Letters, Spring 2019

🖨️ Print post

STRENGTH IN NUMBERS
I live in Maine, a state that is currently trying to do away with our religious and philosophical vaccine exemptions. I am a mom of two young boys and a firm believer in parental choice. WAPF recently sent out an action alert to Maine members about the situation, and I just wanted to say thank you for that, and please keep it up! I think you are reaching people and getting them inspired to reach others. That’s what we need, strength in numbers!
Amanda B. Cote
Scarborough, Maine

Editor’s Response: WAPF has engaged Kendall Nelson to follow all the vaccination bills and write action alerts for us, along with the capable help of Judith McGeary. Likewise, Pete Kennedy keeps track of bills affecting raw milk and direct farm sales so that we can send action alerts to members in various states as needed. Their services represent your membership fees at work!

BAD VACCINE BILL
I just received your action alert on a bad vaccine bill in the State of Washington. This was wonderfully worded and contained well-researched information. I called my representative and left a message. Thank you for your support. I usually feel so alone in my beliefs. It is wonderful to know you see the world the same way I do and that you too are trying to make the world a better place with more freedom for all.
Molly Davis
Snohomish, Washington

THE POWER OF ADVERTISING
from Eileen Dannaman of Vaccine Liberation Army Please consider ordering our large car decals for educating people about the dangers of vaccines. It takes only one car in one community parked at Walmart or riding down the highway to create “doubt.” It is that little crack of doubt that lets the light in. After all, my car has had an influence on the 50 percent unvaccinated rate in our local elementary school. And it’s fun, too! Nothing to do but go about your day.

The Mobile Fleet Package comes with two large seventeen-inch stickers in English or Spanish, vinyl letters for the rear window and two rolls of stickers. When people honk with their thumbs passing on a highway or take photos of your car when you are parked in a shopping center, you hand off a sticker or the new Weston A. Price Foundation vaccination brochure or both! Put stickers on your outgoing mail, bills and packages. Put stickers with the backing left on in the mother, pregnancy, parenting section of your local booksellers. Leave the WAPF brochure in restroom stalls or on the shelves of your grocery
store.

Some people are concerned that they would be attacked or their car damaged. So far in upwards of four hundred packages we have on the road and myself having the same stickers on for ten years (they are very high quality), there has been no attack, no injuries to the car, no problems at all—perhaps some intense conversations from time to time with provaxxers, but the bliss of attracting a conversation with anti-vaxxers replete with eternal gratitude wholly outweighs the few pro-vaxxer challenges. And the decals come off your car when you want to sell it.

All the information is here: vaccineliberationarmy.com/stickerstrategy/
infantry/.

There is increasing censorship of vaccine sites like Mike Adams (Natural News), National Vaccine Information Center and Alex Jones. Even Pinterest has banned anti-vaccine sites. But they can’t censor your car.

Consider these statistics compiled by the Outdoor Advertising Association of America:
• More than 95 percent of Americans are reached by media targeting vehicle drivers and passengers.
• One vehicle can generate between thirty thousand and seventy thousand impressions daily.
• Fleet vehicle advertising boosts name recognition fifteen times greater than any other form of advertising.
• Thirty percent of mobile outdoor viewers indicate they would base a buying decision on the ad they see.

ANTI-CHOICE LOGIC
I consider myself politically liberal or progressive, but I notice that many people who are on my side of the political spectrum haven’t thought through their anti-choice logic when it comes to vaccinations. These are their arguments: women have a fundamental right to control their reproductive healthcare decisions, but parents do not have the fundamental right to control healthcare decisions for their babies and children; genetically modified food and ingredients are bad for the environment and bad for our health, but it’s okay to inject them directly into a baby’s bloodstream; mercury is a neurotoxin and we should ban it from commercially sold products for safety, but it’s okay to inject it directly into baby’s bloodstream; aluminum is a toxin and can cause Alzheimer’s, so switch to natural deodorant that doesn’t contain it, but it’s okay to inject it directly into a baby’s bloodstream; big Pharma is evil and only cares about making a profit, except when it comes to vaccines, and then they should be completely trusted and never questioned; vaccines work, yet I’m still afraid of catching diseases I’m vaccinated against from an unvaccinated person.

And I’ve noticed that those on the other side of the political spectrum from me haven’t thought through this argument: Abortion is wrong, but it’s okay to inject aborted fetal tissue into a baby’s bloodstream. Will people ever stop the hysteria and step back and see where their philosophical arguments are conflicting or hypocritical?
Anonymous Mom
New Jersey

AUTISM VERSUS MEASLES?
We need to work harder to get the word out about vaccination dangers. We’ve reached the point where parents do not fear having a child with autism—despite a rate of over nine thousand cases diagnosed per month in the U.S, roughly 3 percent of all children.

