Good news! - NHS Primary Care Trusts may be scrapped.

See http://www.glgroup.com/News/Health-service-commissioning-may-be-scrapped-in-UK-National-Health-Service-47485.html

The Health Committee of UK MPs have published a damning report on the quality of NHS commissioning of healthcare services, which concludes: "If reliable figures for the costs of commissioning prove that it is uneconomic and if it does not begin to improve soon, after 20 years of costly failure, the purchaser/provider split may need to be abolished."

EU proposals would expose citizens to “intensive promotion” of new drugs

New attack on EU plans for patient drug information

The European Commission has been told that the “only rationale” for its current plans to ease certain controls on the provision of prescription drug information to the public “seems to be to benefit the commercial interests of pharmaceutical companies by expanding their markets and helping them to build brand loyalty.”
Read article at pharmatimes.com (UK)

The Delivery Man who brought my grocery order today was overweight and had a very red face.

The redness of his face led me to think he had probably been prescribed steroids in the past and taken them, and I plucked up courage to ask him politely if this was the case. Happily, he wasn't offended by my question, and he said yes, he had taken prescribed steroids in the past and yes, they had caused him to gain weight.

Obviously, I couldn't, and didn't, delay him in his work, but I was able to give him one of my cards and encourage him to visit my website where he will be able to discover how to lower his excess weight easily and swiftly and improve his health in a multitude of ways just by cutting down on salt and salty food. I do hope he will visit my website and follow the salt reduction suggestions there. - It would at the very least make it a lot easier for him to deliver the heavy groceries...

How to lose weight

And see Sodium in foods

prescribed steroids

Anti-GMO demonstration outside the Polish Parliament

Read article at organic-market.info

Bulgaria votes against GM crops

Bulgaria's parliament voted on 18 March to tighten a law that effectively banned cultivation of genetically-modified (GM) crops for scientific and commercial reasons, in response to public fears.
Read article at euractiv.com

Antidepressants don't work and most of them make you fatter.

So why take them? - It's a no-brainer.

BEFORE you go to the doctor to ask for anti-depressants, consider this research finding, reported in February 2008 in the Telegraph: Anti-depressants 'no better than dummy pills' by a Hull University team led by Prof Irving Kirsch. - I hope this will save a lot of people having their lives/health damaged by harmful, useless drugs.

MIND, the mental health charity, recommends a walk in the country as being helpful in lifting depression.

Are you on a diet? - Dieting is an often overlooked, but significant cause of depression. Good nutrition is an excellent way to improve your health. Obviously when you are not eating enough for the needs of your body and your brain you will experience both physical and mental harm. - It is not necessary (or desirable, or effective or even safe) to diet to lose weight. The safe, natural way to lose excess weight is to cut down on salt and salty food. Avoid ready meals and takeaways because these are usually highly salted and offer poor nutrition. They are likely to worsen your feelings of depression.
See amitriptyline
And see Sodium in foods

Heather Brooke was a guest on Radio 4's Start the Week programme today

Heather Brooke: we should all be very grateful to her. It was she who started the work of exposing the dishonest expenses claims of our MPs.

Today she was on Radio 4's Start the Week in order to talk about her new book, The Silent State, which is due out next week. In it she draws attention to the lack of transparency at all levels of government, in contrast to the increasing erosion of privacy of ordinary citizens who have to provide more and more information to the State. See Heather Brooke: The Silent State.

You can listen to the programme on the BBC iPlayer

Bettany Hughes on Radio 4

I've now heard the historian, Bettany Hughes, three times on Radio 4: presenting her two half-hour programmes, Banishing Eve, and as one of the guests on Loose Ends yesterday, when I was horrified to learn of the cruel death meted out to Hypatia. I was very interested in Hughes' examination of the rôle of women in the founding of the Christian Church, and I warmed to her expressive voice, lively delivery and rich vocabulary. See http://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/b00rl4kn

Very clearly there was a deal of misogyny among the early hierarchy of the early church, and clearly there are many members of the church today who are still of that persuasion. I would welcome another series about institutional sex prejudice, this time specifically about the medical profession's ignoble history of prejudiced views about women and damaging treatment of them, which, like the sexism within the church, still has a destructive presence today.

