In Brief
- The Facts:Caius Rommens was a director at Simplot Plant Sciences where he led the development of the company's genetically engineered Innate potato. He is also a former longtime Monsanto team leader. He is now blowing the whistle on GMOs.
- Reflect On:Does it feel like the pendulum is swinging in favor of information that expresses the long-hidden truth? Is propaganda from big companies being exposed at an even faster rate?
There are clearly, undoubtedly, multiple concerns that arise from the genetic engineering of our food. We are past the second decade since their approval and for a long time, the ‘corporatocracy‘ used its stranglehold on media, education (CIA relationship with media/academia document, read more about it here & here) and overall human consciousness to persuade the human population, health professionals and many within academia that GMO food was completely safe.
They went further by claiming that GMOs could be a great solution to world hunger, climate change, and other factors that are made out to be a threat to global security. It’s the same way the elite use terrorism to impose even more restrictions and security measures on humanity like mass surveillance. Many of these issues don’t exist as we are made to believe they do. They are simply manufactured so the same entity can then propose their solution, all in the guise of the savior while really having ulterior motives.
After observing this, the question then became: How could a human in good conscience do something that they know will be harming many other people? People of high stature are now coming forward, and have been coming forward for years saying this is actually what has been happening. This is all part of the shift in consciousness on the planet right now. The only problem is, GMOs are still taught and viewed as a good thing within schools, especially in post-secondary education. This type of brainwashing that’s been targeted towards academia will change as we keep discussing these things and more people become aware.
This is why the CIA has always kept a close relationship with mainstream media & academia: to manipulate the population, their thoughts and beliefs towards certain things. We are living in an age of mass propaganda and brainwashing, and admittedly, it is done in a very clever way.
Just Look At The Science
Even if we put whistle-blowers on pause and just look at all of the science, that’s enough. There is a reason why GMO products and the pesticides that go with them are completely banned in several countries. It’s simple: human and environmental concerns should be paramount. No product should receive approval before all doubts are put to rest. No debate should exist. In North America, the corporations control politics and control the policy behind this, as well as the ‘science’ that deems these products safe. It’s all company-sponsored science, which greatly contrasts the science published independently around the world.
The GMO-Cancer rat study is a great example. This article is one that correlates them with more than 22 diseases. It’s not hard to see, too often we put our minds in the hands of others, and unfortunately many times it’s an academic institution that is completely controlled by ‘the powers that be.’ We just saw a massive conflict of interest disclosed with regards to cancer care and a major medical figure, you can read more about that here. A lawsuit even forced the FDA to divulgesecret files it had pertaining to GMOs, and how the science used to approve them was completely fraudulent, manipulated and changed. Scientists were even brainwashed.
There are also WikiLeaks documents pertaining to GMOs showing just how politicized these matters are; the US even threatened to cause ‘economic war’ to countries who refused their product.
“The US Department of State is selling seeds instead of democracy. This report provides a chilling snapshot of how a handful of giant biotechnology companies are unduly influencing US foreign policy and undermining our diplomatic efforts to promote security, international development and transparency worldwide. This report is a call to action for Americans because public policy should not be for sale to the highest bidder.” – Wenonah Hauter, Food & Water Watch Executive (source)
The problem goes far beyond the marketing of GMOs as a solution to world hunger and climate change. We really have to turn off Bill Nye the science guy and all the other mainstream brainwashing and get really get serious here.
The Whistleblower
Ken Roseboro is editor and publisher of The Organic & Non-GMO Report, a monthly news magazine that focuses on threats posed by GM foods and the growing non-GMO food trend. He sat down with Caius Rommens, who was Director of Research at Simplot Plant Sciences from 2000 to 2013 where he led the development of the company’s genetically engineered Innate potato. Over time, Rommens started to have serious doubts about his work and worried about potential health risks from eating the GMO potatoes, which are now sold in 4,000 supermarkets in the United States. Prior to this he worked at Monsanto as a team leader. At Simplot, he designed a genetically modified potato that he believed “was resistant to bruise and late blight, and that could be used to produce French fries that were less colored and less carcinogenic than normal fries.
The following came from this interview with Rommens:
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Interviewer: The main genetic engineering of the Simplot GMO potatoes…was silencing genes called RNAi. What are some of the possible negative consequences of silencing genes?
Rommens: Silencing is not gene-specific. Any gene with a similar structure to the silencing construct may be silenced as well. It is even possible that the silencing that takes place inside the GM potatoes affects the genes of animals eating these GM potatoes. I am most concerned about bees that don’t eat GM potatoes but may use GM potato pollen to feed their larvae. Based on my assessment of the literature, it appears that the silencing constructs are active in pollen.
He is telling us that silencing the PRO (polyphenol oxidase, a gene responsible for browning in potatoes) gene increases toxins that accumulate within the GMO potatoes.
Interviewer: Why are these toxins are produced and what effects they could have on human health?
Rommens: Ex-colleagues of mine had shown that PPO-silencing increases the levels of alpha-aminoadipate by about six-fold. Alpha-aminoadipate is a neurotoxin, it can also react with sugars to produce advanced glycoxidation prouducts implicated in a variety of diseases.
This is obviously concerning, and makes one wonder how these ‘things’ were approved for human consumption. In 2009, an application for the approval of a Monsanto GM corn variety, LY038, was denied in Europe after regulators there found it to have high concentrations of alpha-aminoadipate.
Rommens: Similarly, ex-colleagues had shown that the damaged and bruised tissues of potatoes may accumulate high levels of tyramine, another toxin. Such damaged tissues are normally identified and trimmed, but they are concealed, or partially concealed, and much of it is not trimmed in GM potatoes. Therefore, it seems important that Simplot should determine the full spectrum of possible tyramine levels in their GM potatoes. Another potential toxin is chaconine-malonyl. There is little known about this compound, but ex-colleagues had shown that it is increased by almost 200 percent upon PPO-silencing. This should probably be investigated.
They key factor here is the impact of GMO technology on the proliferation of a variety of diseases.