Autism is a lifelong, debilitating disorder, rendering the victim dependent on others for an entire lifetime. Instead, parents fear a benign and beneficial case of measles, which involves a low fever and mild rash for a few days. How has this disconnect with reality occurred? Lots of pharma-sponsored propaganda, that’s how.

If only parents-to-be could experience a week in the lives of those of us who have young adults with “autism”—vaccine-induced catastrophic brain injury, paired with immune and nervous system destruction, often with GI problems, seizures and a laundry list of other ailments, not to mention unwanted behaviors. Believe me, what we are living is not the dream.

Also, it is an important time for everyone to ask, “Why is this legal?” with regard to every single aspect of vaccines, including mandates.

Until people wake up to this vaccine holocaust and rebel against it full throttle, we will continue to bear witness to the elimination of our parental rights and medical choice freedom.

Vaccine mandates cannot exist in a free and ethical society. Exemptions are not an acceptable alternative. Informed consent, the hallmark of ethical medicine, requires a formal opting in, never a formal opting out.

And to top it off: Not one vaccine has ever been tested or approved properly or ethically. Think about that! Take a firm stand and fight for your rights and freedoms. . . today!
Laura Hayes
Granite Bay, California

Editor’s Response: Laura’s presentation, “Why Is This Legal?” given in Utah in November 2018, can be accessed at ageofautism.com/2018/11/why-is-this-legal-presentation-on-vaccines-by-laura-hayes.html.

PROTECTIVE FOODS
A minor note of correction: the poster “Protective Foods” (Winter 2018, page 51) was not “put out by the U.S. Government in the 1940s” but rather by the Australian Victorian Railways (see the circular logo in the bottom right).

The poster shows a group of foods that are all good to eat, but Elmer McCollum—who first coined the term “protective foods”—specifically named just milk and the leafy greens as the “protective foods” because these two foods “made good the deficiencies” of most of our other foods, by providing especially calcium but also the crucially important vitamin A, both of which are insufficiently supplied in the typical meat and potatoes diet. McCollum did not regard the potato as protective or even as a food containing much nutritive value; rather it was just the kind of food that needed nutrient protection, in this case by the addition of butter (remember it was butter that led to McCollum’s discovery of vitamin A).

According to McCollum: “The potato is nearly without flavor, and lends itself to consumption with other things such as butter, cream or milk, salt and pepper or with fat. The appetite of man calls for fat and there are certain foods which are eaten principally as a vehicle for carrying fat. The potato stands first in importance among these” (McCollum, EV. The American Home Diet; An Answer to the Ever Present Question What Shall We Have for Dinner.
Detroit; F.C. Mathews Co., 1920; p54).
William Kubara
Tucson, AZ

Editor’s Response: Thank you for this interesting tidbit. Of course, we at WAPF say that the purpose of almost all vegetables and fruits is to serve as a vehicle for butter or cream!

RAW MILK HEALS!
This is a true story from one of our farm customers, a woman in her fifties who had been ill. Her son decided to intercede when her health took a sharp turn in the wrong direction.

She’d had severe migraines all her life and chronic digestive issues. She had lost a lot of weight and wasn’t overweight to begin with. She was eating what she considered a “healthy” diet, basically whole grains and vegetables. She was a pill popper as well (Ibuprofen, aspirin, etc.) Her family didn’t realize how sick she was because she never complained.

One morning she had a seizure—it was just after having some dental work done. The doctors gave her penicillin, a steroid, an anti-inflammatory and a painkiller to take. She took them and developed what she thought was a stomach ulcer. She then basically stopped eating. She called the doctors, and they told her to drink cranberry juice and eat licorice for her ulcer. They also told her to avoid meat, dairy and eggs.

When she finally called her son, he threw all her meds out. He found that talking to her was strange, she was slower than normal. She told him she felt like she had a chronic lump in her throat. He learned that she was taking Sumatriptan, a migraine drug which, unlike acetaminophen, actually acts on the blood vessels in your brain stem, constricting them to inhibit blood flow—and this was prescribed to a chronic fainter! Basically she was way overmedicated and undernourished.

Out went the meds and in came one quart of raw milk kefir and two gallons of raw milk. Her son told her to take two to four tablespoons of the kefir per day, and raw milk whenever she got hungry, with no solid food at all. The next day she experienced a massive headache, which is common when getting off meds and inundating the body with healthy bacteria. The following day, still on milk, she felt strong again. She could stand up without fainting, and had no more stomach pain. The day after she announced that she never felt better and that even her tooth pain had subsided—all with no meds! Her skin was better, her digestion felt good, her brain “just felt better,” and she was craving milk! This is a woman who was “lactose intolerant.” She hadn’t had milk in decades. She also started eating our farm meat and cheese. She’s now healthy, joking around with her husband and traveling. Crazy!