See Women get worse heart treatment than men

and Fighting the System for NHS Complaints

EU should help to tackle Vitamin D deficiency

A parliamentary hearing has been told the EU should adopt an "effective and efficient" strategy to tackle the growing problem of vitamin D deficiency. There is currently a "huge" shortfall in Europe in the recommended intake of vitamin D.
Read article at theparliament.com

Nutrition training for doctors needs to be improved

Nutrition needs to be made a more important part of the doctor training system, a leading expert has said. Gastroenterologist Dr Penny Neild, who works at London's St George's Hospital, said training on how to spot and tackle malnutrition was "patchy".
Read article on the BBC News website (UK)

BMJ article questions effectiveness of mammography

See Dr Briffa's blogpost on the subject.

I've never been in favour of breast cancer screening. See further negative findings re: breast cancer screening.

High-Fructose Corn Syrup: personally I avoid it.

I try to avoid all those iffy chemicals found lurking in nutrition labels. A chemical that does not occur in food naturally and has been 'invented'/developed in the laboratory is not something I am inclined to want to ingest. HFCS comes high in that category. Here's the latest study that suggests that HFCS isn't good for health: cnn report on corn syrup.

And here's a YouTube lecture about the harm that High-Fructose Corn Syrup does to the body: The Bitter Truth. You'll need to settle down to watch for well over an hour, but it's entertainingly delivered and very interesting, and if it persuades you to avoid HFCS then it will be time well spent.

Campaign group says least 100,000 non-medical staff in NHS trusts have access to confidential patient records

See BBC News report.

EU firms are 'exporting torture equipment', Amnesty says

The equipment includes thumb-cuffs and devices that give electric shocks. Amnesty said firms from Germany, the Czech Republic, Spain and Italy were among those trading the items.
Read article on the BBC News website (UK)

New warning about prescription drugs, shampoos and skin products polluting water supplies

See Telegraph report.

Interesting article on Wikipedia and the Soros Connection

See Wikipedia and the Soros Connection on the Dr Rath Foundation website.

Papal letter of apology

To be honest, it seemed sincere to me, the Pope's long and detailed apology to the surviving victims of sex abuse as children by the Irish Roman Catholic priests and others, and by the institutional cover-ups of these crimes. The contrition, repentance and remorse in the letter seemed genuine, the suggestions and advice seemed helpful. But what do I know? I am not one of the victims; I am not a Roman Catholic; I do not believe in a God - though I used to. I hope the letter will do some good and that some of the victims will find some comfort in it.

I do not believe that those abusers and their protectors and apologists believe in the God they profess/ed to serve. They could not have behaved as they did if they had really believed that "Whosoever shall offend one of these little ones that believe in me, it is better for him that a millstone were hanged about his neck, and he were cast into the sea."

Those cruel, wicked people should be subjected to the full vigour of the criminal law and the severest punishments, in the hope of discouraging future abuse of power by people unsuited to wield it.

Is the Pope going to write another letter of apology to other victims of the Roman Catholic Church in Ireland? To the survivors of the Magdalene Laundries? The former unmarried mothers and their babies so cruelly treated by the nuns in those institutions of horror? I recently read about one of those mothers, Philomena Lee, who had been forced to give up her son to the Irish nuns, who had sold him on to rich Americans. For decades she had tried to find him, and he, when he grew up, tried for decades to find her. But with unrelenting and appalling inhumanity the nuns withheld the information mother and son needed. You can read that story here.

Is there going to be an apology for these long, cruel sadnesses? Any punishment for the heartless nuns and others who played roulette with so many people's lives? In the name of a God of Love?

"Moderation in all things."

A SmugTwit has just had its email read out on Radio 5 Live. It was boasting that its waist has remained the same size (30 inches, iirc) for many years and includes the SmugTwit ritual claim that this is because of "Moderation in all things."

SmugTwits often attribute their slimness to various virtues - not being greedy/lazy/etc. Most of them, if they were honest, would admit that actually they can, and do, eat whatever they like and as much of it as they like, without gaining any weight, but they enjoy feeling superior to overweight/obese people and attributing excess weight to greed and/or laziness.

Slim people are slim because they have strong, healthy blood vessels and are not sensitive to salt. Their slimness has nothing to do with their moral fibre, nor, indeed, "moderation in all things"...(o:

How to lose weight

Dr Iain Brownlee and Prof Jeff Pearson of Newcastle University believe that seaweed may prove significant in reducing obesity. I don't.

