in a greater response. “At this point, one can only guess where the threshold for RF effects may be. It could be lower than now commonly believed, possibly much lower,” Microwave News notes.

Why Evidence of Rodent Schwannomas Could Spell Trouble for Human Health
As explained by Louis Slesin, Ph.D., editor and publisher of Microwave News, the increased incidence of schwannomas in rodents exposed to radiofrequencies is of great concern for public health:11

“Schwann cells play a key role in the functioning of the peripheral nervous system. They make the myelin sheath, which insulates nerve fibers and helps speed the conduction of electrical impulses. There are Schwann cells just about everywhere there are peripheral nerve fibers. They are present in most organs of the body — whether mice, rats or humans.

Schwann cell tumors are called schwannomas. The NTP found schwannomas in many other organs, in addition to the heart, of rats chronically exposed to cellphone radiation. These included a variety of glands (pituitary, salivary and thymus), the trigeminal nerve and the eye … The NTP also saw schwannomas in the uterus, ovary and vagina of female rats.

The brain has no Schwann cells — the brain is part of the central nervous system. There, glial cells play a similar function. In fact, Schwann cells are a type of glial cell … Tumors of the glial cells are called gliomas. The NTP also saw an increase in glioma among the male rats exposed to GSM and CDMA radiation …

While schwannomas and gliomas are commonly noncancerous tumors, they can develop into malignant schwannomas or glioblastomas … The implication is that instead of searching for consistency in radio frequencies’ ability to cause cancer in specific organs, the emphasis should now be on specific cell types — beginning with Schwann cells in the periphery and glial cells in the brain.”

Mitochondrial Dysfunction Is the Primary Hazard of Cellphone Radiation
In my view, the primary hazard of cellphone radiation is not brain cancer per se but rather systemic cellular and mitochondrial damage,12,13,14,15 which can contribute to any number of health problems and chronic diseases. The process begins when low-frequency microwave radiation activates voltage-gated calcium channels (VGCCs)16 — channels in the outer membrane of your cells.
Once activated, the VGCCs open up, allowing an abnormal influx of calcium ions into the cell. This increased intracellular calcium and the accompanying increase in calcium signaling appears to be responsible for a majority of the damage that occurs. This is reviewed in more detail in my interview with professor Martin Pall below.
For example, excess calcium activates nitric oxide, and while nitric oxide has many health benefits, massively excessive nitric oxide reacts with superoxide to produce peroxynitrites — extremely potent oxidant stressors.17 Peroxynitrites in turn:

Can cause single-strand DNA breaks18
Modify tyrosine molecules in proteins to create nitrotyrosine and nitration of structural protein.19 Changes from nitration are visible in human biopsy of atherosclerosis, myocardial ischemia, inflammatory bowel disease, amyotrophic lateral sclerosis and septic lung disease20

This pathway of oxidative destruction — triggered by low-frequency radiation emitted from mobile devices — may partially explain the unprecedented growth rate of chronic disease since 1990,21 and is a far greater concern than brain tumors.

Download Interview Transcript

Heart Problems, Neurological Disorders and Infertility Are Risks of EMF Exposure
While an estimated 80,000 U.S. men, women and children are diagnosed with a brain tumor each year,22 another 787,000 people die from heart disease.23 So, while the relative rarity of brain cancer may lead you to believe that cellphone use is safe, that’s only because you’re looking at a less prevalent outcome.
Cellphone radiation has also been shown to have a significant impact on neurological and mental health,24 contributing to and/or worsening anxiety, depression and dementia, for example, and all of these conditions are rampant and growing more prevalent. (This also makes sense as brain dysfunction will occur much faster than a tumor, which can take decades.)
Research also suggests excessive EMF exposure is contributing to reproductive problems. For example, researchers have found prenatal exposure to power-frequency fields can nearly triple a pregnant woman’s risk of miscarriage.25
According to lead author and senior research scientist at Kaiser Permanente’s research division, Dr. De-Kun Li,26 “This study provides fresh evidence, directly from a human population, that magnetic field exposure in daily life could have adverse health impacts,” adding his findings “should bring attention to this potentially important environmental hazard to pregnant women.”
According to Li, there are at least six other studies, in addition to two of his own, showing this link.27,28,29,30,31 EMF exposure may also play a significant role in testicular cancer and male infertility.
Studies have linked low-level electromagnetic radiation exposure from cellphones to an 8 percent reduction in sperm motility and a 9 percent reduction in sperm viability.32,33 Wi-Fi equipped laptop computers have also been linked to decreased sperm motility and an increase in sperm DNA fragmentation after just four hours of use.34
US Food and Drug Administration Stands Firm on Cellphone Safety
NTP’s final report has now been given to the U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA) and the Federal Communications Commission (FCC), the two agencies involved in the regulation of cellphones and assessment of health risks. Unfortunately, the FDA appears unwilling to change its stance on cellphone safety.
This is no surprise as the telecommunication industry has far more political lobbying influence than Big Pharma and Big Food combined. To expect anything other than full support for the telecommunication industry would be irrational.
In a November 1 press statement, Dr. Jeffrey Shuren, director of the FDA’s Center for Devices and Radiological Health, reaffirmed the agency’s position, saying:35

“The Food and Drug Administration is charged with ensuring cellphones — and any radiation-emitting electronic product — are safe for the public to use. Our scientific expertise and input, along with other health agencies, are used by the [FCC] to set the standards for exposure limits of radiation from cellphones, called radiofrequency energy …

We reviewed the recently finalized research conducted by our colleagues at the [NTP] … [W]e disagree, however, with the conclusions of their final report regarding ‘clear evidence’ of carcinogenic activity in rodents exposed to radiofrequency energy.

In the NTP study, researchers looked at the effects of exposing rodents to extremely high levels of radiofrequency throughout the entire body. This is commonly done in these types of hazard identification studies and means that the study tested levels of radiofrequency energy exposures considerably above the current whole body safety limits for cell phones … [T]hese findings should not be applied to human cell phone usage.

NTP hosted a three-day peer review of this study in March, as part of their normal process for issuing scientific reports … which included an assessment of the study methods and data by a panel of 15 peer reviewers to determine the basis of evidence for the final report.

Based on their assessment, the panel voted to upgrade the conclusions from some evidence to clear evidence for malignant heart schwannomas in male rats, and from equivocal (ambiguous) to some evidence for malignant gliomas of the brain and benign tumors of the adrenal gland in male rats. It’s important to note that the vote does not mean new data or findings were reported in the final assessment …

Based on our ongoing evaluation of this issue, the totality of the available scientific evidence continues to not support adverse health effects in humans caused by exposures at or under the current radiofrequency energy exposure limits. We believe the existing safety limits for cellphones remain acceptable for protecting the public health.”

NTP Findings Have Already Been Reproduced, and at Power Levels Below FCC Limits
While the FDA insists it “must thoroughly evaluate and take into consideration the totality of the data, and do so within the context of the complete body of evidence rather than drawing conclusions from the results of a single study,” it fails to address the elephant in the room, which is the corroborating evidence published by the Ramazzini Institute just one month after the NTP released its preliminary report in February 2018.
The Ramazzini study36 reproduces and clearly supports the NTP’s findings, showing a clear link between cellphone radiation and Schwann cell tumors (schwannomas)37,38,39 — but at a much lower power level than that used by NTP.
While NTP used radiofrequency (RF) levels comparable to what’s emitted by 2G and 3G cellphones (near-field exposure), Ramazzini simulated exposure to cellphone towers (far-field exposure). Ramazzini’s rats were exposed to 1.8 GHz GSM radiation at electric field strengths of 5, 25 and 50 volts per meter40 for 19 hours a day, starting at birth until the rats died either from age or illness.
To facilitate comparison, the researchers converted their measurements to watts per kilogram of body weight (W/kg), which is what the NTP used. Overall, the radiation dose administered in the Ramazzini study was up to 1,000 times lower than the NTP’s — and below the U.S. limits set by the FCC — yet the results are strikingly similar.
As in the NTP studies, exposed male rats developed statistically higher rates of heart schwannomas than unexposed rats. They also found some evidence, although weaker, that RF exposure increased rates of glial tumors in the brains of female rats.
The fact that the Ramazzini study used a radiation dose well below FCC limits yet still reproduced the NTP’s findings of cancer really weakens the FDA’s claims of safety.

Telling Trend: Silicon Valley Founders Don’t Want Their Own Kids to Use the Technology They Created
The good news is that after more than a decade of mounting warnings, many are finally starting to take cellphone exposure seriously — at least as it pertains to their kids. Adults still struggle to curb their own cellphone and computer use, but at least minimizing exposure to children is a step in the right direction, and in my view a really crucial one.
The New York Times recently reported on the trend among Silicon Valley parents to forbid the use of tablets, computers, cellphones and TVs by their young children, and nannies are increasingly having to sign contracts to that end. New York Times contributor Nellie Bowles writes:41

“Even a little screen time can be so deeply addictive, some parents believe, that it’s best if a child neither touches nor sees any of these glittering rectangles. These particular parents, after all, deeply understand their allure … Enter the Silicon Valley nanny, who each day returns to the time before screens.

‘Usually a day consists of me being allowed to take them to the park, introduce them to card games,’ said Jordin Altmann, 24, a nanny in San Jose, of her charges. ‘Board games are huge. Almost every parent I work for is very strong about the child not having any technical experience at all … In the last two years, it’s become a very big deal’ …

The fear of screens has reached the level of panic in Silicon Valley. Vigilantes now post photos to parenting message boards of possible nannies using cellphones near children. Which is to say, the very people building these glowing hyper-stimulating portals have become increasingly terrified of them …

‘The people who are closest to tech are the most strict about it at home,’ said Lynn Perkins, the CEO of UrbanSitter, which she says has 500,000 sitters in the network throughout the United States. ‘We see that trend with our nannies very clearly.’”

Take Safety Precautions to Lower Your Family’s EMF Exposure

> > > > > Click Here

By Dr. Mercola
Worldwide, 5 billion people now have cellphones, which represents about two-thirds of the people on the planet.1 Since their inception, concerns have been raised that holding these radiation-emitting devices so close to our bodies, for so many hours a day, could cause health problems, including cancer. One of the latest studies to date, conducted in England and involving an analysis of more than 79,000 malignant brain tumors, has only added to the accumulating evidence that cellphones may be carcinogenic.
The study, published in the Journal of Environmental and Public Health, revealed a rise in glioblastoma multiforme, an aggressive brain tumor, in England from 1995 to 2015.2 Incidence rates more than doubled from 2.4 to 5 per 100,000 people during the study period, an increase the study authors say cannot be fully explained by random chance or improvement in diagnostic techniques.
“The percentage rise is similar across the age groups, which suggests widespread environmental or lifestyle factors may be responsible,” according to the researchers, with cellphones being a prime culprit. Other sources of radiation exposure, such as X-rays, CT scans and testing of atomic bombs, were also listed as potential causative factors, but Alasdair Philips, the study’s lead author and a trustee of Children with Cancer UK, told CNN, “ … cellphones seem like really they’re the most likely cause.”3
$25 Million Cellphone Studies Yield ‘Clear’ Evidence of Cancer Link
The finding that glioblastoma multiforme cancers have more than doubled in England in the last two decades — a time when cellphone usage has skyrocketed — comes on the heels of evidence suggesting radiation from cellphones may cause tumors in rats. The findings stem from two government-funded studies conducted by the National Toxicology Program (NTP), an interagency research program currently under the umbrella of the National Institute of Environmental Health Sciences.4
The $25 million research involved both mice and rats, which were exposed to cellphone radiation for nine hours a day for two years — close to average life span for these rodents. Most concerning, male rats were more likely to develop tumors in their heart known as malignant schwannomas, which are, according to The New York Times, “similar to acoustic neuromas, a benign tumor in people involving the nerve that connects the ear to the brain, which some studies have linked to cellphone use.”5
In making their conclusions, NTP uses the labels “clear evidence,” “some evidence,” “equivocal evidence” and “no evidence.” They found “clear evidence” that exposure to cellphone radiation led to heart tumors in the male rates, along with “some evidence” that it caused brain tumors in the rats.6 In addition, a National Institutes of Health (NIH) press release explained:7

“Researchers also noted increases in an unusual pattern of cardiomyopathy, or damage to heart tissue, in exposed male and female rats. … The reports also point out statistically significant increases in the number of rats and mice with tumors found in other organs at one or more of the exposure levels studied, including the brain, prostate gland, pituitary gland, adrenal gland, liver and pancreas.”

Despite this, they deemed the findings equivocal, which means they believed it was unclear whether the increases in tumors were due to the exposure to radiofrequency radiation (RFR), and noted that they used levels and duration of RFR exposure that were much greater than what people would typically be exposed to with cellphone use.
Yet, a lifetime exposure study published by the highly respected Ramazzini Institute in Italy duplicated NTP’s findings, showing a clear link between cellphone radiation and schwannomas — despite using power levels that were up to 1,000 times lower than those used in the NTP studies.8
In 2011, the International Agency for Research on Cancer (IARC) classified cellphones as a Group 2B “possible carcinogen,” but the Ramazzini researchers are urging the IARC to re-evaluate this. According to Fiorella Belpoggi, director of research at the Ramazzini Institute and the study’s lead author, radiofrequency (RF) radiation from cellphones should probably be classified as a “probable” human carcinogen rather than a “possible” carcinogen.9
Scientific Advisory Panel Concludes Cellphones May Cause Greater Risk Than Initially Acknowledged
When the NTP studies’ draft report was first released, it was largely downplayed by public health agencies, including the U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA) and the American Cancer Society, which stated the results were inconclusive. A scientific advisory panel, which met to review the research, was expected to greenlight the largely whitewashed conclusions but ended up coming up with a much starker warning that cellphones can be clearly linked to cancer in rats.
One thing that caught the panel’s eye was the type of tumor that occurred in the rats; heart tissue tumors are not only rare in rats but also are the same form of cancer that’s previously been seen in some people who’ve used cellphones at high power settings for years, according to NTP senior scientist John Bucher.10
In addition to finding that exposure to RF from cellphones can cause heart tissue cancer in male rats, the panelists concluded that cellphone radiation may also be linked to brain cancer in rats. Ronald Melnick, a retired NTP scientist who was part of the team that created the study’s design nearly a decade ago, told The News & Observer the findings “should most likely lead to a reduction in exposure limits” and could prompt public officials “not to promote the use of some of these radio-frequency emitting devices for kids.”11
Study After Study Indicating Real Danger of Cellphones

The ramifications of an increased risk of cancer from cellphone use are immense on a global scale. The primary origin of disease processes attributed to electromagnetic field (EMF) radiation exposure is related to mitochondrial damage triggered by the reactive nitrogen species peroxynitrites. Devices that consistently emit EMF radiation at levels that damage your mitochondria include your cellphone, cellphone towers, Wi-Fi router and modems.
An increase in peroxynitrites in your body has been associated with an increased level of systemic inflammation and, most importantly, mitochondrial dysfunction. Please see my interview with Martin Pall, Ph.D., above, who discovered this mechanism of harm, for a more in-depth discussion of this vital leading-edge information. Pall published research12 showing that low-frequency microwave radiation activates voltage-gated calcium channels (VGCCs) — channels in the outer membrane of your cells.13
Once activated, the VGCCs open up, allowing an abnormal influx of calcium ions into the cell, which activates nitric oxide (NO). NO is the only molecule in your body produced at high enough concentrations to outcompete other molecules for superoxide and is a precursor for peroxynitrite.14 These potent oxidant stressors are thought to be a root cause for many of today’s chronic diseases and may be an even bigger concern than brain tumors.
According to Pall’s theory, the physical locations where VGCCs are the densest are indicative of the diseases you might expect from chronic excessive exposure to EMFs. As it turns out, the highest density of VGCCs are found in your nervous system, the pacemaker in your heart and in male testes. As a result, EMFs are likely to contribute to neurological and neuropsychiatric problems, heart and reproductive problems.
Does Coming 5G Raise More Concerns?
You may have heard about the 5G, or “5th Generation,” wireless network that the industry is rallying behind, touting it as a way to create faster internet and streaming services and provide better cellphone coverage. 5G relies primarily on the bandwidth of the millimeter wave (MMW), which has been linked to health problems from eye and heart problems to pain and immune system effects, and are known to penetrate 1 to 2 millimeters of human skin tissue.15
Unlike the “4th Generation” (4G) technology currently in use, which relies on huge 90-foot cell towers with about a dozen antenna ports on each, the 5G system uses “small cell” facilities or bases, each with about 100 antenna ports each.16
Once it’s installed in your neighborhood, you won’t have a choice to opt out of 5G exposure, which is concerning, since research compiled by EMF coach and author Lloyd Burrell17 shows the proliferation of 5G for the sake of faster internet could be a public health disaster. For instance, the frequencies utilized by 5G have been linked to:18

Lens opacity in rats, which is linked to the production of cataracts
Impacted heart rate variability, and indicator of stress, in rats
Heart rate changes (arrhythmias) in frogs
Immune system effects in healthy mice

While MMWs have not been widely used before, it’s already been suggested that sweat ducts in human skin act as antennae when they come in contact with MMWs.19 Further, in 2017, more than 180 doctors and scientists from 35 countries signed a petition to enact a moratorium on the rollout of 5G due to potential health risks, including increased cancer risk, cellular stress, genetic damages, reproductive problems and neurological disorders.20
Reducing Your Risk of Cellphone Radiation Damage
RF-EMF exposure is a significant health hazard of the 21st century, one that I believe each of us should take seriously. If you want to get involved in keeping 5G out of your community, please contact your legislators to voice your opinion. Parents for Safe Technology has compiled a list of U.S. agencies you can contact about this important issue for the health and safety of future generations. In the meantime, here are several suggestions that will help reduce your RF-EMF exposure starting today:

Connect your desktop computer to the internet via a wired Ethernet connection and be sure to put your desktop in airplane mode. Also avoid wireless keyboards, trackballs, mice, game systems, printers and portable house phones. Opt for the wired versions.

If you must use Wi-Fi, shut it off when not in use, especially at night when you are sleeping. Ideally, work toward hardwiring your house so you can eliminate Wi-Fi altogether. If you have a notebook without any Ethernet ports, a USB Ethernet adapter will allow you to connect to the internet with a wired connection.

Filter dirty electricity with appropriate filters using meters

Use a battery-powered alarm clock, ideally one without any light. I use a talking clock for the visually impaired.21

If you still use a microwave oven, consider replacing it with a steam convection oven, which will heat your food as quickly and far more safely.

