Harvard Medical Students Rebel Against Pharma-Ties

Two hundred Harvard Medical School students are confronting the school’s administration, demanding an end to pharmaceutical industry influence in the classroom.

The students worry that pharmaceutical industry scandals in recent years, including criminal convictions, billions of dollars in fines, proof of bias in research and publishing and false marketing claims, have cast a bad light on the medical profession. The students have criticized Harvard as being less vigilant than other leading medical schools in monitoring potential financial conflicts by faculty members.

Harvard received the lowest possible grade, an “F,” from the American Medical Student Association, a national group that rates how well medical schools monitor and control drug industry money.
The students were joined by Dr. Marcia Angell, a faculty member and former editor in chief of the New England Journal of Medicine, who has vigorously advocated for an end to liaisons between academia and Big Pharma. [Read more]


And from The New York Times, an article, "Harvard Medical School in Ethics Quandary" --

BOSTON — In a first-year pharmacology class at Harvard Medical School, Matt Zerden grew wary as the professor promoted the benefits of cholesterol drugs and seemed to belittle a student who asked about side effects.

Mr. Zerden later discovered something by searching online that he began sharing with his classmates. The professor was not only a full-time member of the Harvard Medical faculty, but a paid consultant to 10 drug companies, including five makers of cholesterol treatments.

“I felt really violated,” Mr. Zerden, now a fourth-year student, recently recalled. “Here we have 160 open minds trying to learn the basics in a protected space, and the information he was giving wasn’t as pure as I think it should be.”

Mr. Zerden’s minor stir four years ago has lately grown into a full-blown movement by more than 200 Harvard Medical School students and sympathetic faculty, intent on exposing and curtailing the industry influence in their classrooms and laboratories, as well as in Harvard’s 17 affiliated teaching hospitals and institutes. [Read More]

Research Article from the journal, ALLERGY, 2009

Topic: Prebiotics May Reduce Risk of Allergies in Infants
Keywords:
ALLERGIES, ALLERGY, ATOPY, ATOPIC DERMATITIS, IMMUNITY - Prebiotics, Short-chain Galacto-Oligosaccharides, Long-chain Fructo-Oligosaccharides, Breast Milk

Reference: "A specific mixture of short-chain galacto-oligosaccharides and long-chain fructo-oligosaccharides induces a beneficial immunoglobulin profile in infants at high risk for allergy," van Hoffen E, Ruiter B, et al, Allergy, 2009; 64(3): 484-7. (Address: Dr J. Garssen, Numico Research, Bosrandweg 20, 6704 PH Wageningen, the Netherlands).

Summary:
In a randomized, double-blind, placebo-controlled study involving infants at high risk for allergy, supplementation with a hypoallergenic whey formula containing 8 g/l GOS/FOS in a 9:1 ratio for a period of 6 months was found to significantly reduce plasma levels of total IgE, IgG1, IgG2, and IgG3, suggesting a beneficial effect on the antibody profile and the immune response. Moreover, supplementation with GOS/FOS did not interfere with the response to vaccination (infants were vaccinated with Hexavac against a.o. diphtheria, tetanus, and polio at 3 months of age). The authors conclude supplementation with GOS/FOS is "a safe method to restrain the atopic march."

NICK's Comments-- This is a great example of the benefit of probiotics. The introduction of 'good' bacteria to the gastro-intestinal tract helps to establish a healthy balance of gut flora. This is important because upward of 60% of immune system function is affected here. This is also why for a baby under 1 year old, they have a 3-times greater chance of getting ASTHMA/ALLERGIES after only ONE DOSE OF ANTIBIOTICS. Also, as the article mentioned at the header about Atopic Dermatitis, most people don't realize that ECXEMA is not a skin problem. The symptom presents itself on the skin, but the problem is, for the lack of better words, on the inside. Nutrition should be the first area to be considered. Putting topical creams and such on the skin may help deal with the itch, etc., but it's not addressing the actual problem.