The suggestion made by these researchers is widely reported today. See this BBC News report and this Press Release Could seaweed reduce obesity by reducing fat absorption? for example.

Their claim is that the addition of dietary fibre from alginate, one of the world’s largest commercially-used seaweeds, could reduce the amount of fat absorbed by the body by around 75%. Call me cynical, but my sceptical antennae are roused by the information that this seaweed is a highly commercial product. No doubt a number of food and drink companies are hoping to profit from this research.

Well, maybe alginate could significantly reduce the amount of fat absorbed by the body. I don't know. But whether it could or not is, I submit, largely irrelevant. Reducing fat intake does not reduce obesity, and low fat intake is not conducive to health.

Excess weight is caused by sensitivity to salt and NOT by overeating. - Sensitivity to salt leads to fluid retention and this sometimes leads on to fat retention. - Fluid retention (i.e. excess weight) is easily reduced by cutting down on intake of salt and salty food. Eating plenty of fruit and unsalted vegetables makes the fluid loss even speedier. These measures also reduce fat retention. In addition, fat retention can be reduced by increasing intake of calcium, magnesium and potassium.

And WHEN is someone in Government going to inform people that the most extreme cases of obesity - morbid obesity - are the result of taking prescription drugs incautiously prescribed, often in high dose, by doctors inadequately informed about their side-effects? - If we could have a Government initiative to curb the massive over-prescribing by doctors, that would reduce obesity very effectively indeed!

Here is the correct information:

Lose weight safely, reduce your risk of most cancers, high blood pressure, type 2 diabetes, stroke, heart disease, heart attack, vascular dementia, osteopenia, osteoporosis, hypercholesterolaemia, depression, liver and kidney problems, and improve your health in many other ways without drugs, hunger or expense by eating less salt! - Try it! - You will feel so much better!

Read my Mensa article on Obesity and the Salt Connection

And see Sodium in foods and

http://www.wildeaboutsteroids.co.uk/story.html - my 'political' page

http://www.wildeaboutsteroids.co.uk/socio.html - social and economic considerations

amitriptyline

prescribed steroids and HRT

See advice for pregnant mothers

Children and Obesity

Associated health conditions

and FAT RETENTION

I can be contacted via my website if you need my further help. My help is free.

Stephen Nolan completed 6 miles for Sport Relief.

Very well done, Stephen! - At a weight of 22 stone that was some achievement!

You could speedily lose a lot of your excess weight, which is mainly fluid retention, by seriously cutting down on salt and salty food. I realise you really like salt because I've heard you say so on your Radio 5 show, but the fast, safe weight loss and the other many health benefits of cutting down on salt/sodium would be well worth it to you. - You would feel sooo much better!

I've rung your show and emailed several times over many months to tell you about this safe, sure, fast way to lose excess weight, but I have no way of knowing whether you ever receive my messages.

See Sodium in foods

Read my Mensa article on Obesity and the Salt Connection

Lose weight

Do not believe the lies of the Diet-Gurus who tell you that by eating fewer calories than your body requires you will 'burn off' excess fat.

You won't! Your body's calorie needs will have to be met somehow. You will lose some of your precious firm flesh: some of your skin will be sacrificed and over time you will notice its loss as the skin becomes thinner.

The healthy body has a natural way of ridding itself of excess fat: it is excreted in the faeces. In this matter, a healthy body means a body that is not deficient in calcium. If your body is retaining excess fat then it isn't a diet you need, it is more calcium.

If you are overweight/obese, your blood vessel walls have been weakened by salt sensitivity and excess fluid in the bloodstream. This salt problem results in the body being depleted of calcium as calcium is excreted in the urine. You can reduce the excess blood volume by eating less salt and salty food.

See Sodium in foods

Read my Mensa article on Obesity and the Salt Connection

Lose weight

vulnerable groups

FAT RETENTION

Consider this: if the Diet-Gurus were to tell you the truth about how to lose excess weight (i.e. by avoiding salt and salty food) they would no longer be able to peddle their dangerous nonsense; they would be out of a job and their source of income would dry up.

Diets don't work! Give up dieting! - Give it up forever! Diets lose you your looks and your health; they do not make you slim.