Rommens Retracts His Own Paper
A paper published by Rommens and colleague J.R. Simplot, also a former Monsanto employee, entitled Crop Improvement through Modification of the Plant’s Own Genome, was later retracted by the authors themselves after they admitted to fraud. According to the abstract,
Plant genetic engineering has, until now, relied on the incorporation of foreign DNA into plant genomes. Public concern about the extent to which transgenic crops differ from their traditionally bred counterparts has resulted in molecular strategies and gene choices that limit, but do not eliminate, the introduction of foreign DNA. Here, we demonstrate that a plant-derived P-DNA fragment can be used to replace the universally employed Agrobacterium transfer T-DNA. Marker-free P-DNAs are transferred to plant cell nuclei together with conventional T-DNAs carrying a selectable marker gene. By subsequently linking a positive selection for temporary marker gene expression to a negative selection against marker gene integration, 29% of derived regeneration events contain P-DNA insertions but lack any copies of the T-DNA. Further refinements are accomplished by employing Ω-mutated virD2 and isopentenyl transferase cytokinin genes to impair T-DNA integration and select against backbone integration, respectively. The presented methods are used to produce hundreds of marker-free and backbone-free potato (Solanum tuberosum) plants displaying reduced expression of a tuber-specific polyphenol oxidase gene in potato. The modified plants represent the first example of genetically engineered plants that only contain native DNA.
Except, that wasn’t true. As the retraction notice suggests, Rommens appears to be an expert in the properties of ring fries, but in fact he just made stuff up:
This article has been retracted at the request of the authors. Retraction is based on three inaccurate statements of facts that are associated with a plant-derived transfer DNA. Two of the inaccuracies were described on p. 422 (first paragraph of the “Results” section): the plant-derived transfer DNA was not isolated from pooled wild potato (Solanum tuberosum) DNA but, instead, from DNA of the commercial potato var Ranger Russet, and its sequence was not confirmed by inverse PCR. Furthermore, the sequences of the left and right border-like regions shown in Figure 1B reflect transfer DNA-like primer sequences and are not present in the Ranger Russet genome. The corresponding author, Caius M. Rommens, takes responsibility for the inaccuracies and sincerely apologizes to the readers, reviewers, and editors of Plant Physiology.
One Massive Genetic Experiment
A clear picture is coming into view that these companies developing and producing GMOs have absolutely no regard for science, truth, or humanity itself. Jane Goodall explains what happens with regards to the process of approval, in the foreword of the book Altered Genes & Twisted Truth:
“As part of the process, they portrayed the various concerns as merely the ignorant opinions of misinformed individuals – and derided them as not only unscientific, but anti-science. They then set to work to convince the public and government officials, through the dissemination of false information, that there was an overwhelming expert consensus, based on solid evidence, that GMOs were safe.” (source)
The manipulation of science by GMO proponents in order to get them approved, and become filthy rich at the expense of the environment and human health is clearly a dangerous problem. Biologist and author David Suzuki were right when he said that humanity has become one massive genetic experiment. The genetic modification which has and does occur in nature is far different from what these biotechnology companies are doing. I go into much more detail about that in a previous article. Thankfully, we have courageous scientists with integrity like Caius Rommens who are willing to abandon their lucrative careers in favor of human safety and the truth. For further reading, please refer to the articles linked below.
The Takeaway
GMOs are a topic like vaccines, where it’s difficult to publicly question without being ridiculed. Ridicule is one of the main strategies of those who back these products. When you step away from your television, mainstream academia, and corporate science, and simply do your own research without someone telling you how things are, the picture becomes quite clear. For anybody who has done any type of in-depth research and looked at both sides of this coin, it’s hard to fathom how any human being could not come to the same conclusions.
At the end of the day, it’s one of many great examples of seeing how the corporations control government policy in North America, and the lengths they will go to in order to have their products approved, by-passing and completely controlling regulatory agencies while completely ignoring human health. But we are awakening to all this at an accelerating pace, and we are gaining confidence that we have the choice and the power to say NO to GMO.
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How the CDC Uses Fear to Increase Demand for Flu Vaccines
Published
14 hours ago
on
November 9, 2018In Brief
- The Facts:The CDC continues to use fear of hospitalization & death to increase demand for flu vaccines. Their "Recipe" calls for encouraging medical experts and public health authorities to “state concern and alarm.”
- Reflect On:Is the flu shot necessary? It's becoming hard to trust health professionals regarding this, especially given the fact their knowledge on vaccines isn't up to par. Independent research might be more effective. It's OK to question vaccines.
The CDC claims that its recommendation that everyone aged six months and up should get an annual flu shot is firmly grounded in science. The mainstream media reinforce this characterization by misinforming the public about what the science says.
A New York Times article from earlier this year, for example, in order to persuade readers to follow the CDC’s recommendation, cited scientific literature reviews of the prestigious Cochrane Collaboration to support its characterization of the influenza vaccine as both effective and safe. The Times claimed that the science showed that the vaccine represented “a big payoff in public health” and that harms from the vaccine were “almost nonexistent”.
What the Cochrane researchers actually concluded, however, was that their findings “seem to discourage the utilization of vaccination against influenza in healthy adults as a routine public health measure” (emphasis added). Furthermore, given the known serious harms associated with specific flu vaccines and the CDC’s recommendation that infants as young as six months get a flu shot despite an alarming lack of safety studies for children under two, “large-scale studies assessing important outcomes, and directly comparing vaccine types are urgently required.”
The CDC also recommends the vaccine for pregnant women despite the total absence of randomized controlled trials assessing the safety of this practice for both expectant mother and unborn child. (This is all the more concerning given that multi-dose vials of the inactivated influenza vaccine contain mercury, a known neurotoxin that can cross both the placental and blood-brain barriers and accumulate in the brain.)
The Cochrane researchers also found “no evidence” to support the CDC’s assumptions that the vaccine reduces transmission of the virus or the risk of potentially deadly complications—the two primary justifications claimed by the CDC to support its recommendation.
The CDC nevertheless pushes the influenza vaccine by claiming that it prevents large numbers of hospitalizations and deaths from flu. To reinforce its message that everyone should get an annual flu shot, the CDC claims that hundreds of thousands of people are hospitalized and tens of thousands die each year from influenza. These numbers are generally relayed by the mainstream media as though representative of known cases of flu. The aforementioned New York Times article, for example, stated matter-of-factly that, of the 9 million to 36 million people whom the CDC estimates get the flu each year, “Somewhere between 140,000 and 710,000 of them require hospitalization, and 12,000 to 56,000 die each year.”
