Do You Know What's Inside a Flu Shot?

Each year, just as multiple reminders on the need for and efficacy of getting a flu shot hit the news wires, I start receiving a steady stream of e-mails from readers, all asking the same basic question:

"Should I get a flu shot?"

My answer is an unequivocal no. I never recommend getting a flu shot. Based on everything that I know about flu shots, I think it's pretty clear that their main effect is to tax and possibly weaken one's immune system.

Before I highlight my main reasons for saying no to flu shots, please have a look at the following skit by the Royal Canadian Air Farce - it's quite the humorous look at the main ingredients that go into flu shots, and how little the general public knows about what's being injected into their bloodstreams:

There are a number of reasons why I feel that flu shots should be avoided, and almost all of them are related to the ingredients mentioned in this video.

But here's the most glaring reason: One in a million people who get the flu shot develops a neurological disease called Guillain-Barré Syndrome.

Guillain-Barré syndrome tends to develop without notice, and is marked by extreme muscle weakness and other symptoms related to nerve dysfunction. I once provided ongoing chiropractic treatments to a professional athlete who had to retire early because he developed Guillain-Barré Syndrome, so I know firsthand how debilitating this condition can be.

And let's not miss an obvious point: if one in a million people who get the flu shot can develop a devastating neurological condition, how many others who get the flu shot suffer from a number of uncomfortable symptoms that are never properly or accurately diagnosed? It's just not realistic to think that the ingredients in a flu shot can cause severe neurological damage in a small percentage of the population while leaving everyone else completely uninjured.

The truth is, even if the odds were one in 300 million, I would still say no to getting a flu shot - why take any risk of creating serious damage to my body?

The best defense against the flu and the common cold is to live healthfully every day. And if we do develop the flu or a cold, if we give our bodies time to rest and heal, we can cleanse ourselves of our weakest cells. For more information on this topic, please feel free to view the following articles:

10 Weird and Gross Ingredients in Processed Food

(OrganicJar) Everyone now knows that processed and fast foods are not the bastions of nutrition, but that shouldn’t make these ingredients found inside them any less revolting. This list sends a clear message: when a packaged food contains more than five ingredients and includes some that are difficult to pronounce, stay away. Make a b-line straight to the organics aisle.

1. Fertilizers – in your bread

   

   While chemical fertilizers inevitably make it into our produce in trace amounts, you would not expect it to be a common food additive. However, ammonium sulfate can be found inside many brands of bread, including Subway’s. The chemical provides nitrogen for the yeast, creating a more consistent product.

2. Beaver Anal Glands – in your candy

   The anal glands of a beaver, conveniently euphemized as castoreum, are a common ingredient in perfumes and colognes but are also sometimes used to — believe it or not — enhance the flavor of raspberry candies and sweets.

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3. Beef Fat – in your snacks

   While this may not bother the most ardent omnivore, others are shocked to discover that their favorite childhood treats contain straight-up beef fat. The ingredient comes included a list of other oils that may or may not be used, so it is always a gamble!

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4. Crushed Bugs – as red food coloring

   After killing thousands at a time, the dried insects are boiled to produce a liquid solution that can be turned to a dye using a variety of treatments. Some people worry that the coloring — often called carmine or carminic acid — could be listed as a “natural color,” disguising the fact that there are bugs in the product.

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5. Beetle Juice – the hard candy coating

   You know that shiny coating on candies like Skittles? Or the sprinkles on cupcakes and ice cream sundaes? Well, they get that glaze from the secretions of the female lac beetle. The substance is also known as shellac and commonly used as a wood varnish.

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6. Sheep Secretions – in your bubble gum

   The oils inside sheep’s wool are collected to create the goopy substance called lanolin. From there, it ends up in chewing gum (sometimes under the guise of “gum base”), but also is used to create vitamin D3 supplements.

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7. Human Hair and Duck Feathers – in your bread

   What’s in your morning bagel? If you get it from Noah’s Bagels, it contains either human hair or duck feathers, and it’s your guess as to which. The substance, called L-cysteine or cystine, is used as a dough conditioner to produce a specific consistency. While artificial cysteine is available, it is cost prohibitive and mostly used to create kosher and halal products.

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8. Coal Tar – in red colored candy

   Coal tar is listed as number 199 on the United Nations list of “dangerous goods,” but that doesn’t stop people from using it in food. The coloring Allura Red AC is derived from coal tar and is commonly found in red-colored candies, sodas and other sweets.

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9. Calf Stomach – in your cheese

   In the UK, all cheeses are labeled as either suitable or not suitable for vegetarians because in Britain — and everywhere else — many cheeses are made using rennet, which is the fourth stomach of a young cow. In the United States and most other countries, people are left to guess about the stomach-content of their cheese.

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10. Sand – in your chili

    Sand is hidden in Wendy’s chili as a name you might remember from high school chemistry class: silicon dioxide. Apparently they use sand as an “anti-caking agent,” perhaps to make sure the chili can last for days and days over a heater.

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Let Us Know If You Were Shocked By This, We Were!

Source: wikipedia.org webecoist.com

Are Candles Making You Sick?