Another Warning of Adverse Side-Effects of Simvastatin

The Telegraph reports on an American study which has found that "high doses can cause muscle damage and a rare condition which induces kidney problems and may be fatal."

Statins, of which this drug is an example, are taken by people to lower their cholesterol level and reduce the risk of having a heart attack. They cost the NHS a great deal of money because they are prescribed to millions of people, who take them every day, often for the rest of their lives. This makes them an obvious cash cow for the drug industry, but the benefit to patients is less obvious. See relative risk and number needed to treat. And painful side-effects are much more common than is usually admitted.

A cost-free, drug-free, completely safe way to reduce hypercholesterolaemia is to cut down on salt and salty food. Avoiding salt and salty food also reduces excess weight and the risk of most cancers, high blood pressure, type 2 diabetes, stroke, heart disease, heart attack, dementia, osteopenia, osteoporosis, depression, liver and kidney problems, and improves your health in countless other ways

Unfortunately, too many people benefit financially from conning the public into thinking that statins are a good and necessary therapy. If you click on the STATINS label beneath this post you will find further information about this controversial class of drugs.

Treating vitamin D deficiency reduces heart disease risk

Read article at physorg.com

Vitamin D essential for efficient immune system

Scientists at the University of Copenhagen have discovered that Vitamin D is crucial to activating our immune defenses and that without sufficient intake of the vitamin, the killer cells of the immune system - T cells - will not be able to react to and fight off serious infections in the body.
Read article at physorg.com

Disgraceful 'legitimisation' of NHS cover-ups of medical errors

See Telegraph report. "Peter Walsh, chief executive of AvMA, said: “It is nothing short of a national disgrace that the Government have pushed through these controversial measures."

(AvMA is the patient safety charity Action against Medical Accidents. See http://www.avma.org.uk/)

The routine cover-ups/whitewashes/blatant lies of the NHS and the medical profession, with regard to medical mistakes and negligence, and the terrible futility of the NHS Complaints Procedures, are, of course, the main reasons for the shamefully high incidence of serious patient safety incidents and horrifying hospital scandals.

More children are suffering from EXTREME obesity

See Los Angeles Times blog report.

This tragic state of affairs obtains because members of the public continue to receive the wrong information and advice about obesity, and in particular, about child obesity.

When children become fat it is essentially because they are eating salty food. Children are especially vulnerable to salt because of their small size and small blood volume, and because their blood vessels are weaker than those of adults. Salt, and the water it attracts to it, can more easily distend weak blood vessels than fully mature ones. The resulting increase in blood volume and other fluid retention results in weight gain, as well as higher blood pressure and many other undesirable consequences. The smaller the child, the less salt they should have - and a baby, of course, should have no salt at all. - Babies can die if they are fed salty food.

Because children have much smaller bodies than adults it would be best if they had no more than half as much salt as adults. Most children, however, have much more than this because they eat so many snacks and instant foods. Just one cheeseburger, for instance, contains almost double the recommended daily salt maximum for children. There are high amounts of salt in packet soups, instant noodles, ketchup and sauces, sausages, burgers and savoury snacks. Fat children will lose weight fast if they eat less salt. And even faster still if they eat plenty of fresh fruit and unsalted vegetables, because these are rich in potassium, which helps to displace sodium from the body. Overweight children should not be put on a diet; dieting is harmful and unnecessary and does not usually result in weight loss. Once children start dieting it is often the beginning of a lifetime of yo-yo dieting and increasing weight and ill-health.

Unfortunately bread contains a lot of salt and most families eat quite a lot of bread because of using it for sandwiches in packed lunches, and for toast, etc. Because of its high salt content bread is not a healthy food for little children or for anyone who is overweight. Some bread manufacturers have lowered the salt content of certain loaves, but most bread still usually contains 0.5g or more of sodium per 100g. This is too much. - Always check on the packet; look for the lowest sodium content.

Cheese is often recommended as being good for children because it contains calcium, but cheese is not really good for children because it has a high salt content. So don't give them a lot of it. Children can get plenty of calcium by drinking milk and by eating yogurt (but avoid the sort of yogurt that has lots of chemical additives).

See Children and Obesity

And see Sodium in foods

Read my Mensa article on Obesity and the Salt Connection

Lose weight

vulnerable groups

FAT RETENTION

Very interesting discussion on atheism and religious belief

A 34 minute discussion between Ian McEwan and Richard Dawkins.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=o7LjriWFAEs

My goodness! How I admire McEwan's lucidity!

