93% of Unborn babies found to have GMO toxins

If you thought that the fuss over GM crops was over the top then maybe this new study from Canada will make you change your mind. The biotechnology industry has always claimed that a certain genetic pesticide used in the cultivation of genetically-modified (GM) crops does not end up in the human body upon consumption. Not true.

Researchers from the Department of Obstetrics and Gynecology at the University of Sherbrooke Hospital Centre in Quebec, in Canada have proved that Bt toxin, which is used in GM corn and other crops, definitively makes its way into the blood supply and was found in the bloodstreams of 93 percent of the pregnant women they tested.

If you are feeling complacent because you don’t eat GM modified foods then their study – which was just published in the journal Reproductive Toxicology – reveals that Bt toxin enters the body not only through direct consumption of GMOs, but also from consumption of meat, milk and eggs from animals whose feed contains GMOs. And that is virtually impossible for you to monitor on an individual basis. Among all women tested, 80 percent of the pregnant group tested positive for Bt toxin in their babies’ umbilical cords, but also a staggering 69 percent of non-pregnant women also tested positive for Bt toxin.

GM crops have been given approval in many countries because it was believed (and heavily promoted) that they were the same as conventional crops. The biotechnology industry has claimed for years that the alterations and chemicals used in GM crop cultivation pose no risk whatsoever to human health, and that any GM substances that remain in food are broken down in the digestive system. Now that it has been revealed that such claims are untrue many pressure groups are urging governments to pull GMOs from their food supplies.

“This research is a major surprise as it shows that the Bt proteins have survived the human digestive system and passed into the blood supply — something that regulators said could not happen,” said Pete Riley from GM Freeze, an alliance of organizations united against GMOs. “Regulators need to urgently reassess their opinions, and the EU should use the safeguard clauses in the regulations to prevent any further GM Bt crops being cultivated or imported for animal feed or food until the potential health implications have been fully evaluated.”

I am always wary of research that is funded by the interested parties, and most of the studies that have been used to validate the safety of GMOs have been conducted by the companies that created them in the first place. This does not, to me, make them a credible source for reliable safety data. Although Governments in North and South America, as well as throughout Europe, have essentially welcomed GMOs into the food supply this was based on evidence and reassurances from the companies themselves, and with this new independent study it certainly seems to be time to reassess the situation.

The easier and immediate solution is wherever possible to eat local organic, certified foods where you know their source or point of origin and ensure a reasonably high level of vitamin C intake (500-100mg a day) to help flush toxins from your system.

Why ‘Bad’ Cholesterol Isn’t As Bad As You Think

I would say it isn’t as bad as most doctors claim either, and having lived in France where supermarkets proudly proclaim their cheeses as 100% fat, and they do not have the heart disease rates that we have in the UK and US it’s time to take a balanced view according to a new study.

The so-called “bad cholesterol” or low-density lipoprotein (LDL)—has been examined by Texas A&M University and their findings may surprise you. Steve Riechman, a researcher in the Department of Health and Kinesiology, says the study reveals that LDL is not the evil Darth Vader of health it has been made out to be in recent years and that new attitudes need to be adopted towards it. As a woman who has never given up butter and regards low fat cheese as an anathema, I am pleased to hear it and send thanks to him and a whole raft of colleagues from the Universities of Pittsburgh, Kent State, Johns Hopkins Weight Management Center and the Northern Ontario School of Medicine.

They published their findings in the Journal of Gerontology and their study was based on 52 adults aged 60-69 who were in generally good health but not physically active, and none of them were participating in a training program. The study showed that after fairly vigorous workouts, participants who had gained the most muscle mass also had the highest levels of LDL (bad) cholesterol. Riechman explained that this was “a very unexpected result and one that surprised us. It shows that you do need a certain amount of LDL to gain more muscle mass. There’s no doubt you need both — the LDL and the HDL — and the truth is, it (cholesterol) is all good. You simply can’t remove all the ‘bad’ cholesterol from your body without serious problems occurring.”