…the average number of deaths each year for which the cause is actually attributed on death certificates to the influenza virus is little more than 1000.
On September 27, the CDC issued the claim at a press conference that 80,000 people died from the flu during the 2017 – 2018 flu season, and the media parroted this number as though fact.
What is not being communicated to the public is that the CDC’s numbers do not represent known cases of influenza. They do not come directly from surveillance data, but are rather controversial estimates based on controversial mathematical models that may greatly overestimate the numbers.
To put the matter into perspective, the average number of deaths each year for which the cause is actually attributed on death certificates to the influenza virus is little more than 1,000.
The consequence of the media parroting the CDC’s numbers as though uncontroversial is that the public is routinely misinformed about the impact of influenza on society and the ostensible benefits of the vaccine. Evidently, that’s just the way the CDC wants it, since the agency has also outlined a public relations strategy of using fear marketing to increase demand for flu shots.
In other words, the CDC considers it to be a problem that people are increasingly doing their own research and becoming more adept at educating themselves about health-related issues.The CDC’s “Problem” of “Growing Health Literacy”
Before looking at some of the problems with the CDC’s estimates, it’s useful to examine the mindset at the agency with respect to how CDC officials view their role in society. An instructive snapshot of this mindset was provided in a presentation by the CDC’s director of media relations on June 17, 2004, at a workshop for the Institute of Medicine (IOM).
In its presentation, the CDC outlined a “‘Recipe’ for Fostering Public Interest and High Vaccine Demand”. It called for encouraging medical experts and public health authorities to “state concern and alarm” about “and predict dire outcomes” from the flu season. To inspire the necessary fear, the CDC encouraged describing each season as “very severe”, “more severe than last or past years”, and “deadly”.
One problem for the CDC is the accurate view among healthy adults that they are not at high risk of serious complications from the flu. As the presentation noted, “achieving consensus by ‘fiat’ is difficult”—meaning that just because the CDC makes the recommendation doesn’t mean that people will actually follow it. Therefore it was necessary to cause “concern, anxiety, and worry” among young, healthy adults who regard the flu as an inconvenience rather than something to be terribly afraid of.
The larger conundrum for the CDC is the proliferation of information available to the public on the internet. As the CDC bluntly stated it, “Health literacy is a growing problem”.
In other words, the CDC considers it to be a problem that people are increasingly doing their own research and becoming more adept at educating themselves about health-related issues. And, as we have already seen, the CDC has very good reason to be concerned about people doing their own research into what the science actually tells us about vaccines.
One prominent way the CDC inspires the necessary fear, of course, is with its estimates of the numbers of people who are hospitalized or die each year from the flu.
…many if not most people diagnosed with ‘the flu’ may not have actually been infected with the influenza virus at all, given the large number of other viruses that cause the same symptoms and the general lack of lab confirmation.
The Problems with the CDC’s Estimates of Annual Flu Deaths
Among the relevant facts that are routinely not relayed to the public by the media when the CDC’s numbers are cited is that only about 7% to 15% of what are called “influenza-like illnesses” are actually caused by influenza viruses. In fact, there are over 200 known viruses that cause influenza-like illnesses, and to determine whether an illness was actually caused by the influenza virus requires laboratory testing—which isn’t usually done.
Furthermore, as the authors of a 2010 Cochrane review stated, “At best, vaccines may only be effective against influenza A and B, which represent about 10% of all circulating viruses” that are known to cause influenza-like symptoms. (That’s the same review, by the way, that the Times mischaracterized as having found the vaccine to be “a big payoff in public health”.)
While the CDC now uses a range of numbers to describe annual deaths attributed to influenza, it used to claim that on average “about 36,000 people per year in the United States die from influenza”. The CDC switched to using a range in response to criticism that the average was misleading because there is great variability from year to year and decade to decade. And while switching to the range did address that criticism, other serious problems remain.
One major problem with “the much publicized figure of 36,000”, as Peter Doshi observed in a 2005 BMJ article, was that it “is not an estimate of yearly flu deaths, as widely reported in both the lay and scientific press, but an estimate—generated by a model—of flu-associated death.”
Of course, as the media routinely remind us when it comes to the subject of vaccines and autism (but seem to forget when it comes to the CDC’s flu numbers), temporal association does not necessarily mean causation. Just because someone dies after an influenza infection does not mean that it was the flu that killed him. And, furthermore, many if not most people diagnosed with “the flu” may not have actually been infected with the influenza virus at all, given the large number of other viruses that cause the same symptoms and the general lack of lab confirmation.
The “36,000” number came from a 2003 CDC study published in JAMA that acknowledged the difficulty of estimating deaths attributable to influenza, given that most cases are not lab-confirmed. Yet, rather than acknowledging the likelihood that a substantial percentage of reported cases actually had nothing to do with the influenza virus, the CDC researchers treated it as though it only meant that flu-related deaths must be significantly higher than the reported numbers.
The study authors pointed out that seasonal influenza is “associated with increased hospitalizations and mortality for many diagnoses”, including pneumonia, and they assumed that many cases attributed to other illnesses were actually caused by influenza. They therefore developed a mathematical model to estimate the number by instead using as their starting point all “respiratory and circulatory” deaths, which include all “pneumonia and influenza” deaths.
In his aforementioned BMJ article, Peter Doshi reasonably asked, “Are US flu death figures more PR than science?”
Of course, not all respiratory and circulatory deaths are caused by the influenza virus. Yet the CDC treats this number as “an upper bound”—as though it was possible that 100% of all respiratory and circulatory deaths occurring in a given flu season were caused by influenza. The CDC also treats the total number of pneumonia and influenza deaths as “a lower bound for deaths associated with influenza”. The CDC states on its website that reported pneumonia and influenza deaths “represent only a fraction of the total number of deaths from influenza”—as though all pneumonia deaths were caused by influenza!