(I very much enjoyed his book, "Saturday".)

To Reduce Belly Fat

Lose weight by eating less salt! Salt sensitivity is contributing to your excess weight and 'fat belly' and also to possible liver and kidney problems, etc.

If you are a drinker, you can lose further abdominal fluid retention by reducing your alcohol consumption. But the most important thing is to eat less salt. - So don't snack on salty crisps, salted nuts and the like.

See Sodium in foods

vulnerable groups

and also FAT RETENTION

Morphine injections caused death of two patients: doctor found not guilty of murder

See Telegraph report. The coroner commented "that some recommendations to protect people after the case of Harold Shipman, the GP who killed more than 200 patients, had not been implemented."

Personally, I insist on no morphine - ever.

Don't damage your health with prescription medicines

The Independent reports on increasing problems of addiction to prescription medicines and illustrates the article with examples of celebrity deaths caused by these drugs.

Prominent among harmful prescribed drugs are tranquillisers, anti-depressants, pain-killers and steroids. If you value your health you should avoid taking these potentially harmful pharmaceuticals (some of which are obtainable without prescription) unless they are absolutely necessary, because the adverse side-effects of the drugs, including possible addiction, are frequently far worse than the health problem for which they are being taken. - ALWAYS check out the possible side-effects and bear in mind that drug companies have a track record of not disclosing unfavourable information about their products if they can get away with it.

You can read about some of the many dangerous prescription drugs on these pages:

amitriptyline

prescribed steroids and HRT

Read my Mensa article on Obesity and the Salt Connection

And see Sodium in foods and

http://www.wildeaboutsteroids.co.uk/story.html - my 'political' page

SSRI anti-depressants increase risk of developing cataracts

Some anti-depressant drugs are associated with an increased chance of developing cataracts, according to a new statistical study by researchers at the University of British Columbia, Vancouver Coastal Health Research Institute and McGill University. The study, based on a database of more than 200,000 Quebec residents aged 65 and older, showed statistical relationships between a diagnosis of cataracts or cataract surgery and the class of drugs called selective serotonin reuptake inhibitors (SSRIs), as well as between cataracts and specific drugs within that class.

See physorg.com article.

And remember Anti-depressants work 'no better than dummy pills'

Gillian Braunold, clinical director for the NHS Summary Care Record Programme, argues that NHS electronic records protect patients

Gillian Braunold, clinical director for the NHS Summary Care Record Programme, claims in this Guardian article that NHS electronic records protect patients. Well she would, wouldn't she?

If you read the Comments beneath the article I think you will gain a truer grasp of the real drivers behind this monumentally expensive Connecting for Health project.

And please read my blog post from last year about government plans to sell patient records to insurance companies and 'research organisations', aka drug companies.

Fed up of diets that don't work? Willing to try anything? - Are you willing yet to try the one method that will definitely work?

Fed up of diets that don't work? Willing to try anything? - Are you willing yet to try the one method that will definitely work? - Cut down on salt and salty food! - You are sensitive to salt and it is salt that is causing your weight gain.

Lose weight safely, reduce your risk of most cancers, high blood pressure, type 2 diabetes, stroke, heart disease, heart attack, vascular dementia, osteopenia, osteoporosis, hypercholesterolaemia, depression, liver and kidney problems, and improve your health in many other ways without drugs, hunger or expense by eating less salt! - Try it! - You will feel so much better!

Read my Mensa article on Obesity and the Salt Connection

And see Sodium in foods

Regular use of painkillers can 'increase risk of hearing loss'

Read article in the Daily Telegraph (UK)
Comment: In the case of Aspirin, not only can it increase the risk of hearing loss but it can also raise the risk of deadly pancreatic cancer.

Big Pharma's donations buy political influence and influence drug-prescribing habits in Australia.

Big Pharma spends millions every year buying influence in Canberra. Adele Ferguson and Eric Johnston investigate the ruthless tactics, the money and the spindoctors behind the scenes.

Read article in the Sydney Morning Herald (Australia)

Remember:

1) Pharmaceutical drugs have adverse side-effects that are frequently worse than the problem for which they are prescribed.