Muscle mass is important, particularly as we get older, and are prone to a condition called sarcopenia, which is muscle loss due to aging. Previous studies show muscle is usually lost at a rate of 5 percent per decade after the age of 40, a huge concern since muscle mass is the major determinant of physical strength. After the age of 60, the prevalence of moderate to severe sarcopenia is found in about 65 percent of all men and about 30 percent of all women, and it accounts for more than $18 billion of health care costs in the United States.

Your total cholesterol level comprises LDL (low-density lipoprotein) and HDL (high-density lipoprotein) cholesterol. LDL is almost always referred to as the “bad” cholesterol because it tends to build up in the walls of arteries, causing a slowing of the blood flow which often leads to heart disease and heart attacks. HDL, usually called the “good cholesterol,” often helps remove cholesterol from arteries. “But here is where people tend to get things wrong,” Riechman says.

“LDL serves a very useful purpose. It acts as a warning sign that something is wrong and it signals the body to these warning signs. It does its job the way it is supposed to. People often say, ‘I want to get rid of all my bad (LDL) cholesterol,’ but the fact is, if you did so, you would die because everyone needs a certain amount of both LDL and HDL in their bodies. We need to change this idea of LDL always being the evil thing — we all need it, and we need it to do its job. Our tissues need cholesterol, and LDL delivers it. HDL cleans up after the repair is done and the more LDL you have in your blood, the better you are able to build muscle during resistance training.”

LDL — the bad cholesterol — serves as a reminder that something is wrong and if we have high levels of it then we need to find out why. It gives us warning signs: is smoking the problem, or poor diet, or a lack of exercise? That is where we need to start and you can deal with those factors yourself before resorting to medication.

Why Dental Checks In Menopause Are Vital

When I was a girl, it was not unusual to see women in their 50s and above with false teeth — and if you want to avoid that fate then you need to take preventive action now.

There’s a lot of attention paid now to the whiteness of our teeth and how brilliant our smile is and frankly false teeth are not something anyone willingly seeks out. The expertise and technology of dentistry has improved hugely so that a full set of false teeth is less common than it used to be but there is a new warning for women who want to retain their own teeth throughout their life.

According to a new study from the Case Western Reserve University School of Dental Medicine and the Cleveland Clinic it appears that brushing, flossing and two checkups a year may not be enough to prevent tooth loss in postmenopausal women. The researchers found that two groups of postmenopausal had abnormally high levels of dental plaque, a film of bacteria, bacterial waste and food particles that sticks to teeth.

All of these women had carried out the standard advice on taking care of their teeth: brushing twice a day, flossing and having two dental checkups a year. In fact, in my experience, that is more than the average woman undertakes but it seems that even all of that was not sufficient to keep plaque in check.

Because plaque sticks to be teeth, it sets in motion the conditions that cause gum disease. This in turn is a process that can erode the sockets that anchor teeth and lead to tooth loss. There are some sensible precautions that you can take to avoid losing your teeth at or after the menopause, the first is never to finish any meal with a sweet or sugary substance without cleaning your teeth immediately afterwards.

The recommendation is that you actually increase your checkups to at least four a year and to make sure that they include deep periodontal cleaning to control plaque. Then you can happily smile your way through the menopause.

Pine Pollen and Coffee to Reduce Prostate Cancer Risk?

As I mentioned last week, June sees the start of The Everyman Campaign to raise awareness and funds for research into prostate and testicular cancer. I thought these two ideas from Alex Malinsky, one of the leading experts in the field of raw food, would help men minimize their risk.

Chewing on a pine cone may not be that attractive, but don’t worry it comes in supplement form as well! Raw pine pollen is the richest seedbed of testosterone derived from plants; since it is the male sperm of pine trees, it fosters plush growth in all living creatures, from trees and plants, to animals, to humans. Some experts claim that pine pollen is an ingredient in certain pharmaceuticals designed to treat low testosterone levels in both men and women.

Low testosterone in either men or women may cause an increase in cholesterol levels, premature aging, tissue and bone loss, highs and lows in blood sugar levels, decreased levels of aerobic energy, weight gain, and sexual dysfunction. In men, low testosterone may increase their chances for developing prostate cancer due to the simultaneous increase in estradiol in the body.