But actually not so crazy when you know a bit about what makes the body truly healthy. Instead, it makes sense. Unfortunately, her husband is on fifteen meds a day and won’t drink milk. His doctors won’t allow it!
Vince Hundt

DAIRY CRISIS
I thank you for your work and keeping us updated on the latest in healthy living. I have received your emails about the Ohio dairy crisis and have some comments to make about it. I am an organic dairy farmer in Ohio.

We are finding it increasingly difficult to continue our herdshare program. The environment for it is being whittled away by the dairy industry.

Because of the federal milk marketing order, we are forced to be members of Dairy Farmers of America. The contracts they have state that they own 100 percent of the milk in the tank. They do not allow herdshares. If they find out we are doing it, they will cancel the contract. We became certified organic in 2011. At that time our buyer, Horizon, was okay with us doing herdshares. Since that time Danone has purchased Horizon, and they do not allow herdshares. I was informed by another former Horizon producer that Danone has people employed trying to uncover any farmer continuing herdshares.

Therefore, we feel we cannot publicize the fact that we do herdshares. I continue the program despite the fact it’s breaking the contract because I believe in raw milk. As a Christian, it’s something I wrestle with because we should be obeying the law of the land. If we get caught and they sever the contract, we’ll be in big trouble.

I would love to tell Horizon goodbye and go to all herdshares but we are a long way from having enough herdshare owners to pull this off. I think the consumer is going to find it increasingly difficult to find raw dairy because of the environment being created by the dairy industry.
David Bair, Bair-Trax Dairy
Troy, Ohio

Editor’s Response: WAPF has launched a “Save Family Farms” campaign by urging more people to drink raw milk. See
below.

RAW MILK BATTLE IN CANADA
Here in Alberta, Canada, we are fighting a legal battle to allow herdshare agreements. Please visit Farm Fresh Milk Facebook site at https://m.facebook.com/profile.php?id=217362812483137&ref=content_filter

Please feel free to “like” and “share” and post anywhere and everywhere so that we can gather the strong online presence needed to educate and gather support. We will be posting content to the page regularly. Our goal is to gain ten thousand followers. This will enable us to show that there is strong support for making farm fresh milk available in Alberta and will give weight to our proposed policy that will be presented shortly to the various political parties participating in the upcoming provincial election in Alberta.

We know that a “like” and “share” from WAPF will contribute a lot to the overall goal of our campaign to make farm fresh milk available to all who wish to drink it!
Dave Rand
Alberta, Canada

RAW MILK FORMULA
I am writing to tell you thank you, thank you, thank you. I have a three-month-old baby. She fussed for the first two-and-one-half months of her life and slept very little. I was exhausted and felt like something was wrong, but what?! I was ready to give her away! She was born at home even before the midwife arrived so I didn’t feel it was anything from her birth. I finally decided she must be allergic to foods I was eating, so I took out foods until I got clear down to the AIP (Auto Immune Protocol) diet.

She was better but still more fussy than I felt was okay. She cried every time I held her. I finally broke down and decided maybe she wasn’t getting enough to eat as she was still pretty tiny. I knew the only formula I’d give her was the homemade raw milk recipe. So I reluctantly and sadly ordered the ingredients knowing this was the beginning of the end of nursing.

While I was waiting for the ingredients to come, I happened to start reading through the rest of your writing on nursing and baby health and learned about being able to supplement nursing using a Lact-Aid. What’s that!? I had never heard of that before. I looked it up and squealed with delight. I thought, “This is the answer!”

And it was. I’ve been using the Lact-Aid to supplement nursing using the raw milk formula recipe now for two weeks and she is a totally different baby. I love love love her! She is so happy and smiling, cooing and giggling. Also, she sleeps so well now. It’s nothing short of a miracle, I feel. So I thank you for saving my sanity and my baby’s health. I feel like God led me to your work and your life-saving information, so thank you for all you do.

(Oh, and by the way, I am back to eating normal healthy food. No more AIP for me! She’s doing just fine with me back on all those foods.)
Emily E. McLeran
Caldwell, Idaho

PROBLEMS WITH COMMERCIAL PROBIOTICS
Probiotic foods are traditional staples throughout the world. Recent studies on probiotics and probiotic foods are showing amazing findings. It is fascinating to see some of the studies on food-based probiotics and then compare them to commercial probiotics. When studying each food, different techniques are often used to test what the probiotic food can do inside your body, and which pathogens they counteract. Studying commercial probiotics, or using commercial probiotics is a totally different subject.

Commercial probiotics are supplements. The supplement industry is a self-regulated industry, which means the manufacturer determines what is good to put in the supplement.