The CDC certainly knows better. In fact, at the same time, the CDC contradictorily acknowledges that not all pneumonia and influenza deaths are flu-related; it has estimatedthat in an average year 2.1% of all respiratory and circulatory deaths and 8.5% of all pneumonia and influenza deaths are influenza-associated.
So how can the CDC maintain both (a) that 8.5% of pneumonia and influenza deaths are flu-related, and (b) that the combined total of all pneumonia and influenza deaths represents only a fraction of flu-caused deaths? How can both be true?
The answer is that the CDC simply assumes that influenza-associated deaths are so greatly underreported within the broader category of deaths coded under “respiratory and circulatory” that they dwarf all those coded under “pneumonia and influenza”.
In his aforementioned BMJ article, Peter Doshi reasonably asked, “Are US flu death figures more PR than science?” As he put it, “US data on influenza deaths are a mess.” The CDC “acknowledges a difference between flu death and flu associated death yet uses the terms interchangeably. Additionally, there are significant statistical incompatibilities between official estimates and national vital statistics data. Compounding these problems is a marketing of fear—a CDC communications strategy in which medical experts ‘predict dire outcomes’ during flu seasons.”
Setting aside pneumonia and looking just at influenza-associated deaths from 1979 to 2002, the annual average according to the NCHS data was only 1,348.
Illustrating the problem, Doshi observed that for the year 2001, the total number of reported pneumonia and influenza deaths was 62,034. Yet, of those, less than one half of one percent were attributed to influenza. Furthermore, of the mere 257 cases blamed on the flu, only 7% were laboratory confirmed. That’s only 18 cases of lab confirmed influenza out of 62,034 pneumonia and influenza deaths—or just 0.03%, according to the CDC’s own National Center for Health Statistics (NCHS).
Setting aside pneumonia and looking just at influenza-associated deaths from 1979 to 2002, the annual average according to the NCHS data was only 1,348.
The CDC’s mortality estimates would be compatible with the NCHS data, Doshi argued, “if about half of the deaths classed by the NCHS as pneumonia were actually flu initiated secondary pneumonias.” But the NCHS criteria itself strongly indicated otherwise, stating that “Cause-of-death statistics are based solely on the underlying cause of death … defined by WHO as ‘the disease or injury which initiated the train of events leading directly to death.’”
The CDC researchers who authored the 2003 study acknowledged that underlying cause-of-death coding “represents the disease or injury that initiated the chain of morbid events that led directly to the death”—yet they fallaciously coupled pneumonia deaths with influenza deaths in their model anyway.
At the time Doshi was writing, the CDC was publicly claiming that each year “about 36,000 [Americans] die from flu”, and as seen with the example from the New York Times, the range of numbers is likewise presented as though representative of known cases of flu-caused deaths. Yet the lead author of that very CDC study, William Thompson of the CDC’s National Immunization Program, acknowledged that the number rather represented “a statistical association” that does not necessarily mean causation. In Thompson’s own words, “Based on modelling, we think it’s associated. I don’t know that we would say that it’s the underlying cause of death.” (Emphasis added.)
Of course, the CDC does say it’s the underlying cause of death in its disingenuous public relations messaging. As Doshi noted, Thompson’s acknowledgment is “incompatible” with the CDC’s “misrepresentation” of its flu deaths estimates. The CDC, Doshi further observed, was “working in manufacturers’ interest by conducting campaigns to increase flu vaccination” based on estimates that are “statistically biased”, including by “arbitrarily linking flu with pneumonia”.
…there are otherwise significant limitations of the CDC’s models that potentially result in spurious attribution of deaths to influenza.
More “Limitations” of the CDC’s Models
While the media present the CDC’s numbers as though uncontroversial, there is in fact “substantial controversy” surrounding flu death estimates, as a 2005 study published in the American Journal of Epidemiology noted. One problem is that the CDC’s models use virus surveillance data that “have not been made available in the public domain”, which means that its results or not reproducible. (As the journal Cell reminds, “the reproducibility of science” is “a lynch pin of credibility”.) And there are otherwise “significant limitations” of the CDC’s models that potentially result in “spurious attribution of deaths to influenza.”
To illustrate, when Peter Doshi requested access to virus circulation data, the CDC refused to allow it unless he granted the CDC co-authorship of the study he was undertaking—which Doshi appropriately refused.
While the number of confirmed H1N1-related child deaths was 371, the CDC’s claimed number was 1,271 or more.
In the New York Review of Books, Helen Epstein has pointed out how the CDC’s dire warnings about the 2009 H1N1 “swine flu” never came to pass, as well as how “some experts maintain that the CDC’s estimates studies overestimate influenza mortality, particularly among children.” While the number of confirmed H1N1-related child deaths was 371, the CDC’s claimed number was 1,271 or more. To arrive at its number, the CDC used a multiplier based on certain assumptions. One assumption is that some cases are missed either because lab confirmation wasn’t sought or because the children weren’t in a hospital when they died and so weren’t tested. Another is that a certain percentage of test results will be false negatives.
However, Epstein pointed out, “according to CDC guidelines at the time”, any child hospitalized with severe influenza symptoms should have been tested for H1N1. Furthermore, “deaths in children from infectious diseases are rare in the US, and even those who didn’t die in hospitals would almost certainly have been autopsied (and tested for H1N1)…. Also, the test is accurate and would have missed few cases. Because it’s unlikely that large numbers of actual cases of US child deaths from H1N1 were missed, the lab-confirmed count (371) is probably much closer to the modeled numbers … which are in any case impossible to verify.”
As already indicated, another assumption the CDC makes is that excess mortality in winter is mostly attributable to influenza. A 2009 Slate article described this as among a number of “potential glitches” that make the CDC’s reported flu deaths the “‘least bad’ estimate”. Referring to earlier methods that associated flu deaths with wintertime deaths from all causes, the article observed that this risked blaming influenza for deaths from car accidents caused by icy roads. And while the updated method presented in the 2003 CDC study excluded such causes of death implausibly linked to flu, related problems remain.
As the aforementioned American Journal of Epidemiology study noted, the updated method “reduces, but does not eliminate, the potential for spurious correlation and spurious attribution of deaths to influenza.” Furthermore, “Methods based on seasonal pattern begin from the assumption that influenza is the major source of excess winter death.” The CDC’s models therefore still “are in danger of being confounded by other seasonal factors.” The authors also stated that they could not conclude from their own study “that influenza is a more important cause of winter mortality on an annual timescale than is cold weather.”