The reasons for low testosterone in either sex are varied. For men, the largest contributing factors are nutritional intake and age. In their 30s and 40s, males typically experience andropause, a term coined in the late 1960s, meaning male menopause, or a decline in the synthesis of androgenic hormones, especially testosterone. Nutrition-related onset of lower testosterone levels in both men and women is typically due to an over consumption of foods with too much phyto-estrogen for the body.

Pine pollen can provide the opportunity for endocrine hormonal balance, i.e. the ratio of testosterone to estrogen, within humans, thus reversing the troubling effects associated with the imbalances that cause quality of life to decrease. This is done mainly through the phyto-androgens in pine pollen, including androstenedione, testosterone, dehydroepiandrosterone (DHEA), and androsterone. The conditions of diabetes, high cholesterol and fatigue have all been improved through the biological and nutritional mechanisms provided by routine consumption of pine pollen.

Pine pollen is easily absorbed by the body when taken in powder or tincture form. If the powder taste is not palatable, pine pollen can be mixed in drinks. The tincture form is considered more potent and uses organic grape alcohol as its liquid base. For more information on raw food and pine pollen visit Alex’s website at: www.RawGuru.com

Another cup of coffee?
Coffee is good for men, according to research released from the Harvard School of Public Health, and even better news is that it doesn’t matter whether it is regular or decaffeinated because regular consumption is now linked to having the least risk for prostate cancer.

For men this is the deadliest forms of the disease and this 12-year study of almost 48,000 male health professionals found that men who drank the most coffee, six cups or more daily, had a 60 percent lower risk of developing lethal prostate cancer — and 20 percent lower risk of developing any form of the disease, according to the study published in the online edition of the Journal of the National Cancer Institute. Not a big coffee drinker? Even lighter consumption — up to three cups daily — was associated with a 30 percent lower risk of lethal prostate cancer.

As too much caffeing is not good for the heart by switching to water (not chemical) decaffeinated coffee you get all of the benefit of the antioxidants, that reduce inflammation and regulate insulin.

If you want to know more about male cancer visit www.everyman-campaign.org

Medicinal Cookery

Food as a healing tool is not new: “Let your food be your medicine” said Hippocrates, the Father of Medicine, although many of the medical profession have chosen to forget it. If you would like to swap pills and potions for ingredients from your garden — or at least an organic supermarket — then the new book by Dale Pinnock is just right for you.

Apparently he is the U.K.’s only medicinal cook and the first to bring together three distinct strands; herbal medicine, nutrition and cookery to create a radical new way to help combat a wide range of common health problems. The idea is to literally eat yourself better and I have to admit the recipes look delicious and are not aimed at those who don’t much care what they eat as they have been designed to stimulate the palate and indulge your appetite for gourmet food.

Conditions that he addresses include digestion, heart and circulation, immune and nervous systems, joints and skin disorders. You don’t need a degree in biochemistry either as this book is accessible to all readers with simple, practical recipes with ingredients that are easily accessible to everyone. Indeed he is frequently seen on television and in magazines explaining his philosophy and showing how the compound in food work in a similar way to medicinal plants, and even the pharmaceutical drugs, but without the side-effects.

One of my favourites is the anti-rheumatoid risotto — and I do think he could have come up with a morecatchy name — that is both simple and absolutely delicious. This is no mean spirited cookery as you get to add a dash of wine to the risotto and are encouraged to have another one for working so hard in the kitchen! If this hot weather continues then you might also feeling signs to make some of the Omega ice lollies that are a wonderful combination of yoghurt, mixed berries, flax seed oil and honey and probably take about 30 seconds to make.

If you want to give your skin a boost seek out the red/orange vegetables for their high beta carotene level so get the darkest red peppers you can find and combine with sweet potato to make a tasty skin enhancing soup. If hayfever and allergies are bothering you then add red onions to your daily diet for their high level of quercetin to damp down allergic reactions.

