HYPOTHYROIDISM OR IODINE DEFICIENCY?
Our youngest daughter was born in May, 2001. Through routine newborn screening at the hospital, she was diagnosed with congenital hypothyroidism. The doctors said she would have to take Synthroid her entire life or be permanently impaired, both physically and mentally. They also said that I should be tested, which revealed that I was hypothyroid.
We visited the pediatric endocrinologist at the UW-Madison Clinic. I asked him whether it could be that her tiny body had been supplying the thyroid hormone demand for me. I was told that thyroid hormone did not cross the placenta. (Why, I wondered, when just about everything else did?) I looked at that precious little child and just knew there was nothing wrong with her.
I found a local general practitioner who was willing to work with us and monitor her rather than simply prescribe synthetic hormones at the ripe old age of eight days. If she really needed thyroid hormone, she would get it, but I didn’t want to give it to her unnecessarily. The GP could also take care of me, and he began monitoring my thyroid levels, too. It was like a see-saw. As the weeks went by, her TSH levels came down and mine went up! So thyroid doesn’t cross the placenta, eh? Well, something that was affecting her thyroid gland sure did! Before she was one year old, she had perfectly normal blood tests. Her growth and development have been excellent and she has never had even one dose of synthetic thyroid, praise God!
I began taking Synthroid in October, 2001. After a few months on Synthroid, when the fog began to clear, I decided that I needed to find an alternative to synthetic hormones. I researched thyroid disease and made a strong attempt to eliminate goitrogens (primarily soy) from our diet. I began taking Armour thyroid. I also asked the doctor whether I might be deficient in iodine. I have lived in the Goiter Belt my entire life. I was told that I just wouldn’t be deficient. We have iodized salt, after all, and there is salt in everything we eat, too much salt in fact. No, no, that just couldn’t be my problem.
For years, we in the United States have been told to take the salt shaker off the table to reduce our sodium intake. Processed foods are generally high in sodium.
I did some investigating. I contacted many food processors in the U.S., big name companies that make cereals, meat products, breads, cheeses, snack foods, soups and other foods. Only one company said they used iodized salt in the production of their food (and I use the term “food” loosely), but they didn’t use it in the U.S; only in Canada. So much for getting all the iodine we need from salty processed foods.
I put the iodized salt shaker back on the table, although it certainly is not an adequate source of iodine. A year or two later, a friend introduced me to Weston A. Price Foundation and real milk. We put a little “barnette” in our back yard and got a Jersey cow and some hens. At first, I washed my cow with a little soapy water when I milked. Eventually, I started washing her with an iodine udder wash that I bought at our local farm supply store. You know, putting my hands in that iodine water twice a day did something for me. I was too warm. I couldn’t sleep. My hands shook. My heart pounded. My hair fell out. I was jittery. I was weak. I was taking too much Armour thyroid!
I went back to the doctor and told him I was taking too much Armour. I told him about the iodine udder wash I used on my cow. He absolutely did not believe me. Perish the thought that my problem was lack of iodine! My blood was tested for TSH and my dose was lowered. I couldn’t even take the reduced amount. I went back again. He tested me again. I will never forget the way he looked as he said, “Now tell me. What exactly is it that you have been doing?”
Laughing with “udder” glee, I said, “I stick my hands in iodine water twice a day when I wash my cow before I milk her. I was iodine deficient. That’s my story, and I’m sticking to it!”
I immediately cut my dose of Armour in half and devised a plan to slowly let my healing thyroid gland take over so I did not shock my system. Nearly six months ago, I was completely weaned from Armour thyroid. What a great simple cure, and cheap! One whole gallon of iodine udder wash concentrate costs about $10.00. Seven years of being poked, paying doctor bills, and taking prescriptions when all the time the cure was at the farm supply store! Now that we know what a little iodine can do, we take kelp and use that good, old fashioned, stinging 2% iodine tincture on any wounds. It prevents thyroid disease and infection!
What is horrifying is the fact that my precious child was nearly condemned to a lifetime of unnecessary and harmful treatment! Would her normal little thyroid gland have atrophied and given up the ghost? Would she have suffered all the horrible side effects of hyperthyroidism from unnecessary treatment and not been able to tell me? I don’t know. I am just thankful I did not have to find out.