Waterbirth Lecture Tonight

I just wanted to jot down a few notes from tonights lecture with Barbara Harper, RN,CD,CCE and founder of Waterbirth International. She is in town leading a workshop/certification on waterbirth, and led a free public lecture tonight at the Mercy and Truth Medical Center in KCK. Her talk was entitled, "Do Our Birth Choices Matter?" Here are some random points that I wanted to remember...

- Article from ACOG (American College of Obstetrics/Gynecology) with regard to 'Evidence-Based practice' guidelines - - stated from an OBGYN that much of what is done in obstetrics and childbirth is not 'Evidenced-Based medicine,' meaning that there is no evidence in research that the methods being employed are helpful or even safe. (As I've noted numerous times, much of the protocol in our hospital obstetrics has nothing to do with what's best for mother or baby, but what is best for the doctor/hospital, i.e. eating/drinking while in labor, mother position, repeated vaginal exams during labor, induction, immediate umbilical cord cutting, just to name a few...) and I would add, it seriously questions the overall safety of a hospital birth due to that fact.

- With regard to mother positioning, a Mother delivering in the upright position, such as squatting, is better at opening the pelvis than on her back, as is customary in the hospital setting... (it opens the pelvis 28% more when standing than lying supine)

- The importance of a vaginal delivery due to the introduction of bacteria, etc. to the baby while on his/her way out! It's an important part of the development and foundation of the child's immune system.

- The need to get that baby immediately to the mom's chest, or 'Habitat,' as Barbara called it :-) Regardless of the outcome of the delivery, the next step (immediate breastfeeding and skin-to-skin contact with mom) can significantly affect the baby's new arrival to the outside world. She told us about how her 2nd child didn't leave her 'habitat' for about 2 days (he pooped, pee'd, and it didn't matter!)... that's the importance of skin-to-skin contact.

That's all for now, it's late. For more info, see Barbara's book "Gentle Birth Choices."

Interesting Quotes...

A study in the Journal of the American Medical Association (JAMA) finds that adverse drug reactions are a major cause of deaths among hospital patients. The study estimates that somewhere between 76,000 and 137,000 hospital patients die each year from an adverse drug reaction. That would make it one of the leading causes of death in this country.

And these are just from drugs that are correctly given. Wow! (and this study is from 10 years ago...)

Don Miller

check out the video for the future movie about the book, Blue Like Jazz. Don is a great writer and thinker, and one who addresses some great issues in the evangelical church. Also, here are a few short clips from Don talking about the Democratic party, and also the prayer he led at the Democratic National Convention

Happy watching.

Nick

The Real Truth Behind Flu Shots -- And Why So Few People Get the Flu During The Summer

*Click Here To Watch This Video and to know how to prevent yourself from getting the flu naturally!

Close to 150 million doses of flu vaccine have been produced this year, which is the highest number ever available. Yet, the chances of a flu shot being effective in any given year are about as high as your chances of pulling a needle from a haystack. This is because flu shots only protect against certain strains of the flu virus. These strains mutate rapidly, and scientists can only make educated guesses about which strains will be most prevalent this year.

As you might suspect, often they are way off base. As the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) states:

“In some years when vaccine and circulating strains were not well-matched, no vaccine effectiveness can be demonstrated in some studies, even in healthy adults. It is not possible in advance of the influenza season to predict how well the vaccine and circulating strains will be matched, and how that match may affect the degree of vaccine effectiveness.”

This does not bode well for the millions of Americans who are being lulled into a false sense of security that getting a flu shot is all they need to do to prevent the flu.

Flu Shots’ Poor Rates of Effectiveness:

It really amazes me how effective the drug companies have been at manipulating the culture to actually let them sell these toxic, ineffective and expensive options in pharmacies, airports, college campuses, grocery stores and countless other outlets.