In addition to the simple recipes he also gives the medicinal properties of the ingredients for each one which is not only informative but also extremely interesting. Medicinal Cookery would make a great addition to any kitchen and if you want to know more about the man himself then visit his website at www.dalepinnock.com or see him in action at http://www.youtube.com/user/DalePinnock?feature=mhum

Why You Should Avoid Airport Scanners in the USA

In the US there has been a great outcry against the naked body X-ray scanners recently introduced into American airports as a counter terrorism measure. The transport safety authority (TSA) has always claimed that they were safe, but this has been greatly disputed by many in the health media and now it seems also by authorities who certainly seem to know what they are talking about.

It appears that TSA faked its safety data on its X-ray airport scanners in order to deceive the public about the safety of such devices. The evidence has emerged thanks to the revelations of a letter signed by five professors from the University of California, San Francisco and Arizona State University. The letter reveals:

• To this day, there has been no credible scientific testing of the TSA’s naked body scanners. The claimed “safety” of the technology by the TSA is based on rigged tests.

• The testing that did take place was done on a custom combination of spare parts rigged by the manufacturer of the machines (Rapidscan) and didn’t even use the actual machines installed in airports.

• The names of the researchers who conducted the radiation tests at Rapidscan have been kept secret. This means the researchers are not available for scientific questioning of any kind, and there has been no opportunity to even ask whether they are qualified to conduct such tests.

Further, none of the Rapidscan tests have been available to be subjected to peer review. They are quite literally secret tests using secret techniques engineered by secret researchers. We the People apparently have no right to see the data, nor the methodology, nor even the names of the researchers who supposedly carried out these safety tests.

What is perhaps the most worrying aspect is that the final testing report produced from this fabricated testing scenario has been so heavily redacted that “there is no way to repeat any of these measurements,” say the professors. In other words, the testing violates the very first tenant of scientific experimentation which is that all experiments must be repeatable in order to be verified as accurate.

As the professors state in their letter:

“The document is heavily redacted with red stamps over the words and figures. In every case the electric current used which correlates one to one with X-ray dose has been specifically redacted. Thus there is no way to repeat any of these measurements. While the report purports to present the results of objective testing, in fact the JHU APL personnel, who are unnamed anywhere in the document either as experimenters or as authors, were not provided with a machine by Rapiscan. Instead they were invited to the manufacturing site to observe a mock-up of components (spare parts) that were said to be similar to those that are parts of the Rapiscan system. The tests were performed by the manufacturer using the manufacturer’s questionable test procedures.”

Unfortunately, this is not that unusual when national defence is called into question. However with my alternative health hat on I cannot begin to imagine the outcry if a herbal product company claimed that its products cured cancer, and it did all the testing itself, and all the names of the researchers were kept secret, and the methodology was a secret, and the whole document was 50% redacted to protect “proprietary information.”

So is it safe? Well, the dose rates of X-rays being emitted by the Rapidscan machines are actually quite high — comparable to that of CT scans, say the professors. Yes, the dose duration is significantly lower than a CT scan, but the dose intensity is much higher than what you might think. And as anyone who knows a bit about physics and biology will tell you, the real danger from radiation is a high-intensity, short-duration exposure. That’s exactly what the TSA’s backscatter machines produce. Further, the radiation detection device used by Rapidscan to measure the output of the machines — an ion chamber — is incapable of accurately measuring the high-intensity burst of radiation produced by the TSA’s naked body scanners, say the professors.

At the same time, the radiation field measurement device used by the TSA — a Fluke 451 instrument — is incapable of measuring the high dose rates emitted by backscatter machines. The measurement devices, in effect, “max out” and cannot measure the full intensity of the exposure. Thus, the TSA’s claims of “low radiation” are actually fraudulent.
The amount of electrical current applied to the X-ray tubes has been redacted by the TSA (working with John Hopkins). This makes it impossible for third-party scientists to accurately calculate the actual radiation exposure, and it hints at yet more evidence of a total TSA cover-up.

The TSA adamantly refuses to allow independent testing of the radiation levels being emitted by the machines and this is on the basis that “terrorists might be able to circumvent the technology” if anyone is allowed to actually test the machine. For once, I cannot even find a comment to make.

So again, is it safe? Well the actual radiation emitted by the machines is far higher than what the TSA claims according to John Sedat, a professor emeritus in biochemistry and biophysics at UCSF and the primary author of the letter.