After writing an article recently on commercial probiotics naming those that don’t rank high, I received a phone call from the president and CEO of a supplement company bearing his name. He told me the starch they used in the probiotic caused it to maintain a shelf life that made it profitable. He made it very clear that if I said anything negative about his company or his products, that I would receive a world of hurt and I would be shut down. He said: “You have no idea what I can do to you, to shame you, to discredit you, to burn through your money in court like it was water.” Unfortunately, the article was removed. Instead, I have published a book, Commercial Probiotics VS Food Probiotics, now on Amazon.

Finding how commercial manufacturers make their probiotics is not easy, as each told me, “That’s proprietary information.” After contacting countless companies, only two gave any insight on how they manufacture their probiotics. Both said the information is not to be published connected to their names.

One company said they grew their probiotics on food scraps and put the byproduct into a liquid medium for consumption. Another company said they grew their probiotics on bits of food, where the probiotic bubbled up on top. The probiotic layer was scraped off, dried on large sheets, powdered and put into capsules or containers.

When I set out on the adventure of putting this information together, my intention was simple. I wanted to know whether home-brewed probiotic foods, like kraut juice, sauerkraut, milk kefir, fermented garlic, fermented fish, fermented beans, beet kvass, kombucha, and others were just as good as commercial probiotics, which cost hundreds of dollars. The findings were shocking.

In our house, we no longer fear getting sick. We no longer rely on the traditional medical model when someone gets sick. Instead we support our systems properly with fermented foods. When someone feels they are picking up a cold, flu or other illness, we simply turn to the specific probiotic food that addresses the ailment, according to the NIH studies I found.

Most recently, my husband suffered from itchy eczema that grew into a horrific fire that itched and irritated his skin so profusely that it was angry and purple, and he was going mad inside his head with itching. He took four hot showers a day to calm the incessant itch. When he told me about it, I didn’t trust my findings and ordered hundreds of dollars of commercial probiotics, which he finished in two weeks. After it barely soothed his fire, we began addressing the problem with the probiotic food specific to his issue, namely raw milk kefir. He drank two quarts of it a day and it was 80 percent soothed the first day and totally gone shortly thereafter.

Probiotics are tools in the toolbox, to be used for specific situations. Knowing which ones to use and when is a valuable skill everyone needs to know.
Becky Plotner, ND, CGP, DPSc
Rossville, Georgia

CHILDHOOD CANCER
For some time I have been pondering why so many children are in cancer hospitals—and yes, it is good to cure it, but why does it happen in the first place? What about prevention?

I have just read most of the new edition of Wise Traditions (Winter, 2018), particularly the articles regarding vaccinations and about the dangers of sunscreens. It shouldn’t have taken me so long to put two and two together to realize that many if not all of the awful illnesses showing up in ever-increasing numbers must certainly be connected to the amount of chemicals in our world—many of which end up inside our bodies,
even the most vulnerable, tiny bodies.

I remember a story from Portland, Oregon about the attempt to foist fluoridated water onto the population. A local scientist wrote about how fish migrating up the Columbia River (near Portland) came to a place where they refused to go up the next ladder. Upon investigation it was found that an aluminum manufacturing company upstream had been (illegally) discharging fluoridated aluminum by-products into the mighty river. After the cleanup, the fish continued on their journey. Seems that fish cannot be fooled as easily as some of us humans.

Thank you, Weston A. Price Foundation, for helping to expose the ways in which humans do so much harm to others in the pursuit of money. Your scientific reporting is invaluable.
Charlene Stone
Santa Rosa, California

A WHOLE APPLE A DAY KEEPS CANCER AWAY!
I have had the misfortune of knowing quite a few individuals with seemingly healthy diets (a number of WAPF members included) who have succumbed to cancer. To the best of my knowledge, none of them frequently consumed a nutrient common in many traditional diets. Eating small amounts of amygdalin (also called vitamin B17) on a daily basis should be considered an integral part of a healthy nutritional regimen. The highest sources are bitter almonds, apricot seeds, peach seeds, plum seeds, cherry seeds, apple seeds, and pear seeds. Many wild berries contain high amounts as well. Amygdalin can be degraded by boiling and soaking. Amygdalin does contain a small amount of cyanide, but a person would have to eat an extremely large amount to be poisoned by it! The best rule of thumb for obtaining proper amounts of this nutrient is to eat the seed with the fruit, and keep a small weight close by for cracking when stone fruit is in season! I have been doing so since 1998 with no ill effects.
S. K.
Wayne, Pennsylvania

5G MENACE
In this brave new world, capitalism-at-any-cost continues to drive Father Technology with a vengeance, with seemingly no real consideration for Mother Nature. I am referring to the new 5G towers recently rolled out in Chicago, Los Angeles, Dallas, Atlanta, Washington DC, Houston, Indianapolis, San Francisco, Sacramento and Las Vegas. The former FCC chairman, Tom Wheeler, and other industry leaders are eschewing any safety concerns with the resulting higher radiation levels in order to position the U.S. as the front runner in this emerging technology, and to benefit from the billions of dollars that
can be made.