Avoid using “smart” appliances and thermostats that depend on wireless signaling. This would include all new “smart” TVs. They are called smart because they emit a Wi-Fi signal and, unlike your computer, you cannot shut the Wi-Fi signal off. Consider using a large computer monitor as your TV instead, as they don’t emit Wi-Fi.

Refuse smart meters as long as you can, or add a shield to an existing smart meter, some of which have been shown to reduce radiation by 98 to 99 percent.22

Consider moving your baby’s bed into your room instead of using a wireless baby monitor. Alternatively, use a hard-wired monitor.

Replace CFL bulbs with incandescent bulbs. Ideally remove all fluorescent lights from your house. Not only do they emit unhealthy light, but more importantly, they will actually transfer current to your body just being close to the bulbs.

Avoid carrying your cellphone on your body unless in airplane mode and never sleep with it in your bedroom unless it is in airplane mode. Even in airplane mode it can emit signals, which is why I put my phone in a Faraday bag.23

When using your cellphone, use the speaker phone and hold the phone at least 3 feet away from you. Seek to radically decrease your time on the cellphone. I typically use my cellphone less than 30 minutes a month, and mostly when traveling. Instead, use VoIP software phones that you can use while connected to the internet via a wired connection.

By Dr. Mercola
If you’re one who swoons over chocolate, you may be pleased to know there may be a scientific reason for it. In fact, researchers say potent compounds in dark chocolate as well as blueberries may contain secrets to staying youthful. Scientists from Exeter University in England, supported by colleagues at Brighton University, identified the compounds as a “secret” wrinkle-fighting substance because they help rejuvenate old cells.
In fact, lab research showed old cells both looking and “behaving” like younger cells, actually resuming dividing.1 Professor Lorna Harries, a director of research at Exeter and lead author in the study, explained that using plant chemicals effectively “switched back on” the major class of genes that switch off as you age, which may be used as a means to restore the function of old cells.
When lab scientists applied natural compounds found in red grapes, red wine, chocolate and blueberries, specifically antioxidant, anti-inflammatory flavonoids, the compounds were found to have longer telomeres, which are the “caps” on chromosomes that shorten as you get older.

“When we age, the strands of DNA in our cells gradually lose the protective telomeres, which … act like the plastic tips at the end of shoelaces … Within hours of treatment, with these so-called resveratrol analogues, the older cells started to divide, and had longer telomeres.”2

Eva Latorre, a research associate who conducted the experiments, said she couldn’t believe it when she noticed the extent of the cell rejuvenation and how quickly it took place. “These old cells were looking like young cells. It was like magic.”3 She repeated the experiment several times, and the same cell changes took place every time.

Latorre said she’s excited by the implications and potential for the research, which was published in the journal BMJ Cell Biology.4 Harries said the scientists hope it can be used not only to promote normal lifespans for people, but also to help them be healthy throughout their entire life.
Old Research, New Discoveries
One reason researchers found their study so exciting was because it built on earlier anti-aging experiments that had focused on a class of genes called splicing factors (which play a significant role in helping your genes operate as they should, but progressively “switch off “as you age) as well as a group of dysfunctional cells called senescent, which build up in your tissues as you get older.
Old cells lose their ability to correctly regulate the output of their genes, which is why your tissues and cells become increasingly susceptible to disease as aging progresses. When they’re activated, genes send messages instructing your cells to behave in certain ways. Most genes send more than one message, which partially explains why splicing factors are so crucial for ensuring genes perform functions, or a series of functions, properly.
An example might be the range of functions needed, as well as whether it’s necessary, to grow new blood vessels, and it’s the splicing factors that make the determination. In the featured study, the application of resveratrol analogues, found in foods such as red wine, dark chocolate, red grapes and blueberries, allowed the splicing factors to switch back on and simultaneously reversed signs of ageing.
According to Science Daily, “As people age, the splicing factors tend to work less efficiently or not at all, restricting the ability of cells to respond to challenges in their environment.” In addition:

“The discovery has the potential to lead to therapies which could help people age better, without experiencing some of the degenerative effects of getting old. Most people by the age of 85 have experienced some kind of chronic illness, and as people get older they are more prone to stroke, heart disease and cancer.”5

Harries explained the study demonstrated that when you treat old cells with the molecules that will restore the abilities of splicing factors, the cells take on some of their former youthful aspects. They’re able to grow and the telomeres are longer, as they were when they were younger. However, while the possibilities are exciting for the scientific world to contemplate, Harries stresses that “far more research is needed to establish the true potential for these sort of approaches to address the degenerative effects of ageing.”6
So What’s the Science Behind the Secret?
The so-called “secret” compound is one that’s gained international attention in recent years. Multiple studies have indicated that resveratrol, or, as the study couched the term, “resveralogues,” has beneficial effects on senescence phenotypes through other pathways, such as SIRT1 activity.7 Further, studies have shown resveratrol to modulate the ERK signaling pathway, which is another potential regulator of splicing factor expression, as well as to suppress cellular senescence.8 Interestingly, the authors wrote:

“SIRT1 is also a current target for drug design and for nutraceutical interventions and is known also to be activated by resveratrol. We suggest that focusing on SIRT1 activity alone may be misleading and that other pathways activated by resveralogues may be more important in alleviating senescence and improving health outcomes in later life.”9

While the aspects and potency of the compounds specifically found in blueberries, red grapes and chocolate are exciting, it’s worth mentioning that the Exeter researchers note: “There is already considerable interest in the development of drugs that can attenuate senescence for eventual human use,” adding:

“The renewal of proliferation we observe upon resveralogue treatment obviously raises questions about the potential cancer risk attached to such treatment, should it eventually be employed in a clinical setting. We propose that the renewed proliferation arises from a transient increase in telomerase activity brought about by the induction of specific splicing factor proteins, and that the growth is still regulated.”10

The scientists added that these observations from resveratrol treatments were suggested to have “a protective effect against cancer in both humans and rodent models.”11,12
Significant Compounds in Curcumin
While you may be tempted to get your daily “dose” of resveratrol by overindulging in red wine, there are other foods that contain similarly powerful anti-inflammatory compounds, like curcumin. Curcumin is a powerful compound found primarily in the spice turmeric.
One study highlighted curcumin, along with resveratrol and flavonoids, in light of their ability to beneficially impact a variety of ailments. The “notion” that these plant-based foods could be responsible for disease intervention couldn’t be ignored, particularly for cancer, cardiovascular, neurological, respiratory and age-related diseases. Additionally:

“Exposure of the body to a stressful environment challenges cell survival and increases the risk of chronic disease developing. The polyphenols afford protection against various stress-induced toxicities through modulating intercellular cascades which inhibit inflammatory molecule synthesis, the formation of free radicals, nuclear damage and induce antioxidant enzyme expression. These responses have the potential to increase life expectancy.”13

The same study concluded that these three compounds also have anti-inflammatory, cell- and DNA-protective properties. So limit your consumption of red wine and instead opt for curcumin, resveratrol and flavonoid-rich whole foods to fight inflammation and premature aging.
Antioxidants: Not Just a Buzzword
As the name suggests, antioxidants are the compounds that combat oxidation, a chemical process that can cause serious damage to the cells throughout your body. You may have guessed that blueberries and dark chocolate both contain antioxidants, but the fact is, their strength in these two foods can be described as impressive.
To explain the damaging aspects of oxidation, many scientists use the metaphor of a rusty bicycle or an apple that’s cut in half starting to turn brown. In a very real sense, that’s similar to what happens in your body when you smoke, work or live in a high-stress environment and/or eat a diet based largely on processed foods. The Atlantic explains:

“When there are disruptions in the natural oxidation process, highly unstable and potentially damaging molecules called free radicals are created. Oxygen triggers the formation of these destructive little chemicals, and, if left uncontrolled, they can cause damage to cells in the body.”14

That’s where antioxidants come in, as some foods contain high amounts of antioxidants to fight the damage free radicals make in your body, and one reason why resveratrol is such a potent compound.
Flavonoids for Improved Brain Function and Decreased Disease Risk
Then there are flavonoids, and blueberries are famous for having a lot. One function of flavonoids is that they’ve been shown to be the element that improved brain function in clinical trials. In fact, one study found that when a group of elderly adults drank blueberry juice daily, blood flow to the brain increased and their cognitive function improved.15
Exeter was also the site of this study, after which lead author Joanna Bowtell, associate professor of sport and health sciences, explained in NutraIngredients, “Epidemiological studies demonstrate that risk of dementia is reduced by higher fruit intake, and cognitive function is better in healthy older adults with a diet rich in plant-based foods.”16
While flavonoids are found in most fruits and vegetables, nuts, seeds and green and black tea also contain these nutrients, specifically, as well as anthocyanins, which is where the deep color comes from. Red wine was included in the study, but should only be consumed in moderation.17 Multiple studies regale the protective exploits of deep-hued foods like red grapes and blueberries. The polyphenols they contain are natural plant chemicals that benefit every area of your body, including your brain, heart, skin, bones and gut.
At the same time function in these areas is improved and protected, blood pressure is normalized,18 inflammation is reduced, blood sugar levels are stabilized, your bones are built up19 and insulin resistance is lowered. Here’s another benefit: Flavonoids may help with erectile dysfunction. One study showed an 11 percent to 16 percent lower risk in men younger than 70 if they ate several foods rich in flavonoids.20
The George Mateljan Foundation, a not-for-profit dedicated to healthy eating and cooking, notes that flavonoids support your nervous system, contribute to heart health and significantly “block the production of messaging molecules that promote inflammation.”21
Who Doesn’t Love Chocolate or Its Brain-Boosting Power?
In dark chocolate, flavonoids are also abundant. One of them is in the form of epicatechin, which is also beneficial for optimal brain function, particularly for learning and memory, lowering your Alzheimer’s risk as well as improving mood and emotional stress, benefiting your vascular system and decreasing your stroke risk, one study notes.22 The European Journal of Clinical Nutrition published a list of the top 100 polyphenols, and cocoa powder ranked number four with 3,448 milligrams in every 100 grams.23
Believe it or not, polyphenol benefits include boosting healthy gut bacteria for an overall improved gut microbiome, which you can benefit from by eating certain foods containing dark chocolate. Your bones benefit, too, so your risk of osteoporosis decreases.24 The caveat is that dark chocolate is the “good” chocolate because it doesn’t have the milk products and sugar that, obviously, milk chocolate contains.
Raw cacao nibs are one of the best choices, which can be eaten whole or ground into powder for use in recipes. When selecting chocolate, look for higher cacao and lower sugar content.

What you eat may not be something your doctor addresses as a significant option for crucial aspects of longevity and disease prevention, but the compounds that provide the most benefits are found in whole foods like blueberries and dark chocolate. If you choose foods that can provide better health as well as help prevent disease, you’ll feel and function better, and will most likely live longer.

By Dr. Mercola
Chronic fatigue syndrome (CFS) is a debilitating condition that affects up to 2.5 million Americans,1 incurring up to $51 billion in annual medical costs.2 There are actually a number of different names used for this condition, including myalgic encephalopathy/myalgic encephalomyelitis (ME), post-viral fatigue syndrome (PVFS) and chronic fatigue immune dysfunction syndrome (CFIDS).3 The most common designation is ME/CFS.
Without an ability to pinpoint a cause, many physicians have credited the condition to psychological roots. Reports of the condition were first published in the literature in 1934.4 It has only been very recently that researchers have found physiological commonalities between groups of individuals that has separated their symptoms from other comparable conditions.
Diagnostic changes have been discovered in gut bacteria and in brain tissue of individuals suffering from symptoms of ME/CFS. Now, scientists have found biomarkers in blood that correlate with ME/CFS symptoms. This combination of information puts researchers one step closer to finding a causative agent, and potentially improving treatment options.
What Is Chronic Fatigue Syndrome?
Researchers have not found a reason for the symptoms of ME/CFS. A significant hurdle is the fact that symptoms can vary widely from one person to the next. However, the most common symptom is one of overwhelming exhaustion that gets worse with physical or mental activity, and does not get better with additional rest.5 Interestingly, you may not experience the full extent of the exhaustion until up to 48 hours after the activity.
Complications from the symptoms may also include depression, social isolation, increasing absences at work and lifestyle restrictions that are related to an inability to function at your activities of daily living.6
The condition affects people of all socioeconomic, ethnic and racial groups as well as people of all ages.7 However, more people report symptoms in their 40s and 50s and women report symptoms four times more frequently than men. The way in which people who suffer from ME/CFS is not described completely by a simple list of symptoms. David Tuller, coordinator at the University of California (UC), Berkeley writes:8

“In an interview with The New York Times earlier this year, best-selling author Laura Hillenbrand (‘Seabiscuit,’ ‘Unbroken’), who has lived with CFS for decades, called the name of the illness ‘condescending’ and ‘so grossly misleading.’ She added: ‘The average person who has this disease, before they got it, we were not lazy people; it’s very typical that people were Type A and hard, hard workers …

Fatigue is what we experience, but it is what a match is to an atomic bomb. This disease leaves people bedridden. I’ve gone through phases where I couldn’t roll over in bed. I couldn’t speak. To have it called ‘fatigue’ is a gross misnomer.'”

Symptoms of the condition may mimic other medical conditions necessitating a diagnosis by excluding other health conditions, such as thyroid disorders, sleep disorders and kidney or liver problems.9 These additional symptoms may include:10,11,12

✓ Muscle pain
✓ Sore throat
✓ Tender lymph nodes
✓ Short attention span

✓ Palpitations
✓ Enlarged glands
✓ Food intolerance
✓ Memory problems

✓ Irritable bowel-like symptoms
✓ Pain in multiple joints
✓ Visible muscle twitching
✓ Intermittent flu-like symptoms

✓ Word find problems
✓ Fainting
✓ Mood swings
✓ Gastrointestinal problems

✓ Headaches
✓ Difficulty sleeping
✓ Clumsiness
✓ Alcohol intolerance

✓ Difficulty concentrating
✓ Excessive sweating
✓ Difficulty with temperature control
✓ Hypersensitivity to light and noise

New Study Finds Biomarkers Indicating an Inflammatory Problem
A recent study from Stanford University School of Medicine identified 17 biomarkers in the blood that correlated closely with reported symptom severity in patients suffering from ME/CFS.13 These biomarkers are cytokines, small proteins your immune system secretes that are used by other cells in your body. This new finding offers hope to both sufferers and physicians, as it provides objective evidence and concrete confirmation of the existence of ME/CFS. It may also lead to better treatment options or a cure.
During the study, researchers analyzed blood from over 185 people who suffer from ME/CFS and had suffered symptoms for at least 10 years. These were compared against blood samples of over 385 healthy individuals.14 They tested for 51 different cytokines in all individuals and found two that were significantly different between the groups.
However, in looking more closely at the cytokines tested in the symptomatic group, the researchers also found different levels of 17 cytokines that appeared to correlate with the severity of the symptoms the individual reported. The researchers hypothesized this had not been discovered in prior studies as the high levels of cytokines in some individuals that were low in others, may have canceled out the information.
Of the 17 cytokines identified in this study, 13 are known to be associated with increased levels of inflammation. This confirms a suspicion of some researchers that symptoms of fluctuating flu-like symptoms and body aches associated with ME/CFS is linked to an inflammatory response.15 Senior researcher Mark M. Davis, Ph.D., from Stanford University, commented:16

“There’s been a great deal of controversy and confusion surrounding ME/CFS — even whether it is an actual disease. Our findings show clearly that it’s an inflammatory disease and provide a solid basis for a diagnostic blood test.”

Inflammatory Response May Be Triggered by Leaky Gut
Another recent study from Cornell University found a difference in the gut microbiome of people diagnosed with ME/CFS and a group of healthy individuals.17 This discovery may help shed some light on diagnostic procedures for other health conditions and lead to strategies for treatment and prevention of ME/CFS. The differences the researchers found were evident in both blood and stool samples.
The researchers used DNA sequencing to find a distinct lack of diversity in the gut microbiome of individuals and found inflammatory biomarkers in their blood.18 The changes could not be clearly linked to either a cause or consequence of the condition. Professor of molecular biology and genetics at Cornell University, Maureen Hanson, Ph.D., commented in The Washington Post:19

“Our work demonstrates that the gut bacterial microbiome in chronic fatigue syndrome patients isn’t normal, perhaps leading to gastrointestinal and inflammatory symptoms in victims of the disease. Furthermore, our detection of a biological abnormality provides further evidence against the ridiculous concept that the disease is psychological in origin.”

The researchers theorize these markers could be the result of a “leaky gut from intestinal problems that allow bacteria to enter the blood.”20 A leaky gut is triggered by the development of “gaps” that occur between the membrane walls that line the intestines. This allows material that was meant to stay in your intestinal tract, such as undigested food, bacteria or waste products, to leak into your bloodstream.
There is a distinct link between the development of these gaps and the food you consume each day. Grains are particularly problematic as research demonstrates gluten stimulates zonulin, a protein in your gut that triggers the opening of these junctures.
Legumes and other lectin-rich foods are also best avoided21 if you are struggling with an inflammatory condition such as ME/CFS. Not all people with a leaky gut will develop ME/CFS, but healing and sealing your gut may help to reduce the inflammatory response in your body and result in a reduction in symptoms.
Neurological Changes Also Found in People Suffering From ME/CFS
ME/CFS sufferers also experience changes in the white matter in their brains, another piece of concrete evidence that it’s a real physiological condition.22
Using new technology, imaging studies were used to distinguish differences in the brains of people who suffer from ME/CFS compared to those who don’t. ME/CFS sufferers had both a diminished amount of white matter and changes to the right hemisphere of the brain. Researchers commented in a press release from Stanford Medical Center where this study was also completed:23

“It’s not uncommon for CFS patients to face several mischaracterizations of their condition, or even suspicions of hypochondria, before receiving a diagnosis of CFS. The abnormalities identified in the study … may help to resolve those ambiguities …”

The study exposed three findings:

A reduction in brain white matter responsible for transporting information throughout the brain. This was not unexpected as chronic inflammation has a known effect on white matter.
A consistent abnormal appearance using advanced imaging techniques in patients suffering from ME/CFS in the right hemisphere of the brain, which connects the frontal and temporal lobes.
Thickening of the gray matter in the brain on either end of the white matter between the temporal and frontal lobes, indicating it is highly unlikely the findings were coincidental.