Once the CDC has its estimated hospitalization rate, it then multiplies that number by the ratio of deaths to hospitalizations to arrive at its estimated mortality rate. Thus, any overestimation of the hospitalization rate is also compounded into its estimated death rate.
As a 2002 BMJ study stated, “Cold weather alone causes striking short term increases in mortality, mainly from thrombotic and respiratory disease. Non-thermal seasonal factors such as diet may also affect mortality.” (Emphasis added.) The study estimated that of annual excess winter deaths, only “2.4% were due to influenza either directly or indirectly.” It concluded that, “With influenza causing such a small proportion of excess winter deaths, measures to reduce cold stress offer the greatest opportunities to reduce current levels of winter mortality.”
CDC researchers themselves acknowledge that their models are “subject to some limitations.” In a 2009 study published in the American Journal of Public Health, CDC researchers admitted that “simply counting deaths for which influenza has been coded as the underlying cause on death certificates can lead to both over- and underestimates of the magnitude of influenza-associated mortality.” (Emphasis added.) Yet they offered no comment on how, then, their models account for the likelihood that many reported cases of “flu” had nothing whatsoever to do with the influenza virus. Evidently, this is because they don’t, as indicated by the CDC’s treatment of all influenza deaths plus pneumonia deaths as a “lower bound”.
For another illustration, since it takes two or three years before the data is available to be able to estimate flu hospitalizations and deaths by the usual means, the CDC has also developed a method to make preliminary estimates for a given year by “adjusting” the numbers of reported lab-confirmed cases from selected surveillance areas around the country. The “80,000” figure claimed for last season’s flu deaths is just such an estimate. The way the CDC “adjusts” the numbers is by multiplying the number of lab-confirmed cases by a certain amount, ostensibly “to correct for underreporting”. To determine the multiplier, the CDC makes a number of assumptions to estimate (a) the likelihood that a person hospitalized for any respiratory illnesswould be tested for influenza and (b) the likelihood that a person with influenza would test positive.
Caveats such as that, however, are not communicated to the general public by the CDC in its press releases or by the mainstream media so that people can make a truly informed choice about whether it’s worth the risk to get a flu shot.
Once the CDC has its estimated hospitalization rate, it then multiplies that number by the ratio of deaths to hospitalizations to arrive at its estimated mortality rate. Thus, any overestimation of the hospitalization rate is also compounded into its estimated death rate.
One obvious problem with this is the underlying assumption that the percentage of people who (a) are hospitalized for respiratory illness and have the flu is the same as (b) the percentage of those who are hospitalized for respiratory illness, are actually tested, and test positive. This implies that doctors are not more likely to seek lab confirmation for people who actually have influenza than they are for people whose respiratory symptoms are due to some other cause.
Assuming that doctors can do better than a pair of rolled dice at picking out patients with influenza, it further implies that doctors are no more likely to order a lab test for patients whom they suspect of having the flu than they are to order a lab test for patients whose respiratory symptoms they think are caused by something else.
The CDC’s assumption thus introduces a selection bias into its model that further calls into question the plausibility of its conclusions, as it is bound to result in overestimation. In a 2015 study published in PLoS One that detailed this method, CDC researchers acknowledged that, “If physicians were more likely to recognize influenza patients clinically and select those patients for testing, we may have over-estimated the magnitude of under-detection.” And that, of course, would result in an overestimation of both hospitalizations and deaths associated with influenza.
Caveats such as that, however, are not communicated to the general public by the CDC in its press releases or by the mainstream media so that people can make a truly informed choice about whether it’s worth the risk to get a flu shot.
Conclusion
In summary, to avoid underestimating influenza-associated hospitalizations and deaths, the CDC relies on models that instead appear to greatly overestimate the numbers due to the fallacious assumptions built into them. These numbers are then mispresented to the public by both public health officials and the mainstream media as though uncontroversial and representative of known cases of influenza-caused illnesses and deaths from surveillance data. Consequently, the public is grossly misinformed about the societal disease burden from influenza and the ostensible benefit of the vaccine.
It is clear that the CDC does not see its mission as being to educate the public in order to be able to make an informed choice about vaccination. After all, that would be incompatible with its view that growing health literacy is a threat to its mission and an obstacle to be overcome. On the other hand, a misinformed populace aligns perfectly with the CDC’s stated goal of using fear marketing to generate more demand for the pharmaceutical industry’s influenza vaccine products.
This article is an adapted and expanded excerpt from part two of the author’s multi-part exposé on the influenza vaccine. Sign up for Jeremy’s newsletter to stay updated with his work on vaccines and receive his free downloadable report, “5 Horrifying Facts about the FDA Vaccine Approval Process”.
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In Brief
- The Facts:Cheerios, Quaker Oats, and other breakfast cereals are contaminated with Glyphosate, among other things. It was also recently discovered that some of the most popular brands of Orange Juice are also chock full of this herbicide.
- Reflect On:Did we not learn from DDT? How, after so many publications that clearly show multiple causes for concern with regards to human health and environmental impacts
(Posted with permission from the Children’s Health Defence team). In August, news broke that Cheerios, Quaker Oats, and other breakfast cereals were contaminated with glyphosate weed killer. Just this week, more news of glyphosate in snack bars. Parents across the nation became concerned about their family’s breakfast foods and snacks. Now we learn we must also be looking at the most popular breakfast beverage, orange juice, as well.
The sample from (Florida’s Natural) showed results almost 3 times higher than the previous year’s test results provide to another organization, showing an increase, rather than a decrease of the use of glyphosate herbidies.
Over one year after initial tests, Moms Across America sent America’s most popular orange juice brands to be tested again for the carcinogenic chemical glyphosate. The new test results, ranging from 2.99 ppb to 17.16 ppb, are not promising. Although the different brands, Tropicana, Minute Maid, Costco’s Kirkland Signature, and Stater Bros. had slightly lower levels of glyphosate weed killer than the first tests conducted a year ago, all still had detectable levels of glyphosate. In addition, Moms Across America added another sample, Florida’s Natural, and the results were not only among the highest of all the brands tested for glyphosate residues, the sample from the brand showed results almost 3 times higher than the previous year’s test results provided to another organization, showing an increase, rather than a decrease of the use of glyphosate herbicides.