He says, “..the best guess of the dose is much, much higher than certainly what the public thinks.” Peter Rez, the physics professor from Arizona State, says that the high-quality images described by the TSA could not be produced with the low levels of radiation being claimed by the TSA. The images, in other words, don’t match up with the TSA’s story. Rez estimates the actual radiation exposure is 45 times higher than what we’ve previously been told.

The TSA refuses to allow independent testing of its machines because it knows what informed readers already know: That if the machines were honestly and accurately tested, they would show far higher levels of radiation exposure than indicated and it would show that the TSA’s body scanners significantly increase the risk of cancer to a population that is already over-irradiated with medical imaging tests such as CT scans and chest X-rays.

There is already a very strong public backlash against these devices in the US and it has reached the point where the state of Texas is about to pass a law that would criminalize TSA agents who attempt to operate these naked x-rays. The TSA has put out a preemptive statement on its blog that claims none of this matters as “States cannot regulate the federal government.” It will certainly be interesting to see what happens and Texas would seem to be the ideal state to challenge this.

If you have any choice in the matter avoid the scanners altogether or go by sea.

Update from Patrick Holford on Free Test and Preventing Age-Related Memory Loss

You may have seen the item in the newspapers talking about important research that has been completed at Oxford University that shows that you can prevent both the age-related memory loss and brain shrinkage associated with Alzheimer’s disease – and a 15 minute free on-line test.

In case you didn’t, I wanted to pass on this information that came to me from nutritionist Patrick Holford and that he has asked to be passed on to as many people as possible. It is important because what you do next can make all the difference to what happens to your mind later in life.

In essence, what has been discovered is that a toxic amino acid called homocysteine both predicts risk, and causes the brain damage that is the hallmark of Alzheimer’s – and, most importantly, you can lower your homocysteine level (if you need to) with a simple B vitamin supplement. It is especially important to know your homocysteine level if you do have any signs of memory decline. A not-for-profit educational charity, www.foodforthebrain.org has created the first free, on-line Cognitive Function Test, validated for anyone over 50. It takes 15 minutes to complete.

If your score is slightly below par it becomes doubly important to know your homocysteine level. A level above 9.5 micromol/l (the average for people over 50 is 11micromol/l) is associated with accelerated brain shrinkage and memory loss. Your doctor can test your homocysteine level (or you can do it yourself with a home test kit from YorkTest Laboratories). If your Cognitive Function Test is below par it both gives you clear instructions on how to protect your memory and concentration, and generates an optional letter for your GP suggesting homocysteine testing.

If your homocysteine level is above 9.5 this important research has proven that supplementing high doses of vitamins B6, B12 and folic acid stop accelerated brain shrinkage and memory decline. The Cognitive Function Test explains exactly how much you need and how best to get them.

The first step is to take the free Cognitive Function Test. Chris is a case in point. At age 59 his memory was rapidly going downhill – he kept losing his car in multi-storey car parks. His homocysteine was 119, way above 9.5. Now, 12 months later, his homocysteine is below this cut-off point and, His memory and concentration is completely restored, his energy is so good he now exercises for an hour every day and his sex drive has returned. “You have saved my life, or, at least made it worth living again.” says Chris.

If you want to know the full story of this really important breakthrough then visit the Food for the Brain website. If you want to read more about what you can do to help yourself then read Patrick Holford’s book about everything that works in The Alzheimers Prevention Plan.

And, in case you have alrady forgotten it, the free, on-line Cognitive Function Test is at www.foodforthebrain.org

Herbal Medicine – How the EU Ruling Affects You

May is not so merry this year if you, like me, are a fan of alternative medicine. Though calling herbal medicine alternative is a misnomer as it is has been used safely for hundreds of years and many common drugs are based on their active ingredients being synthesized, patented and made profitable. This move only helps drug companies and ignores thousands of years of medical knowledge.

This is despite the fact that recent studies show that at least six million Britons (26% of adults) have used a herbal medicine in the past two years and high level support from the Prince of Wales and Professor George Lewith, professor of health research at Southampton University, who said: ‘Evidence for the efficacy of herbal medicines is growing; they may offer cheap, safe and effective approaches for many common complaints.’