ME/CFS Sufferers Struggle With More Than the Disease
Although the condition is often physically and emotionally devastating, sufferers struggle with many other challenges as well. Lead researcher in the study that demonstrated cytokine biomarkers in the blood of people who suffer from ME/CFS, Dr. Jose Montoya, told NPR News:24

“This is a field that has been full of skepticism and misconception, where patients have been viewed to have invented their disease. These data clearly show the contrary, and demonstrate what can be achieved when we couple good research design with new technology.”

Unfortunately, information from these studies does not quickly reach practicing physicians, and patients continue to be met with resistance and recommendations they improve their physical conditioning based on the PACE trial published in the Lancet,25 which recommends cognitive behavioral therapy and physical exercise to cure patients with ME/CFS.
This study appeared to use a large cohort of patients and underwent peer review before being published. However, after the raw data from the study was released, it revealed several major flaws in the assumptions of the researchers.26
Prior to the study the researchers determined their standards for success, defining “recovery” and “improvement.” However, once the unblinded portion of the study began, the researchers revised the definitions so patients could actually get worse over the course of the study in both fatigue and physical function and still would be classified as being “recovered.”27
Tuller published his analysis of the study results,28 and another recent analysis confirms his evaluation the PACE trial, which he concluded was severely flawed and made poor conclusions.29 The damage to individuals and their families by physician-driven recommendations to increase physical activity and seek psychological care to cure their condition contributes greatly to the emotional and mental burden these people must bear.
In another analysis of this patient population, researchers evaluated any increased risk of death caused by a diagnosis of ME/CFS. While they found no increase in all-cause mortality, there was a significant increased risk of death due to suicide that accompanied a diagnosis of ME/CFS.30
Could Mitochondrial Support Help Reduce Symptoms?
It stands to reason that a condition that triggers an inflammatory response in the body and that results in overwhelming fatigue will respond favorably to lifestyle choices that reduce inflammation and support the function of your mitochondria. These tiny powerhouses are an interconnected network that rapidly and effectively distributes energy throughout your body’s cells.31
In other words, supporting a system that provides energy to all the cells in your body will likely affect many health conditions, not just ME/CFS. Studies of mitochondrial function have increased our understanding of the development of heart disease and other mitochondrial diseases, including cancers.
There are significant challenges to your health when you experience mitochondrial dysfunction. It plays a role in neurodegenerative diseases, seizure disorders, diabetes, hypertension and more. In fact, many of the conditions being treated with toxic drugs could potentially resolve with proper nutritional and lifestyle intervention that addresses the fuel your cells use for energy.
Healthy Support Options to Use at Home
At this time there is no known cure for ME/CFS, but there are methods of supporting your body to alleviate your symptoms,32 including the foods you choose and the decisions you make throughout your day. Each of these choices may not only help reduce your symptoms of ME/CFS, but also may help improve your overall health. Practical changes to your nutritional plan that can help heal your gut and lower inflammation include:

• Avoid gluten and wheat products: Gliadins, a component of gluten, are a class of protein found in wheat and cereals. These proteins increase the permeability of your gut. Keep in mind that gluten can also be found in other grains, not just wheat. Wheat germ agglutinin (WGA) is a lectin, or plant protein found in high concentration in seed form.
Bread wheat is a relatively new form of wheat that has a resilient and problematic form of WGA. It plays a key role in a toxic effect on your kidneys, and there is evidence it increases the damage to your intestinal membrane walls.
• Avoid lectins: Some lectins, including WGA, bind to receptor sites on your intestinal mucosal cells and interfere with absorption of nutrients. As such, they act as “antinutrients,” and can have a detrimental effect on your gut microbiome by shifting the balance of your bacterial flora — a common precursor to leaky gut.
Lectins are also strongly associated with autoimmune diseases of all kinds. To learn more, including which foods are best avoided due to high lectin content, please see “How to Reduce Lectins in Your Diet.”
• Reduce your net carbs: The carbohydrate sugar, like grains, will upset the balance of microbes in your gut. Sugar is the food source for bacteria that can prompt damage to your intestinal walls, while fiber is the food source for bacteria that build your intestinal membranes.
Your net carbs are the total grams of carbohydrates you’ve eaten in a day, minus the grams of fiber you’ve eaten. The difference is your net carbs. Seek to reduce your net carbs to 50 grams per 1,000 calories of food eat each day.
• Increase your fiber intake: The fiber you eat from whole foods is the nutrient source for bacteria in your gut that help maintain and build the membrane cells in your intestinal walls. This helps to seal the “gaps” between the cells and reduces any leakage of waste products and bacteria into your blood stream. Focus on eating whole food vegetables, nuts and seeds (with the exception of lectin-rich varieties).
• Eat fermented foods: Although the idea of eating “fermented” foods may sound distasteful, you might be surprised by the list of tasty delicacies produced through this ancient preparation and preservation technique. By breaking down carbohydrates and proteins using bacteria, foods become functional, delicious and a source of natural probiotics to feed your gut.
Olives, pickles, cheese from grass fed cows, homemade yogurt and sauerkraut are just a few of the foods you may not have considered. Your best bet is to make your own. In this video, Julie and I demonstrate how to make your own fermented vegetables at home.

You can read more about supporting your gut health in my previous article, “Nourishing Your Gut Bacteria is Critical for Health and Mental Well-Being” and how to support your mitochondrial health in “How Your Mitochondria Influence Your Health.”

By Dr. Mercola
Robert Romeo, a former telecommunications worker in Italy, told an Italian court that he used his cellphone three to four hours a day for 15 years as part of his job duties. He subsequently developed a brain tumor, which the court ruled was due to his constant cellphone use. As a result, he was awarded a state-funded pension of about $535 a month.1 In 2012, Italy’s supreme court similarly upheld a ruling that heavy cellphone usage — five to six hours daily for 12 years — led to a brain tumor in Innocenzo Marcolini.
He, according to Tech Times, “normally held the device in his left hand while taking notes using his right hand.” The tumor was on the left side of his head.2 In the U.S., where the safety, or lack thereof, of cellphones remains hotly debated, the issue has regained renewed attention after a statement from the office of Sen. John McCain announced he had been diagnosed with glioblastoma, an aggressive and fast-growing type of brain tumor.
The question being posed is whether McCain’s tumor could be due to cellphone usage, as politicians certainly spend a good deal of time on the phone. It’s a rhetorical question at the moment, not one being seriously investigated — but perhaps it should be. Sen. Ted Kennedy was also diagnosed with, and died from, a brain tumor nearly a decade ago. Could his brain tumor also have been cellphone-related?
Is Cellphone Usage Linked With Brain Tumors?
While the International Agency for Research on Cancer (IARC) has classified radiofrequency (RF) radiation — the type used by cellphones to send signals — as a “possible human carcinogen,” the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) stops short of making such a claim. “There is no scientific evidence that provides a definite answer” to the question of whether using a cellphone can cause cancer, they say.3
Some experts disagree, however, and there is a growing body of evidence that suggests urgent caution is warranted. In 2016, for instance, a National Toxicology Program study exposed male rats to radiofrequency radiation (RFR) at frequencies and modulations used in the U.S. telecommunications industry. Rats exposed to cellphone radiation for about nine hours a day over a two-year period were at increased risk of developing malignant gliomas in the brain and another type of tumor, schwannomas of the heart.4
The study authors noted that, given the widespread usage of cellphones, including among children, “even a very small increase in the incidence of disease resulting from exposure to RFR could have broad implications for public health.” They continued:5

“Lastly, the tumors in the brain and heart observed at low incidence in male rats exposed to … cellphone RFR in this study are of a type similar to tumors observed in some epidemiology studies of cellphone use. These findings appear to support the International Agency for Research on Cancer (IARC) conclusions regarding the possible carcinogenic potential of RFR.”

Meanwhile, a 2017 systematic review and meta-analysis looking at cellphone use and glioma risk — while noting that current evidence is of poor and limited quality — also found that long-term cellphone use (minimum of 10 years) may be associated with an increased risk of glioma.6
Hundreds of Scientists Call on WHO to Increase Protections Against Cellphones
There was an open letter written in 2015, in which more than 200 scientists called on the World Health Organization and the United Nations to increase protection against the pervasive exposure to electromagnetic fields (EMFs), including the RFR from cellphones. It explained, in part:7

“Numerous recent scientific publications have shown that EMF affects living organisms at levels well below most international and national guidelines.

Effects include increased cancer risk, cellular stress, increase in harmful free radicals, genetic damages, structural and functional changes of the reproductive system, learning and memory deficits, neurological disorders, and negative impacts on general well-being in humans. Damage goes well beyond the human race, as there is growing evidence of harmful effects to both plant and animal life.

These findings justify our appeal to the United Nations (U.N.) and, all member States in the world, to encourage the World Health Organization (WHO) to exert strong leadership in fostering the development of more protective EMF guidelines, encouraging precautionary measures, and educating the public about health risks, particularly risk to children and fetal development. By not taking action, the WHO is failing to fulfill its role as the pre-eminent international public health agency.”

Another concerning study, published in 2015, looked at data from two previous case-controlled studies on Swedish patients diagnosed with malignant brain tumors during the periods of 1997 to 2003 and 2007 to 2009.8 The patients were between the ages of 18 and 80 years old at the time of their diagnosis. Using regression analysis, the odds of developing glioma rose concurrently with increased cellphone use.The more hours spent with a cellphone pressed to their ear, and the more years they’d spent using a cellphone, the higher the odds were.

Those who logged the most hours on their cell phones were twice as likely to develop glioma compared to those who logged the least
Those who used either a cellphone or cordless house phone for more than 25 years had triple the risk of glioma compared to those who had used wireless telephones for less than one year

To put this risk ratio into some perspective, just over five people out of 100,000 were diagnosed with malignant brain cancer between 1995 and 2002. If that rate triples, the odds of developing a malignant brain tumor rises to about 16 out of 100,000, which is alarming considering the prevalence of cellphones and other wireless technologies. According to Pew Research Center, 91 percent of U.S. adults have a cellphone.9
Further, the average age a child receives their first smartphone is just over 10 years,10 and half of children under 10 already have a cellphone.11 Children are more vulnerable to the effects of EMFs, and many use their phones more frequently and for longer periods of time each day than adults, starting from the time they’re very young. Because brain tumors may take 10 or 15 years to develop, the full extent of damage from cellphone radiation may not be fully realized for some time, which is why taking precautions now is so important.
The Primary Dangers of Cellphones Are Related to Mitochondrial Damage
The primary pathology behind cellphone damage is not related specifically to brain tumors, or even to cancer. Instead, the real danger lies in damage from the reactive nitrogen species peroxynitrites. Increased peroxynitrites from cellphone exposure will damage your mitochondria, and your brain is the most mitochondrial-dense organ in your body.
Peroxynitrite is an unstable structural ion produced in your body after nitric oxide is exposed to superoxide. This complex chemical process begins with exposure to low-frequency microwave radiation from your cellphone, Wi-Fi and cellphone towers. The process begins when low-frequency microwave radiation activates voltage-gated calcium channels (VGCC), producing calcium inside your cells and mitochondria.12 Nitric oxide is dependent on the presence of calcium to activate.
With additional calcium present, nitric oxide is then activated in the cells.13 Nitric oxide is a substance present in all vertebrates and helps to control blood flow, neural activity and clotting.14 While it has many health benefits, it can become destructive when superoxide molecules, an ionized oxygen molecule, is released during pathological change, such as a stroke or muscle injury.15 This reaction between nitric oxide and superoxide produces peroxynitrites, believed to be one root cause for many of today’s chronic diseases.16
Nitric oxide is the only molecule in your body produced at high enough concentrations to outcompete other molecules for superoxide and is a precursor for peroxynitrite.17 These changes from nitration are visible in human biopsies of atherosclerosis, myocardial ischemia, inflammatory bowel disease, amyotrophic lateral sclerosis and septic lung disease.18 Significant oxidative stress from peroxynitrites may also result in single-strand breaks of DNA.19
This pathway of oxidative destruction triggered by low-frequency radiation emitted from mobile devices may partially explain the unprecedented growth rate of chronic disease since 1990.20 This, truly, is a far greater concern than brain tumors when it comes to the hazards of cellphones.
California’s ‘Unofficial’ Cellphone Guidelines Finally Made Public
To protect public health from the risks of cellphone radiation, California’s Environmental Health Investigations branch developed a set of recommendations and warnings. Despite being written in 2014, the guidelines were only publicly released in March 2017, after a legal battle. Joel Moskowitz, Ph.D., director of the Center for Family and Community Health at the University of California Berkeley, requested access to the information but was denied, so he sued the state under the California Public Records Act — and won.21
What do the guidelines say? For starters, they warn that some studies suggest “long-term cellphone use may increase the risk of brain cancer and other health problems.” They also point out the risks of cellphone EMFs to children, noting that “EMFs can pass deeper into a child’s brain than an adult’s.” In addition, they recommend the following tips to reduce your exposures to EMFs from cellphones:22

Increase the distance between you and your cellphone by using the speaker phone, sending text messages and carrying your phone away from your body
Limit your cellphone use when reception is weak (as your phone will emit stronger EMFs if you have only one or two bars showing)
Reduce the amount of time you spend talking on a cellphone and keep calls short

Protect Yourself and Your Family From Long-Term Health Damage
In terms of reducing your risk of developing a brain tumor, reducing your exposure to RF radiation from cellphones and other devices is important, but keep in mind that there are many other factors at play, like your diet and light exposures, that should also be addressed. For instance, exposure to too much blue light and not enough infrared red, and not burning fat for fuel, can also play a role in cancer development.
As for as cellphone usage is concerned, however, there are strategies you can use to protect yourself from RF radiation emitted from these devices. Remember, your cellphone, portable phone, Wi-Fi router and modem are the primary devices in your home emitting microwave radiation consistently. To protect yourself and your family, get in the habit of using these strategies regularly. Cell damage builds over time. It may feel safe to use your devices as you always have since you don’t experience the health effects immediately, but it definitely is not.

• Keep the phone away from your head
Consider moving your cellphone away from your head when it’s turned on or the Wi-Fi, data or Bluetooth are enabled. You may do this by using a selfie stick, speaking on the speaker phone or using a headset. Short conversations and texting more than talking also reduce your exposure.
• Increase your distance from RF-emitting devices
The closer the device, the more radiation you absorb. Find a way to transport your phone other than in your pants pocket or bra, and avoid keeping your phone and tablets in your bedroom while you’re sleeping.
• Turn off your Wi-Fi routers
When they aren’t in use, such as at night, turn your Wi-Fi, modem and cellphone off. Many routers can be linked with an inexpensive remote, making the process simple and easy.
• Spices may reduce damage
Researchers have discovered certain spices may help prevent or repair damage from peroxynitrites.23,24 Spices rich in phenolics, specifically cloves, rosemary, turmeric, cinnamon and ginger root exhibited some protective capacity against peroxynitrite-induced damage.
However, while this is good news, it is not a reason to ignore strategies that reduce your exposure to electromagnetic radiation, since your home is not the only place you are at risk. Any public venue that hosts Wi-Fi or has a cellular tower nearby increases your exposure to microwave radiation.
As for the widely available devices that you can attach to your phone to block radiation, they do nothing to reduce this radiation exposure. They fail miserably in blocking this energy. They may have some biological benefit in mediating the way this energy interacts with your body, but this is in no way a replacement for the proactive protective measures described above.

By Dr. Mercola

Regardless of your views on the pros and cons of recreational marijuana, the body of scientific evidence about its medicinal value is getting more compelling as additional research is done.
The cannabinoids in cannabis — cannabidiol (CBD) and tetrahydrocannabinol (THC) — interact with your body by way of naturally-occurring cannabinoid receptors embedded in cell membranes throughout your body.

In fact, scientists now believe the endocannabinoid system may represent the most widespread receptor system in your body.1 There are cannabinoid receptors in your brain, lungs, liver, kidneys, immune system and more, and both the therapeutic and psychoactive properties of marijuana occur when a cannabinoid activates a cannabinoid receptor.

Your body actually makes its own cannabinoids, similar to those found in marijuana, albeit in much smaller quantities than you get from the plant. The fact that your body is replete with cannabinoid receptors, key to so many biological functions, is why there’s such enormous medical potential for cannabis.
The whole plant also contains terpenes that have medicinal properties. More often than not, medicinal marijuana is made from plants bred to have high CBD and low THC content. While THC has psychoactive activity that can make you feel “stoned,” CBD has no psychoactive properties. However, recent research shows THC should not be written off completely just because it’s psychoactive. It has valuable therapeutic potential in its own right.
THC May Reverse Aging Process in the Brain

According to recent animal research,2 THC has a beneficial influence on the aging brain.3,4 Rather than dulling or impairing cognition, THC appears to reverse the aging process and improve mental processes, raising the possibility it might be useful for the treatment of dementia in the elderly.5

To test the hypothesis, mice were given a small daily dose of THC over the course of one month at the age of 2 months, 12 months and again at 18 months of age. It is important to understand that mice typically live until 2 years old. The dose was small enough to avoid any psychoactive effects.

Tests assessed the animals’ learning, memory, orientation and recognition skills. Interestingly, 18-month-old mice given THC demonstrated cognitive skills equal to 2-month-old controls, while the placebo group suffered cognitive deterioration associated with normal aging.

According to one of the authors, neurobiology professor Andreas Zimmer, University of Bonn, “The treatment completely reversed the loss of performance in the old animals. We repeated these experiments many times. It’s a very robust and profound effect.” Even more remarkable, gene activity and the molecular profile in the brain tissue was that of much younger animals. Specifically, neurons in the hippocampus grew more synaptic spines — points of contact necessary for communication between neurons.

According to Zimmer, the THC appeared to have “turned back the molecular clock” in the THC-treated animals. (Previous research has also shown that the brain ages much faster in mice who do not have functional receptors for THC, suggesting THC may be involved in the regulation of the aging process.6) The team is now planning tests to see if the same holds true in human subjects.

Cannabinoids Maintain Homeostasis

Your endocannabinoid system has homeostatic properties, meaning it helps balance your body’s response to stress. This helps explain some of the individual variations in response to cannabis.
In your brain, cannabinoids modulate neural activity. In younger people, in which endogenous cannabinoids are already plentiful, cannabis will not have the same effect as in older people, in whom activity of the endogenous cannabinoid system is much lower. The effects of THC in particular appear to vary significantly depending on age. As noted by Forbes:7

“[Y]ounger animals excelled at the tests when ‘sober’ but tended to struggle significantly under the influence of THC. ‘Mature’ and ‘old’ mice, on the other hand, struggled with tasks as consistent with their brain ages at first, but saw a huge increase in performance with THC infusions …
Overall, the results seem to support researchers’ belief that the benefits for older mice are a result of stimulating the brain’s endocannabinoid system, a biochemical pathway in both mice and human that grows less active over time.”