Are Candles Making You Sick?
Researchers warn of toxic buildup from paraffin, suggest beeswax instead

(HealthDay News) -- Paraffin wax candles, used mainly for romantic ambiance, fragrance and light, may also contribute to air pollution inside your home.

The candles, which are made from petroleum, are a source of known human carcinogens and indoor pollution, researchers said in a study to be presented Wednesday at the American Chemical Society's national meeting in Washington, D.C.

In the study, R. Massoudi and Amid Hamidi found that candles made from beeswax or soy, although more expensive, apparently are safer because they do not release potentially harmful pollutants.

"An occasional paraffin candle and its emissions will not likely affect you," Hamidi said in a news release. "But lighting many paraffin candles every day for years or lighting them frequently in an unventilated bathroom around a tub, for example, may cause problems."

Ventilation can help reduce the level of pollutants in closed rooms, the researchers said.

Besides the more serious risks, Hamidi also said that some people who believe they have an indoor allergy or respiratory irritation may actually be reacting to pollutants from burning candles.

More information

The U.S. National Institutes of Health has more information on indoor air pollution.
-- Dennis Thompson

SOURCE: American Chemical Society, news release, Aug. 19, 2009

More on MSG (revised)

The negative effects of glutamate were first observed in 1954 by T. Hayashi, a Japanese scientist who noted that direct application of glutamate to the CNS caused seizure activity, though this report went unnoticed for several years. The toxicity of glutamate was then observed by D. R. Lucas and J. P. Newhouse in 1957 when the feeding of monosodium glutamate to newborn mice destroyed the neurons in the inner layers of the retina.[7] Later, in 1969, John Olney discovered the phenomenon wasn't restricted to the retina but occurred throughout the brain and coined the term excitotoxicity. He also assessed that cell death was restricted to postsynaptic neurons, that glutamate agonists were as neurotoxic as their efficiency to activate glutamate receptors, and that glutamate antagonists could stop the neurotoxicity.[8]

For further information go to http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Excitotoxin

Dr. Russell Blaylock, neurosurgeon, on Vaccines and other medically induced toxins

How Mercury Causes Brain Damage-University of Calgary

Sources of mercury include *farm-raised* fish, immunizations, and "silver" dental amalgams.

Rapid Swine Flu Test Misses Many Infections

Rapid Swine Flu Test Misses Many Infections
Doctors should diagnose based on symptoms and strains in circulation, experts say

By Steven Reinberg
HealthDay Reporter

THURSDAY, Aug. 6 (HealthDay News) -- Doctors can't rely on rapid tests to diagnose the pandemic H1N1 swine flu, say U.S health officials who evaluated three kits and found that they miss many infections.

The tests do a better job detecting seasonal flu than H1N1 flu, the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention reported. Sensitivity for the H1N1 swine flu was just 40 to 69 percent.

"These are rapid tests that the physician would do in the office while the patient is waiting," said Michael Shaw, associate director for laboratory science in CDC's influenza division and the report's co-author. "These tests can sometimes provide misleading results."

A quick flu test is just one diagnostic tool, Shaw said. "You shouldn't rely on it alone," he said. "There is no substitute for the judgment of the clinician."

Because people might test negative but actually have the flu, Shaw said, "we want to emphasis that the clinician should also go by the patient's symptoms and what they know is circulating in the community."

Positive test results are accurate, however. "But a positive result only tells you it's flu, not what kind," Shaw said. "It could be seasonal, it could be the pandemic strain." In either case, he said, doctors could start antiviral treatment with a drug such as Tamiflu.

For people at high risk for flu complications, doctors should start treatment with antiviral medication and also get a test to confirm the results, which can take 24 hours, Shaw said.

For the report, which is published in the Aug. 7 issue of the CDC's Morbidity and Mortality Weekly Report, CDC researchers tested three commercially available rapid influenza diagnostic tests that can identify influenza A or B antigens in about 15 minutes. Respiratory samples were used from 65 people known to have swine flu or seasonal flu.

The tests were able to detect the H1N1 swine flu only when a high percentage of the virus was in the respiratory sample, which means that many infections would be missed, according to the CDC.

Shaw said that people will shed the most virus shortly after symptoms start so, for the most accurate results, it's important to give the test early.

Fast flu tests have been in use for a couple of decades. "It's not news that these tests are not as sensitive as we would like them to be," Shaw said. The question for the CDC was whether they would work with the new pandemic strain, he said.

Dr. Marc Siegel, an associate professor of medicine at New York University Langone Medical Center in New York City, said that anyone currently suffering from the flu has H1N1 swine flu.

Right now, the test is not clinically important, Siegel said. "If you got flu now, this is what you got," he said.

Siegel agrees with the CDC that a flu diagnosis is best made on the basis of a person's symptoms and the flu strains in circulation.

"I make the diagnosis on clinical grounds. I am comfortable doing that," Siegel said. "The test is just an adjunct. It's helpful if it's positive, but a negative flu test does not rule it out. Go by your clinical judgment."

Getting a more definitive test, Siegel said, would have two benefits: It could identify what viruses are circulating, and it could confirm a diagnosis for high-risk patients susceptible to complications such as pneumonia.