OLM: Can you tell us a little about the history of the companies that are making GMOs? Who are they? What did they do before they made GMO foods?

Mike Adams: Well, I think Monsanto is one of the most dangerous corporations in the world. I think it has a long history of oppressing the farmers and oppressing developing nations and their farmers. I think it has put profits before the people time and time again to such a degree that it really poses a threat to the sustainability of the human race. That’s about as bluntly as I can state it. [chuckle]

OLM: Are there other companies doing what Monsanto does with GMOs?

Mike Adams: There are smaller companies toying with genetics in the same way, but no one has dominance over the industry like Monsanto. It virtually holds a monopolistic control over seeds. I imagine Arthur Daniel Midland would be next in line in terms of culpability for destroying the food supply, but I don’t know if ADM has a GMO lab or not. That would be interesting to check out.

OLM: We hear that Monsanto bought many seed companies. The FTC didn’t take notice of this action?

Mike Adams: It’s very clear that the FTC is highly selective in its application of anti-trade action. It totally ignores some monopolies such as the pharmaceutical monopoly or the seed monopoly while attacking other things that are beneficial to consumers. For example, the FTC will attack a church that sells anti-cancer herbs. I actually documented one of those cases, so I’ve seen it
firsthand. But the FTC completely ignores these monopolies, which are the most dangerous to human beings. I think that the food supply and the pharmaceutical industries are two of the best examples.

OLM: How did these foods get approved without testing? Wasn’t it true that many FDA scientists took issue with the foods not being tested?

Mike Adams: GRAS – generally regarded as safe. It’s sad. It’s hilarious, but sad. You’re right; there was no testing done. No safety testing, at least not to the degree any reputable scientist would agree to be adequate. Basically, they just swept it under the rug and pushed it through the approval process. They declared it to be safe by decree, you know? Like, “The king declares this poison to be safe.”  It’s kind of like the aspartame story—you know where Donald Rumsfeld was pivotal in getting aspartame approved by the FDA despite all the tests showing it to be dangerous. It just proves that decisions about the food supply are political decisions. They do not have anything to do with the actual science, or real safety, or prioritizing the health of the people. They are purely political/commercial decisions. That’s the sad state of the FDA today.

Why aren’t GMO foods labeled?

Mike Adams: It is very clear that the reason they are not labeled is because the industry does not want the consumers to know. This is a censorship campaign to prevent people from being informed. It’s the same reason that irradiated foods are not labeled. The FDA is on the record as saying that they are afraid people might not understand what irradiated means. It’s a remarkable statement all by itself.

OLM: Yeah, when in fact, the statement really means the opposite. They don’t want people to know. They don’t want us to understand.

Mike Adams: Industry is afraid of knowledge. It’s afraid of people being informed and having access to accurate knowledge about GMOs or irradiated foods, or even other toxic chemicals that are in the foods such as acrylamides. Essentially, the food industry supports a delabeling campaign. It wants to remove as much information as possible from the labels so consumers don’t have access to the information they need to make informed decisions.

OLM: Obviously there is an indirect link to the drug companies and the food industry. It seems as if they have made a deal to line each others’ pockets. It seems as though they’re working together.

Mike Adams: I think that’s a really great observation on your part. The food industry feeds the pharmaceutical industry in terms of profits. It’s the foods that make people sick; they cause chronic degenerative disease. So the foods create demand for the drugs, which are real profit centers. Of course these companies are making money off of foods as well, but GMOs fit into this picture in a very clever and insidious way. All the evidence so far shows that GMOs may pose a very real health threat to those who consume them. As you mention, that benefits the pharmaceutical industry by poisoning people, by creating patients who need pharmaceuticals or who can be diagnosed with diseases and sold pharmaceuticals whether they need them or not.

I think at the retail level Walgreens demonstrates it the best. Walgreens is a pharmacy, but it sells some of the most toxic processed junk food that you can find in America. In front of the store they sell foods that cause disease and in the back of the store they sell the drugs that they claim treat disease. It’s a system of toxicity. I have gone into the store to buy samples of processed
foods that I was sending to laboratories for testing. When I walk through the store I cannot believe the depth of the poisons that are in there: personal hair care products, fragrance, cosmetics, sodas, all the foods. Those stores should be completely shut down. They should be banned. They should be outlawed in this country. They are creating
a toxic America.