In other words, in young mice (and probably people as well), THC can easily have an overly stimulating effect, resulting in a decline in memory and learning (albeit temporary, while under the influence). In older mice, a small amount of THC basically restored levels to a more youthful optimum.
Similarly, one of the reasons cannabis is so effective for seizures is because of this ability to regulate neuronal activity and reestablish homeostasis. If there’s too much neuronal activity, the cannabis suppresses activity, and if activity is low, it raises it.
Cannabis for Pain

Download Interview Transcript

Polls show older Americans are becoming increasingly converted to marijuana use.8 Between 2006 and 2013, use among 50- to 64-year-olds rose by 60 percent. Among seniors over 65, use jumped by 250 percent.9 Pain and sleep are among the most commonly cited complaints for which medicinal marijuana is taken.
Considering the high risk of lethal consequences of opioid painkillers and sleeping pills, medical marijuana is a godsend. It’s really unfortunate that we’ve been so successfully indoctrinated to view marijuana as a dangerous gateway drug that will lead to illicit drug use.
The reality is that prescription drugs have far greater potential to turn you into a “junkie.” Legal drug addiction is also taking lives in record numbers. There’s absolutely no doubt that cannabis is safer than most prescription drugs — especially opioids. As noted by Dr. Margaret Gedde, an award-winning Stanford-trained pathologist and founder of Gedde Whole Health, there’s enough scientific data to compare the side effects of cannabis against the known toxicities of many drugs currently in use.
This includes liver and kidney toxicity, gastrointestinal damage, nerve damage and, of course, death. Cannabidiol has no toxicity and it’s virtually impossible to die from marijuana. It’s also self-limiting, as excessive doses of THC will provoke anxiety, paranoia and nausea.
Such side effects will disappear as the drug dissipates from your system without resulting in permanent harm, but it’ll make you think twice about taking such a high dose again. Make the same mistake with an opioid, and chances are you’ll end up in the morgue.
Cannabis Often Works Where Drugs Fail
Gedde also notes that cannabis products often work when other medications fail, so not only are they safer, they also tend to provide greater efficacy.
In 2010, the Center for Medical Cannabis Research (CMCR) released a report10 on 14 clinical studies about the use of marijuana for pain, most of which were FDA-approved, double-blind and placebo-controlled. The report revealed that marijuana not only controls pain, but in many cases, it does so better than pharmaceutical alternatives.
When cannabis is inhaled, smoked or vaporized, its effects are rapid and short-lasting. Orally, it’s the most unpredictable and delayed. When ingesting it, it can take up to two hours to take effect, but if dosed appropriately, you can achieve once-a-day dosing with an edible medicine.
As for the psychoactive effects of THC, a dose of 10 milligram (mg) or more of an oral (edible) THC product is required to produce a high.11 Taking 50 to 100 mg of oral THC could result in a serious case of paranoia, with or without nausea and vomiting.
Other Common Ailments Treated With Cannabis
Aside from pain and sleep, other common ailments being treated with cannabis include:

• Degenerative neurological disorders such as dystonia
• Multiple sclerosis and other autoimmune issues
• Parkinson’s disease
• Mood disorders, anxiety and post-traumatic distress disorder (PTSD).12,13 Marijuana suppresses dream recall, so for those having nightmares, it can be transformative. Marijuana is also reported to help individuals stay focused in the present, which is beneficial for those experiencing flashbacks.

In January 2017, the Multidisciplinary Association for Psychedelic Studies14 began the first federally-approved study in which the subjects — combat veterans diagnosed with PTSD — will ingest marijuana by smoking. It’s also the first whole-plant marijuana study, as opposed to an extract
• Seizure disorders such as Dravet syndrome,15 also known as Severe Myoclonic Epilepsy in Infancy, a form of intractable, life-threatening epilepsy in which a child can suffer upward of 100 seizures a day. Certain varieties of cannabis offer the only real hope for children with this type of disorder, as Dravet syndrome does not respond well to standard epilepsy drugs

Cannabis even appears to be a natural chemotherapy agent. Dozens of studies point to marijuana’s effectiveness against many different types of cancer, including brain cancer, breast, prostate, lung, thyroid, colon and pituitary cancer, melanoma and leukemia.

It fights cancer via at least two mechanisms, making it difficult for a cancer to grow and spread. It’s proapoptotic, meaning it triggers apoptosis (cellular suicide) of cancer cells while leaving healthy cells untouched, and antiangiogenic, meaning it cuts off a tumor’s blood supply.

Could Cannabis Offer New Hope for Alzheimer’s Patients?

Getting back to where we started, with THC rejuvenating the aging brain, this actually wasn’t the first time THC has been shown to provide benefits against dementia.

In a 2014 study, researchers at the University of South Florida and Thomas Jefferson University found that low-dose THC directly impedes the buildup of beta amyloid plaque in the brain,16,17 which is associated with the development of Alzheimer’s, and unlike so many pharmaceutical drugs, it produces no toxicity. THC was also found to enhance mitochondrial function in the brain. Lead author and neuroscientist Chuanhai Cao, Ph.D., wrote:

“THC is known to be a potent antioxidant with neuroprotective properties, but this is the first report that the compound directly affects Alzheimer’s pathology by decreasing amyloid beta levels, inhibiting its aggregation and enhancing mitochondrial function.”

Cannabis is also known to reduce some of the non-memory-related symptoms typically experienced by Alzheimer’s sufferers, including anxiety, irritability and rage,18 so cannabis may well have multiple benefits for those with dementia and Alzheimer’s.

Where to Find Reputable Information About Medical Cannabis, Its Uses and Benefits
If the idea of using medical cannabis (provided it’s legal in your state) still makes you cringe, I recommend delving deeper into the research to educate yourself on the matter, especially if your alternative is an opioid pain pill or some other dangerous drug.
One reputable source where you can find research relating to the use of cannabis is cancer.gov.19,20 This is the U.S. government’s site on cancer. Simply enter “cannabis” into the search bar. You can also peruse the medical literature through PubMed,21 which is a public resource (again, simply enter “cannabis” or related terms into the search bar).
The Journal of Pain,22 a publication by the American Pain Society, has a long list of studies on the pain-relieving effects of cannabis and would certainly seem worth the effort for anyone with chronic pain to utilize.
According to the National Institute on Drug Abuse,23 which also has information relating to the medicinal aspects of marijuana, preclinical and clinical trials are underway to test marijuana and various extracts for the treatment of a number of diseases, including autoimmune diseases such as multiple sclerosis and Alzheimer’s disease, inflammation, pain and mental disorders.
I also recommend listening to my previous interviews with Gedde and Dr. Allan Frankel, in which they discuss the clinical benefits of cannabis. Frankel is a board-certified internist in California who has treated patients with medical cannabis for the past decade.
Awareness is starting to shift, and many are now starting to recognize the medical value of cannabis. Even the former U.S. Surgeon General has spoken out in favor of medical marijuana. His statement echoes a growing sentiment in the medical and scientific communities that the health benefits of marijuana should no longer be ignored. Murthy was replaced this month by his deputy, Rear Adm. Sylvia Trent-Adams.

By Dr. Mercola
During the past 10 years or so, intriguing scientific studies on mice have suggested certain aspects of aging, including brain function, can be slowed or reversed when older animals receive blood from younger ones.
A common technique used in such studies is called parabiosis — the process through which the circulatory systems of lab mice are surgically conjoined, co-mingling their blood. In studies dating from the 1950s, blood from young mice seems to have a rejuvenating effect on older mice.
Most recently, researchers have attempted to isolate proteins in human blood plasma that may be responsible for improving brain function in old mice infused with it. In 2016, at least two startup clinics were launched in the U.S. to bring the concept of “young blood” to human beings through pay-to-participate clinical trials, mainly as a proposed anti-aging strategy, but also in hopes of counteracting chronic disease.
At one such clinic in Monterey, California, called Ambrosia, if you are age 35 or older, you can pay $8,000 to receive an infusion of 1.5 liters of plasma from a donor between the ages of 16 and 25.1 (Note: These infusions do not involve actual parabiosis.)
PayPal co-founder Peter Thiel is one of the prominent personalities fueling the buzz around how blood transfusions may help fight aging. He reportedly has expressed interest in Ambrosia, and told Inc. he finds the mice studies involving parabiosis to be “really interesting.”2
While the results with mice related to the infusion of young blood have demonstrated positive outcomes, particularly related to learning and memory improvements, the question yet to be answered is, “How might this practice of transfusing blood from the young to the old benefit human beings?”
Young Human Blood Improves Brain Function in Old Mice
A 2017 study published in Nature3 presents evidence that a protein found in human blood plasma from young people helps improve brain function in old mice. For decades scientists have posited that “young blood” can reverse the symptoms of aging, such as loss of memory and reductions in muscle function and metabolism.
While previous studies using mouse-to-mouse transfers of “young blood” have demonstrated its rejuvenating properties on older mice, researchers suggest this is the first time a human blood protein has been shown to trigger similar anti-aging effects in older mice.
To date, at least two U.S.-based companies have launched clinical trials in an attempt to bring this research to bear on human subjects. In those trials, elderly people receive blood from younger adult donors, after which physical qualities in the older adults are evaluated for potential improvements.
Blood From Human Umbilical Cords Seems to Have the Most Dramatic Effects
In one of the clinical trials,4 researchers at California’s Stanford University School of Medicine demonstrated human blood plasma can improve the memory and learning abilities of older mice. Their tests involved infusing plasma from the umbilical cords of newborn babies into the veins of elderly mice.
With improved brain function due to the plasma infusion, the mice were able to, for example, more effectively navigate mazes and learn to avoid areas of their cages wired to deliver electrical shocks.5 These outcomes suggest something in young blood appears to be vital to maintaining mental acuity.
Because several behavioral and biological characteristics of mice closely resemble those of humans, it may follow that young blood plasma has the potential to boost cognitive ability in older humans, but more research is needed. According to the trial’s lead author Joseph Castellano, neurology instructor at Stanford University School of Medicine, the findings may support future exploration of new drugs targeting the dementia process.
“Part of what makes this exciting is it suggests there’s more communication between the blood and brain than we’ve thought,” Castellano said.6 The current study follows earlier work performed by the same team, in which old mice showed improvements in learning and memory after receiving plasma infusions from young mice.
The aim of the new research was to investigate whether young human blood also might have similar beneficial effects on older mice. According to CBS News, while several types of human blood were tested, only blood plasma from umbilical cords had noteworthy positive effects. Plasma from young adults, ages 19 to 24, was less effective, and plasma from older adults, ages 61 to 82, yielded no benefits at all.7
Can Specific Blood Proteins Like TIMP2 Help Reverse Alzheimer’s?
The Stanford team8 compared 66 proteins found in umbilical cord plasma to those in plasma of older humans, as well as proteins previously identified in parabiosis experiments with mice. Each protein was injected into old mice prior to them being run through various memory experiments. TIMP2 (tissue inhibitor of metalloproteinases) was the only protein shown to improve performance. High levels of TIMP2 are found in cord plasma.
Because TIMP2 has not previously been linked to learning or memory, scientists are not yet completely sure how it exerts its effect on memory. Some have suggested TIMP2’s effects on your brain may be indirect, perhaps through alterations it makes to your immune system or metabolism.
Although still potentially several years away, Nature suggests both TIMP2 and GDF11 (growth differentiation factor 11), which was called out previously by researchers at Harvard University,9 may be useful in treating people with memory problems such as Alzheimer’s disease:10

“Infusions of young plasma — pooled from thousands of donors — could be one potential treatment for age-related diseases, including Alzheimer’s disease. Alternatively, elderly patients may one day receive a cocktail of proteins, such as GDF-11 and TIMP2, or drugs that mimic their effects.”

The Benefits of Platelet-Rich Plasma Therapy
In the past decade, medical professionals have been using platelet-rich plasma (PRP) therapy to release growth factors that help heal and strengthen areas of the human body. As you may know, platelets are an important part of your body’s healing process — they’re responsible for blood clotting and are among the “first responders” to an injury site. By forming a clot, platelets stop bleeding.
In the process, platelets open up and spill out the growth factors held inside. These growth factors act as signaling molecules, issuing the instructions needed to call forth your body’s resources to repair damaged tissue. To avoid confusion, while some stem cells may be present in PRP therapy, stem-cell therapy is its own separate and more sophisticated process.
Blood-Based Rejuvenation Therapy Continues to Be Popular
So-called “vampire facelifts” are another phenomenon born out of the potential rejuvenating power of blood. In this case, your own blood is drawn and spun in a centrifuge to separate the platelets from the red blood cells. The platelets and a mix of natural fillers are then injected back into your face, which is said to smooth lines and reduce wrinkles.
Unfortunately, the procedure is costly — roughly $800 to $1,500 per session — and the results are only temporary. Perhaps more intriguing are studies showing PRP may promote wound healing and help your body recover from injuries. Research published in Plastic and Reconstructive Surgery11 suggests growth factors released from activated platelets effectively support wound healing in both soft and hard tissues. The study authors stated:

“[A] variety of potentially therapeutic growth factors were detected and released from the platelets in significant levels in platelet-rich plasma preparations. Sufficient concentrates and release of these growth factors … may be capable of expediting wound healing in a variety of as yet undetermined specific wound applications.”

Platelet-Rich Plasma Therapy for Diabetic Wounds and Osteoarthritis
PRP therapy also has shown promise in treating the typically slow-healing wounds related to diabetes.12 Researchers at the Yale University School of Medicine said:

“Despite the many advances in the treatment of diabetic foot ulceration, this common complication continues to devastate the community of patients suffering from diabetes. … [T]reatment with growth factors may result in faster healing times and regained limb function, in addition to a decreased rate of amputation … PRP shows promise as an effective treatment modality in the setting of diabetic foot ulceration.”

Research published in the Clinical Journal of Sport Medicine investigated the effects of PRP on early knee osteoarthritis using magnetic resonance imaging (MRI). About the usefulness of PRP, the study authors noted:13

“Of the 15 knees that underwent MRI assessment pre-platelet and post-platelet-rich plasma treatment, 12 of the 15 knees (80 percent) demonstrated no significant worsening of osteoarthritis in their patellofemoral joint. There was no change in the appearance of osteoarthritis one year after platelet-rich plasma therapy in 83.3 [percent] of all cases … with lateral-femoral and tibial compartment involvement.”

Ambrosia Pay-to-Participate Clinical Trial Touts Benefits of Young Blood
Entrepreneur Jesse Karmazin launched Ambrosia in 2016, focusing on bringing the concept of “young blood” to human beings. As mentioned, according to Business Insider,14 if you are age 35 or older, you qualify to participate in Karmazin’s pay-to-participate trial. For $8,000 and two days of your time, you will receive 1.5 liters of plasma from a donor between the ages of 16 and 25.
In case you’re curious about the company’s name, according to ancient Greek myths, Ambrosia referred to the food or drink of immortal Greek gods, the belief being that anyone who consumed such food or drink would have longevity or immortality bestowed upon them.
Karmazin claims most participants see improvements within a month after a single plasma infusion.15 Scientists and clinicians are skeptical about Karmazin’s methods, suggesting his trial is poorly designed and therefore unable to produce scientific evidence demonstrating the effectiveness of the transfusions. Others look down on his methods because it is a paid trial.
Although Karmazin suggests the inspiration for his work comes from earlier studies involving parabiosis with lab mice, his trial for humans does not involve parabiosis, nor does it include a control group, which is common in lab trials. Karmazin says it would not be fair to use a control group or placebos because his clients are paying for the infusion.16
As of December 15, 2016, 25 people had been infused with “young blood” at Ambrosia. Karmazin claims participants are seeing “miraculous results,” including a woman with chronic fatigue syndrome who claims to “feel healthy for the first time” and “looks younger.”17 Jonathan Kimmelman, a bioethicist at McGill University in Montreal, shared with MIT Technology Review what I think is certainly a valid concern about Ambrosia:18

“There are a lot of patient-funded trials run by companies that use the trials as a way to sell products that wouldn’t be marketable because they’d have to be regulated by the [U.S.] Food and Drug Administration.”

Peter Thiel Thought to Be on a Quest for Young Blood
Thiel, a wealthy venture capitalist, has attracted considerable attention for his interest in the science of anti-aging. He seems to be just one of many Hollywood and Silicon Valley elite expressing interest in a modern-day “fountain of youth.” About Thiel, Inc. notes:19

“More than anything, Peter Thiel, the billionaire technology investor …  wants to find a way to escape death. He’s channeled millions of dollars into startups working on anti-aging medicine, spends considerable time and money researching therapies for his personal use, and believes society ought to open its mind to life-extension methods that sound weird or unsavory.”

To date, no one is certain if Thiel has attempted parabiosis for himself, but he continues to show definite interest in techniques he believes may help him live beyond age 100. For example, Forbes said in 2014 Thiel acknowledged using human growth hormone pills as means of extending his life.20 During a 2015 interview related to his investments in biotech firms and life-extension medicine, Thiel told Inc. about his interest in parabiosis. He stated:21

“I’m looking into parabiosis, which I think is really interesting. This is where they [infused] the young blood into older mice and they found that had a massive rejuvenating effect. … [I]t’s one of these very odd things where people had done these studies in the 1950s, and then it got dropped altogether. I think there are a lot of these things that have been strangely underexplored.”

The video below, produced by DNews, highlights parabiosis as well as several scientific studies related to the potential benefits of young blood.