I know the symptoms of thyroid disease well. If I ever need to see a physician to get a thyroid prescription again, I will do it. There is a need for good doctors. If I were ever in a car wreck and someone had to put me back together, I can tell you, I would be exceedingly grateful for skilled physicians. I only wish they would consider nutrition first before pharmaceuticals.
Suzanne Rohloff
Monroe, Wisconsin
GLUTEN AND THYROID FUNCTION
In the Summer, 2009 Wise Traditions, both Dr. Rind and Dr. Dommisse mention allergies to wheat in their articles, points which many readers might overlook. I have come to the conclusion that wheat and gluten were two of the main factors in suppressing my metabolism, leading to weak adrenals, weight gain, fatigue, infections, slow healing and a weak immune system, despite spending a fortune each month on the best health foods and supplements, while I was simultaneously consuming gallons of raw milk during those many months.
A few years ago, I went for one month without wheat except for one big slip mid-month, namely Oreo cookies— we crave what we’re allergic to. A blood test at the end of the month ordered by my endocrinologist proved conclusively that the absence of wheat and related grains alone caused my thyroid to heal and no longer be swollen, eliminated fatigue, gave me new energy, and as the doctor’s scale proved, lose fifteen pounds effortlessly. I did no exercise that month, not even mowing the lawn; I was a couch potato to prove the theory. The doc examined my thyroid gland and confirmed I’d reversed fifty years of hypoactive thyroidism.
Candy Reed
Lake Panasoffkee, Florida
MERCURY DETOX WITH IODINE
Thank you for the article on iodine in the Summer, 2009 Wise Traditions. I have been using iodine for about a year or more now for mercury poisoning. I also have problems with thyroid function, I think, since I am cold all the time, and my eyebrows are faint on the outer edges. I have fibroids, and other such symptoms. I found Brownstein’s and Galen Knight’s lectures at the last WAPF conference to be very reaffirming and informative. Also Jerry Brunetti’s lecture on trace minerals from years past was extremely helpful.
I probably got mercury poisoning from lots of amalgam fillings, which I had removed years ago by a dentist who took no precautions because he thought it was harmless. I also probably took in a lot of methylmercury and DDT from a year of eating catfish from the Sacramento/San Joaquin River Delta in California, where I worked on a catfish tagging project for the California Department of Fish and Game in the early 1980s.
I had a large parotid tumor removed several years ago, before I knew that they were often caused by dental mercury, and that cod liver oil and iodine could detoxify the mercury. It had grown over a decade from a pimple-sized lump to the size of half a ping pong ball at the time of surgery.
I was especially interested in the sidebar “Reaction to Iodoral” on page 46. In it Dr. Lonsdale says that he and other doctors taking Iodoral were afflicted with dysphagia after taking the tablets for a short time. This is very interesting because the first of my mercury detoxification symptoms was difficulty swallowing. I had no idea what this was and had never before experienced it. In fact, before this happened, I was proud of being able to swallow numbers of pills, huge mouthfuls of food, and to gulp down large quantities of liquids effortlessly.
When the detoxification began, I became unable to swallow. I would chew my food forever, until it was liquid, and still couldn’t swallow it. I went to my acupuncturist and said that I thought my stomach meridian chi was flowing backwards! I got no relief there, though.
Through electrodermal testing I discovered high levels of mercury in my stomach, throat and esophageal lining. I didn’t know what to do about it, and it was a terrible thing to choke so easily. Some days I couldn’t even drink raw milk! In fact, the choking started right after I started drinking raw milk. I wasn’t taking Iodoral back then. Somehow I knew that the raw milk was causing my body to detoxify the mercury, so even though I got that terrible symptom, I kept drinking it, at least when I could swallow! As the mercury has moved out of my body that was one of the first symptoms to disappear—thank heavens, as swallowing is important!
I believe that those doctors who had an adverse reaction to Iodoral may have been detoxifying mercury. Dental mercury poisoning is usually found concentrated in the head, although it spreads all through the body. I believe the surface of the gut (from the mouth all the way down) is one of the first areas to detoxify. For me, as my body has detoxified mercury, the symptoms have moved from the top down. They have also moved from the inside (bones and joints) out (connective tissue, now fatty tissue, nerves, and endocrine glands). It would be interesting to me to find out if those doctors who experienced dysphagia had ever had dental mercury put into their teeth.