OLM: What was that quote about GMO consumers not being able to reproduce?

Mike Adams: What I talked about was that GMOs do damage to the ability to reproduce and as a result the future of the human race is going to be inherited by those who do not consume GMOs and who do not expose themselves to toxic chemicals like pharmaceuticals.

Along those lines I just want to clarify that especially in the natural health field, no one wishes death or suffering upon another human being. I’m not happy that unhealthy people die. But what I am pointing out is that they are making a choice. By consuming GMOs they are choosing not to have great- grandchildren. And that choice is given a label—it’s a Darwin Award [chuckle]. These people are all participating in this multi-generational or trans-generational Darwin award. And in the long term, it is probably a great benefit to the future of human civilization that the people who choose to consume poisons do not inherit the future of our race.

OLM: Is it true that executives from these companies are hired in top positions by the USDA and FDA?

Mike Adams: Yeah, definitely. That’s called the revolving door policy. You’ll see many examples of top managers or executives at drug and food companies who become top people at the FDA or the FTC or the USDA. They often go back and forth between the regulators and the industry several times.

OLM: And then they write the laws?

Mike Adams: Well, it’s not laws. They enforce regulations. Sometimes they write regulations. It’s important to distinguish between the two. Laws are passed only by the legislative branch, members of congress. But the USDA, the FDA and the FTC are essentially lawless regulatory agencies. They are not required to follow any law in their day-to-day decision making. They are above

the law. In fact they are violating the law. If you or I did what the FDA or the FTC did, we would be charged with felony crimes. We can’t just pick up an assault rifle and walk into a company that sells products we don’t like and seize all their computers and handcuff their people and march them off to prison. But that is what the FDA does on a regular basis. It’s a violation of law. It’s a violation of the constitution. So these are lawless organizations.

OLM: Does the president appoint the heads of the USDA and the FDA?

Mike Adams: Yes, the president does appoint the heads of those organizations without a public vote. That’s important to note. All that has to happen is that the senate confirms those appointments. The public is never given a chance to vote on them, so it’s bypassing the democratic system.

OLM: What do you think of Obama’s appointee for the Department of Agriculture?

Mike Adams: I’ve been following that on the Organic Consumers Association. Ronnie Cummins there has reported on that appointment with a lot of good details. I think clearly Obama’s siding with big business. He is going to continue the policies of Monsanto and he is not going to speak up for the people, for the farmers, you know. I see a lot of this with the Obama administration which is kinda frustrating because he came in under a platform of change, you know, talking about protecting the people. And certainly, of course, none of us wanted to see the Bush policies continue, at least not on human rights, and war, and all that. But then with Obama in office, not just for agriculture, but for the treasury, and many other areas, the policies are quite disturbing. They show that the Obama administration, at least through its appointments so far, is largely continuing business as usual, at least in my opinion. I’m optimistic that maybe there will be some changes, but you know, I don’t see any big changes so far, other than a whole lot of money being handed out. And that’s not change. That’s just the same old scam.

OLM: Are you keeping up with the new laws they are trying to pass?

Mike Adams: Ronnie Cummins would have a lot more detail on this, but I keep up with some of it. The big picture is very clear. They are working at federal and state levels to destroy small family farms, to destroy even the definition of organic so that anything could be called organic. They are the enemies of anyone who believes in sustainable agriculture or true organic foods.

OLM: What’s going on with GMOs in Europe?

Mike Adams: GMOs had been banned in certain parts of the U.K. I think that issue has come to the surface again with codex and the harmonization of the European Union. They’re trying to keep GMOs in the food supply. But the thing is, GMO labeling is now mandatory in the U.K. At least that’s my understanding of it. And U.K. citizens are much better informed about this issue than U.S. citizens. And in the U.K. they are very vocal in their opposition to GMO foods, as they should be. And it is in America that people have this kind of bizarre acceptance of whatever the government tells them to do. It’s like America has been drugged into a state of complacency. Pharmaceuticals and fluoride maybe have something to do with that.