Unfortunately those views, and the thousands who signed the online petitions to the EU have been ignored and we have now lost access to hundreds of herbal medicines after European regulations came into force banning sales of all herbal remedies, except for a small number of popular products for ‘mild’ illness such as echinacea for colds and St John’s Wort for depression. The EU Directive erects high barriers to any herbal remedy that hasn’t been on the market for 30 years – though they are only concerned with commercial sales – not the hundreds of years of experiential use. That includes the most popular traditional systems like Chinese and Ayurvedic as well as the long-established English herbal tradition.

No more popping into your health store, or more recently Boots, to buy your herbal medicines but instead finding a practitioner – not all that numerous – and having to pay a consultation fee is going to deter many people. Both herbal remedy practitioners and long-established manufacturers like fear they could be forced out of business as a result.
Health Secretary Andrew Lansley approved a plan for the Health Professions Council to establish a register of practitioners supplying unlicensed herbal medicines, and in a written statement said the Government wanted to ensure continuing access to unlicensed herbal medicines via a statutory register for practitioners ‘to meet individual patient needs’. Well, not this patient and as this register is only open to those who could afford the licensing process which costs between £80,000 to £120,000 many individual practitioners are at risk of losing their business and livelihood.

At least 50 herbs, including horny goat weed (so-called natural Viagra), hawthorn berry, used for angina pain, and wild yam will no longer be stocked in health food shops, according to the British Herbal Medicine Association. Some familiar preparations may also disappear to be replaced by alternative licensed formulas, which may contain different ingredients – in some cases ‘unnatural’ ingredients such as artificial colourings.

Richard Woodfield, the head of herbal medicine policy at the Medicines and Healthcare Products Regulatory Agency claims that “the scheme means that consumers will have access to a wide choice of over-the-counter herbal medicines made to assured standards. The current signs are that the market will be lively and competitive. The key difference for consumers is that in future they will be in the driving seat and able to make an informed choice when they wish to use these medicines.”

Quite how you make an informed choice when your access to the proven remedies is limited is beyond me and presumably to the 750,000 people who also signed the petition against the ban. If the criteria is safety – as stated – then how safe is it to force people to buying online without the benefit of advice or from long-established companies with a proven track record?

There is an international trade in poor-quality, unregulated and unlicensed herbal products. Some of these have been found to contain banned pharmaceutical ingredients or heavy metals which are poisonous.

Licensing and registering is going to make money for the government and limit your choice to the few large commercial companies who can afford to do so. My advice is if you have a favourite herbal remedy you have been using for years then stock up quickly before it is no longer available or buy online only from a reputable company.

To find a herbalist in your area consult the National Institute of Medical Herbalists at www.nimh.org.uk or www.associationofmasterherbalists.co.uk

Diet Dangers for Type 2 Diabetics

Being overweight is a risk factor for diabetes, and there are a million diets out there if you are looking to lose a few pounds, or even stones. However, for diabetics the right diet is crucial as it is essential to have the right balance of foods to keep blood sugar levels under control.

The most popular diet advocated generally has been one that is low fat and high carbohydrate based, but many diabetics have struggled to lose weight, and keep it off, on this. More recently there has been a surge of interest in low carbohydrate and high protein diets (Atkins and similar) which have proved highly effective, but have not previously been suggested for diabetics. This has prompted Diabetes UK, the UK’s leading charity for people with diabetes, to state their position as their previous dietary recommendations have focused on the type of carbohydrate in the diet of people with diabetes and they have clarified this to say that the priority for people with Type 2 diabetes wanting to lose weight should be reducing overall energy intake whilst ensuring that the diet still provides all essential nutrients.

Everyone responds differently and what suits one person’s metabolism does not necessarily work for another and so you may need to try a number of different variations in your diet to achieve, and maintain, optimum weight loss. Diabetes UK does not say that low carbohydrate diets are best for all people with Type 2 diabetes, but that it may be suitable for some. Information to date has suggested that low-carbohydrate diets can reduce weight and lead to improvements in blood glucose control but the charity only found convincing evidence that this was effective for up to 1 year. Thus far there is insufficient evidence to support the safety and benefit of low-carbohydrate diets in the longer term.