Florida’s Natural glyphosate testing in 2017 showed the following results: glyphosate amount detected: 2.14 ppb; AMPA amount detected: 1.98 ppb, the effective glyphosate level was 5.11 ppb. In 2018 the test results showed an effective level of glyphosate at 14.42.
Recently plaintiff Alexandra Axon, represented by Richman Law Group, sued Florida’s Natural for misleading the public by claiming their product is natural when in fact it contains glyphosate. The lawsuit is still pending.
The use of glyphosate in orange production and in Florida is controversial for many reasons. Moms Across America founding executive director states, “Orange growers have known for over 3 years now that the World Health Organization branch of the International Agency for Research on Cancer classified glyphosate a definite animal carcinogen and a probable human carcinogen, and yet they continue to use this harmful herbicide in the growing of oranges. We do not want harmful chemicals in the beverages we give our children and families every day. We have asked these brands to make changes and received no favourable response. We are releasing these test results and we are publicly asking again. Please, stop sourcing oranges from farmers who use glyphosate, and be a part of reducing the exposure of glyphosate to children.”
Glyphosate, Citrus Greening and Poor Crop Health
Many orange growers will insist they need glyphosate herbicides to prevent weed growth. They also complain of citrus greening, a plight impacting their livelihood. According to Frank Dean, crop consultant with a BS Biological and Physical Sciences from the University of Houston, who works with orange growers in Florida, commented for this article,” I can say every visual symptom of citrus greening can be induced with an application of glyphosate; that includes asymmetric chlorosis, short internodes, tiny leaves, abnormal flowers and flowering events. When a grove reduces, or, eliminates the use of glyphosate and the organic substances and minerals blocked by glyphosate are applied, the sick trees begin to recover. Over time, the soil has the sub-lethal dose of glyphosate reduced with organic amendments and the indicator of the disease cannot be found with CT Scans for 16S rDNA.”
In other words, the use of glyphosate contributes to citrus greening and reduction of soil quality.Dr. Don Huber, 50 year plant pathologist has pointed out that lower soil quality also mean lower water retention, resulting in higher water usage, less nutrients in the produce, and decreased quality of the crop. Discontinuing the use of glyphosate herbicides in orange groves, and all farming in Florida, would not only reduce exposure to children, but improve the health, productivity and profits of the crop.
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A major denier of this assessment would be the University of Florida, which is funded by Monsanto, and who puts out the majority of the information about citrus greening. They claim it is an insect, and therefore call for more pesticides, likely produced by Monsanto.
Glyphosate and Non-Hodgkin’s Lymphoma
The use of glyphosate herbicides is also a hot topic due to the recent Johnson v Monsanto Trial verdict, in which a California jury awarded millions to a school groundskeeper stricken with non-Hodgkin’s Lymphoma in connection to using Roundup®️ and Ranger Pro – both glyphosate herbicides. Monsanto was found responsible for its role in producing and selling the carcinogenic substance when the Judge upheld the jury’s ruling of guilty on all counts.
A new French study showed an 86% lower incidence of non Hodgkin’s Lymphoma when participants ate organic food, which does not allow the use of glyphosate.
Glyphosate and Marine Life Losses
In addition, environmentalists have long been linking glyphosate to toxic green algae, which has plagued Florida for months. Scientists from many studies are finding that so-called blue-green ‘algae’ are actually not algae but rather a type of primitive bacteria called ‘cyanobacteria.’ They have a special skill that is rare among all species to be able to fully metabolize glyphosate and use its phosphorus atom as a source of phosphorus. So they obtain a competitive advantage against other species in the presence of chronic glyphosate exposure. Phosphorous levels are a serious issue, as documented in the Lake Erie’s cyanobacteria blooms in 2017- “It turns out that many cyanobacteria present in Lake Erie have the genes allowing the uptake of phosphonates, and these cyanobacteria can grow using glyphosate and other phosphonates as a sole source of phosphorus.” stated George Bullerjahn of Bowling Green State University in Ohio.
As shown in this Mercola article, scientists and environmental leaders have long been linking the chemicals (the most widely used chemical is glyphosate herbicide) used in factory farm runoffs in Florida to Red Tide which has devastated millions of marine life. Glyphosate residues are found at very high levels in animal feed and presumably then the animal feces, creating pollution which runs off into the waterways. These same chemicals are used in sugar and orange groves. The blue-green algae (cyanobacteria) are able to convert free nitrogen from the air into nitrates. Thus, they cause an excess of nitrates in the water, in addition to those nitrates that come from excess run-off from nitrate-based fertilizers. The excess nitrates provide essential nutrients for the red algae (Karenia brevis), that then grow to large numbers offshore, which can cause Red Tide.
In other words, glyphosate FEEDS cyanobacteria…or…another perspective is that mother nature’s way of cleaning up glyphosate is with cyanobacteria blooms. These blooms can then encourage the growth of Red Tide…which has devastated marine life, tourism, local restaurants and business along thousands of miles of Florida’s coastline.
Glyphosate Overuse in Florida
The amount of glyphosate that is used in Florida on orange groves, sugar cane fields, and on city streets is enormous. Over 3.5 million lbs per square mile of glyphosate was sprayed in Florida according to the Environmental Working Group (EWG) between 2000-2012.
In addition, glyphosate herbicide AquaMaster was permitted to be sprayed directly in waterways such as Lake Okeechobee and the Everglades, a nature reserve. Local environmentalists are outraged by the lack of action from their governor and local authorities to discontinue the use of glyphosate herbicides and protect marine life.
Glyphosate herbicides are sprayed to prevent weed growth in the Florida Everglades. Glyphosate feeds the growth of cyanobacteria, or “green algae,” and then copper is sprayed to combat the green algae. Copper is a known spermicide.