Without raw milk, I don’t think I’d be alive today, because on some days it was the only thing I could consume. The raw milk nourished me and helped with detox. I also had to get rid of lead, organophosphate pesticides and cadmium, and make up a lot of deficiencies, especially minerals. I am doing this through a WAPF kind of diet, very high in saturated fats and minerals, lots of cod and skate liver oil, and lots of butter oil, sea salt, and most important, raw milk.
The Iodoral has also been wonderful, as it has brought me back to life, energy-wise. I take several tablets a day, from one to ten or more, depending on what my body seems to want through muscle testing. I also take a lot of cod and skate liver oil and the butter oil blend every day. Every once in a while my body takes a break and doesn’t want the vitamins. I noted with interest that Edgar Cayce recommended taking a break in the Atomidine protocol you mentioned on page 43.
By the way, my husband recovered from osteopenia in less than one year when we switched to a high animal fat diet with cod liver oil (he won’t drink raw milk). He was tired all the time and overweight when we were eating our “healthy” organic diet devoid of bone broth, low in fat and meat, and high in soy and grains. Now he’s trim and fit, and a lot happier, too. We have more money now, because he has so much energy that he works two jobs and travels all over Florida giving lectures about butterflies just for fun (he’s a lepidopterist).
WAPF has helped countless people around the world become healthier and happier, and now it’s the environment, too, not just for pastured animals, but for butterfly conservation!
Maria Minno
Gainesville, Florida
MOLE PATROL
Thank you for your suggestion to put tincture of iodine on moles (Summer, 2009). I followed your suggestion and can testify that it works. Raised moles shrivel up and come off after about three weeks of application (one time per day). Flat moles (dark spots) take longer but eventually flake off or fade away.
Susan Greenburg
Los Angeles, California
DEAFNESS CURED
When my daughter turned eleven she developed a condition called allergic Eosinophilic Esophagitis (EE). Her throat would close around food so that no food or water could pass into the stomach. Dairy, soy, gluten, MSG, eggs and peanuts would trigger this reaction. At first we tried the doctor-and-drug route, but that only made my daughter sicker. She developed complications from the meds she was put on, the worst being damage to her liver.
I learned about Weston Price about the same time that I had given up on the doctors. I started to manage her EE with traditional foods. Even though she could not eat any gluten, we found that properly prepared sourdough bread was fine for her. She could not drink pop, but kombucha actually helped her detox after an allergic reaction.
However, we had problems with cod liver oil. We started her on high vitamin cod liver oil, but she developed hives. Her liver had been damaged from the steroids the doctors used to treat her EE. Because the liver damage was so severe, she could not break down the vitamin D. So, we stopped the cod liver oil and continued on the diet. I thought maybe she just didn’t need the cod liver oil. Wrong!
When she was about thirteen, she started menstruating. Her cycles were heavy and frequent. She would cycle multiple times in a month. She started to look anemic. From my research, I knew she needed cod liver oil. At that time, the new fermented cod liver oil had just been introduced. We tried it and she handled it fine, with no reactions. Her periods started to lighten and were not as frequent. In order to control her menstrual cycles properly, we had to give her 15 ml a day of the fermented cod liver oil.
But what happened next was amazing. My daughter had been diagnosed by the children’s hospital in Indiana to be deaf in her left ear. Because of tumors (cholesteatomas) that had grown in her ear canal, she had part of her ear canal removed, leaving her ear canal like that of an infant. Her ear drum had been operated on so many times, that she was legally deaf in that ear. After about four months on the fermented cod liver oil, we brought her for her regularly scheduled hearing test and ear check. (The doctors were always looking for more ear tumors.) But we didn’t expect to hear what we heard. They told us that she had normal hearing for speech sounds in the left ear! They no longer pushed the need for a hearing aid! I didn’t believe it and thought that maybe they had made a mistake. But we have had two years of follow-up appointments where her hearing has remained at this level. The only thing we can attribute with this healing is the fermented cod liver oil (and prayer).
We are now on the Gut and Psychology Syndrome (GAPS) diet and my daughter continues to improve, although she still has EE. However, we are hopeful that the combination of diet and fermented cod liver oil will lead to total healing. After all, who would have dreamed that the search for a cure for difficult menstruation would lead to the healing of a child’s hearing? I am so thankful for all you good folks at the Weston A. Price Foundation! Keep up the good work!