OLM: What’s your take on Monsanto’s claims that GMOs are a better way to grow food, that they produce better yields and can help stop world hunger?

Mike Adams: Sure, it’s all about short-term thinking versus long-term thinking. Of course, Monsanto and ADM and other such companies are really focused on short term thinking. In the short-term, it’s true that a single planting of a genetically modified crop can out-produce a non-GMO crop. You look at that season and you weigh how much corn came out of the field and so on. But in the long term, what risks are there to the viability of the food supply? How do GMO organisms affect honey bees, for example? We have colony collapse disorder, which is really threatening the global food supply. We had the issue of cross pollination, cross contamination, which is a huge threat to the food supply.

These long-term threats are never factored into the equations that are being decided by Monsanto or these other companies. So they ignore the long-term risks and they just highlight and focus on the short-term benefits. And it is this kind of short-term thinking that could very well spell the destruction of human civilization as we know it today. All it would take is one year of crops being wiped out around the world due to monoculture farming, and perhaps genetically, GM contamination. One season of the food disappearing and the human population collapses by maybe 70 to 80 percent.

That’s a loss of billions of lives. That’s what’s at risk here. These companies are essentially putting billions of lives at risk in order to obtain a short-term profit.

OLM: What are your favorite GMO information sources?

Mike Adams: Well, definitely the Organic Consumers Association is a top source on this issue, but there is also the Environmental Working Group which is doing great work, although they don’t post as much content as the OCA.

Recommended Supplements (These supplements help detoxify GMOs):

• Shillington’s Total Nutrition Formula
• FloraMend Prime Probiotic – Thorne Research
• Fundamental Sulfur Powder (MSM Powder) – Douglas Labs
• Shillington’s Intestinal Cleanse Formula
• Shillington’s Intestinal Detox

Further Reading:

• How to Avoid GMOs
• Foods That Are GMO
• The Difference Between Heirlooms, Hybrids, and GMOs
• The Unspoken Link Between GM-Foods and Cancer
• GMO-Bananas are Going Into Human Trials

Supplements on a Budget

I have a tight budget. What are the most important supplements I should get? I really can’t spend more than $40 a month.

Thanks,

Shawn

DR. SHILLINGTON ANSWERS: On a tight budget, there is only one product that I would recommend above all others since it does it all. This is “Total Nutrition” as manufactured by Organic Solutions, Inc. It has all the building blocks necessary for creating a healthy body.

Doc a Vegetarian?

Dr. Shillington, are you a vegetarian? I know you eat raw eggs, but do you eat any other meat or cheese? And what do you recommend? I am considering being a vegetarian myself and want to make sure I am making the healthiest choice.

Jessie

DR. SHILLINGTON ANSWERS: I am NOT a vegetarian. The only time I have a person go vegan is when they are cleansing. The reason for this is that I want the body’s attention to be focused on healing rather than on digestion. Eating meat takes up way too much time in the digestion process. Healing requires that the body gets REST, and this includes a rest from the heavy digestive processes of eating meat. For the most part, inactive and sedentary people eat far too much meat. Only those who labor heavily should eat large quantities of meat. I believe in balance. 4 to 6 oz of organic meat (tops) with 6 to 8 oz of vegetables in a meal is excellent. Cheese has too much fat and should be eaten sparingly. Raw eggs are brilliant since they contain the enzymes necessary to process the protein in them, and a fertilized egg contains every amino acid there is. I have two every day.

Hope this helps.

(Note from OLM: If you eat eggs, especially raw, be sure they are organic !)

Birth Control

I am trying to choose birth control. I am 30 years old, and I am concerned about the toxinsI will be putting into my body. I have tried the pill and the depo shot. I become very moody and irritable on these. My boyfriend and I have tried condoms, and he has trouble…umm…achieving his goal while using them. Also, they tend to tear or come off sometimes, too. Is spermicidal cream my best option? And if I choose to go on the pill again, any ideas to help with the mood swings?

Thank you,

Wendy (name changed)

RYAN HARRISON ANSWERS: Birth control is both a very personal and individual choice and one that should be made by consensus in a partnership. Obviously, if it doesn’t work well for both partners, it’s worth looking for a solution that does. There are many different kinds of birth control available today with new ones introduced to the market fairly regularly.