2) Good nutrition is the best medicine and has no adverse side-effects.

3) Cutting down on salt and salty food benefits your health in a multitude of ways.

Useless Social Services Allowed Bullying Father to Rape His Two Daughters Repeatedly and to Father Children by them during Decades of Terrible Abuse

BBC News reports yet another horrifying failure of battalions of agencies that should have protected/rescued these vulnerable, suffering daughters from cruelty and incest, but failed them over and over and over again. Today they apologise for their failings. Their insincerity rings in our ears. They should be weeping tears of searing regret. They should be sobbing with remorse. They should have resigned from their lucrative posts long ago. They should be hanging their heads in shame...

No one has been sacked - or even disciplined.

Guess what? - "Lessons have been learned." - The only lesson that is EVER learned is that no-one will be punished for allowing suffering, vulnerable people to carry on suffering.

British Medical Association criticises the "breakneck speed" at which NHS patient database of Summary Care Records is being set up.

BBC News reports unease among doctors at this fast-developing IT project, amid security fears and other concerns.

Hamish Meldrum, chairman of the BMA, has said: "Patients' right to opt out is crucial, and it is extremely alarming that records are apparently being created without them being aware of it.

"If the process continues to be rushed, not only will the rights of patients be damaged, but the limited confidence of the public and the medical profession in NHS IT will be further eroded."

I expressed my own concerns about this in an earlier post on this blog. Government databases have a notorious record of insecurity.

Want to know about the Elements? There are some excellent free podcasts available.

The Royal Society of Chemistry’s series of free podcasts can be accessed HERE.

If you are overweight or obese and want to lose some of that excess weight, then you need to cut down on the element SODIUM, chemical symbol, Na.

Read how to Lose weight here.

Sodium in foods

Read my Mensa article on Obesity and the Salt Connection

BBC Panorama's programme tonight about very poor quality care in some NHS hospitals and the misleading claims they had made about the quality of care

I watched BBC Panorama's programme tonight about very poor quality care in some NHS hospitals and the misleading claims they had made about the quality of that care. For many years I have myself experienced deplorable NHS care both as an in-patient and as an out-patient and indeed had my health wantonly and callously destroyed by the 'caring professions'. And I've had a lot of personal experience of their lies.

If you hold the view that the NHS is admirable and that we are fortunate to have it I very profoundly disagree with you. - You must be one of the lucky ones who has not yet been harmed by the NHS. You can view tonight's programme on the iPlayer here: Panorama: Trust Us We're an NHS Hospital.

Or you can read about it on this BBC News webpage. If you think that making a complaint remedies anything you are mistaken. Complaints are routinely ignored, and certainly not acted upon. They routinely add to the problems and suffering of the complainants. See Fighting the System.

I firmly believe the NHS does far more harm than good and that it should be scrapped.

Medical training in receipt of undesirable support from Big Pharma

Read article at pharmalot.com

UK Patient died of dehydration after being refused water

The Telegraph reports that 22 year old hospital patient, Kane Gorny's "requests for water were refused and nurses called in security guards to restrain him when he became angry."

I do hope that this horrifying neglect will not become just another instance of appalling hospital negligence in which no-one is found responsible and no-one is punished for what should surely be regarded as corporate manslaughter.

Drug company grants to consumer health groups in Australia raise concerns about their independence

Read article on the AdelaideNow website (Australia)

What are the side-effects of eating less salt?

You will feel better.
If you are overweight you will lose some of that excess weight/water weight.
If you have high blood pressure it will go lower.
You will sleep better.
You will look better.
Your skin will improve.
Your nails and hair will be in better condition.
You will feel less pain.
Your risk of degenerative illness will be reduced.
Your mental alertness will improve.
You will have more energy and vitality.
You will think about food less.
Your eyes will look brighter.
You will get less tired.
You will be less likely to catch infections.
Cholesterol problems will be reduced.
And so on...

Lose weight safely, reduce your risk of most cancers, high blood pressure, type 2 diabetes, stroke, heart disease, heart attack, vascular dementia, osteopenia, osteoporosis, hypercholesterolaemia, depression, liver and kidney problems, and improve your health in many other ways without drugs, hunger or expense by eating less salt! - Try it! - You will feel so much better!