Elizabeth Bridgewater
Atlanta, Indiana
ALLERGIES GONE WITH RAW MILK
My daughter in Boone, North Carolina has been purchasing raw milk for the past year from a small local dairy farmer. My ten-year-old grandson has suffered from a large range of allergies and allergy-induced asthma. This bothers him most in the winter and he has always stayed on Claritin.
Since drinking raw milk he has been allergy-free, and medication-free as well. In addition, his digestive system (previous gas problems) also is greatly improved. The addition of raw milk in his diet is the only change so it is obvious the raw milk is responsible for his improved health.
Vicki Wilson
Whitsett, North Carolina
RAW MILK IN ITALY
In Italy, in the past three years, latte crudo (raw milk) machines have sprung up all over the country and now raw milk makes up ten percent of the entire nation’s milk market!
In Parma, which is a city of 200,000, there are four machines easily accessible within the town’s historic center. Each machine is filled by different local dairy farmers’ daily output and you purchase the milk in whatever increment of a liter that you would like. The cost is only one Euro per liter. The milk is filtered and chilled and that’s all. It’s very popular here now!
Rani Narulla
Parma, Italy
REGLAN SIDE EFFECTS
I work with the Tardive Dyskinesia Center. I came across the WAPF website while searching for digestive disorder resources and wanted to connect with you.
We provide educational information on tardive dyskinesia, a movement disorder caused by the medication Reglan. Reglan is recommended to patients who suffer from digestive disorders such as GERD.
Tardive dyskinesia (TD) is a result of damage to the bodily systems that process dopamine, and is typically caused by exposure to certain neurological medications—including Reglan. The symptoms of TD, which are irreversible and incurable, mimic those of Parkinson’s disease. TD victims suffer from involuntary, repetitive movements which often continue after the drug is no longer used.
We feature the most up-to-date information on TD, its causes, and all known treatment options. Additionally, we distribute free wristbands to all of our users in hopes of raising TD awareness. Please visit our website at tardivedyskinesia.com.
Chase Peterson
Melbourne, Florida
EVERYTHING-FREE
I qualified as a naturopath in 2002, and I have worked in almost every facet of the field since then, from private clinic to retail dispensaries, and I currently work in naturopathic distribution. I worked hard all the way through college, alongside embracing wholeheartedly the principles of a “naturopathic diet”—wheat-free, glutenfree, sugar-free, dairy-free, yeast-free, egg-free, meat-free, taste-free, just about everything-free.
As I ate this way, slowly depleting my health, I learned how to “fill in the gaps” with synthetic supplements. After all, it was foods like liver, butter, eggs and seafood that contained the highest density of important nutrients, and I couldn’t possibly eat these because of the quantities of (shock, horror!) saturated fats and (boo, hiss!) cholesterol. I was also taught that eating animal products was not ecologically sustainable, and that every bite of animal food would contain a host of antibiotics, hormones, and pesticides to destroy my health.
Despite being taught what not to eat and why I shouldn’t eat it (and subsequently which supplements I would require), I was left bereft of any information about what I should eat, where to buy it, or how to prepare it.
Years of chickpeas and brown rice followed; low energy, poor concentration and depression resulted, not to mention a painfully sensitive digestive system and quite a stubborn and nasty case of dermatitis. I was forced to rethink my nutrition from scratch as a part of my own, somewhat ironic, health crisis and myriad questions I was forced to start asking about standard naturopathic theory. This was when the Weston A. Price Foundation information showed up.
So many of the questions I had been asking were answered by these principles! What engaged and fascinated me the most, and continues to do so, is that the WAPF body of work provides us with nutritional principles based on anthropological evidence, rather than pure theory. We need only look at Price’s magnificent photographs to see real nutrition in action, and to understand how important it is for us to nourish ourselves. Not only this, but the Foundation has pulled together a supporting group of brilliant scientific minds to back up Price’s data in a very real and grounded way.
As I began to gradually integrate the principles into my lifestyle, I noticed my health, energy and headspace improving with a steady, gentle and powerful swiftness. I’m still on this journey, and with each passing day, week, month, I feel healthier, stronger and more vital. In private practice, I noticed that it was clients who made nourishing changes in their diets who got the amazing results, not those who popped pills with compliance.