Though I certainly appreciate the health-related complexities of the common birth control pill, I’m not a woman and wouldn’t presume to give definitive advice on that topic. So, I’m turning to another expert on the subject, Susun Weed. In her seminal work the Wise Woman Herbal for the Childbearing Year, she suggests three different kinds of herbal birth control: sterility promoters, implantation preventers, and menstrual promoters. Naturally, she suggests that such herbal approaches are “most effective when combined with knowledge of your fertility cycles, selective abstinence, mental control, and barriers to sperm,” but the list of herbs she presents have a long history of preventing pregnancy.

Among the sterility-promoting herbs, Weed suggests Stoneseed root (Lithospermum ruderale), used by women of the Shoshone and Dakota tribes to cause sterility. Another herb called Jack-in-the-Pulpit root (Arisaema triphyllum) was used by Hopi women, preventing conception for one week.

Implantation preventing herbs may be a more suitable choice; they safely and painlessly make the endometrium unsuitable for the growth of an embryo. The seeds of Queen Anne’s Lace (Daucus carota) can be taken daily starting at menstruation or even immediately after unprotected intercourse and continued for up to one week to prevent pregnancy. Smartweed leaves (Polygonum hydropiper) can be found all over the world as a common weed. This herb is used world-wide as a fertility regulator as it contains naturally-occurring components that interfere with normal pregnancy.

Among herbal remedies that promote menstruation are Ginger root (Zingiber officinale), which is one of the strongest and fastest actingemmenagogues (menstruation promoters) around; Tansy leaves (Tanacetum vulgare); and Pennyroyal leaves (Hedeoma pulegioides), an herbal emmenagogue that is so potent it can also act as an abortifacient.

Obviously – and I cannot stress this enough – if you want to approach birth control from an herbal angle, you need to work with a very qualified, very well trained herbalist. Collecting the herbs mentioned and trying to tackle this on your own may not only prove futile but harmful, as many of the herbs listed here can have powerful side-effects when used improperly. It’s certainly worth looking into, but I encourage you to do so with a professional at your side.

Condoms remain one of the easiest, efficient and side-effect free ways to prevent an unwanted pregnancy. They can tear, yes. To prevent this, be sure that there is plenty of lubrication involved, and that it is appropriate for the condom being used. (Mismatched lubricants and condoms are at the top of the list for reasons for condom tearing.) If the condom slips off with regularity, I suggest exploring different kinds of condoms. All condoms are not created equal! Condoms actually do come in different sizes, as well as in different textures. Some may work better for your partner than others.

That your partner is unable to achieve orgasm with a condom on speaks less about the effect of the condom on his penis than on his state of mind. Any man will tell you – at least if he’s being honest – that sexual arousal can be achieved simply as a result of thoughts, let alone physical stimulation. So, what’s going on in his head is just as important as what he’s wearing “down there.” If you’re not opposed to a little experimentation, I’d suggest you and your partner explore manual stimulation with a condom on. Find out what it takes – words, sounds, ideas, images, etc. – to bring him to orgasm while wearing a condom. Once you both know, you can incorporate those aspects into your sexual encounters.

Finally, if you do opt for a standard birth control pill, you should take time to find one that reacts well with your unique physiology. There are many different birth control pills on the market; some will cause cramps or mood swings, others may not. It can take some shopping around to find the one that works best for you. Either way, as long as you are taking birth control, you should also be taking a good, enteric coated probiotic. One of the downsides of regular birth control pill usage is that it negatively alters your body’s intestinal flora. You can do yourself a huge favor by supplementing daily with a probiotic to keep the beneficial bacteria plentiful. Additionally, you should know that women on the pill have an increased need for vitamins B6, B12, folic acid and zinc.

Hungry

I eat very healthy, but way too much. I am 6’3” and overweight by about 45 pounds. Besides being overweight, I consider myself to be very healthy. I just can’t quit eating!!! If I buy only fruit and vegetables I will eat a week’s worth in a day! Any ideas?