Fortunately, even people outside our holistic community are speaking up. Firefighters in California have filed to have the 5G towers recently placed outside of their stations moved away after reporting an epidemic of disturbing neurological symptoms (confusion, memory loss, headaches, insomnia). Further, some cities like Santa Rosa, California, are not allowing 5G towers installed until further research on the health repercussions from this powerful radiation are addressed. And although the CDC and EPA continue to report that 5G is safe, over two hundred forty scientists and doctors from forty-one nations have appealed to the UN to institute a moratorium on this 5G roll-out due to the serious human and environmental health risks linked with this dangerous ionizing radiation.
Louisa Williams
Austin, Texas

THIN
I am watching a documentary called Thin. My mother-in-law, who just passed away (after the flu shot), was anorexic, and I am haunted by this. She would ask for food (I was the short order cook), eat a couple bites and stop. We could do nothing about this. I tried to make works of art with one egg, a teaspoon of cheese, parsley and tiny amounts of roasted vegetables. To no avail.

All these women in the film with disordered eating were into constant dieting in their early life. The main theme in the 1970s appears to be lowfat, low-calorie. The nutritional deficiencies stemming from these diets were so terrible, they warped their minds to the point where they just sort of withered and died.

Too many young women today are in this diet trap, and at earlier and earlier ages. Veganism has compounded this problem (I found several books on veganism in my mother-in-law’s stash, while cleaning her room after her death, all with extraordinarily twisted science and terrible caricatures of good traditional recipes). The thinness trap is a recipe for absolute disaster.

These are young women of reproductive age, in the prime of their life. They are infertile and at death’s door. Is there anything we can do to reach these women? Seminars? Education? Cooking classes? YouTube videos? Food is the biggest problem for these young women, not encouragement to take math and science.

And you should’ve seen the therapies they gave in the treatment facility. The wall clocks had Prozac and proton pump inhibitor ads on them. Forced feeding of Restore (Ensure like beverage), uppers, downers and other drugs. Just horrible food. And no education about fats or proteins. No wonder the relapse rate is 90%. It’s not addressing the problem. I’d die in a facility like Renfrew.
Sushama Gokhale
Sebastopol, California

REGENERATIVE GRAZING
Thank you for your informative publication. A few issues back, you featured Allan Savory on regenerative grazing. This practice is becoming widely used to increase soil carbon and also resulting in high performance and profit. The carbon that is sequestered in the soil is pulled down out of the atmosphere.

The Carbon Farming Solution by Erick Toensmeier highlights all the different ways regenerative agriculture is being used to reduce atmospheric carbon dioxide. In his view, it is profitable to shift global farming practices to these methods in time to avoid not only the worst effects of climate change, but actually reverse it and reap economic and health benefits as well.

The author also believes that in order to achieve this, we will simultaneously need to dramatically reduce carbon dioxide pollution from fossil fuels. Luckily, there is a solution to that. It is the Energy Innovation and Carbon Dividend Act, introduced in the U.S. Congress. It puts a price on carbon pollution and returns all revenue back to American households equally. Please invite Eric Toensmeier to be interviewed or pen a guest article in the farming section of the journal. If readers want to donate time to the amazing group responsible for the climate legislation, please join your local chapter
of the Citizens’ Climate Lobby.
John O’Bryan, raw milk farmer
Skandia, Michigan

HEALTH BENEFITS OF COFFEE
A letter from Julia Ross published in the summer 2018 WAPF journal states that coffee consumption “ruins our appetite for real food” and increases adrenaline, which interferes with sleep which “weakens health generally.” Julia concluded, based on a 2013 study, that “consuming more than three cups a day on a regular basis increases our risk of premature death by 50 percent.” Julia also stated that suppression of insulin response by caffeine can accelerate progression toward diabetes.

My wife and I have followed most dietary recommendations of the Weston A. Price Foundation for more than a decade. We understand that the Foundation does not recommend consumption of stimulants like coffee. However, we drink coffee regularly in the morning in part because of the proven health benefits.

After reading the letter from Julia Ross, I reviewed hundreds of studies on the association of coffee consumption and health. The following abstract lists the main disease conditions that are improved by coffee consumption.

“Coffee is among the most widespread and healthiest beverages in the world. Coffee typically contains more caffeine than most other beverages, and is widely and frequently consumed. Thus, it contributes significantly to the overall caffeine consumption within the general population, particularly in adults. Controversies regarding its benefits and risks still exist as reliable evidence is becoming available supporting its health-promoting potential. Several lines of evidence have highlighted the beneficial effects towards several disease conditions including Type II diabetes, hepatitis C virus, hepatocellular carcinoma, nonalcoholic fatty liver disease and neurodegenerative disorders such as Alzheimer’s disease (AD), Parkinson’s disease (PD) and Amyotrophic Lateral Sclerosis (ALS). The health-promoting properties of coffee are largely attributed to its rich phytochemistry, including caffeine, chlorogenic acid, caffeic acid, and hydroxy hydroquinone.” (PMID: 29546172)

Review of many studies regarding the effect of coffee on health has reinforced my belief that coffee consumption is highly beneficial.
Jack Cameron
Fairhope, Alabama

Editor’s Response: Many individuals, including your editor, found that they experienced greater energy and had fewer health problems (such as allergies) when they discontinued coffee. (See our “Reading Between the Lines” column in Wise Traditions, Winter 2018.)