Read my Mensa article on Obesity and the Salt Connection

And see Sodium in foods

EU has authorised the cultivation of a GM potato

Read article on the website of the Slow Food organization

EU committee's conflict of interest on fluoridation of water

Read press release on the Voice of Irish Concern for the Environment (VOICE) website (Ireland)

Salt shakers with fewer holes may reduce salt intake in Cllr Harwood's West Norfolk Council area and benefit the health of fish 'n' chip lovers

I'm a bit late in coming across this BBC News item from 2008 but it is never too late to give praise where it is due.

Well done to Cllr David Harwood and his fellow councillors for taking a practical step in reducing the ill-health that salt/sodium and salty food can cause to many, many people.

Read my Mensa article on Obesity and the Salt Connection

See Sodium in foods and

See Vulnerable to salt.

http://www.wildeaboutsteroids.co.uk/story.html - my 'political' page

http://www.wildeaboutsteroids.co.uk/socio.html - social and economic considerations

Children and Obesity

Associated health conditions

and FAT RETENTION

I can be contacted via my website if you need my further help. My help is free.

BBC TV Programme: Who Made Me Fat?

I watched part of this a couple of evenings ago and the remainder on the iPlayer this evening. You could watch it on the iPlayer too - BBC TV Programme: Who Made Me Fat?

I can't say I favour the tabloidy style of either the programme or of the presenter, nor was I thrilled that yet again an opportunity was lost to tell the truth about what really causes obesity. There were transient references to salt here and there during the programme, but not the slightest effort to explain why salt gets mentioned at all in the anti-obesity advice/insults/lies that are currently being used against overweight/obese human beings in a doomed strategy to reduce obesity. And yet SALT is the ingredient that needs to be reduced/restricted/avoided in order to reduce obesity. (Just a reminder that they are human beings, by the way. The way fat people are usually shown on television is without heads. - Have you noticed? - Fat bodies walking along the street or fat bodies sitting on chairs? Heads chopped off to avoid identification or to avoid complaints or what? - To avoid thinking of fat people as fellow human beings with feelings and sensitivities like other people? The show's presenter came pretty close to presenting them as mere objects of derision, I'd say.)

Obesity is not caused by over-eating or by laziness or by a combination of the two.
Taking extra exercise does not reduce obesity.
Trying to 'shame' fat people into losing weight cannot succeed because they are being given the wrong information/advice about what causes obesity and how best to reduce it.

Since obesity seems to be regarded as inexorably on the increase despite the evermore strident and ubiquitous advice and the ever-increasing money poured into giving that advice, isn't it time that even the bird-brained among us realised that the advice being given is self-evidently wrong?

Excess weight is caused by sensitivity to salt and NOT by overeating. - Sensitivity to salt leads to fluid retention and this sometimes leads on to fat retention. - Fluid retention (i.e. excess weight) is easily reduced by cutting down on intake of salt and salty food. Eating plenty of fruit and unsalted vegetables makes the fluid loss even speedier. These measures also reduce fat retention. In addition fat retention can be reduced by increasing intake of calcium, magnesium and potassium.

Exercise has many potential benefits but those benefits do not include weight loss. Exercise does not reduce excess weight, no matter how many health ministers and medics tell you that it does!

And WHEN is someone in Government going to inform people that the most extreme cases of obesity - morbid obesity - are the result of taking prescription drugs incautiously prescribed, often in high dose, by doctors inadequately informed about their side-effects? - If we could have a Government initiative to curb the massive over-prescribing by doctors that would reduce obesity very effectively indeed!

Here is the correct information:

Lose weight safely, reduce your risk of most cancers, high blood pressure, type 2 diabetes, stroke, heart disease, heart attack, vascular dementia, osteopenia, osteoporosis, hypercholesterolaemia, depression, liver and kidney problems, and improve your health in many other ways without drugs, hunger or expense by eating less salt! - Try it! - You will feel so much better!

Read my Mensa article on Obesity and the Salt Connection

And see Sodium in foods and

http://www.wildeaboutsteroids.co.uk/story.html - my 'political' page

http://www.wildeaboutsteroids.co.uk/socio.html - social and economic considerations

amitriptyline

prescribed steroids and HRT

See advice for pregnant mothers

Children and Obesity

Associated health conditions

and FAT RETENTION

I can be contacted via my website if you need my further help. My help is free.