RYAN HARRISON ANSWERS: The human appetite has both physiological and psychological components. On the one side, we feel hunger for a reason: our bodies let us know when they require fuel. On the other side, emotional connections to food can be so powerful as to create the illusion of hunger even if it is not physiologically required.

The first thing that comes to my mind when I hear someone say “I eat very healthy” is “what does healthy mean to you?” Some people truly believe they follow a healthy diet, but actually consume a good deal of empty calories – calories with no real redeeming qualities such as vitamins, minerals or phytonutrients attached to them. And the problem with empty calories is that they often promote hunger, weight gain and cycles oF addiction. So, if there’s even the possibility that your version of “healthy” could be different from mine, I’d suggest you contact a nutritional consultant to get a second opinion.

Otherwise, I’d suggest that the foods you may be eating may not be in the ratio that your body requires to function optimally. In a perfect world, the human diet would consist of roughly 65% complex carbohydrates, 20% healthy fats, and 15% high quality protein. The typical American diet, unfortunately, is 28% carbohydrates (typically simple, not complex), 40% fat (including saturated and trans fats), 12% protein (often accompanied by high amounts of saturated fat) and 20% sugar. The truth of the matter is that if your body is not getting the blend of macronutrients that it needs, it might send you hunger signals even if you’re eating lots of food!

For example, you mentioned that you can go through a week’s worth of fruit in one day. In some ways, that’s actually pretty good for you; most people don’t get even the meager 5 servings a day that the USDA recommends. Unfortunately, if you’re eating mostly fruit all day long, you are not getting the amount of protein required by a 6’3” body. And protein helps promote feelings of satiety, whereas fruit – even with all its fiber – tends to digest fairly quickly (in some cases, taking only 30minutes).

If you are eating a more balanced diet, then you might take a look at your emotional connections to food. Are you an emotional eater? Do you eat when you’re happy or sad? Stressed or relaxed? To reward yourself? As a punishment or a pick-me-up? Perhaps it would be a good idea for you to keep a food journal, writing down how you feel each time you start to eat something and whether you think your feelings are affecting your appetite and/or food choices. The results may surprise you.

Some might suggest finding a supplement that curbs hunger. One such supplement recently hit the market like a tidal wave, but has since faded (as they always do). It’s called Hoodia gordonii and while it is a natural appetite suppressant, I warn against any kind of diet pill. The truth is that, even if it works, when you stop taking the supplement, your basic attitude toward and approach to food will not have changed. This is why people can take all kinds of diet pills, lose all kinds of weight, and then once the pills have run out, they gain it all back plus some. So, my advice is to simply steer clear of diet pills, including appetite suppressants.

Finally, here are a few suggestions that may help curb your appetite, or at least control it. Drink a full glass of purified water before you eat a meal. Sometimes, hunger is really dehydration in disguise. Eat 5 or 6 smaller meals during the day instead of 3 large ones. Having food in your stomach more or less all day keeps the metabolism up and can help take the edge off of hunger pangs. Limit your portion sizes. That may sound like a no-brainer, but it’s probably half the battle. If you’re going out to eat, ask for a to-go box right at the start and when your food arrives, immediately put half of it in there and out of sight. You may experience unpleasant hunger as you limit your intake, but it doesn’t take long – maybe a couple days – for the human body to adapt to such a change. I believe that most people eat more than they really require for optimal health. Making this kind of change may be one of the best investments in your overall health and longevity that you can make. OLM
Email your questions to questions [at] organicmail.net. Questions may be edited for clarity or length.

All of the cells in our body require the proper pH balance to function at an optimal level. If our body is acidic or too alkaline, chemical reactions including enzyme activity, cellular repair, and cellular reproduction are inhibited. Raymond Francis writes, “On the pH scale, 7 is neutral; 0 to 7 is acidic, and 7 to 14 is alkaline. The normal pH inside a cell is 7.4, which is slightly alkaline. Maintaining normal pH in the fluid inside the cell as well as the other body fluids is crucial for keeping the body systems functioning normally.”

While most of the body can still operate, however poorly, outside of the optimum pH zone, blood cannot. Dr. Shillington writes, “Your blood operates between 7.3 and 7.5 on the alkaline side of this pH scale. If it goes out of this range, you’re dead!”