More Research Needed to Validate Young Blood’s Impact on Humans
While the research presented in the featured article seems promising, it’s important to remember more studies are needed to validate the potential benefits of plasma infusions for humans. It may be many years into the future (if at all) before we can embrace blood transfusions from younger donors as a verified medical solution for aging concerns such as dementia and Alzheimer’s disease.
In terms of TIMP2, the blood protein thought to have renewing effects on aging mice brains, even Castellano is exercising caution. He said, “Now, we really need to get a better understanding of what [TIMP2 is] doing in the brain. We are not saying we’ve found the protein that’s responsible for brain aging.”22
Dr. Marc Gordon, a professor at the Litwin-Zucker Center for Alzheimer’s Disease and Memory Disorders at the Feinstein Institute for Medical Research in Manhasset, New York, also emphasized the need for further studies, especially given the research model simply involved old mice, not old mice presenting with Alzheimer’s-like pathology.
“[T]his is not saying that cord blood is a cure for aging,” says Gordon. “What this could mean for human disease is purely speculative.”23 While we await further scientific developments around anti-aging, I recommend the following strategies for counterbalancing any effects of aging that might be troubling you:

Eat a high-quality diet composed of healthy fats, grass fed meat and organic fruits and vegetables, and limit your intake of packaged and processed foods to less than 10 percent of your diet
Strive to sit less than three hours a day, engage in near-continuous movement during your non-exercise hours, exercise regularly and be sure to include some of my personal favorites, such as daily walking, high-intensity exercises, stretching and strength training
Get enough sleep according to the sleep needs of people your age, targeting around seven to nine hours per night for adults, and even more for teenagers and children

By Dr. Mercola
Falls are a leading cause of injury among Americans aged 65 and over, with 1 in 5 leading to a serious injury such as a broken bone or head injury. More than 1 in 4 older Americans falls every year, and such falls are the most common cause of traumatic brain injuries (TBI) among this population.1
In March 2017, the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) released a report with some startling figures regarding TBI in older Americans, including those related to falls.
Among those 75 and older, 1 in 45 suffered from a brain injury that led to an emergency room visit, hospitalization or death in 2013 — a 76 percent increase from 2007 — with the primary cause being falls.2
While brain injuries due to motor-vehicle accidents decreased during the study period, and considerable attention has been given to concussions in youth as a result of sports, far less attention has been given to the risk of brain injury in older Americans due to falls. The authors noted:3

“[F]rom 2007 to 2013 … the number and rate of older adult fall-related TBIs have increased substantially … the findings in this report suggest that TBIs attributable to older adult falls, many of which result in hospitalization and death, should receive public health attention.”

‘Urgent Need’ for Fall Prevention Efforts
The CDC cited an urgent need to increase fall prevention efforts in older adults, given the concerning increase in fall-related brain injuries. Adding to the risk, once a person has fallen, their likelihood of falling again doubles.4 Risk factors that increase a person’s risk of falling include:5

Lower body weakness
Vitamin D deficiency

Difficulties with balance and walking
Use of certain medications, such as tranquilizers, sedatives or antidepressants

Vision problems
Foot pain or poor footwear

Hazards in the home, such as clutter, throw rugs or uneven steps
Health conditions, including Parkinson’s disease, Alzheimer’s disease and arthritis, as well as recent surgery, such as hip replacement

Lack of Physical Activity Increases Fall Risk
One of the many reasons why exercise is so important for older adults is that doing so can significantly lower your risk of falls and all of the health risks that go along with them. Not only that, but if you do fall, if you’re a regular exerciser you’re less likely to get hurt.
Older adults who took part in an exercise program were 37 percent less likely to be injured during a fall compared to non-exercisers, according to research published in the BMJ.6
This included a 61 percent lower risk of having a fall-induced broken bone and 43 percent lower risk of sustaining a fall-related injury serious enough to require admission to a hospital.
The exercises included an emphasis on balance training along with strength and functional training and even Tai Chi. As you get older, your muscle and bone mass decrease and the senses that guide your balance — vision, touch, proprioception — may all start to deteriorate, and this can make you unsteady on your feet.
However, eight weeks of balance training reduced slips and improved the likelihood of recovery from slips among the elderly.7 Balance training has also been found effective in improving functional and static balance, mobility and falling frequency in elderly women with osteoporosis.8
Since exercise strengthens both your body and your mind, it’s likely that regular exercisers are not only physically more able to prevent falls but also may be quicker mentally, perhaps allowing them to reach out and grab a railing for support before succumbing to a fall.
Easy Strength Training Exercises to Reduce Your Fall Risk
Strength training is also important for older adults, as it helps you maintain healthy bone mass, prevent age-related muscle loss and strengthens your connective tissues, tendons and ligaments, which help hold your body in the upright position.
Strength training also helps with functional movements — the ones you do every day — which will make activities like climbing stairs and getting out of a chair easier. This, in turn, will lower your risk of falls. Even if you’re new to exercise, there are options that can lower your fall risk, including the two that follow.
Knee Extension

Knee extension exercises will help strengthen your knees, which will improve your balance and reduce your risk of falling. Strengthening your knees will also allow you to walk and climb stairs with greater ease and comfort.

Sit on a chair with your back straight and knees bent
Slowly extend your right leg out in front of you and hold for a few seconds before lowering it back to starting position
Repeat with your left leg
Do 10 repetitions on each leg

For a more advanced version, strap an ankle weight around each ankle. Aim for a weight that is heavy enough to where you cannot do more than 15 repetitions per leg. As you get stronger, you can add more weight to keep it challenging.
Partial Squat

Squatting exercises increase hip flexibility and strengthen your hip flexors and quadriceps, which will improve both your walking ability and your ability to stand up from a seated position. They also improve your overall balance and stability, reducing your risk of falling.
For the beginner’s version, stand up using a chair for support, and perform a standing partial squat as demonstrated in the ElderGym video above. Remember to push your buttocks out as you bend to maintain a straight back posture and do not bend your knees past your toes.
Take Care of Your Vison Health
Being able to see clearly is important to avoid tripping hazards and avoid dizziness. Your diet is key to protecting your vision, including eating plenty of vitamin-C-rich foods, which may lower your risk of cataracts.9 Bioflavonoids, which may have a complementary effect when consumed along with vitamin C, are also important.
Excellent dietary sources of bioflavonoids include dark-colored berries, dark leafy greens, garlic and onions. Other notable nutrients for vision health include:

Astaxanthin
Animal-based omega-3 fat (found in wild-caught Alaskan salmon).

Anthocyanins (found in blueberries, bilberries, and black currants)
Vitamin D

Lutein and zeaxanthin (found in green leafy vegetables and pastured egg yolks)
Bioflavonoids (found in tea, cherries, and citrus fruits)

Besides eating plenty of the nutrients above, carotenoid-rich vegetables, organic pastured egg yolks, omega-3 and astaxanthin-rich wild-caught salmon are beneficial for vision health. Another important dietary aspect is to normalize your blood sugar, as excessive sugar in your blood can pull fluid from the lens of your eye, affecting your ability to focus.
It can also damage the blood vessels in your retina, thereby obstructing blood flow. To keep your blood sugar in a healthy range, follow my comprehensive nutrition guidelines, including avoiding processed foods, as they tend to be loaded with processed fructose. Exercise will also help protect your vision.
Block Blue Light to Protect Your Vision, Especially at Night
Many people are unaware of the importance of avoiding exposure to blue light after sundown, including from light-emitting diode (LED) lighting and electronics. Near-infrared light is important as it primes the cells in your retina for repair and regeneration, which explains why LEDs — which are devoid of infrared — are so harmful for your eyes.
There are cells in your retina that are responsible for producing melatonin in order to regenerate your retina during the night. If you use LED lights after sunset, however, you reduce the regenerative and restoring capacities of your eyes and with less regeneration you end up with degeneration.
In this case, the degeneration can lead to age-related macular degeneration (AMD), which is the primary cause of blindness among the elderly and can also contribute to falls.
So, to summarize, the main problem with LEDs is the fact that they emit primarily blue wavelengths and lack the counterbalancing healing and regenerative near-infrared frequencies. They have very little red in them, and no infrared, which is the wavelength required for repair and regeneration.
Because of this, I strongly recommend using blue-blocking glasses after sundown and swapping out your LEDs for clear bulb incandescents or even candle light. For your computer, reduce the correlated color temperature down to 2,700 K — even during the day, not just at night. Many use f.lux to do this, but I also like the software Iris for this purpose.
How to Make Your Home Safer to Avoid Falls
Home hazards can be a significant contributor to falls, as it’s estimated that one-third of falls in the elderly may be due to environmental hazards that could easily be addressed.10 Aging Care compiled a comprehensive list of tips to make your home safer in order to prevent falls.11

Install safety bars and grab bars where necessary, such as in the shower/bath and near toilets
Stairwells should be well lit, with sturdy railings that extend beyond the first and last steps
Remove loose throw rugs and tack down all carpeting/rugs

Put anti-slip mats into the bottom of the bathtub or consider a shower chair
Use a stool riser seat when using the toilet
Remove clutter from the home

Adjust electrical cords so they are not stretched across the floor
Wear shoes or slippers with non-slip soles
Keep items used daily in easily accessible locations

Avoid the use of chairs or stepladders to reach item; use a grasping tool instead
Install adequate lighting in the home

In addition, fall mats, which are cushioned surfaces that help reduce injuries in the event of a fall, can be placed in frequented areas, such as next to a bed, chair or toilet. Some people may find added support from the use of a cane or walker, but be aware that some research has linked the use of walking aids to an increased risk of falls.12
It’s important to understand that falls are not inevitable and oftentimes are preventable. By making sensible changes to your home, eating right, exercising and taking care of your vision health, you can significantly lower your risk of suffering from a debilitating fall and related brain injury.

By Dr. Mercola
One in 3 reading this likely has a serious overload of a mineral that may be more dangerous to your health than lack of vitamin D. That mineral is iron.

Making matters worse, few physicians fully appreciate the danger of excess iron, which Gerry Koenig, former chairman of the Iron Disorders Institute and the Hemochromatosis Foundation,1 discusses in this interview. Koenig’s personal story is a powerful illustration of what can happen to someone with excess iron.

Approaching his 50th birthday, he’d lost a lot of weight, worked out, and felt healthy. By age 55, he was in good shape, but he did drink more than recommended. Eventually, during a physical exam, he found out his liver enzymes were high.

“The doctor recommended I stop drinking,” Koenig says. “I stopped drinking. But I got sick again … Turned out I had hemolytic anemia. My red blood cells were breaking down.

I didn’t know what that meant, nor, apparently, did my doctor. They never tested my iron … Finally I had an episode where I went to the hospital. I had encephalopathy, a pretty serious condition … They said I would need a new liver.

I didn’t get an iron test until the eve of my liver transplant in 2005 … By chance I ran across a Scientific American article. It described something called hemochromatosis, which I didn’t know anything about. I decided I would have the test.

As it turns out, I have a single gene for one of the variants for hemochromatosis — C282Y. Because of that, I decided to look into it more and started researching it … I’ve been doing that for the last 11 years.”

Are You at High Risk for Iron Overload?

Most all adult men and non-menstruating women have damaging levels of iron. However, there is a genetic disorder called hemochromatosis which causes your body to accumulate excessive and dangerously damaging levels of iron.

If left untreated, it can damage your organs and contribute to cancer, heart disease, diabetes, neurodegenerative diseases and many other disorders.

The good news is iron overload is easy and inexpensive to treat. By monitoring your serum ferritin and/or gamma-glutamyl transpeptidase (GGT) levels, avoiding iron supplements and donating blood on a regular basis, you can avoid serious health problems.

Sadly, many doctors are severely underinformed about iron overload. Hence the problem tends to go undetected.

How High Is Too High?

The serum ferritin test measures your stored iron. I strongly recommend all adults to get your iron tested (serum ferritin test) on an annual basis. I believe iron overload is every bit as dangerous to your health as vitamin D deficiency.

Just don’t make the mistake of going by what’s considered “normal.”2 In some labs, a level of 395 nanograms per milliliter (ng/ml) falls within the normal range, which is FAR too high for optimal health. In reality, you’re virtually guaranteed to develop disease at that level.

Ideally, your serum ferritin should be somewhere between 20 and 80 ng/ml, certainly no higher than that. As a general rule, somewhere between 40 and 60 ng/ml is the sweet spot for adult men and non-menstruating women.

Unfortunately, few besides children, premenopausal women who lose blood through monthly menstruation, and those with acute blood loss like a bleeding ulcer, have these ideal levels.

“Even some premenopausal women (if they’re not under control) will go up to 60 or 70, which is dangerous if they get pregnant. There’s a greater chance of poor outcomes in the pregnancy.

The U.S. is 35th in the world in infant survival. It’s a terrible situation when you look at the numbers. There’s no reason for this. There’s no reason for us to have a population that’s so unhealthy given the access to medical care that we have,” Koenig says.

Again, if your iron level is high, the solution is to simply donate your blood. If you’re an adult male, you’ll want to donate blood two to three times a year once your levels are normal. If ferritin levels are over 200 ng/ml, a more aggressive phlebotomy schedule is recommended.

Although your local blood bank may not realize this, recent U.S. legislation allows all blood banks to perform therapeutic phlebotomy for hemochromatosis or iron overload. All you need is a doctor’s order.

Recommended Lab Tests

While a full iron panel that checks serum iron, iron-binding capacity and ferritin can be helpful, you really only need the serum ferritin test. It’s fairly inexpensive — typically less than $40.

Your doctor can write you a prescription for it, or you can order it from Koenig’s website, HealtheIron.com. They recently also added a (GGT) test.

GGT measures liver enzymes, which can tell you if you have liver damage. It can also be used as a screening marker for excess iron. The free iron measured by GGT is also great indicator of sudden cardiac death.

“If you only took that marker (GGT), you have an indication of iron that’s not well-bound. When you have iron in the serum, it’s generally bound by transferrin, which carries two iron atoms through the serum.

Ferritin can hold 4,000 to 4,500 iron molecules and put those inside the cells. If those measures are high, they’re risky, because you don’t know how well your body is going to hold on to that iron when the cells fall apart over time hemolysis or catabolism.

Our diet is the biggest factor today that’s really causing this problem. It’s not so much that we’re eating too much iron; it’s that the iron we have in our body effectively can harm us. That’s where the GGT comes in. It’s a surrogate measure of free iron.”

For women, a healthy GGT level is around 9 U/L, whereas the high end of “normal” GGT lab ranges are generally 40 to 45 U/L for women. For men, Koenig recommends a level of 16 U/L (normal lab ranges for men is 65 to 70 U/L).3
“Women with GGT above 30 U/L have higher risk of cancers — breast cancer, all kinds of cancers — and they will have high risk of autoimmune disease,” Koenig warns.

What Causes Excess Iron Buildup?

Besides having one or both genes for hemochromatosis, you may also end up with high iron levels for the simple fact that most people don’t excrete iron very well. So what’s the biology behind iron loading?

Ninety percent of the energy your body creates is by burning carbs or fat with oxygen in your mitochondria to produce adenosine triphosphate (ATP). You need oxygen to burn the fuel because it goes through the Krebs cycle. Ninety-five percent of the time, oxygen is converted to water.

But anywhere from 0.5 to 5 percent of the time, you’re going to develop what’s called a reactive oxygen species (ROS). The first one is superoxide, which then transforms to the next ROS, which is hydrogen peroxide.

Here’s the key: when you have excess iron in your blood, the chemical reaction (Fenton’s reaction) doesn’t produce water. Instead, the excessive iron catalyzes the formation of hydroxyl free radicals, which are the most potent and destructive free radicals known to man. They will decimate your mitochondrial DNA, mitochondrial electron transport proteins and cellular membranes.

This is how iron overload accelerates every major disease we know of. That’s how it causes the pathologies, especially in liver and cardiovascular disease. Believe me, very few health care professionals understand the molecular biology of this reaction, which is why virtually no one is sounding the alarm about excessive iron levels. This is why you need to share this article with your friends and family as you can literally save many of their lives.

It is absolutely vital to confirm that you have safe iron levels, and once they are in a safe range, continue to monitor them so they don’t rise. Remember, you don’t have to have hemochromatosis to be affected. According to Koenig, iron levels have literally DOUBLED in the general population over the past four decades.

“Serum ferritin was not measured for the first National Health and Nutrition Examination Survey (NHANES I,4 1971 to 1974) was done. But during NHANES II5 (1976 to 1980), they measured ferritin. The male serum ferritin was under 100 nanograms per milliliter (ng/ml). Now the median is close to 200 ng/ml. In some minorities, it’s a lot higher …
If you look at the scales of premature death and infant mortality in African-Americans versus whites, that big difference can be accounted for by this one element. Hispanic-Americans live longer than white Americans. They also handle the iron a little bit better,” Koenig says.

Beware of High Iron, High-Carb Diet Combination

If you eat a lot of net carbs (total carbs minus fiber), the situation is exacerbated. Unfortunately, most reading this are burning carbs as their primary fuel, which adds another 30 to 40 percent more ROS on top of the hydroxyl free radicals generated by the presence of high iron.

“What people generally have when they eat better, in terms of slowing those little fires down before they become a raging fire, are antioxidants,” Koenig says. “The most important one is glutathione. If you don’t have good cellular health, including glutathione, those fires (inflammation) will just self-ignite and you’ll have a chain reaction of effects that go on until you’re really sick.

That happened to me. I got peripheral neuropathy. They try to say it’s a diabetic problem, and I never had diabetes. Both of my legs were on fire. The pain was unbelievable. You wind up going to a specialist for that, a neurologist. But when the membranes on your neurological system essentially flare up and melt, the pain is unbearable. But nobody connected that to the iron.”

Hemochromatosis, Another Iron-Damaging Disease

About 1 in 3.5 or an estimated 100 million people in the U.S. have the single gene for hemochromatosis. But not all of them get sick with an iron overload disorder. If you have both genes for hemochromatosis, then your risk of developing iron overload and associated health problems rises significantly.

Approximately 1 million people have the double gene variant (C282Y/C282Y), which is considered the genotype most predictive of liver disease complications. However, this only becomes a serious problem if significant iron overload occurs before a diagnosis is achieved and proper treatment can be administered. Each year there are roughly 36,000 deaths from liver diseases and about 6,000 liver transplants. Most all of these cases are affected by excess iron, whether or not they have a hemochromatosis genotype.

The primary cause for liver transplantation and liver death is non-alcoholic fatty liver disease (NAFLD), a condition that can advance to non-alcoholic steatohepatitis (NASH) and cirrhosis. Excess dietary fructose is likely a primary contributor or initiator to NAFLD these days (especially in children and young adults), but high iron is another major culprit that triggers insulin resistance and disease progression.

Certainly, if you combine a high-sugar diet with excess iron, you’re asking for trouble. That will create a powerfully poisonous, deadly synergy that will accelerate just about any pathology. If you’ve read this far, you probably know more about this problem than your physician. High iron simply isn’t brought to their attention in the medical literature. The reason I know about it is because I’ve been personally affected.

My dad has beta-thalassemia and he gave me the gene, which is a form of hemolytic anemia (similar to sickle cell anemia). As a result of that, my red blood cells die faster than normal, and I’m prone to excess iron. My dad had a ferritin level of 800 when I diagnosed him 20 years ago.