Over the last twelve months specifically, I’ve been able to fully integrate the principles into my life, and it’s trial, error and experience (including a few exploding sauerkraut lids, moldy soaked grains, bizarre cultured growths and assorted other miniature disasters!) that bring me to heading up the Sydney chapter. I’ve had first hand experience in how overwhelming it can be when we first access this information: how do we bring these foods and techniques in with ease? It’s my job to help make the transition easier, and also to initiate networking and community building so that we can start to support each other in wellness.
Gemma Davies, BA, ND, DBM,
DRM, Chapter Leader
Sydney, Australia
GRATEFUL AND PLEASED
A thorough study of Weston Price’s research as well as the work of Mary Enig and others clearly demonstrates with overwhelming evidence that ancestral, primitive diets represent the way our bodies evolved to eat. Our digestive systems were designed over thousands of years to assimilate foods of the Earth, certainly not the “foods” big business has designed for us to eat. Now is such a critical time to get the word out as autoimmune illnesses, digestive problems, obesity and behavioral problems are rampant.
On a personal level, my daughter just had her third baby. She has been putting the principles of traditional diets into practice for the last three years— raw milk, raw cheese, grass-fed butter, cod liver oil, coconut oil, mostly all organic meats, fruits and vegetables.
Her previous two pregnancies had complications—premature deliveries due to placental problems, and the babies had low birth weights (although now her two little boys are very healthy and have exceptional diets). Her third baby, Aviana Hayden Skaggs, born April 6, 2009, went full term with a healthy birth weight of over seven pounds. In three days she gained back her original birth weight, which the pediatrician was amazed to see. She is a voracious nurser and a very calm baby. Already in two weeks she is sleeping through the night except to nurse, and then she goes right back to sleep.
We are so very grateful and pleased to see that a few adjustments in one’s diet can produce such positive, healthy results. Also, my daughter has never felt so good after having a baby.
Thank you, WAPF, for having the courage to take on the diet dictocrats and doing so in such a calm, non-threatening, lovely manner.
Anne Greenwood
Rimrock, Arizona
A VISIT TO CUBA
Recently my husband and I visited Cuba on a sustainable agriculture research delegation. While there we had hoped to gather material for an article on traditional Cuban foods. We were to meet with a mother-daughter team in Havana who are reportedly good, traditional Cuban cooks but the meeting did not happen.
Nevertheless, we learned enough on this trip to realize that this meeting probably would not have provided us with much information. Fifty years of Castro and socialism seems to have effectively wiped out any semblance of good food or anything much of pre-revolution interest in cuisine. I understand a commonly told Cuban joke is, “What are the three biggest failings of the revolution?” Answer: “Breakfast, lunch and dinner.”
The food was miserable overall—I just hope home cooking is better than what we experienced. We found only one type of white bread, although shaped and baked in various forms, but all tasting exactly the same—squishy and bland. There was one type of cheese, always sliced extremely thinly (maybe because it was precious), which did have a decent taste; a few luncheon meats (ditto on the amazingly thin slices); vastly overcooked fish, beef, chicken and pork, ubiquitous; monotonous black beans; and white rice. I don’t think there’s much access to herbs and spices as even finding salt and pepper on the table was a challenge! “Salads” consisted of shredded cabbage, sliced tasteless pale tomatoes, cucumbers (I think we saw lettuce and olives once) with (sometimes) cruets of vegetable oil and distilled white vinegar as dressing. Otherwise the raw vegetables were served dry without anything resembling vinaigrette. Frozen or canned vegetables were served alongside the cooked-to-smithereens meat or fish, but only if we were lucky.
Our guidebook told us that lobster (which we had once in Old Havana— fresh and rather tasty but also horribly overcooked) and beef are state controlled and hefty fines are levied if they are sold outside of state channels. I did ask our Cuban tour guide about fishing and boats, and he assured me Cubans can and do own boats and are allowed to fish, but for their personal consumption only. You’d never know it; looking out over the gorgeous, calm waters for those ten days I saw only two boats! On any other Caribbean island, there’d be marinas and boats galore. Thank heavens eggs were always available for breakfast, and there was some butter— the butter in packets came from New Zealand. And Cubans consume a lot of sugar.