Fast foods and processed foods are highly acidic. So how do we survive eating a Big Mac and a Coke? Our bodies pull alkalizing minerals—calcium, sodium, potassium, and magnesium from soft tissues, organs, glands, and bones to neutralize the acid and return our blood to the proper pH balance. If we continually eat a diet high in acidic foods, chronic acidosis will result. “Eventually, as time goes by, your body will leech your teeth and bones of their much needed calcium to balance this out-of-whack situation,” writes Dr. Shillington. “This is the ’cause’ behind arthritis, bone loss, tooth decay, liver and kidney failure, and a multitude of other diseases too numerous to mention.  According to my up-to-date research, every disease has some connection to an acid/alkaline imbalance.”

The typical American diet is very high in protein. Most meat eaten is not organic and the animals are not fed their natural foods. Cows’ main diet staple is grass, but we proudly hail the “best choice meat”; as “grain fed.”;  Grains are not the natural diet of cows. When they eat grains, their bodies become acidic and they are more likely to become ill. They are then shot full of antibiotics (in addition to hormones) and we eat meat which is more acidic than nature intended.

In addition, our industrial society pollutes water, feeds us chemical laden foods sprayed with poisons, wraps and stores foods in toxic plastic and Styrofoam, and encourages us to eat fast foods and processed foods. Is it any wonder chronic illnesses and devastating disease has reached epidemic proportions?

Though the belief that chronic acidosis is the cause of chronic illness or the basis for much of our disease today is not upheld by mainstream conventional medicine, conventional medicine does agree that acid diets pull calcium from bones and that alkaline diets help prevent osteoporosis, kidney stones, and age-related waste of muscle mass.

When you think about acidity of foods, you may immediately think of citric acid in oranges, lemons, and limes. Citrus fruits are acidic, but they turn alkaline when digested. The same is true for tomatoes. It doesn’t matter whether a food is acidic or alkaline. What matters is how it is chemically metabolized in the body. You may search through books on the subject and through sites on the Internet to find lists ranking foods on the pH scale. Unfortunately, the lists are not comprehensive nor are they in agreement, but they all do say to increase fruits and vegetables.

So how do you use this new information? How can you find out if your body is acidic? You can test your pH using the same test strips you might have used in high school chemistry class or to test the pH in your aquarium. Some recommend testing both saliva and urine. Raymond Francis recommends measuring your first morning urine before you eat. “This test offers an indicator of your cellular pH and can be used to monitor changes as you work to normalize your pH. First morning urine should be in the range of 6.5 to 7.5. If readings fall below 6.5, you are too acidic. Occasional readings above 7.5 are normal, but consistent readings above 7.5 are an indication of tissue breakdown, and a pH over 8.0 is a serious matter.”;

What’s the easy way to make sure your body is not too acidic or alkaline? How do you make sure your body has the right amount of omega 3s and omega 6s? How do you make sure your food has just the right amount of vitamins and minerals? How do you decrease the number of toxins you ingest? How do you rid your body of all virtually all disease and illness? Does it seem overwhelming? It’s not. It’s simple. Eat more raw, fresh, organic foods!

Recommended Supplements:

• Shillington’s Body Balance+
• Shillington’s Total Nutrition Formula

There are two supplements we recommend you take every day, regardless of who you are and what diet you choose. Obviously, a good multivitamin/mineral is a must, but you also need a fatty acid supplement.

Multivitamins and minerals

Ideally you want to get your vitamins and minerals from the foods you eat. But it’s next to impossible for some and completely impossible for others in this day and age. A good multivitamin/mineral supplement is an absolute must for anyone who wants to reach optimum health regardless of their diet.

Thorne Basic Nutrients

Dr. Timothy Kelly recommends Thorne Research vitamins and mineral combinations. They offer a multi vitamin-mineral combination, Basic Nutrients ($30) I and II. Formula I is without copper and iron (recommended); formula II includes them. Another good choice is Basic Immune Nutrients, which combines Basic Nutrients with nutrients that have been found to enhance the functioning of the immune system. A third excellent choice from Thorne is Extra Nutrients. This comprehensive multi vitamin-mineral formula provides the added benefit of reduced glutathione, coenzyme Q10, and hesperidin methyl chalcone. For patients exposed to increased oxidant or free-radical stress, this formula maximizes antioxidant support.