Glyphosate Test Results in Florida’s Water
Lake Okeechobee water test result:
Moms Across America commissioned the testing of water in Lake Okeechobee and off the coast of Cape Coral. Lake O results, where cyanobacteria was present, showed levels between half the amount and 2 times higher than is allowed in European drinking water. Because cyanobacteria digests glyphosate it would be expected that where cyanobacteria is present the water would sometimes test for lower levels of glyphosate.
ape Coral, FL water test result:
The test results off the coast of Cape Coral, at the mouth of the Caloosahatchee River where cyanobacteria was present* showed levels of glyphosate 5 –12 times higher than is allowed in European drinking water.
Runoff from orange grove spraying and weed management with glyphosate in the Everglades contributes to the presence of glyphosate in Florida waterways. A 2013 study shows that glyphosate can remain viable in salt water for 315 days. Another 2016 study by Roy et al. has shown that glyphosate induces cardiac toxicity in fish. Harm from glyphosate upon marine life, pets, and humans living in Florida is a scientifically sound concern. Residents, an notable environmental proponents such as Erin Brockovich are increasingly justified in calling for action.
Glyphosate and Cancer
WFTX Fox 4 News reported in 2016 regarding South Florida, “The result of one study explains that “compared with the state, there is a statistically significant 36% increased risk of childhood cancer.”
Although there is no conclusive evidence this increased risk is due specifically to glyphosate, author Warren Wright continues, “these findings are suggestive of environmental risk factors in our area.” Considering that glyphosate is widely and heavily used in this specific environment and has been deemed a definite animal carcinogen and a probable human carcinogen by theWorld Health Organization, residents are justifiably outraged that the spraying of glyphosate would continue on crops or waterways for any reason. Some local residents have taken action. Stuart and Miami, Florida have banned the use of glyphosate. Residents in Tampa are suing Monsanto. Florida residents want the entire state to be protected and are calling on Governor Scott to place a moratorium on glyphosate.
The conservation group Friends of the Everglades is frustrated that the Florida State Department of Health (FDOH) has yet to take any action. “What I can say is that scientists who are fearful for their careers and have a hard time finding funding, would all say this is an area that needs much more serious investigation and follow-up by the state of Florida,” says chairman Alan Farago.
Glyphosate and Health Impacts, Especially on Children
Chemical farming proponents and even some food movement individuals have claimed that low levels of glyphosate are safe. This information is not only confusing but blatantly wrong. Peer-reviewed scientific studies have shown that ultra-low levels of glyphosate herbicides cause, yes cause, non-alcoholic fatty liver disease. According to the Liver Foundation, 1 out of 10 Americans now has liver disease. Some are children as young as 8 years old. Additional studies show that low levels of glyphosate herbicides can be endocrine disruptors, changing sex hormones. In addition, Andre Leu, president of IFOAM and author of The Myth of Safe Pesticides stated at the Monsanto Tribunal “Children do not have the enzymes in their livers to break down toxins, especially infants and unborn children. There are NO safe levels.” Clearly, ignoring the science and encouraging people to continue to consume glyphosate, especially children who are especially vulnerable to pesticides, a fact acknowledged by the American Academy of Pediatrics, is dangerous.
Millions of children often start their day with a glass of orange juice and eat oatmeal or Cheerios with high residues of glyphosate. By doing so, they may be increasing their risk of liver disease, cancer, and many other health issues connected to glyphosate. Too many, however, want to feel comfortable in eating what they want to eat. Too many farmers want to continue to spray chemicals they have been told are safe. And too many food manufacturers want to continue profiting from cheap food grown with chemical farming. The question is, when will there be too many sick children? And when will the harms from chemical farming be deemed too much?
Take Action to Ban Glyphosate
Take action today. Tell your Governor you do not want glyphosate herbicides used anywhere in your state. Sign petition.
In Brief
- The Facts:Peer-reviewed research published over many years has shown the tremendous health benefits one can achieve from consuming black seed.
- Reflect On:Imagine if the same resources that are poured into chemical medicine were put into natural medicine. Food interventions have shown great results, far greater than some of our most commonly prescribed drugs, so why isn't the doctor prescribing food?
This article was written by Sayer Ji, founder of Greenmedinfo.com where it originally appeared, it’s posted here with permission. For more information from Greenmedinfo, please sign up for their newsletter here.
A year ago, we wrote an article about nigella sativa (aka black seed) titled, ‘The Remedy For Everything But Death.’ It described the research on the many ways in which black seed (nigella sativa) is a potentially life-saving medicinal food, and is one of our most popular articles, with over 700K social media shares.
Opening with, “This humble, but immensely powerful seed, kills MRSA, heals the chemical weapon poisoned body, stimulates regeneration of the dying beta cells within the diabetic’s pancreas, and yet too few even know it exists,” the article summarized the peer-reviewed and published research on 10 of the seed’s remarkable health benefits:
- Type 2 Diabetes: Two grams of black seed a day resulted in reduced fasting glucose, decreased insulin resistance, increased beta-cell function, and reduced glycosylated hemoglobin (HbA1c) in human subjects.[ii]
- Helicobacter Pylori Infection: Black seeds possess clinically useful anti-H. pylori activity, comparable to triple eradication therapy.[iii]
- Epilepsy: Black seeds were traditionally known to have anticonvulsive properties. A 2007 study with epileptic children, whose condition was refractory to conventional drug treatment, found that a water extract significantly reduced seizure activity.[iv]
- High Blood pressure: The daily use of 100 and 200 mg of black seed extract, twice daily, for 2 months, was found to have a blood pressure-lowering effect in patients with mild hypertension.[v]
- Asthma: Thymoquinone, one of the main active constituents within Nigella sativa, is superior to the drug fluticasone in an animal model of asthma.[vi]Another study, this time in human subjects, found that boiled water extracts of black seed have relatively potent antiasthmatic effect on asthmatic airways.[vii]
- Acute tonsillopharyngitis: characterized by tonsil or pharyngeal inflammation (i.e. sore throat), mostly viral in origin, black seed capsules (in combination with Phyllanthus niruri) have been found to significantly alleviate throat pain, and reduce the need for pain-killers, in human subjects.[viii]
- Chemical Weapons Injury: A randomized, placebo-controlled human study of chemical weapons injured patients found that boiled water extracts of black seed reduced respiratory symptoms, chest wheezing, and pulmonary function test values, as well as reduced the need for drug treatment.[ix]
- Colon Cancer: Cell studies have found that black seed extract compares favorably to the chemoagent 5-fluoruracil in the suppression of colon cancer growth, but with a far higher safety profile.[x] Animal research has found that black seed oil has significant inhibitory effects against colon cancer in rats, without observable side effects.[xi]
- MRSA: Black seed has anti-bacterial activity against clinical isolates of methicillin resistant Staphylococcus aureus.[xii]
- Opiate Addiction/Withdrawal: A study on 35 opiate addicts found black seed as an effective therapy in long-term treatment of opioid dependence.[xiii]
Since then, the biomedical research on black seed has continued to flourish, with another 78 studies published and cited on the National Library of Medicine’s biomedical database MEDLINE over the past 11 months.