If you want to lose weight on a low carbohydrate diet, and are diabetic, then you must discuss this with your dietitian so they can alert you the possible side effects of such a diet. If you are on a low carb diet then your blood glucose levels should be closely monitored and medications adjusted where necessary. Carbohydrate foods mainly provide energy for physical activity, so it is sensible to tailor the amount of the foods to how much exercise you do. Few people today get recommended daily minimum amount of physical activity, so it is little wonder that the old advice to eat more starchy foods would lead to weight gain for many.

This is good news for diabetics to try the high protein, low carb diets but remember you do need some carbohydrates – just make sure they are wholegrains and in moderate quantities. The best diet is the simplest; one that is low in saturated fats and salt, and rich in vegetables and fruits and includes wholegrains and oily fish. The two main factors that promote weight gain are having a sedentary lifestyle and eating too much refined carbohydrate from heavily processed foods.
If you want more information on living with diabetes visit www.diabetes.org.uk

Natural Progesterone Helps Baby Blues and Reduces Risk of Premature Births by Half

I was looking at a piece in the newspaper last week on some new research on women with post natal depression. There is a link between low levels of oxytocin during pregnancy and decreased ability to bond well with the baby and that has been shown as a factor in the ‘baby blues’. However, the suggestion that women who are likely to be more prone to this should be given oxytocin during their pregnancy as a ‘preventive’ doesn’t make much sense to me. If a woman is overdue then hospitals give oxytocin to start labour so that might give a women pause for thought over taking it during a pregnancy don’t you think? The risk of starting labour prematurely is a real one, and there is no need to take such action when there are alternatives available.

Previous research has confirmed that giving the hormone natural progesterone given during pregnancy, and afterwards, can help control post natal depression and also prevent miscarriage in the first trimester. If you know someone who is concerned about this then there are two excellent articles on dealing with post natal depression by Dr Tony Coope at http://www.bio-hormone-health.com/2010/04/16/hormones-and-the-baby-blues-part-1/

Premature Birth Risk Reduced by Half:
A new study published in the journal Ultrasound in Obstetrics and Gynecology has found that natural progesterone given to certain groups of pregnant women effectively reduced premature birth rates by 50 percent. Doctors working with natural hormones have for many years recommended natural progesterone to help women both before and during pregnancy and now this new study has identified pregnant women with a condition known as short cervix as being specifically lacking in progesterone.

Progesterone is an essential hormone released by the corpus luteum that stimulates the uterus to prepare for pregnancy, and provides optimum conditions in the body that are necessary for the furtherance of the pregnancy and the development of healthy babies.

For the study, Dr. Sonia S. Hassan and her team from the National Institutes of Health (NIH) assigned 458 pregnant women to either receive a once-daily dose of vaginal progesterone, or a once-daily dose of a placebo gel, during their second and third trimesters. While 16 percent of those in the placebo group gave birth before the 33rd week of pregnancy, only 8.9 percent in the progesterone group gave birth early.

Besides reducing the overall rate of preterm births, the progesterone also demonstrably reduced the rate of respiratory distress syndrome (RDS), a breathing disorder linked to early births. Not only did the women themselves experience less cases of RDS as a result of taking progesterone, but so did their children. Infants whose mothers did not receive progesterone during their pregnancies were nearly three times more likely to develop RDS than children from mothers who took the hormone.

Dr. Roberto Romero, chief of the Perinatology Research Branch of NIH, said “The study … offers hope to women, families and children. Worldwide, more than 12 million premature babies — 500,000 of them in this country — are born each year, and the results are often tragic. Our clinical study clearly shows that it is possible to identify women at risk and reduce the rate of preterm delivery by nearly half, simply by treating women who have a short cervix with a natural hormone — progesterone.”

Although this study was done using progesterone gel, progesterone cream is a highly effective and rapid delivery method, as well as being cost effective, and I would like to see another study done using it.

« Previous Page — Next Page »