He would be dead by now if we hadn’t taken measures to correct it. He’s now 90 years old. He was recently hospitalized with pneumonia. His doctor did an iron test, which came back “low,” despite being well over 200 ng/ml! They were about to give him an iron injection when my sister intervened and stopped them. Had she not been there, he might have ended up another medical error statistic.
Key Treatment Points

To reiterate, the three keys to control this situation are:

Lower your net carb intake and increase your consumption of healthy fats, including animal-based omega-3, to switch over to fat-burning mode and protect your mitochondria. This will help to radically reduce reactive oxygen species (ROS) and secondary free radical production.

Regularly screen for iron overload with a serum ferritin or GGT level to confirm that you don’t have excess iron, and if you do, donate blood to lower your levels.
If you are an adult male or non-menstruating woman, make sure that you donate your blood at least twice a year.

Relying on antioxidants to indiscriminately suppress ROS can backfire, as ROS also act as important signaling molecules. They’re not all bad. They cause harm only when produced in excess. You’re better off lowering the production of them rather than squelching them after they’re produced.

So optimize your ROS levels biologically rather than relying on vitamins and supplements. Eating healthy fats can make a bigger difference than you might think, especially if you have high iron. Koenig explains:

“There was a very interesting group of studies on captive U.S. Navy dolphins. The dolphins had metabolic syndrome. Very, very high ferritin (serum iron). They were unhealthy. Metabolic syndrome in any population is a sign of potential risk of going from diabetes to heart disease. They cured it by providing them good fish to have plenty of fats, where they had been getting fish with poor fats …

If anybody remembers the film ‘Lorenzo’s Oil,’ that’s where children have brain damage as a result of having this metabolism that doesn’t create a good mixture of fatty acids in the cell linings. If the cell linings are damaged, particularly if it happens in the brain … you’re going to get hurt

… If you have leakage of iron from subcells, lysosomes, and/or red blood cells (hemolysis) … it will shoot the ferritin level up high as an indication of risk. That’s when action should be taken. But it’s hard to find specialists. We need a couple of thousand general practitioners who know about this.”

Be Mindful of Food Combos That Promote Iron Retention

Here are a few other tips and suggestions regarding diet. Eating vitamin C-rich food with a meal that has iron will increase iron absorption. If you’re anemic, this might be a good thing, but if you struggle with high iron, avoid combining foods high in vitamin C and iron. On the other hand, calcium will bind to iron, limiting absorption.

It impairs iron, so to speak, so if your iron is high, consider eating iron-rich foods with foods high in calcium. Interestingly, curcumin (derived from turmeric) acts as a potent chelator of iron and can be a useful supplement if your iron is elevated.

“For most people that works well. Your body is designed to not over-absorb non-heme iron, which is elemental iron. That’s the iron inside vegetables and fruits. If you do something to enhance that absorption, the body will take it in.

The iron from meats you can’t control very well. We’re the only country in the developed world, together with Canada, to put 44 parts per million of elemental iron in our grains and flours.  The other one is the U.K. They put 16.5 parts per million. That’s a lot of iron, and [many] don’t need it,” Koenig says.

More Information

To learn more, I recommend visiting HealtheIron.com, where you can also order your serum ferritin and GGT tests or either of their special FeGGT-LifePRO™ test panels. If either serum ferritin or GGT is elevated, you need to take action. The treatment couldn’t be simpler. Unless you’re a menstruating woman, simply donate blood two to three times a year. If you cannot donate blood due to restrictions for hemochromatosis, get your doctor to write you a prescription for therapeutic phlebotomy.
Every blood bank can do that for you and many will do it free of charge, so shop around. Otherwise, a typical charge ranges from $30 to $90, which is still fairly inexpensive considering the health benefits. Most people with moderate iron overload will require no more than two or three such treatments a year to keep this risk under control.

There’s also a really informative book called “Dumping Iron: How to Ditch This Secret Killer and Reclaim Your Health,” which is a well written and easy to understand resource. Remember, high iron may not only be as common, or more, than low iron. It’s also more dangerous, and may actually be a factor in a significant number of diabetes, heart disease and cancer cases.

Unfortunately, nearly every physician is still clueless about this, and so you need to be your own advocate if you suspect (or know) your iron is too high.

I believe correcting elevated iron levels may be just as important, if not more so, than optimizing your vitamin D. If you have high iron, you definitely have the pedal to the metal when it comes to speeding up disease and aging. Koenig is a perfect example. He ended up needing a liver transplant as a result of iron overload. In conclusion, Koenig notes:

“If your doctor tells you that you have fatty liver disease, you probably have high iron, high ferritin. He probably will not test you for that. Get the test. You can see some benefit by donating blood, or changing your diet. On my website, I have about 700 publications. If you want to dig into it, it’s a section. Find out how to reduce [your iron] by diet alone. It’s been done and done successfully.”
free radicals

By Dr. Mercola

If you pick up a package of chicken breasts from your supermarket, it gives no clues to the controversies and political unrest facing the farmers that raised those chickens. Nor does it hint at the unethical, inhumane, and often unsanitary conditions that have become commonplace in “modern” poultry farming.
Who’s to blame? The giant poultry processors – like Tyson Foods, Perdue Farms, Pilgrim’s Pride, and Sanderson Farms – who dominate the industry and control the chicken farmers like puppets and punish those who dare to speak out against the system.
If you happened to catch John Oliver’s HBO episode of “Last Week Tonight” that featured this issue (it aired in May 2015), you were party to one of the most compelling and honest exposes of US poultry production to be featured by mainstream media.
John Oliver Takes on Giant Poultry Processors

Poultry processors feature promotional videos of chicken farmers who appear happy and secure in their work, but this rosy picture is, according to Oliver, nothing but PR spin.
Many farmers tell a different story of hardship and financial ruin. More than 70 percent of chicken farmers live below the poverty line,1 despite the fact that chicken is in high demand in the US, due to a process known as contract farming.
Companies bring chicks in to individual farms, drop them off and then pick them up for processing after they’re fully grown. Nearly all US chickens (97 percent) are raised in this manner, but the problem is that the poultry processors own the chickens while the farmers own the property and equipment. In other words, as Oliver put it:
“You [the farmer] own everything that costs money and we [the processor] own everything that makes money.”
Many farmers go into significant debt (over $1 million) to start up their farms because they’re led to believe they’ll have a steady source of income. But then they’re left at the complete mercy of the processors to continue on.
Even the growing conditions – the fact that chickens are raised indoors without access to sunlight and fresh air, for instance – are dictated by the poultry processors. Further, as farmers begin to pay off their debt, the processors can step in and demand costly upgrades, sending the farmers right back into the red.
Chicken Farmers Paid Using Cut-Throat Gladiator System and Face Retaliation for Speaking Out

Chicken farmers are also paid via a tournament or “gladiator system,” which pits farmers against each other. Those ranked in the top half (producing the fattest chickens with the least amount of feed, for instance) receive a bonus payment while those at the bottom will get a penalty. That may mean the farmers at the bottom receive about half the pay for the same number of chickens…
And when the farmers speak out against the industry, the processors retaliate by cutting the number and quality of chickens the farmers received. The industry denies this, but the farmers say otherwise.
Chicken farmer Mike Weaver told Politico that after he spoke at a USDA-hosted panel about the tournament system, Pilgrim’s retaliated by giving him poor-quality chicks and feed. He told Politico:2
“They do it clandestinely… They have ways of getting back at you that’s hard for you to prove.”
The retaliations are no secret among the business – so much so that it’s rare for chicken farmers to speak up at town hall meetings designed to get protective regulations in place. The poultry producers warn the farmers not to attend — and the farmers listen lest they have their livelihood threatened.
Rules to Protect Chicken Farmers Are Not Being Enforced

Rules have been made to help protect the farmers, but each year the Grain Inspection, Packers, and Stockyards Administration (GIPSA) rider is inserted into the House Appropriations bill. This defunds the Agriculture Department’s efforts to protect farmers.3
This isn’t surprising, since the poultry industry spends million to lobby Congress on their behalf. As reported by EcoWatch:4

“Two lawmakers, Rep. Marcy Kaptur (D-OH) and Rep. Chellie Pingree (D-ME), have led the charge to torpedo the GIPSA rider, but have been stymied repeatedly by colleagues like Rep. Steve Womack (R-AR)…
Womack, a member of the Appropriations Committee from the district where Tyson is headquartered, has received tens of thousands of dollars from individuals associated with Tyson and the National Chicken Council, the industry’s trade group.
But the money flow does not stop there. Kaptur published a press release with the names of representatives who voted against her provision. Of them, in 2014, Reps. Jack Kingston (R-GA), Robert Aderholt (R-AL), and Henry Cuellar (D-TX) received contributions from Tyson. 
Rep. Andy Harris (R) received contributions from Perdue (both are based in Maryland); Rep. Kay Granger (R-TX) received a donation from Pilgrim’s Pride, and Sanderson gave thousands to the late Rep. Alan Nunnelee (R), who hailed from the Mississippi district where the company is headquartered…
Each of them received a substantial portion of the National Chicken Council’s $302,900 in 2014 contributions… The National Chicken Council has spent more than $2.5 million [lobbying Washington] just in the last five years…
Tyson goes above and beyond with more than $9 million in recent lobbying expenditures; Perdue has spent hundreds of thousands, as has Pilgrim’s; and Sanderson Farms has spent more than a million dollars in the last three years. They have each lobbied against GIPSA reform in some capacity.”
On a positive note, the Agriculture bill for 2016 was recently approved by the House Appropriations Committee without the GIPSA defunding rider attached for the first time in years, although for now the poultry farmers are still being gagged…
Perdue Chicken Farmer Speaks Out

In the video above, Leah Garces of Compassion in World Farming visits Craig Watts, a contract farmer for Perdue. Dissatisfied with the system, he has taken the bold step to show everyone the reality hiding behind his barn doors. “There’s a lot of flaws in the system,” he says. “The consumer is being hoodwinked.”
His chicken farm raises about 30,000 chickens at a time (which is far less than the 60 million chickens common at farms in Iowa), and over a six-week growing period, it’s considered normal for at least 1,000 of them to die. Causes of death include illness, genetic problems, and injuries occurring from overcrowding. The chicks are sent to the contract farmer from Perdue, and the farmer has no control over the health or genetics of the chicks they receive.
Their only job is to raise them, and in order to fatten them up faster, the farmers are, sadly, actually contractually prohibited from giving the flock access to open air and sunshine, because the less the chickens move, and the more they eat, the bigger they grow.
Is it any wonder that the lobbyists for the meat, egg, and dairy industries heavily promote, and several states have already enacted, so-called ag-gag laws to prevent anyone from exposing animal cruelty and food-safety issues at CAFOs? They don’t want you to know what’s really going on at their “farms,” which is a significant red flag that you do not want to eat food raised there.
It’s worth noting, too, that most CAFO animals are fed genetically modified (GM) feed, like corn and soy. These crops are heavily treated with herbicides like Roundup, the active ingredient of which is glyphosate. Glyphosate is also patented as an antibiotic — and a very effective one at that — against a large number of beneficial organisms.
Unfortunately, like all antibiotics, it also kills vitally important beneficial soil bacteria and human gut bacteria. This is yet one more way that eating CAFO foods may harm your gut, your mental health, and your physical health.
New Drug-Resistant Bacteria in Your Meat

There are other reasons to think twice before buying chickens that come from concentrated animal feeding operations (CAFOs) – the potential for drug-resistant bacteria. Nearly 25 million pounds of antibiotics are administered to livestock in the US every year for purposes other than treating disease, such as making the animals grow bigger faster. In fact, 80 percent of the antibiotics used in the US are used in agriculture, and this practice is promoting the spread of antibiotic-resistant disease.
Antibiotic-resistant bacteria infect 2 million Americans every year, causing at least 23,000 deaths.5 Worse still, a report commissioned by UK Prime Minister David Cameron estimates that by 2050 antibiotic resistance will have killed 300 million people, with the annual global death toll reaching 10 million.6 And according to the CDC, 22 percent of antibiotic-resistant illness in humans is in fact linked to food,7 but a more accurate statement might be linked to food from CAFOs.
Take Klebsiella pneumonia, a bacteria that can lead to pneumonia, bloodstream infections, wound and surgical site infections and meningitis. Klebsiellaare often found in the human intestinal tract, where they are normally harmless. But if your immune system is compromised and you get exposed to an especially virulent drug-resistant form of Klebsiella, the consequences to you can be deadly. It wasn’t thought to be transmitted via food… until now. New research published in the journal Clinical Infectious Diseases showed that turkey, chicken, and pork sold in US grocery stores may contain klebsiella pneumonia.8  In fact, 47 percent of samples tested contained the bacteria, which was, in some cases, nearly identical to strains found in people with klebsiella pneumonia infections during the same time period. US chicken is not currently tested for klebsiella pneumonia bacteria. In the case of CAFO chicken, you’ve probably heard about the risks of salmonella, but in addition to that and klebsiella pneumonia, campylobacter is particularly problematic. Chickens and turkeys normally harbor campylobacter in their digestive tracts without becoming ill. Antibiotics routinely given to the birds in CAFOs don’t completely eliminate campylobacter from the birds’ intestinal tracts, so the surviving bacteria are the tougher ones that have resisted being killed off by the antibiotics.  Those bacteria proliferate in the birds and end up being passed on to you — along with their antibiotic-resistance. Campylobacter bacteria are found on chicken carcasses in slaughterhouses and in commercial poultry products — including on the outside of poultry packaging — where they can easily infect you, your children, or even your pets.
Another Massive Chicken Recall

It seems a week doesn’t go by without a major recall of some type of food product, often one that’s mass produced. Salmonella Heidelberg,a particularly virulent strain of salmonella, sickened several hundred people between 2004 and 2014. The strain was traced to Foster Farms, one of the largest poultry companies on the US West Coast. You can see some of Foster Farms cruel and highly questionable “business practices” in the video above (warning, it’s graphic).
From March 1, 2013 to July 11, 2014, chicken from this CAFO sickened more than 600 people before a recall was issued. Foster Farms got a fair share of bad publicity in 2014, yet no punitive action has been taken. Again in 2015, we’ve already had two large chicken recalls – Barber Foods’ recall of 1.7 million pounds of frozen and stuffed, raw chicken products, and Aspen Foods recall of 1.9 million pounds of chicken products. Both companies’ products were recalled after reports of people being infected with salmonella enteritidis after eating the chicken.
While the poultry industry reports that rates of salmonella contamination have actually gone down, rates of human salmonellosis have remained stable. But a company can actually be in compliance with the food safety standards and still be responsible for a salmonella outbreak, which is what happened in the case of Foster Farms. Since the company was meeting USDA performance expectations, the agency didn’t have the power to force a recall; it was left up to the company to voluntarily recall their tainted chicken and it was resistant to doing so.
So it’s important to realize that whole poultry is permitted to contain a certain level of salmonella — and there’s NO set level for chicken parts. Since salmonella is so prevalent, you should assume any store-bought CAFO chicken is contaminated and handle it accordingly. In fact, the USDA expects you to destroy any present pathogens through safe handling and proper cooking.
USDA Allows US Chickens to Be Shipped to China for Processing

Unbeknownst to many Americans, the US Department of Agriculture (USDA) allows chicken raised in the US to be shipped to China, processed, then shipped back for US sale.9 It’s unclear which, if any, companies are using this process, but still unsettling to know it can occur, especially given that China’s food-safety record is less than admirable. Further, there are no plans for USDA inspectors to be stationed at the Chinese processing sites, and US consumers will have no way of knowing if their chicken took a trip to China, as labels aren’t required. Tom Super, spokesman for the National Chicken Council, told the Houston Chronicle:10
“Economically, it doesn’t make much sense… Think about it: A Chinese company would have to purchase frozen chicken in the U.S., pay to ship it 7,000 miles, unload it, transport it to a processing plant, unpack it, cut it up, process/cook it, freeze it, repack it, transport it back to a port, then ship it another 7,000 miles. I don’t know how anyone could make a profit doing that.”
There is potential for profit, however, because while US poultry processors are paid about $11 an hour, such Chinese workers may only earn $1.11 The seafood industry already uses such a system, sending US-caught salmon and crab overseas to China because of the “significant cost savings” in processing.12
Bird Flu Epidemic Still Raising Costs

2015 ushered in the largest outbreak of highly pathogenic H5N2 avian flu in US history. Nearly 50 million birds have been infected and killed as a result. Wisconsin, Minnesota, and Iowa have declared a state of emergency and China and Mexico have imposed bans on US poultry and eggs. The US government approved $330 million in “emergency funds” to help fight the disease’s spread.13 And the USDA also stepped in, with 266 employees dedicated to helping states affected by the outbreak. The Agency also approved $130 million (of taxpayer money) to help CAFOs “get back on their feet.”14
And the outbreak is still costing taxpayers, as the USDA has hired private security firms to place armed guards outside of CAFOs hit by bird flu, even though the birds have already been cleared out. As reported by Politico:15
“The concern, one official said, is that people enter the facilities and track the virus out to other facilities that contain healthy birds.”
The costs that have been incurred are incredible, especially considering the epidemic was caused by the CAFOs. What happens when you have tens, or even hundreds, of thousands of animals living together in cramped, waste-covered quarters, fed an unnatural and unhealthy diet, and unable to spend time outdoors or engage in any of their natural behaviors? Disease takes hold and runs rampant. As reported in the journal Environmental Health Perspectives:16
“As a general principle, the concentration of humans or animals in proximity enhances potential transmission of microorganisms among members of the group. It also creates greater potential for infecting surrounding life forms, even those of different species. The conditions created also may be a breeding ground for new, more infectious, or more resistant microorganisms.”
As a result of the epidemic, “shell eggs,” which are the type sold by the carton in grocery stores, have increased significantly in price. Wholesale costs rose from $1.19 a dozen in late April to $2.03 a dozen in late May.17 According to analysts at Goldman Sachs, consumers may end up spending up to $8 billion because of the bird-flu-induced egg shortage. If you haven’t already considered it, now would be a great time to connect with a local farm that offers healthy chicken and eggs. The products might be more expensive than the CAFO versions at your grocery store… but are they really more expensive, all things considered?
Celebrities Get Involved to Clean up the Chicken Industry

Celebrities like Brad Pitt and Ryan Gosling have contacted wholesale store Costco to urge them to stop selling eggs from caged hens. Pitt wrote in an open letter to the store:18
“As you know, these birds producing eggs for your shelves are crammed five or more into cages that are not large enough for even one hen to spread her wings… In these cruel cages, the animals’ muscles and bones atrophy from years of immobilization. That’s why the cages are illegal in most of Europe, and why California banned the cages by an overwhelming vote years ago… In short, cramming hens into cages for their entire lives constitutes cruelty to animals, and animals deserve better. As you know, many major corporations, from Burger King to Unilever, are getting rid of cages – and Whole Foods hasn’t sold eggs from caged hens in years.”
While Costco hasn’t given a response about selling eggs from caged hens, the company has been involved in an ongoing push to end the use of human antibiotics in chicken and other livestock. Costco has been working with the FDA and the CDC to help eliminate the use of so-called shared-use antibiotics (those used for both humans and livestock), a step in the right direction – although taking a stand against caged hens is equally important.
Wouldn’t You Rather Eat Meat Without Drugs?