Sainsbury's have a new range of 'freefrom' products

I see that Sainsbury's have a new range of 'freefrom' products, free-from wheat, gluten and/or dairy, and that is admirable. No doubt some other supermarkets have similar ranges to cater for customers who have allegies to wheat, gluten and/or dairy. But when are supermarkets going to provide products free from added SALT? - I don't mean low or lower in salt; I mean
FREE FROM ADDED SALT.
Far, far, far, far, far more of all supermarket customers are harmed by added salt than by wheat, gluten and dairy all combined They are the people who are overweight/obese/sensitive to salt, because obesity is caused by salt sensitivity.

See Vulnerable to salt.

And see Sodium in foods

See my Mensa article on Obesity and the Salt Connection

Pang Ya: Poor little BIG toddler!

In the Telegraph's Pictures of the Day today, the very first picture is of a two year old Chinese girl, Pang Ya, who weighs a massive 41.5kg (6.5st), although she was normal weight at birth.

I hope you can recognise the tell tale signs of thin skin and huge fluid retention? - Her poor vastly swollen face is beetroot red, which is a clear indication that the skin is thin and is so overstretched as to be near transparent, and that we are really seeing the vastly distended blood vessels beneath. Her poor eyes are barely able to open. And see how terribly swollen her poor feet are beneath their covering? - From my own experience, I can tell you without needing to see the feet themselves, that like her face, the skin will be taut and overstretched, and that dark red veins near to the skin's surface will be making her feet look red or purple or near-black. And I can tell you that they will be very painful, especially if she ever tries to walk on them, with her heavy weight pressing on those swollen veins. And when she lies down the pressure on her face will increase. Poor, poor girl! Her problem is massive fluid retention/salt sensitivity/morbid obesity/oedema/abnormally high blood volume. She must be in constant pain from those swollen veins and thin skin. She needs to be fed food that has NO ADDED SALT. She will certainly not live long if she is fed salty food and she will be in preater and greater pain.

Salty food is what causes babies and toddlers to become fat. But Pang Ya's obesity is so extreme that I strongly suspect that sometime in her short life she has been treated with one of the many prescribed medications that cause fluid retention and are even more harmful to children than to adults. Doctors around the world tend to be very ill-informed about the side-effects sodium retention and water retention which inevitably cause obesity unless salt intake is kept very low indeed.

See Child Obesity

And see Sodium in foods

Is the Government trying to do a quick fix stitch-up with NHS IT service before the election?

Well I believe it is. - Yesterday in the post I received a letter and a booklet from the NHS, explaining about a new wheeze they intend to set in place. It's called the NHS Summary Care Record. They want to hold on the internet a central database of Summary Care Records (SCRs) for NHS patients. See http://www.nhscarerecords.nhs.uk/about .

The letter and booklet explain over and over and over again that if you are in agreement with having your records on the internet that you need to do nothing. There's less information about what to do if, like me, you don't trust the security of sensitive personal details being put onto the internet.

If you don't want your health records to be put onto the internet, given the government's deplorable history of lax security of personal data, then you can ring your GP surgery and make your wishes known, or you can download a form from that http://www.nhscarerecords.nhs.uk/about website and fill it in and post it.

This article on BBC News questions the Conservative Party's claim that the "government is trying to fix a quick deal with suppliers for its controversial £12.7bn NHS IT programme ahead of the next General Election". "Industry insiders and the Conservative Party allege the deals, which would be in place by the end of March, would "tie the hands" of whoever forms the next government."

"Shadow health minister Stephen O'Brien told File on 4 that Whitehall is trying to reset these contracts within the next four weeks, which could make it harder for whoever forms the next administration to cancel them."

You may like to listen to File on 4 tonight for further insight and information about this matter.

File on 4 is broadcast on BBC Radio 4 on Tuesday, 2 March 2010, at 2000 GMT, repeated Sunday, 7 March, at 1700 GMT. You can listen via the BBC iPlayer or download the podcast.

Feeling stressed? Here are some stress management ideas.

Stress Management

Three-year-olds show signs of heart disease

BBC News reports on a US study that found obese children as young as three years old show signs of future heart disease.

It is ever more important that the truth be told about how child obesity comes about, namely that it is caused not by over-feeding children, but by giving them food too high in salt/sodium.

See Child Obesity

And see Sodium in foods