The truth is that:

• Giving young children flu shots appeared to have no impact on flu-related doctor visits or hospitalizations during two recent flu seasons, according to a study published in the October issue of the Archives of Pediatric & Adolescent Medicine.

• The flu vaccine is no more effective for children than a placebo, according to a large-scale, systematic review of 51 studies, published in the Cochrane Database of Systematic Reviews.

• No studies have conclusively proven that flu shots prevent flu-related deaths among the elderly.

• A study published in the Lancet just found that influenza vaccination was NOT associated with a reduced risk of pneumonia in older people. Why is this important? Because 35,000 of the 36,000 “flu” deaths the government claims happen each year are actually caused by diseases like pneumonia, and NOT the flu.

• Research published in the American Journal of Respiratory and Critical Care Medicine also confirms that there has been no decrease in deaths from influenza and pneumonia, despite the fact that vaccination coverage among the elderly has increased from 15 percent in 1980 to 65 percent now.

I can’t imagine anyone signing up to receive this vaccine even if they were paid to do it, yet tens of millions are conned into thinking money spent on this shot is worthwhile! If people only understood the facts, I doubt many would rationally decide to receive this shot.

Sadly, throwing away the money spent on the flu vaccine is the least of your worries, should you decide to get a flu shot.

What Exactly is in a Flu Shot?

Before you decide to get vaccinated, it would serve you well to find out.

According to Dr. Donald Miller, MD, two-thirds of this year’s flu vaccines contain 25 micrograms of thimerosal. Thimerosal is 49 percent mercury by weight.

Each dose of these flu vaccines contains more than 250 times the Environmental Protection Agency’s safety limit for mercury.

By now, most people are well aware that children and fetuses are most at risk of damage from this neurotoxin, as their brains are still developing. Yet the CDC still recommends that children over 6 months, and pregnant women, receive the flu vaccine each year. This is just inexcusable.

In addition to mercury, flu vaccines also contain other hazardous ingredients like:

• Formaldehyde -- a known cancer-causing agent
• Aluminum -- a neurotoxin that has been linked to Alzheimer’s disease
• Triton X-100 -- a detergent
• Phenol (carbolic acid)
• Ethylene glycol (antifreeze)
• Various antibiotics: neomycin, streptomycin, gentamicin -- which can cause allergic reactions in some people

How many people do you think would knowingly sit down and allow themselves, or their children, to be injected with:

• Formaldehyde?

• Aluminum?

• Mercury?

• Antifreeze?

It’s time word got out that if you got a flu shot, you did exactly that. And for what? Even if you get a flu shot, you can still get the flu, or flu-like symptoms, because it’s anyone’s guess which flu viruses will be in your area.

The powers that be have done an excellent job of instilling fear into the population so they believe that they must get a shot to stay healthy, but the simple reality is it’s doing you and your family more harm than good.

Exercise only takes 3 minutes!

Surge Training, or Burst Training, as we refer to and teach in Maximized Living, has finally made the medical research. It's about time.

This article, "Brief but Intense Exercise May Thwart Diabetes," describes a study that showed doing brief 3 minute high-intense exercises significantly improves measures dealing w/ Diabetes.

Over the course of 2 weeks, the participants completed 6 sessions of supervised high-intensity interval training. Each session consisted of four-to-six 30-second sprints on a stationary bicycle.

Type-2 Diabetes is completely reversible! Sadly, the medical profession doesn't typically 'advertise' it this way. The RX drug ads on TV aim more to help you 'live' with diabetes well. That is ethically wrong and pretty much a big middle finger to everybody purchasing their drugs. So, what does this exercise look like...

Monday, Wednesday, Friday --
20 seconds sprints on stat. bike/ or running in place

20 sec. rest

20 seconds sprints on stat. bike/ or running in place

20 sec. rest

20 seconds sprints on stat. bike/ or running in place

--> and repeat 1 time. That's it. You can also replace any exercise you want to, as long as you are doing it INTENSELY! Squat thrusts, push ups, crunches, whatever!