Positive change is on the horizon. Consumer demand has put pressure on meat companies like Tyson, Perdue, and Pilgrim’s Pride to adjust their production practices. Fast-food chain Carl’s Jr. even recently rolled out a burger made with grass-fed, free-range beef, promising to be free of antibiotics, steroids, and hormones,19 which shows that when enough consumers talk, corporations listen.
However, the best way to change the system is to stop supporting them. Instead, seek out a local farmer near you who is operating outside the constraints of these industry giants. By purchasing your meat from smaller farms that raise their animals in a humane fashion, according to organic principles, you’re promoting the proliferation of such farms, which in the end will benefit everyone, including all the animals. The organic industry also tends to favor far more humane butchering practices, which is another important part of “ethical meat.” The following organizations can help you locate farm-fresh foods — including organic grass-fed and finished meats — in your local area:

Local Harvest — This Web site will help you find farmers’ markets, family farms, and other sources of sustainably grown food in your area where you can buy produce, grass-fed meats, and many other goodies.

Farmers’ Markets — A national listing of farmers’ markets.

Eat Well Guide: Wholesome Food from Healthy Animals — The Eat Well Guide is a free online directory of sustainably raised meat, poultry, dairy, and eggs from farms, stores, restaurants, inns, and hotels, and online outlets in the United States and Canada.

Community Involved in Sustaining Agriculture (CISA) — CISA is dedicated to sustaining agriculture and promoting the products of small farms.

FoodRoutes — The FoodRoutes “Find Good Food” map can help you connect with local farmers to find the freshest, tastiest food possible. On their interactive map, you can find a listing for local farmers, CSA’s, and markets near you.

When shopping for antibiotic-free meat, you can also keep the following labels in mind to help you find truly high-quality meat:20

100% USDA Organic label offers excellent assurance that antibiotics have not been used at any stage of production.

“Grass-fed” label coupled with USDA Organic label means no antibiotics have been used, but if the “grass-fed” label appears alone, antibiotics may have been given.

“American Grass-fed” and “Food Alliance Grass-fed” labels indicate that in addition to having been raised on grass, the animal in question received no antibiotics.

The following three labels: “Antibiotic-free,” “No antibiotic residues,” and “No antibiotic growth promotants,” have not been approved by the USDA and may be misleading if not outright fraudulent.

“Natural” or “All-Natural” is completely meaningless and has no bearing on whether or not the animal was raised according to organic principles. “Natural” meat and poultry products can by law receive antibiotics, hormones, and genetically engineered grains, and can be raised in confined animal feeding operations (CAFOs).

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By Dr. Mercola

If you feel challenged in consuming enough vegetables, then making a small investment in a high-quality juicer is one of the best steps you can take for your health.

Raw juice is equivalent to a “living broth” teeming with micronutrients that many people are lacking, and this deficiency is a major factor in disease.

More people die from chronic disease today than all other causes combined. According to the World Health Organization (WHO), 36 million people die every year from degenerative conditions, and 100 million are driven into poverty by healthcare costs alone.

When you drink fresh, live juice, it’s almost like receiving an intravenous infusion of vitamins, minerals, and enzymes because they go straight into your body without needing to be broken down. Since juicing is essentially “mainlining” live nutrients, it’s no surprise it can produce rapid and profound health benefits.

What if the answer to preventing and reversing disease is as simple as juicing? Jason Vale designed an experiment to help answer that question.

‘Super-Juicing’ for 28 Days Cured Diabetes and Chronic Pain

Juicing expert Jason Vale recruited eight people who collectively suffered from 22 different chronic diseases and put them on a juice-only diet for 28 days (plus exercise) in order to explore juicing’s potential benefits for reversing chronic disease. And then he filmed their experience.

The documentary “Super Juice Me” chronicles Vale’s 28-day “super-juicing” experiment. The health improvements seen by those eight are nothing short of astounding.

Every participant felt energized and lost weight, and most reported a drastic reduction in their symptoms—as well as in the number of medications they used. One man went from 52 prescription pills per day to two pills per day. Another had his diabetes completely resolve.

One woman went from years of chronic pain to being completely pain free, and others suffering from asthma, colitis, and sleep apnea enjoyed a profound reduction in symptoms.

It was not an easy journey as several experienced detoxification reactions, food cravings, and for some, a temporary increase in symptoms as their bodies began to purge toxins they’d been accumulating for years. But those reactions were relatively short-lived, and they felt immensely better on the other side—better than they’d felt in years.

The Many Health Benefits of Juicing

The movie shows an extreme example of juicing, but it can be incorporated into your life to any degree you choose—as an occasional cleanse or as the start of every morning. There are several reasons to consider incorporating vegetable juicing into your health plan:

Juicing helps you absorb all the nutrients from your vegetables. This is important because most people have impaired digestion as a result of making less-than-optimal food choices over many years, which limits your body’s ability to absorb all of the nutrients in whole, raw vegetables. Juicing helps “pre-digest” them, so that you won’t lose any of this valuable nutrition.

Juicing makes it easier to consume a large quantity of vegetables. Virtually every health authority recommends that you get six to eight servings of vegetables and fruits per day, but very few actually get that. Juicing virtually guarantees you’ll reach your daily target.

You can add a wider variety of vegetables to your diet. Many people eat the same vegetables every day, which violates the principle of regular food rotation and increases your chance of developing an allergy to certain foods. Juicing expands the number of different phytochemicals you receive, as each vegetable offers unique benefits. Juicing also allows you to consume vegetables that you may not normally enjoy eating whole.

Boosts your immune system. Raw juice supercharges your immune system with concentrated phytochemicals and biophotonic light energy, which can revitalize your body. The nutrients in fresh juice also feed your body’s good bacteria and help suppress potentially pathogenic ones.

Increases your energy. When your blood is flooded with nutrients and your body’s pH is optimized, you’ll feel energized. Since juice is absorbed and utilized by your body very rapidly, juicers report feeling an almost instantaneous “kick” of energy.

Supports your brain. In the Kame Project,1 people who consumed juice more than three times per week were 76 percent less likely to develop Alzheimer’s disease than those who consumed juice less than once a week.

Provides structured water. Vegetable juice is one of the purest sources of water and actually qualifies as water. Vegetable water is structured water (living water), which is different from regular water—H3O2 rather than H2O. Water from vegetables is the best quality water you can drink!

What About Protein and Fat?

When you think of protein, the image that might come to your mind may be a big juicy steak—but many vegetables actually contain substantial amounts of protein. For example, broccoli contains roughly 4 to 5 grams of protein per cup. Spinach contains 5 to 6 grams, and kale, watercress, collard, and turnip greens have respectable amounts of protein as well.

So during a juice fast when you are drinking juices all day long, you could easily be consuming 20 to 30 grams of protein or more from your juices alone. If you’re doing a short fast—a few days, for example—chances are you’re going to get plenty of protein from the juices.

If you were to try an extended juice fast (as in the film), you might want to consider adding a source of high-quality protein, such as whey, especially if you’re exercising heavily. You could augment your fats by blending healthy fats into your juice, such as avocado, coconut oil, and extra virgin olive oil, as well as raw seeds (flax, chia, hemp, etc.).

It’s important to remember that juice is not a beverage—it’s a liquid food. The way to get substantial protein from veggies is to consume them in high volume, and the way to consume a high volume of veggies is by juicing! I recommend getting into the habit of juicing daily. But even if you don’t, a three- to seven-day monthly juice fast is a great detox that can give your health a considerable boost.

My Thoughts on Why this 28 Day Juice Fast Worked

If you haven’t watched the video yet, I would certainly encourage you to do so as there were some very dramatic improvements noted in the individuals who took part in the experiment. There is simply no question in my mind that high quality vegetable juices can lead to dramatic improvements in one’s health as the video clearly demonstrates. However, what the program did not elaborate on is that there was another factor involved. It was clear that most of the people on the program ate a typical Western diet. Not only did they juice, but they eliminated many of the toxic processed foods that they were eating. I suspect that in many cases it was the elimination of the processed foods was the more important factor. So unless you commit to eliminating all the processed foods in your diet, there is a strong likelihood that you will not observe the same improvements that the people in the video did.Juicers 101: Three Basic Types of Juicers

Please understand that blenders, like Blendtec and Vitamix are NOT juicers but blenders. They are great blenders but will damage the juice because they process it at much higher temperatures, and the added fiber makes it less palatable and more difficult to consume larger amounts. When it comes to juice extractors, you have three options:

Centrifugal Juicers: Centrifugal juicers separate the juice from the fiber through a spinning process. These are the most common and least expensive machines, but they are noisy, generate higher heat, are harder to clean and typically less efficient at separating the juice from the pulp.
Masticating Juicers: Auger or masticating types of juicers (single and double gear) chew up the vegetables and push them through a strainer. They work very well and tend to give you more juice than a centrifugal juicer (possibly 20 to 25 percent more), with less heat. They’re also quieter than other models and tend to be easier to clean and assemble. They cost a bit more than centrifugal juicers, but over time you’ll break even as they give you more juice per veggie.
Grind-and-press: Presses work like an apple cider mill. These are quite expensive and therefore not as popular for everyday juicing.

Study Shows Blenders Significantly Damage Vegetable Nutrients

In addition to juicers, there are also high-power blenders that some people use to make “whole juice,” which is essentially whole vegetables and/or fruits blended with water or another liquid. This is not the same as juice. You lose at least one of the major advantages of juicing—which is being able to consume a very large quantity of vegetables, because the fiber limits the amount you can drink and it’s not as tasty. While fiber certainly has its own benefits, the abundant live nutrients in real juice are more important. The following comparison between blended juice and extracted juice by Juicing Science is instructive in understanding why the fiber issue may be insignificant:2

“One hundred grams of kale contains more than 100 percent of your recommended daily intake (RDI) of vitamin A, vitamin C, and vitamin K, and more than 10 percent of your RDI of vitamins B1, B2, B6, calcium, iron, magnesium, and manganese. Yet, despite its dense, dry appearance, it is made up of only 1.7 percent fiber, which means it provides less than six percent of your RDI for fiber.”

So if you’re pursuing a high-fiber diet, blended green smoothies may help, but you’re still going to have to get the majority of your fiber from other sources. Another downside to blended juices is that the heat generated by blending significantly damages many of the micronutrients, due to oxidation. One laboratory analysis3 found that 60 seconds in a high-powered blender destroys between 23 and 63 percent of the vitamin C, calcium, and potassium in green vegetables. There is simply no replacement for the flood of vitamins, minerals, enzymes, and phytonutrients your body gets from fresh, cold-extracted juice.

Don’t Be Afraid of the Green!

Download Interview Transcript

Your juices should consist mostly of green vegetables, with minimal fruits so its sugar (fructose) content will be low. You can add in an apple, kiwifruit, or a handful of berries to give your juice flavor, but the bulk of it should come from organic green veggies—spinach, celery, kale, Swiss chard, etc. Unfortunately, green juice has a stigma for tasting bad, and many people avoid it simply because of its color. But green juice actually has a very pleasant flavor, and it’s easy to “tweak” it to taste even better.

If you’re new to juicing, you can start with more mild-tasting veggies, like celery and cucumbers. From there you can work your way up to red leaf lettuce, romaine, spinach, and escarole, along with parsley and cilantro. Kale, collard, dandelion, mustard, and other greens can be bitter, so you’ll want to start slowly and add just a few leaves at a time.

Some of the most nutrient-dense veggies are the strongest tasting, but don’t avoid them—just use a lesser quantity in your juice until your taswissste buds acclimate. Selecting organic, non-GMO produce is very important when juicing, but the price can be a challenge for some. One alternative is to grow your own veggies, making sure to avoid toxic garden chemicals (synthetic herbicides, pesticides, and fertilizers). A great trick to make your juice more palatable, especially in the beginning, is to add one or more of these elements:

Limes and lemons: You can add one half to a whole lime or lemon for every quart of juice. Provided you’re using organic lemons or limes, you can even juice the skin if you want to avoid the hassle of peeling them. Limes are my favorite for cutting bitter flavors.
Cranberries: You can also add some cranberries if you enjoy them. Limit the cranberries to about four ounces per pint of juice.
Fresh ginger: This is an excellent addition if you enjoy the taste—it gives your juice a little “kick”!
Limited amounts of apple and carrot (just be mindful of your overall sugar content)

Juice Preparation and Storage Tips

One nice thing about juicing is that you don’t have to peel the majority of your veggies, provided they’re organic—simply brush them thoroughly. One exception is beets, which have a rather foul tasting skin. If you’re using non-organic vegetables, your best bet is to peel them, to avoid juicing pesticide residues. This is particularly important for fruits and vegetables that have been waxed, as this seals in the chemicals. It can be difficult to discern if a vegetable has been waxed or not, because the wax can be applied in a very thin, transparent layer. According to Dr. Saul:

Eggplant, turnips, cucumbers, and tomatoes are almost always waxed
Zucchini and other squash are usually waxed, but not always
Carrots are never waxed

Ideally, you’ll want to drink the juice right away. The longer it sits, the more nutrients are lost through contact with the air (oxidation). You also lose taste. This brings me to another reason I prefer masticating juicers: they introduce less air into your juice, so the juice may actually stay fresher longer. When storing juice in a container, such as a Mason jar, make sure you fill it all the way up to the top to minimize air space.
You might want to enlist the help of a FoodSaver vacuum sealer, which comes with an attachment designed to suck out the air from the top of a Mason jar. You still need to keep the juice refrigerated, and you’ll want to drink it all that day to avoid the risk of botulism, which can happen over time in an oxygen-free environment.

Juices stored more than 24 hours can also build up methanol. Your body is not adapted to detoxify methanol, which can cause a number of problems—for example, it can convert into formaldehyde that can then make its way into your brain. Methanol toxicity, which is primarily associated with the artificial sweetener aspartame, has been linked to Alzheimer’s and other health problems. Methanol is not a problem in fresh produce because the methanol is bound to pectin, which allows it to safely pass through your system, but juice is a different story. So, if you haven’t consumed your juice within 24 hours, toss it into the compost bin.

Managing Cravings and Detox Symptoms

Changing your diet or any other aspect of your lifestyle is sometimes stressful, and stress can sabotage your success. As some of the people in Vale’s super-juicing experiment discovered, you might feel a little worse before you feel better, as detox symptoms and food cravings can arise. You simply can’t address your physical health without also addressing your mental health. EFT (Emotional Freedom Technique) makes it possible to tap away your anxiety about dietary changes—it’s one of the most powerful tools for reducing stress and anxiety that I know of. In 2012, a triple blind study4 found that EFT reduced cortisol levels and symptoms of psychological distress by 24 percent—more than any other intervention tested.

If you worry that you won’t be able to get the juice down or you won’t take the time to do it, or your food cravings will be unbearable, EFT may be able to help. The first couple weeks of a new eating routine are typically the most challenging, while your body is making the necessary biochemical adjustments. Tapping can be extraordinarily beneficial for reducing anxiety, cravings, and detox symptoms during this time.
EFT is easy to learn and once you do, it’s always at your fingertips—whenever and wherever you need it. You can even adapt this intermittent fasting EFT video by Julie Schiffman, for juice fasting. Just as juicing helps reduce your body’s toxic burden, you can think of EFT as detoxification for your mind. By combining the two, your healing will be unstoppable!

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By Dr. Mercola

Your sense of smell is your most primal sense and exerts surprising influence over your thoughts, emotions, moods, memories, and behaviors. Scents are experienced long before words.
This is why it’s nearly impossible to describe them with language. Olfaction is different from your other senses, processed through different pathways in your brain.
For other sensations such as sounds and visual images, sensory input is delivered straight to your thalamus, which you can think of as “the big switchboard” in your head. From there, data goes out to your primary sensory cortices.
But smells are different. Before reaching your thalamus, they first wind their way through other regions of your brain, including areas controlling memory and emotion. So with scents, you have all this extra processing even before you have conscious awareness of the scent.1
For this reason, scents can have a powerful influence over how you think, feel, and behave. Aromatherapy allows you to harness the olfactory power of plants for healing, or simply to enhance your state of well-being.
Essential oils carry biologically active volatile compounds in a highly concentrated form that can provide therapeutic benefits in very small amounts. Please understand that I am referring to pure, therapeutic grade essential oils from plants, NOT synthetic fragrances and perfumes, which can be toxic and are typically loaded with allergenic compounds.

Aromatherapy Was Used to Treat the Plague

The use of fragrances has been around for thousands of years, although traditions and methodologies have changed through the ages. According to “The Smell Report,”2 the process of extracting and preserving a flower’s scent using alcohol distillation was discovered by Avicenna. Avicenna was an 11th century Arabian alchemist and physician, who sort of stumbled upon it while “trying to isolate for Islam the soul of its holy rose.” Before this, perfumes consisted only of thick resins, gums, and gooey unguents.
Back in the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries, physicians promoted the therapeutic use of scents, including Hippocrates, Galen, and Crito. Even the plague was treated with fragrances!3
It wasn’t until the early nineteenth century that the medicinal use of aromatics was largely discredited by scientists who favored drugs. Fortunately, aromatherapy is now making a strong comeback, moving steadily in the direction of mainstream.

How Essential Oils Can Help with Several Common Maladies

There are probably as many uses for aromatherapy as there are essential oils, but research shows particular promise in relieving stress, stabilizing your mood, improving sleep, pain, and nausea relief, and improving your memory and energy level.
An important element of aromatherapy is synergy, which is why using a combination of oils often creates a much more powerful effect than any one particular oil. With a skilled aromatherapist, the possibilities are nearly endless!
In order to give you an idea of the versatility of aromatherapy, the following table lists some of the therapeutic uses of several oils for a few of today’s most common complaints. As you can see, there are some real “multitaskers,” like lavender and peppermint—oils that treat more than one problem.4
Many of these are discussed in an excellent article in The Huffington Post5 about scents that can enhance your well-being. For further information, refer to the resource section at the bottom of this article.