Even if one has extra money, access to a varied source of nutritious food does not seem possible. Of course I don’t know about black market possibilities, but even the best farmers’ market we saw in Havana was very lacking in variety. I don’t think I saw a single green vegetable there. They were mostly selling tubers, onions, garlic and some tropical fruits such as papaya, mango and pineapple. At the hotels for breakfast we did have sliced grapefruit, oranges, pineapple, mango and papaya but did not ever see a single banana, and only once on the streets did we manage to find a coconut—to drink the water inside through a straw. Peanuts are grown on the island, but I never saw peanuts or peanut butter.
However, I must add that we totally enjoyed everyone we met. Everyone was warm, gracious, friendly. We noticed a perceivable joie de vivre even though their living conditions are certainly lacking, with little hope of betterment. They go about their business with overall good cheer and smiling faces. Especially the young people, wow! The school kids were positively adorable and even the teenagers looked so much more alive than our youth—they did not have that slouching, sad look we see in our teenagers here.
Another interesting factor in researching indigenous foods and preparation methods is that the last indigenous peoples, the Tainos, were effectively wiped out during the time of Spanish colonization and little is left of their culture. I bought one book (“Sustainable Agriculture and Food Security in an Era of Oil Scarcity, Lessons from Cuba” published in the UK) before we left that has some info on even earlier peoples, the Guanahatabeyes and the Ciboneyes, but with little info on their agricultural practices and nothing about food preparation except one item: a bread called casabe. This was made from cassava. “The bitter variety was grated, leached and toasted on ceramic griddles” to produce this bread.
The Cubans are guaranteed a stipend of rice, beans, sugar, cigarettes(!) and something like 4 ounces of lard per month. If you have children under seven, you get a certain amount of cow’s milk. After seven years old, the ration for children switches to soy milk. Argh.
While the food was a disappointment, the agricultural tours were wonderful. We visited large cooperatives in the countryside, small, intensive raised-bed urban gardens, government and university research stations, small and family-owned farms. There really is a concerted move towards sustainable agriculture, increasing diversity in their farming systems and food sustainability. However, there is a problem getting younger folks interested and involved in farming, and inefficiencies in transportation and distribution continue to be a problem. Apparently a huge amount of produce never makes it to the consumer.
We did see a very interesting type of pasturing for dairy cows, using edible-leaf trees. This was at the Indio Hatuey agricultural research station, where they planted both the grass and the trees. They selectively cut off branches for the cows to eat the leaves, which are said to be high in protein. The trees regrow, and the limbs help shade the cows from the tropical sun. They were cutting limbs as our group watched, and as soon as the cows heard the chain saw start up, they were on the move towards it, and went straight for the leaves. I asked whether the milk was sold raw, and they said yes, but that most folks boil it at home.
With the thawing of relations with the U.S., Cuba faces a huge decision: will more freedom mean that Cubans consume more processed food, or will they return to their culinary traditions?
Lynn Wright
Fort Jones, CA and Tucson, AZ
FRUCTOSE QUESTIONS
In the section “The Big Dirty Secret about HFCS” (Spring, 2009) the authors take the stance that the fructose found in HFCS is D-fructose, while the fructose found in fruits is L-fructose or levulose. There is some confusion here.
Levulose is actually another name for D-fructose, and it is the kind that is found in fruit. L-fructose is not found in nature to any large degree. I have looked into the matter and it would appear that D-fructose (or levulose) is the form of fructose found both in fruits and HFCS. L-fructose does not occur in nature, and production in the lab is apparently a proprietary production. See the following link for some background information: www.freepatentsonline.com/4734366. html.
Dr. Matthew Marturano
Troy, Michigan
Editor’s Response: Thank you for pointing out this error in labeling of fructose; we have made the correction on our website. Regarding the main type of fructose in HFCS, insiders have told us that it is indeed an artificial L-fructose of reverse polarity, not the natural D-fructose (levulose) that occurs in fruit. The industry has gone to great lengths to hide this critical difference, but one clue comes from the fact that D-fructose has a caramelization or darkening point of 183 degrees F while HFCS has a darkening point of 138-140 degrees F (causing problems for HFCS in higher temperature applications such as candy making). Meanwhile, evidence of HFCS dangers accumulates: a high-fructose diet in rats causes memory problems (Neurobiology of Learning and Memory, July 2009) and fructose raises serum uric acid levels and inhibits nitric oxide bioavailability (American Journal of Physiology, Renal Physiology, October 18, 2005). The heat-formed contaminant hydroxymethylfurfural (HMF) is very toxic to honeybees and may explain why use of HFCS in beehives has led to die-off of bee colonies (not to mention contamination of the honey they produce). A switch from HFCS to sugar by some food manufacturers may explain the current sugar shortage.