THE TRAGEDY OF PSYCH DRUGS
On January 11, 2019, the world lost a kind, gentle beautiful soul: my son, Andrew Jeffrey Rich. His story is yet another example of how profit-driven forced commitment and involuntary medication crushes the mind and spirit of the most vulnerable among us.

Andrew was a bright, happy, creative, charming person who captured our hearts from the moment of his birth on January 28, 1989. He was generous to a fault, always ready to give the shirt off his back to anyone in need. One of his last acts was to purchase a cheeseburger for a friend with the $2 remaining in his wallet. Andrew was a true empath—one who could apprehend the mental or emotional state of others, and whose sensitivity made him vulnerable to the world’s slights and unkindness. Andrew felt and loved deeply; and taught us that those who love the most, suffer the most. He was a gentle, beautiful ‛old’ soul. He leaves behind many, many loving friends and family members whose lives are richer for having known him.

Andrew struggled with opioid addiction for many years. His family supported him, and celebrated with him when he reached a milestone of five years of being opioid-free in May of 2018. Unfortunately, our legal system was not helpful or supportive of Andrew’s needs. In 2013, he was prosecuted for being a drug addict, and saddled with a felony conviction for possession of a very small amount of heroin. The collateral consequences of this conviction robbed him of his future. County prosecutors argued against expunging his record, meaning that serving time for the offense was not enough—rather, he was to serve a life sentence that included forever denials of educational, housing and occupational opportunities. He was understandably despondent regarding his circumstances.

Following a breakdown in May 2017, Andrew was diagnosed with a serious mental illness. At that point, he entered the broken mental health care and mental health legal system in Wisconsin. At the time of his breakdown, he was tased and nearly killed; rejected admission at three psychiatric hospitals; and ultimately thrown into an isolation cell at the Sheboygan County Detention Center—treatment known to have lifetime detrimental effects for the mentally ill. He spent time in the Winnebago Mental Health facility, where he reported he was subjected to inhumane treatment and unlawful restraints.

While incarcerated at the jail and the mental health institution, Andrew was fed a diet high in sugar, with virtually all protein coming from soy. He was raised eating traditional foods on his family’s farm, and ate a Weston A. Price diet when not confined. Andrew’s objections to eating soy and drinking fluoridated water were introduced at his involuntary commitment hearing by a psychiatrist as evidence of his irrationality and delusional thinking.

Following his release, he was assigned to a county-appointed doctor who spent only a few minutes with him each month. He was involuntarily and heavily medicated with psychotropic drugs that were not monitored and which were adjusted only once in a one-and-one-half year period. Just a few weeks before his death, his family asked that they be allowed to select his doctor and monitor his treatment, telling the court that the family, not the county and its taxpayers, should be responsible for this. That request was denied. Andrew was beaten down, hopeless and depressed as a result of this infringement on his civil liberties.

We can and must do better than this. It is our hope that Andrew’s tragic passing will serve to raise awareness of the significant defects in how the United States handles criminal cases involving drug addicts and the mentally ill, as well as how involuntary civil commitments are handled. It is, literally, a matter of life and death.

Donations can be made to the Andrew Rich Memorial Fund; this money will be used to advocate reform of the mental health laws and mental health treatments (including institutional diets) that are failing so many people like Andrew. To donate and follow our progress visit: andrewsvoice.org (Victory Over Involuntary Commitment Excesses).
Elizabeth Rich
President, Andrew’s V.O.I.C.E.
Plymouth, Wisconsin

FATS HAVE SAVED MY LIFE
A year ago, when WAPF came to Perú–just when my health was collapsing after being a vegetarian for years—I started eating a more nourishing diet, which immediately made me feel stronger. But still, depression seemed unstoppable. After several months, I gave up and went to a psychiatrist. He gave me pills and said that, given my condition, I needed to take them for at least two or three years before I might need to readjust the prescription or perhaps I could drop them.

I took them for only two days and then listened to the Wise Traditions podcast episode that I knew existed about mental health, for I was now feeling literally crazy under the effect of those pills. Listening to it gave me the strength to keep trying without the pills, but I decided not to follow the recommendation of the doctor interviewed to stop the dairy, for there are some strong testimonials of how it can be a healing food; instead, I actually increased the amount of good dairy in my diet.

