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Round-Up of Global News In Health and Complementary MedicineNews Beginning Wk 25 Sept 2000
Cancer Link To Diet Ignored By MedicsThe medical profession has come under fire by a leading complementary therapy expert for failing to take a more holistic approach to the prevention of breast cancer. Michael van Straten strongly believes that doctors do not place sufficient emphasis on the importance of dietary considerations as part of the drive to prevent this disease. The incidence of cancer is much lower is those World populations who eat larger quantities of the important antioxidant selenium in cabbage, garlic, soya and berries. Mr van Straten comments, "Like the scientific community I support trials but many doctors state there is no scientific evidence simply as an excuse to do nothing." The Daily Telegraph 28 September 2000
Complementary Medicine Deserves RespectOne of the country's leading experts in the field cancer medicine expert has berated the fact that UK patients are being denied the best chances of survival by the medical community because it continues to refuse to recognise the value and place of complementary therapies. Dr John Smyth expressed his firm views to in excess of a thousand cancer experts during a conference held in Brussels. He urged the European medical community to ensure that clinical trials into the efficacy of unorthodox treatments are made a priority immediately. He also urged that practitioners of complimentary medicine should prove the effectiveness of their practices and therefore speed their adoption. He continued that they should "Expose their treatments to the full rigour of scientific evaluation." The Daily Mail Thursday 28 Sept 2000
Alternative Medicine On The UpThe world of alternative health received a fillip when it was revealed that the use of complementary medicine is growing in adoption among GPs and patients. The news was heard at a conference held at the Royal Society of Medicine. The complementary specialities of osteopathy, homeopathy, acupuncture and herbalism are greatly increasing in popularity amongst the general population public. The most recent figures are according to a survey carried out in 1989 when 74 per cent said they were in favour of alternative medicine being widely available on the NHS. At the moment, 20 per cent of GPs and nurses are already utilising complementary and a further 50 per cent have admitted to being "warm to the idea". The UK Government has given its full support to the much wider use of these treatments, but unfortunately it has been estimated that it would take at least five years before they are fully available on the NHS - the overriding factor being the distinct lack of necessary funding. Daily Express Wednesday 27 Sept 2000
Cancer & Birth Defects Linked To Pesticide UseThe latest research from America and Germany shows us that exposure to pesticides may be the cause of certain birth defects and childhood cancers. This research indicates that those women who are exposed to pesticides are twice as likely to give birth to children born without one or more normal limbs. The German research studied over 1,200 children with leukaemia, 200 with non-Hodgkin's lymphoma and more than 900 with other forms of cancer. It concluded that exposure to pesticides increased the chances of getting these diseases by nearly 50%. Furthermore the use of insecticides in the home has been shown to more than double the incidence of cancer in children under 15. These revelations follow a similar British Government report which shows that over 43 per cent of fruit and vegetables sold to consumers contains significant traces of pesticides. A further study from the Netherlands has indicated that any frequent exposure to pesticides will make people more prone to the so-called, mild cognitive dysfunction (MCD), in which the key feature is memory loss. A Ministry of Agriculture, Fisheries and Food (MAFF) spokesman observes that "Only 1.6 per cent of food tested showed pesticide traces above the "ultra-cautious" legal limits". The Observer Sunday 24 Sept 2000 http://www.guardianunlimited.co.uk/
Tuna The Natural ViagraNobody could ever imagine the tuna as a romantic fish. However it could provide a very natural alternative to Viagra. This alternative has been located as an extract from fish. In a recent research study the piggy version of the product showed that sows gave birth to significantly more offspring after mating with boars that had been given the virility product in their daily feed. This pig sex enhancer went on sale to farmers last week and looks likely to be very popular indeed . From the human point of view similar results could be seen if the product was to go on sale in chemist shops and health food stores. It is derived on the whole from tuna fish oils to which have been added extra vitamin E and selenium. Comments from Brian Edwards, the Managing Director of JSR Healthbred, the international pig genetics company was suitably enthusiastic about the potential of the fishy viagra. He remarked: "We sprinkled the product on the boars' food and they loved it. We soon noticed that they became livelier and more active. Tests showed that their sperm count had increased by up to 15 per cent." A word of warning though: one of the major side-effects of the fertility product included the enlargement of the pigs' testicles by up to 20 per cent. At the moment, nobody is quite sure whether the same could happen to men and furthermore whether or not this might have an advantage. The Daily Telegraph Saturday 23 September 2000
Beat The Blues With A JogIf you want to beat the blues of depression best put on your exercise shoes. That is according to the latest news. In fact, researchers have found that regular exercise might be more effective than medication in the treatment of serious depression. They suggest that three brisk half hour sessions per week is effective in both treating and preventing the symptoms of depression. The report from the Duke University in North Carolina also found that extra activity was effective in preventing any future relapses. These groundbreaking findings suggest patients will actually cope far better with depression when actually they feel much in more control of the therapy they receive. Somewhat astonishingly a group of patients who combined drugs with exercise showed results that were not as good as for those who took exercise alone. Head of the Duke research team, the psychologist Dr James Blumenthal commented on the results, "We had assumed that exercise and medication together would have an additive effect, but this turned out not to be the case. We found there was an inverse relationship between exercise and the risk of relapsing - the more one exercised, the less likely one would see their depressive symptoms return." The Times Friday 22 September 2000
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