Total Nutrition powder

Dr. Ian Shillington N.D. sells his own formula, Total Nutrition Powder ($48), a balanced blend of whole foods specially formulated to supply natural food source vitamins, minerals, amino acids, and essential trace elements.

These are nature’s nutrients, not manmade synthetic vitamins. All ingredients are from rich, whole food sources, which are organically grown or wild crafted. You can buy Total Nutrition Powder at our online store, read through his main site, www.academyofnaturalhealing.com, where Dr. Shillington shares his recipe for those who want to make their own Total Nutrition Powder.

Buried Treasure VM-100

Another good choice, available at most health food stores and Whole Foods, is Buried Treasure’s VM-100 ($30). VM-100 is a liquid vitamin/mineral with a full range of B vitamins and it’s also an excellent source of vitamin C.

Beyond Health Multi Vitamin Formula

The top of the line, arguably best, and certainly most expensive is the Multi Vitamin Formula available at BeyondHealth.com ($90). Raymond Francis designed and developed his own line of supplements and you can trust that in this case, you get what you pay for. His website is very informative and well worth your time.

Fatty Acid
Supplements

Fatty acids in the proper balance are needed for many metabolic functions and our bodies cannot produce them. We recommend a fatty acid supplement with a blend of omega-3s, omega 6s, and omega 9s:Udo’s DHA Oil Blend. Dr. Shillington, Raymond Francis, and many other alternative health care practitioners recommend Udo’s Choice Oil with DHA, available at most health food stores. In the past we recommended UDO’s oil and a high quality fish oil Like Carlson or Nordic Naturals in order to get DHA, but now you can get all of the fatty acids you need from one source. Vegans need not worry, Udo’s Oil DHA formula is still 100% vegan.

Other Supplements YouMay Need

PMS

Udo’s Oil and Buried Trasure VM-100 are an absolute must for any women with PMS. The B vitamins in the VM-100 are essential for controlling emotions and you need a variety of Omega 3’s, 6’s, and 9’s to process those B vitamins. Men or women, if you suffer from mood swings of any kind, you could benefit from these two supplements.

Candida (Fungus and/or Yeast)

Anyone coming off of antibiotics, struggling with chronic yeast infections or Candidaovergrowth (usually a result of antibiotic use or excessive alcohol consumption), or eating a typical American diet high in refined sugar, flour, and other refined foods, needs to supply the colon with beneficial bacteria. Forget yogurt, kefir, and most of those probiotics you find at your local health food stores. Virtually all of them are an absolute waste of money.

Little if any of the healthy bacteria makes it through your acidic stomach and into your gut where you need them. Probiotic strains need to be alive when they reach the intestine to be beneficial. A high quality probiotic such as Bio-K Plus is available in diary or soy-based formulas as well as capsules, though we recommend the non-capsule formulas for better absorption.

In addition we recommend Thorne Research SF-722, a castor bean oil abstract that does as good if not better than anything we’ve ever used to kill yeast.

Chronic Acidity

For chronic acidity or acute acidity due to a night out on the town drinking or eating an abundance of acidic foods, you will benefit from Body Balance + Formula by Dr. Shillington. This formula contains black walnut hull tincture, organic blackstrap molasses, and organic apple cider vinegar.

“The average person should take two tablespoons a day. If you’re suffering from arthritis, osteoporosis, or migraines, start off with three (one before each meal) for one month, then cut back to two tablespoons (one in the morning, and one at night, or two in the morning), which is the maintenance dosage. This formula works and has saved many an expensive trip to the Medico. With the quality of the food on our planet being so terrible, Body Balance + should be a daily supplement for everyone, including children,” says Dr. Shillington.

Understanding both healthy & not so healthy sugars with their Glycemic Index & Load

Is there such a thing as healthy sugar?