Complaint
Essential Oils

Stress

Lavender, lemon, bergamot, peppermint, vetiver, pine, and ylang ylang

Insomnia
Lavender,6 chamomile, jasmine, benzoin, neroli, rose, sandalwood oil, sweet marjoram, and ylang ylang; lemon can wake you up7

Anxiety
Lavender, bergamot, rose, clary sage, lemon, Roman chamomile, orange, sandalwood, rose-scented geranium, and pine8

Depressed mood
Peppermint, chamomile, lavender, and jasmine9

Pain
Lavender, chamomile, clary sage, juniper, eucalyptus, rosemary, peppermint, lavender, and green apple (especially for migraines)

Nausea and vomiting
Mint, ginger, lemon, orange, ginger, dill, fennel, chamomile, clary sage, and lavender

Memory and attention
Sage, peppermint,10 and cinnamon

Low energy
Black pepper, cardamom, cinnamon, clove, angelica, jasmine, tea tree, rosemary, sage, and citrus

The Science of Smell

Why does the fishy scent of a beach make one person retch while evoking feelings of expansiveness and joy in another? These variations in responses to scents tie into the special brain pathways of your olfactory system. Olfactory information is stored or encoded with all sorts of memories and associations in your brain. The neurological substrates of olfaction are especially geared for associative learning (in your hippocampus) and emotional processing (in your amygdala).11Kate Fox explains it well in “The Smell Report”:12

“Our olfactory receptors are directly connected to the limbic system, the most ancient and primitive part of the brain, which is thought to be the seat of emotion. Smell sensations are relayed to the cortex, where ‘cognitive’ recognition occurs, only after the deepest parts of our brains have been stimulated. Thus, by the time we correctly name a particular scent as, for example, ‘vanilla,’ the scent has already activated the limbic system, triggering more deep-seated emotional responses.”

A number of studies have shown that odor learning begins before birth. A fetus detects flavor/odor compounds in its amniotic fluid, from the mother’s diet. In studies where a mothers’ consumption of distinctive smelling substances such as garlic, alcohol, or cigarette smoke were monitored during pregnancy, their infants were found to prefer these scents more than infants who had not been exposed to them.13 After birth, newborns locate their mothers’ nipples by smell. Breastfeeding also influences scent preferences; babies will associate breastfeeding smells with maternal bonding and the comfort of their mothers’ arms.  According to a recent study14, babies can even smell their mothers’ fears and learn the dangers of the world, just days after birth. When mothers experience stress, their body releases a scent that their baby detects and responds to. 
Scent preferences change along with developmental stages. Studies show that three-year-olds have essentially the same likes and dislikes as adults. Children do not develop sensitivity to certain odors until they reach puberty. Researchers have also found that olfactory receptors differ by as much as 30 percent between any two individuals.15 On tests of smelling ability, women consistently score higher than men, and this gender difference holds true even for newborns!16
In summary, your responses to scents are largely “learned” as a function of the emotional context in which they were first experienced, and then the association influences your mood and behavior later in life. Naturally, there are genetic differences as well. Do you LOVE the smell of cilantro—or do you think it smells like soap? If the latter is true, you may be an olfactory mutant… literally.17

We Are MUCH Better Smellers Than We Thought

Since the 1920s, scientists have believed that the human nose was capable of detecting about 10,000 odors, but a new study published in the journal Science shows this estimate is way off the mark. In the first empirical study ever done, researchers at Rockefeller University discovered the human nose can discriminate more than one trillion olfactory stimuli!18 The least successful smeller is now thought to be capable of smelling about 80 million unique scents, but if you’re a super-sniffer, you can detect a spectacular one thousand trillion scents.19

This discovery begins to explain why studies are now finding that the human olfactory system is able to detect factors such as fear, disgust, age,20 and gender.21 Yes, studies show you can identify the age or gender of another person simply by his or her smell. A mother can identify an infant by smell alone after holding the child for just one hour, even others than her own.
It used to be thought that humans did not produce (or sense) pheromones, but many scent scientists are revising their beliefs about this. A study out of New York’s Stony Brook University found people who are scared do indeed give off “fear pheromones” in their sweat—hormones that trigger parts of your brain that are subconsciously associated with fear. This may explain why an individual with a fear of flying can trigger anxiety in other passengers who would not normally be afraid—the fear pheromone can trigger similar emotions in others who happen to catch a whiff.22 The same researchers also found that disgust can be “contagious.”23

Scents Can Alter Your Nervous System

Scents can actually change your nervous system biochemistry. A Japanese study found that inhaling essential oils can modulate your sympathetic nervous system activity. Certain oils were found to be stimulating, while others were found to be calming. For example:24

Black pepper, fennel, and grapefruit oil caused a 1.5-to 2.5-fold increase in sympathetic nervous system activity (as measured by an increase in systolic blood pressure)
Rose and patchouli oil resulted in a 40 percent decrease in sympathetic nervous system activity
Pepper oil induced a 1.7-fold increase in plasma adrenaline concentration, while rose oil caused adrenaline to drop by 30 percent
Other oils have been shown to measurably decrease stress hormones—inhaling lavender and rosemary were shown to reduce cortisol levels.25

As mentioned earlier, scents play a powerful role in memories, especially emotional memories. Olfactory input is routed through your amygdala and hippocampus (which process emotion), but bypasses your brain’s higher cortical areas, the “thinking parts.”26 This suggests aromatherapy might possibly be helpful to those with dementia, although research thus far has produced mixed results.

From Onions to Cow Manure: Smell Is in the Nose of the Beholder

As you might expect, cultural differences contribute to what smells enhance your feelings of happiness, versus making you want to flee to the nearest open window. Scent preferences differ dramatically across cultural lines. In many non-Western cultures, smell is regarded with much more importance and even reverence. For example, among the Ongee of the Andaman Islands, the universe and everything in it is defined by smell.
Their calendar is based on the aromas of flowers that bloom at different times of the year. When greeting someone, the Ongee do not ask, “How are you?” but rather, “Konyune onorange-tanka?” which translates to, “How is your nose?”27 For the cattle-raising Dassanetch of Ethiopia, no bouquet is more beautiful than a herd of cows. The men wash their hands in cattle urine and smear their bodies with manure to make themselves more attractive to the ladies. The Dogon of Mali rub fried onions all over their bodies, as it’s the most highly desirable perfume!
Although we have convincing evidence that pleasant fragrances can improve your sense of well-being, some recent studies suggest it’s your expectation about an odor, rather than the odor itself, that may be responsible for the mood and effects produced—essentially the placebo effect. Could merely thinking about lavender oil make you calm? In one experiment, researchers found that just telling subjects that a pleasant or unpleasant odor was being administered, which they might not be able to smell, affected their mood, symptoms, and sense of well-being.28

A Few Resources I’ve Sniffed Out for You

Aromatherapy can be a beneficial adjunct to your overall health plan. It’s not a replacement for wise lifestyle choices like good nutrition and exercise, but it is an excellent way to further enhance your physical and emotional health. Aromatherapy is also one more tool you can keep in your tool bag for managing everyday stress, balancing out mood swings, and improving your sleep. Your nose is probably an underappreciated resource, so perhaps it’s time to make some use of it! Whether you seek out a trained aromatherapist or adopt a DIY approach, the following are a few resources you might find useful.

National Association for Holistic Aromatherapy (NAHA): Everything about the medicinal use of aromatic plants and the holistic practice of aromatherapy
Aroma Web: A directory of aromatherapy information, tips, recipes, sources, including a regional aromatherapy business directory
American Botanical Council: Herbal medicine information that includes an herb library and clinical guide to herbs
Herb Med: Interactive electronic herb database (some information is free, but full access requires a fee)

By Dr. Mercola

“Stress is not a state of mind… it’s measurable and dangerous, and humans can’t seem to find their off-switch.” These words of warning come from renowned author and award-winning neurobiologist Robert Sapolsky in the documentary Stress: Portrait of a Killer.1
The film, jointly produced by National Geographic and Stanford University where Dr. Sapolsky is a professor and scholar, shows just how dangerous prolonged stress can be.
As we evolved, the stress response saved our lives by enabling us to run from predators or take down prey. But today, we are turning on the same “life-saving” reaction to cope with $4 per gallon gasoline, fear of public speaking, difficult bosses, and traffic jams—and have a hard time turning it off.
Constantly being in a stress response may have you marinating in corrosive hormones around the clock.
This film shows the impact stress has on your body, how it can shrink your brain, add fat to your belly, and even unravel your chromosomes. Understanding how stress works can help you figure out ways to combat it and reduce its negative impacts on your health.

Monkey See, Monkey Do

Dr. Sapolsky has learned a great deal about the human stress response and its effects on your body by studying primates in Africa. Every year, he spends a few weeks in the Kenyan wilderness studying baboon societies that have intraspecies social and psychological tumult that mimics the stress of modern man.
He monitors their adrenal hormone levels, namely adrenalin (epinephrine) and glucocorticoids (such as cortisol). The fact that baboons live in communities with hierarchical structures led Dr. Sapolsky to one of his most profound discoveries: baboon stress is related to hierarchy, or social rank.
The higher a baboon’s rank, the less stress it experiences. The lower its rank, the higher its stress. More importantly, Dr. Sapolsky discovered that the low ranking “have-nots” of the baboon world experienced higher heart rates and blood pressure than the “haves.”
Arteries in the “have-not” monkeys filled up with plaque, restricting their blood flow and increasing their heart attack risk. This was the first time stress was scientifically linked to deteriorating health in wild primates. As it turns out, the same is true for other primates—for example, us!

Mortality Rates Follow a Social Gradient

Professor Sir Michael Marmot performed a 40-year long stress study in which he followed 18,000 men occupying various positions with the British Civil Service. His findings paralleled what Sapolsky found for the baboons: the higher your status, the lower your risk for stress-related diseases.2
Marmot found that men in the lowest employment grades were much more likely to die prematurely than men in the higher grades—there is in fact a “social gradient” for mortality. Subsequent studies involving women had similar findings. But why would this be—what does your status have to do with your stress?

It’s All About Your Locus of Control

Dr. Sapolsky explains how psychological distress may turn on your stress response in this short video clip. If the link does not work for you, you can access it on the Stanford University website (click on “Related to this Story” in right column, then the tab “More on Stress”). Sapolsky explains how you are more vulnerable to stress if the following factors are true:

You feel like you have no control
You’re not getting any predictive information (how bad the challenge is going to be, how long it will go on, etc.)
You feel you have no way out
You interpret things as getting worse
You have no “shoulder to cry on” (e.g., lack of social affiliation or support)

Like baboons, people at the top of the social pyramid feel a greater sense of control because they are the ones who call the shots, as well as typically having more social connections and resources at their disposal. This results in less stress, which over the long run translates to lower rates of disease. Stress is also closely related to the experience of pleasure, related to the binding of dopamine to pleasure receptors in your brain. The brains of “primate CEOs” light up brightly in PET scans, whereas the brains of subordinate monkeys do not, indicating that life is less pleasurable for the subordinates.
Like primates, people of lower socioeconomic status appear to derive less pleasure from their lives. Perhaps this is why laughter therapy is so effective!3, 4 Overall, men and women suffer from the same stress-related illnesses, but they differ in the types of situations they experience as most stressful. The genders also experience stress differently. For example, women suffer more stress-induced anxiety and depression than men.5 One thing is known to be true for both genders: higher stress equates to a shorter life expectancy.

Are You a Stress Junkie?

The paradox here is that humans have essentially become addicted to stress. There is “good stress” (eustress) and “bad stress” (distress)—meaning, you experience certain stressful experiences as unpleasant and seek to avoid them, but others you may actually seek out because they’re fun. For example, snowboarding, skydiving, rollercoasters, and scary movies are experiences that may flip your thrill-switch—and your body responds to those stresses in the same way as if a tiger were chasing you. Your muscles tense, your heart pounds, your respirations increase, and your body stops all of its non-essential processes.This can be pleasantly exhilarating, and for some rather addictive… you might know someone whom you could describe as an “adrenalin junkie.” A thrill is simply the relinquishing of a bit of control in a setting that feels safe. But when you’re in that heightened state of arousal 24/7, stress takes its toll on your body—whether you perceive the stress as “good” or “bad.”

Stress Takes a Toll on Your Brain and Adds Inches to Your Waistline

Science has established that stress can lead to cardiovascular disease, but did you know that it can also lead to weight gain—of the worst kind? Stress-induced weight gain typically involves an increase in belly fat, which is the most dangerous fat for your body to accumulate, and increases your cardiovascular risk. Stress alters the way fat is deposited because of the specific hormones and other chemicals your body produces when you’re stressed.
Prolonged stress can also damage your brain cells and make you lose the capacity to remember things. The brain cells of stressed rats are dramatically smaller, especially in the area of their hippocampus, which is the seat of learning and memory. Stress disrupts your neuroendocrine and immune systems and appears to trigger a degenerative process in your brain that can result in Alzheimer’s disease. Stress can also accelerate aging by shortening your telomeres, the protective genetic structures that regulate how your cells age. In the words of Dr. Lissa Rankin, author of Mind Over Medicine:6

“Our bodies know how to fix broken proteins, kill cancer cells, retard aging, and fight infection. They even know how to heal ulcers, make skin lesions disappear and knit together broken bones! But here’s the kicker—those natural self-repair mechanisms don’t work if you’re stressed!”

According to Dr. Sapolsky, the following are the most common health conditions that are caused by or worsened by stress:

Cardiovascular disease
Hypertension
Depression

Anxiety
Sexual dysfunction
Infertility and irregular cycles

Frequent colds
Insomnia and fatigue
Trouble concentrating

Memory loss
Appetite changes
Digestive problems and dysbiosis

The Dutch Famine Study

The Dutch Famine Birth Cohort Study (Hungerwinter Study) shows that stress in utero might be followed by a lifetime of poor health. Survivors of the Dutch famine are now in their 60s, and those conceived during the famine have higher rates of cardiovascular disease and diabetes and are in poorer overall health than those conceived after the famine ended. Researchers postulate that stress hormones in the blood of those pregnant women triggered changes in their babies’ developing nervous systems as they battled against starvation. Decades later, their bodies still “remember” this prenatal stress.7
The Dutch Famine Study is not the only scientific research to show that your mental and physical health can be permanently affected by childhood stress and trauma. The Adverse Childhood Experiences (ACE) study is an ongoing research project that analyzes the relationship between stressful childhood experiences and health outcomes later in life. There is a very strong correlation between childhood stress and many diseases, including cancer, depression, and heart disease.8

Cortisol Can Be an Important Health Challenge

The stress hormone cortisol, released by your adrenal glands as part of the “fight-or-flight” response, is the master hormone that regulates many aspects of your body’s stress response. However, cortisol levels are typically elevated across the board in today’s culture, to the detriment of mental and physical health. The impact stress is having on society as a whole is so profound that Psychology Today calls cortisol “Public Enemy Number One:”9

“The ripple effect of a fearful, isolated and stressed out society increases cortisol levels across the board for Americans of all ages. This creates a public health crisis and a huge drain on our economy.”

For example, elevated cortisol levels are a potential trigger for mental illness and reduced resilience, especially among adolescents. Evidence of the societal affects of unmanaged stress is disturbingly evident on the evening news, with seemingly ever-increasing episodes of bullying, suicides, and mass shootings, which are unfortunate, albeit extreme examples of what happens when people cannot cope. When you have effective stress reduction tools, you and your children are mentally and physically healthier, more resilient and less likely to be depressed, sick, or violent.

Is It Time to Send Yourself to Cortisol Rehab?

Sapolsky’s baboons prove that stress is not inevitable. You can change your environment and your responses. And as you learn how to effectively decrease your stress level, your cortisol will stabilize, your blood pressure will drop, and your health will improve in just about every way. It’s important to realize that stress management isn’t something you save up to do on the weekend—it needs to be done on a daily basis, because that’s how often stress rears its ugly head. There are many different stress reduction techniques, and what works for you may not work for another.
One may enjoy meditating, but another may feel calmer by cleaning house! Stress management is a highly individual thing, and the last thing you want to do is be stressed by your supposedly stress-busting activity. You’ll have to find what works best for you. Of course, making good food choices will support your overall health and increase your resiliency. Be sure to get adequate sleep as sleep deprivation dramatically impairs your body’s ability to handle stress. Several more stress management approaches are suggested in the following table.

Regular physical activity
Meditation: Taking even 10 minutes to sit quietly, such as during work breaks, can help decrease your feelings of stress and anxiety

Mindfulness training and breath work
Yoga: Health benefits from regular yoga practice have been shown to decrease stress, improve sleep and immune function, and reduce food cravings, among other things

Social connectedness
Laughter and levity

Spend time in nature
Music

Have more fun
EFT: Emotional Freedom Techniques

Emotional Freedom Techniques (EFT): Some of the Most Powerful Tools for Managing Stress

When it comes to managing stress, the Emotional Freedom Technique (EFT) deserves special mention. EFT is a group of energy psychology techniques that involve tapping on several of your body’s acupressure points while focusing on and making specific verbalizations about the issue at hand—in this case, stress. Like acupuncture, EFT is based on the fact that your body is an electrical system, and vital energy flows along invisible channels known as meridians. When you’re stressed, anxious, traumatized, or sick, your energy flow can become blocked, which EFT can help reverse—without the needles used in acupuncture!

EFT has been scientifically shown to calm your central nervous system and significantly reduce cortisol levels. In 2012, a triple blind study conducted by Dr. Dawson Church (who can be credited for the majority of current research on Clinical EFT), found EFT reduced cortisol levels and symptoms of psychological distress by 24 percent—more than any other intervention tested.10, 11
Tapping can help your body repair emotional “scarring” and reprogram the way it responds to stressors. Since these stressors are often connected to physical complaints, many people find that pain and other physical symptoms will improve or completely disappear. There are many styles of EFT, but Clinical EFT12 is the one I have the most experience with and is the best established and best supported by scientific research. If you are interested in experiencing EFT for yourself, please refer to the video demonstration of EFT for stress relief above.
Although the basics of EFT can be learned quite easily, for serious issues I recommend your seeking the help of a qualified EFT practitioner.13 There is an art to these techniques and having an expert guide you—someone who has spent years training in these skills—will accelerate your progress. Working with an expert will also prevent you from falsely concluding that EFT doesn’t work, when you simply need a little coaching and support, especially if you are working on deeper issues such as trauma or post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD). The beauty of EFT is that it can actually reprogram your body’s reactions to the unavoidable stressors of everyday life, providing a lasting effect.
As Sapolsky’s baboons have shown you, stress is an extremely significant player in your overall health. The better you get at managing stress on a daily basis, the better your health will be.