SPECIFIC CARBOHYDRATE DIET AND CELIAC DISEASE
I was grateful to read the review by Jill Ebbott on Elaine Gottschall’s book, Breaking the Vicious Cycle. However, neither of those two authors dealt with the issue of whether celiac disease, as an auto-immune disorder, can really be completely overcome. According to the father-son gastroenterology team in the 1950s who developed the Specific Carbohydrate Diet (SCD), it can, but current information and research would be nice.
I spent eleven months following the SCD described in Gottschall’s book. It did improve my digestion, but not to the point where I can comfortably and confidently eat gluten. I have been off gluten for too long to be blood tested for celiac, but even if I were and it was positive, I am not convinced that it is a permanent condition. I have learned from WAPF the amazing benefits of probiotic foods and tend to believe that they hold the key to our problem.
Debbie Eaton
Poway, California
Editor’s Response: In addition to probiotic foods, nourishing bone broths can help heal a gut damaged by gluten. For an inspiring article on recovery from celiac disease, see www.westonaprice.org/moderndiseases/ healing-celiac-disease.html.
ANOTHER VIEW ON FOOD SAFETY
Having had a farm destroyed by the government’s pathogenic organism-contaminated sludge disposal policy, I can say you are right to oppose the proposed food safety act.
Almost thirty years ago, FDA, USDA, and EPA agreed to poison farmland by using farms as a cheap disposal option for contaminated sewage sludge, rather than putting it in a landfill as the law required. EPA created a massive public relations program though the Water Environment Federation (WEF) to convince farmers and the public that pathogen-contaminated sludge was a good fertilizer.
Part of that program included the use of the term “coliform” for gram negative enteric bacteria such as E. coli, salmonella, shigella, etc., which grow best at 97 degrees Fahrenheit, and the term “fecal coliform” for one type of thermo-tolerant E. coli that continue to slowly replicate at 112.1 degrees Fahrenheit. It is the government’s position that neither coliform nor fecal coliform are human pathogens. E. coli O157:H7 does not show up in FDA’s fecal coliform test for food contamination.
EPA has been fully aware since its early 1980s studies that wastewater (sewage) treatment plants create and release antibiotic-resistant bacteria, in both sewage effluent and sludge. At the same time studies show that disinfectants used in drinking water treatment plants also created antibiotic resistant bacteria. Furthermore, over the years, studies have clearly shown that bacteria will be taken up internally by plants and fruits.
The food safety bill is just a method of covering up bad government disposal policy by blaming the victims. The human victims as well as farmers and the corporate victims will continue to pay as the FDA, USDA and EPA expand their kingdoms.
It doesn’t take a genius to figure out there might be a connection between the government spreading pathogenic organisms in the environment and the dramatic increase in sickness and associated deaths. For example, hospital stays due to methicillin resistant Staphylococcus aureus (MRSA) infections have risen from 1900 in 1993 to 368,000 in 2005.
A good book on this subject is Toxic Sludge is Good for You! by John Stauber. Also, please see our website at www.thewatchers.us where we have posted the 1981 Health Effects project summary “Sewage Sludge Viral and Pathogenic Agents in Soil-Plant-Animal Systems,”www.thewatchers.us/PDF_ files/1981-sludge-study.pdf. We have posted a petition to ban sludge with a goal of getting one million signatures: www.thepetitionsite.com/2/help-bansludge#signatures.
Jim Bynum, VP, Help for Sewage Victims
Smithville, Missouri
A DENTAL HISTORY
I wanted to share my experience of dental health with everyone in hope of spreading knowledge among the community. I was lucky enough to grow up in the home of a health nut and avoided most of the fake foods during my childhood. But I had a secret stash of candy for a few years, which seemed to be harmless enough and only resulted in a few cavities as a teenager.
It was during my years in college in my mid-twenties, when I ate more of the standard American diet that my teeth really suffered. My gums began to bleed, I had enough tartar buildup for four cleanings per year, and I needed to have fillings at almost every dental appointment for several years. Even flossing twice per day didn’t help. Fortunately, I avoided sugar and cheap grains more than the average person, but something was very wrong. My first and only crown came at age 31 after breaking a tooth while eating popcorn. That was the point that scared me into searching for answers.