What I have seen so far is that even the knowledgeable doctors who understand the WAPF message are recommending we should stop dairy when there are neurological issues, but I believe that including raw dairy was the only way I could let my gastrointestinal system rest and recover while nourishing– and literally reconstructing–my whole body, including my nervous system. Only months later, I can now say I’m free of most of the symptoms of irritable bowel syndrome I had also been diagnosed with, and it’s been a while since I felt any physical or mental sign of depression. I’m positive I will keep improving. Daily, I eat tons of ghee, raw butter, raw cheese, fermented raw milk, coconut oil, lard and several egg yolks, and I am progressively including more and more organ meats in my diet. In my experience and research, eating this amount of fat is mandatory for depression and anxiety.

Eating this way has also been a way to rediscover the traditional foods of my country. Peruvian food is full of shellfish, red meats, organ meats, blood, cheese and lard. Now I’m also including more grains and legumes since I no longer have trouble digesting them (as long as I prepare them correctly).

This is a little bit of what happened to me. I have never felt this good and I have never eaten such delicious food. I’m deeply thankful to WAPF for educating me and giving me what feels like a second chance to live. I’m very happy to be spreading the word about fats!
Verónica Belli
Lima, Perú

FOOD TRADITIONS IN HANOI
I live near Washington, DC, where, like everywhere else in the U.S., the food culture contains little resemblance to a pre-industrial tradition. Most Americans have no idea what to eat, and they do not appear to care very much.

In February 2019, I visited Vietnam for the first time. I went for one week with my fiancé, Ha, to meet her family and to celebrate the Lunar New Year. What I saw amazed me and gave me hope that, at least somewhere, healthy food traditions still exist.

Ha grew up in a small village in the city of Hanoi. Her parents still live there along with numerous extended family members, and that is where we stayed. On the first morning of my visit, we visited a huge farmers market. It was amazing. The U.S. has farmers markets too, but this one had a raw, disorganized, and unpolished quality. Nowhere to be seen were freezers containing pre-packaged meats sealed in plastic with labels and government stamps of approval. I also saw no pastries, jams, and other sweet things often present at U.S. farmers markets. Instead there was simply row after row and table after table where farmers sold fresh pork, beef and poultry, including the liver, heart, kidney, and intestine—all laid on a table in the warm air, unrefrigerated, unpackaged, uninspected, and unapproved. There was a woman sitting next to a small pool containing large swimming fish, and she was gutting and chopping one for a customer. There were cages and cages of clucking chickens next to farmers who were happy for you to pick one and watch it be killed, gutted and plucked.

There were farmers selling buckets of crabs and other exotic live seafood. I saw countless fruits and vegetables and much more, as well as hundreds of customers eagerly shopping for their holiday meal. While the U.S. boasts that it’s “the land of the free,” these people experienced true freedom at this market. No applications, licenses, waiting times, fees or approvals were required.

During my visit, we ate at several restaurants. Hanoi is a huge city, and its vast number of streets and alleys are filled with thousands of tiny restaurants and sidewalk vendors that serve just one or two dishes, often called “street food.” Like the farmers market, these restaurants face little if any regulation. They do not provide a menu. Instead, you just sit down, usually on a small plastic stool, and they bring you their dish—often a bowl of their signature soup called “pho.” Two other favorites are snailnoodle soup and oyster-noodle soup. All of these soups contain rice noodles, meat or seafood, a few vegetables, and the most important ingredient—lots of broth. Sometimes a raw egg is added. These soups are made with very little processing.

I saw a worker preparing bones to make broth. The meat used for the soup often contains chewy bits of cartilage, which are left in. I saw no microwaves but only hot steaming vats from which the soup is ladled. Another favorite dish in Vietnam is “balut,” which is a developing bird embryo that is hard-boiled in its egg and eaten from the shell. Everyone there loves it—even the kids. A favorite snack to have along with beer is dried squid.

We enjoyed several meals prepared by Ha’s family. Their homemade dishes routinely included ample amounts of organs, including intestine, heart and kidney. Ha told me that one of her favorite foods is pork brain. Their meals also included an abundance of broth, either in soup or in a “hot pot,” which is a pot of boiling broth that is placed in the center of the table into which they dip raw meat or fish to be cooked and immediately consumed.

The modern food culture in Vietnam is not perfect. Vietnamese people consume some soft drinks, MSG, vegetable oil, and other processed foods. I doubt that their animals are entirely grass-fed. KFC, Burger King, and Starbucks are increasingly present. Grocery stores contain familiar rows of boxed and bagged products. However, I believe that the food habits of the Vietnamese still contain strong ties to tradition. These ties provide protection against disease.