Here are 16 additional potential health benefits to add to the growing list:
- Prevents Radiation Damage: Nigella sativa oil (NSO) and its active component, thymoquinone, protect brain tissue from radiation-induced nitrosative stress.[i]
- Protects Against Damage from Heart Attack: A thymoquinone extract from nigella sativa has a protective effect against damage associated with experimental heart attack.[ii]
- Prevents Morphine Dependence/Toxicity: An alcohol extract of nigella sativa reduces morphine-associated conditioned place preference, an indication of morphine intoxication, dependence and tolerance.[iii]
- Prevents Kidney Damage Associated with Diabetes: A thymoquinone extract from nigella sativa has protective effects on experimental diabetic nephropathy.[iv]
- Prevents Post-Surgical Adhesions: Covering peritoneal surfaces with Nigella sativa oil (NSO) after peritoneal trauma is effective in decreasing peritoneal adhesion formation in an experimental model.[v]
- Prevents Alzheimer’s Associated Neurotoxicity: A thymoquinone extract from nigella sativa has protective effects on experimental diabetic prevents neurotoxicity and Aβ1-40-induced apoptosis in the cell model.[vi]
- Suppresses Breast Cancer Growth: : A thymoquinone extract from nigella sativa inhibits tumor growth and induces programmed cell death (apoptosis) in a breast cancer xenograft mouse model.[vii] [viii]
- Exhibits Anti-Psoriasis Properties: The alcohol extract of nigella sativa seeds exhibit anti-psoriatic activity, consistent with its medicinal use in traditional medicine.[ix]
- Prevents Brain Pathology Associated with Parkinson’s Disease: A thymoquinone extract from nigella sativa protects cultured neurons against αSN-induced synaptic toxicity, a pathology observed in the brains of patients with Parkinson’s disease and dementia with Lewy bodies.[x]
- Kills Highly Aggressive Glioblastoma Brain Cancer Cells: A thymoquinone extract from nigella sativa exhibits glioblastoma cell killing activity. [xi]
- Kills Leukemia Cells: A thymoquinone from nigella sativa induces mitochondria-mediated apoptosis in acute lymphoblastic leukaemia in vitro.[xii]
- Suppresses Liver Cancer Growth: A thymoquinone extract from nigella sativa prevents chemically-induced cancer in a rat model.[xiii]
- Prevents Diabetic Pathologies: A water and alcohol extract of nigella sativa at low doses has a blood-sugar lowering effect and ameliorative effect on regeneration of pancreatic islets, indicating its value as a therapeutic agent in the management of diabetes mellitus.[xiv]
- Suppresses Cervical Cancer Cell Growth: A thymoquinone extract from nigella sativa exhibits anti-proliferative, apoptotic and anti-invasive properties in a cervical cancer cell line.[xv]
- Prevents Lead-Induced Brain Damage: A thymoquinone extract from nigella sativa ameliorates lead-induced brain damage in Sprague Dawley rats.[xvi]
- Kills Oral Cancer Cells: A thymoquinone extract from nigella sativa induces programmed cell death (apoptosis) in oral cancer cells.[xvii]
Why is such a powerful seed not yet on the radar of most medical and nutrition communities? We know sesame seed can beat Tylenol in reducing arthritis pain and can reduce cardiovascular disease risk factors in a manner that makes statin drugs envious, and we know flaxseeds shrink breast and prostate tumors, but black seed’s benefits are still largely under reported and underutilized.
Interestingly, despite this blind spot, and as if to confirm black seed’s immense potential as a healing agent, Nestlé, the Switzerland-based global food giant, filed a patent on patent on the use of nigella sativa to “prevent food allergies” in 2010 (Nestlé’s international patent publication WO2010133574). This obvious attempt to appropriate traditional knowledge and use claimed the plant seed or extract should be Nestlé’s intellectual property when used as a food ingredient or drug. According to a Third World Network Briefing Paper from July, 2012:
“The Swiss giant’s claims appear invalid, as traditional uses of Nigella sativa clearly anticipate Nestlé’s patent application, and developing country scholarship has already validated these traditional uses and further described, in contemporary scientific terms, the very medicinal properties of black seed that Nestlé seeks to claim as its own “invention”.
“Nestlé claims any use of an opioid receptor-stimulating compound to treat or prevent allergies, specifically thymoquinone and, more specifically, administration of thymoquinone in the form of Nigella sativa plant material (seeds).3 The type of food allergy of greatest focus is upset stomach and diarrhea.”
The good news is that no such patent has yet to win approval, and for now, this food is still freely available. For additional research updates, simply go to Pubmed.gov, and sign up for an automatic email update for the keyword “nigella sativa,” and you’ll be one of the first to learn about the new research being done on this amazing seed as it comes directly through the biomedical research pipeline.
References
[i] Adem Ahlatci, Abdurahman Kuzhan, Seyithan Taysi, Omer Can Demirtas, Hilal Eryigit Alkis, Mehmet Tarakcioglu, Ali Demirci, Derya Caglayan, Edibe Saricicek, Kadir Cinar. Radiation-modifying abilities of Nigella sativa and Thymoquinone on radiation-induced nitrosative stress in the brain tissue. Phytomedicine. 2013 Nov 21. pii: S0944-7113(13)00432-7. doi: 10.1016/j.phymed.2013.10.023. [Epub ahead of print]