The first major change was the complete elimination of soy. I had gotten into the habit of eating protein bars for snacks, thinking that protein is good. I was dismayed to read the label and find that I had been eating soy protein isolate.
Two things resulted. First, my intestinal bloating and gas went away. Second, my next dental cleaning was easy because there was a drastic reduction in tartar after stopping the protein bars.
The second major change in dental health came with the purchase of an expensive vibrating toothbrush from the dentist. This really reduced the bleeding of the gums.
The third major change was reading the book How to Save Your Teeth by David C. Kennedy, DDS. Using his suggestion of baking soda and salt as tooth powder further reduced the bleeding of the gums.
The fourth and final major change has been the daily consumption of homemade yogurt from raw milk. The bleeding gums have not bled in six months and there has been virtually no buildup of tartar on my teeth. I hope this will help me keep all of my teeth and lead to a long life of dental health.
Bruce Summers
Columbia, Missouri
ALLERGY TO SOY
After two or three years, I am finally sure that a majority of my health issues are a result of soy allergy.
I have spent so much money with a gastroenterologist trying to determine why I have had so many gastric issues. He could not figure it out—every test came back negative. So, after all these years, I have done my own research and after much despair, I began the elimination diet to see if I could finally get some relief!
First I eliminated gluten for a month, as well as soy. This is next to impossible—soy is so often in the hidden ingredients that it was easier going gluten-free!
Now that I’m off soy, I realize that I have hit on my problem. My mother has always said that she had trouble with soy, but it doesn’t seem to be as severe as my trouble—excessive, non-stop belching that goes on for days when I eat soy. My father had the same symptoms as I, but never figured out the soy connection. Like me, he kept taking Prilosec and antacids but they were only band-aid remedies.
I noticed this problem had gotten worse through the years and now I suspect it’s on account of the use of fillers today that are being added more and more, in order to adjust to inflation and stretching foods of real substance to make them go further! What a travesty!
My problems with excessive gas and belching, along with abdominal swelling and pain, all began with pre-menopause and got worse when I was finished and through menopause. My gynecologist even tested me with ultrasounds of the reproductive organs to rule out cancer. I just can’t tell you how much time and money I’ve spent to find out what was wrong with me!
I am now free of the belching and gastrointestinal trouble for the first time in years. I accidentally ate something that I was told had no soy in it, but within twenty minutes, I had a full outbreak of gas!
I am quite sure that the soy lobby works nonstop promoting soy—more and more of everything contains soy. Thanks for all you are trying to do to persuade Washington to stop pushing soy on us! If more people knew they had soy issues, they’d get on the bandwagon to eliminate it!
Kay Davis
Wilmington, North Carolina
SHARING MY STORY
I am interested in promoting the Weston A. Price Foundation message while educating my local community about imitation foods—I call them plastic foods—and in support of locally and ethically raised meats, which I now distribute in our area via my modified CSA (Community Supported Agriculture) program.
I have started a meat riot against CAFOs (Confined Animal Feeding Operations), which are slowly killing our communities by causing degenerative disease. We have medical proof because we have saved our two-year-old daughter’s life as she battles esthesioneuroblastoma, using ethical local foods and natural medication. We converted her solid mass tumor into a cyst over the past eighteen months after chemo was killing her.
I urge your members to support my meat riot by sourcing their meats directly from local farmers, ranchers and anglers who practice sustainable farming methods. Please visit my website www.farmtoforkmeat.com so you can read about my mission.
Niti Bali
Raleigh-Durham, North Carolina
BAD CHOICE
I invite all WAPF members to write to Commissioner Margaret Hamburg at FDA (commissioner@fda.hhs.gov), to protest the appointment of Michael R. Taylor, formerly of Monsanto, as senior advisor to the commissioner. Here’s what I wrote:
“Your appointment of Michael Taylor is a slap in the face of every consumer who held out hope that during your tenure the FDA would move from promotion of industry profits to protection of consumers. Your press release reads like it was written by Monsanto—with no mention of Taylor’s loyalty to that firm and its industry associates.
“My heart goes out to all who believed that this would be a time for change—for their hearts will surely be broken.”
Adrienne Samuels, PhD
Chicago, Illinois
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