In Vietnam, I observed almost no obesity, and the elderly were healthy and active. Ha’s large family was filled with happy, curious and well-adjusted people of all ages, who welcomed me with open arms. I believe that the health and happiness of the Vietnamese, who thrive despite the obvious hardships of the past, is due partly to their daily consumption of bone broth, organ meats, and other unprocessed foods. I hope that they do not eat such foods blindly but with an appreciation for their food tradition and for the health that it provides. Without such an appreciation, I fear that their tradition will erode with predictable health consequences.
Patrick Crawford
Prince Frederick, Maryland

TRUTH-IN-LABELING CAMPAIGN
Should you be concerned about MSG added to the food you and your family eat?

Our nonprofit Truth-in-Labeling Campaign website blows the lid off FDA and industry assurances that MSG added to food is safe. Unfortunately, our kids are at the biggest risk of suffering lifelong damage.

There really is no controversy. MSG is a toxic substance that puts everyday consumers at risk for a wide variety of health problems ranging from headaches, anxiety and depression to heart-rhythm ailments and brain damage. Even more frightening, it puts the very young in jeopardy of lifelong conditions such as reproductive disorders
and gross obesity.

MSG added to children’s food is an excitotoxic endocrine disruptor, meaning it has the power to disrupt how hormones work to coordinate the proper growth and functioning of a child’s body.

TLC’s new website, truthinlabeling. org, reflects decades of scientific research, personal experience and investigation into the effects of monosodium glutamate, exposing the truths about this commonly used additive. Further, it reveals the “Six Big Fat Lies” used as propaganda by the glutamate industry.

You’ll also learn how the Food and Drug Administration has long turned a blind eye to the ongoing efforts to keep manufactured free glutamic acid (found in such ingredients as autolyzed yeast, glutamic acid, hydrolyzed pea protein, maltodextrin, and monosodium glutamate) unlabeled, practically unregulated and unrestricted in foods, drugs and supplements.

Once you realize how our food supply has been compromised to allow a known brain toxin to be liberally used in processed foods, food products designed for invalids and infant formulas, you’ll never be able to shop the same way again.

The Truth in Labeling Campaign was founded in 1994 as a nonprofit organization dedicated to securing the full and clear labeling of processed foods. Over the years, the group’s activities have included visits with politicians and scientists, attending food industry meetings and giving testimony before the FDA. In 1995, TLC filed a lawsuit against the FDA. The website also offers visitors a free download of the book, It Wasn’t Alzheimer’s, It Was MSG.

The website offers tips on how to avoid hidden MSG in food, as well as ways to advise others about the insidious dangers of this unlabeled additive.

All of the information presented at the TLC website is thoroughly referenced with reams of supporting data to help the public make informed choices. The website offers tips on how to avoid hidden MSG in food, as well as ways to advise others about the insidious dangers of this unlabeled additive.

Adrienne Samuels, PhD
Chicago, Illinois

IN FOND MEMORY
November 28, 2018 was a day of great loss for our Foundation and for many personally. It was the day we lost one of our greatest friends and supporters, Cherie Calvert.

Cherie was a founding board member of WAPF and an advocate until the end. Few of us had met her, but I was one of those blessed few. We met at my first conference in 2003 and, as was typical of Cherie, she never forgot our meeting, nor that of many others whom she felt privileged to meet and work with through the years.

Besides her husband Stephen and daughter Charlotte, Cherie was most proud of her role in WAPF. Everywhere she went she promoted the Foundation and its principles. She always carried WAPF brochures and influenced doctors, dentists, nurses, midwives, restaurateurs, farmers and many others, everywhere she went. In so doing, she made many friends and helped change many lives.

Cherie loved people and had an infectious enthusiasm for life and all that it has to offer. She lived her life with color and great gusto, always surrounded by devoted friends and generously sharing her joy with others. My home is filled with sweet mementos of our friendship as one of Cherie’s greatest joys was to surprise her friends with thoughtful gifts; she was always thinking of others!

We will miss Cherie. There is no other who can fill her colorful shoes. She will never be forgotten and we are thankful for her years of service.
Maureen Diaz

I am so sad to hear the news about Kim Schuette. She was such a wonderfully honest, gentle, kind soul. She did so much for our community and brought teaching to a whole new level. She was loved by many young mothers who benefitted greatly from her presence in their lives. She was a wonderful mother and friend and I will miss her so very much.

I know how important she was to WAPF and feel this is a big loss for us every day. Of course, there are new stars rising who can carry on the Foundation’s work, but there will never be anyone quite like Kim. She was a unique light in this world, and I am very sad to see her go.
Lawren Pulse

It is with great fondness that the GAPS community remembers Kim Schuette! She was a GAPS practitioner—a very knowledgeable and experienced one. She has helped thousands of people to regain good health and was a good friend and support for many. Her gentle nature and kindness will be remembered by many people. God bless you, Kim! Wherever you are, may our love keep you warm!
Dr. Natasha Campbell-McBride

🖨️ Print post