Our body needs sugar to survive. But what we don’t need is refined sugars. Anyone suffering from an overabundance of Candida should limit their fruits, choose them wisely, and forget about sweets in general until the Candida is under control. This goes for those suffering from diabetes and any fungal, viral, or bacterial infection as well. If you do suffer from Candida problems we recommend Thorne SF722. It kills Candida better than anything we know of. A good probiotic to help rebuild the healthy gut flora is recommended too.

(Click here to scroll to table)

In nature, we didn’t eat a lot of sugar, and none of it was refined. In fact, just to get an idea of how easy it is for us to ingest more sugar than we would have ever done in nature, consider the fact that our fruit has grown in size and has become sweeter and easier to eat. One good example is the banana. Just google “wild banana.” Check out the pictures.

Sugar is wrecking havoc on our bodies in a few different ways. It’s hard on the pancreas, the liver, and it feeds fungus, bacteria, viruses, and other parasites that stress the whole body. Consuming refined sugars radically lowers the body’s immune system and leads to allergies, both seasonal and food allergies.

Note: If you’ve been eating too much sugar (and this includes those known as “healthier sugars,” check out How to Kill Candida and Balance the Inner Ecosystem. For a better understanding of how sugar interacts with the body, check out Gluten, Candida, Leaky Gut Syndrome, and Autoimmune Diseases.

Many people consider themselves healthy but suffer from certain ailments due to their sugar intake. In many cases, these people do not realize that the alternative healthier sugar choices they make still contribute to health problems. Sugars like brown rice syrup, honey, coconut palm sugar, and apple juice are still refined sugars and should be used sparingly. Maple syrup and dates are other sweeteners that, depending on your definition are not necessarily refined, but still are sugars none the less and need to be limited as well. If you or someone you know suffers from seasonal allergies or chronic Candida overgrowth, give up the honey, the brown rice syrup, the agave, and any other sweetener, save stevia, completely for a week and see what happens. We bet the results will surprise you.

The reality is that junk food, whether made with healthier sugar substitutes or high fructose corn syrup is still junk food. Healthy foods are whole foods, and whole foods should be the foundation of anyone’s diet.

Glucose

Glucose is the simple sugar made by the body through digestion of carbohydrates. It is the body’s chief source of energy. Sometimes glucose is called dextrose.

Sucrose

Sucrose is what we commonly refer to as table sugar. It is made from highly processed sugar cane or sugar beets. The composition of sucrose is a combination of glucose and fructose, which separates during digestion. Pure sucrose is devoid of any nutrients.

Fructose

Fructose, commonly called fruit sugar, is a simple sugar found in honey, tree fruits, berries, and melons. But don’t be fooled into thinking fructose on a label means you are eating fruit sugar. Pure crystalline fructose comes from two sources: corn or sucrose (table sugar). Corn starch is processed to release fructose. Sucrose (table sugar) is enzymatically hydrolyzed to separate into glucose and fructose. Crystalline fructose is pure fructose from one of these two sources.

High Fructose Syrups

High Fructose Corn Syrup is made from starches like corn, wheat, and rice. High fructose syrups contain nearly equal amounts of glucose and fructose, a composition nearly identical to sucrose (table sugar). The reason high fructose corn syrup is so abundant in our processed food is simple-it’s cheaper than sugar. Because we highly subsidize corn and place tariffs on sugar imports, high fructose corn syrup is much less expensive.

Pure fructose is 1.2-1.8 times sweeter than sucrose so less is needed for the same level of sweetness. It is low on the glycemic index, therefore it does not lead to peaks and dips in the body’s glucose levels. But fructose is processed in the liver. When too much fructose enters the liver at once, the liver can’t process fructose as a sugar. Instead, the liver turns excess fructose into fats-triglycerides. When you incorporate these fats into our bodies cells (the cell membranes) triglycerides cause these cells to be insulin resistant. This is the reason that high fructose corn syrup leads to diabetes. Fructose is linked to significant increases of both cholesterol and triglycerides. And remember-fructose, like sucrose-is a highly refined processed sugar devoid of any nutrition.

Maltose

Maltose, also known as malt sugar, is half as sweet as sucrose (table sugar). It is produced from starch (barley, wheat, rice or other grains). It has been produced in China since 200 B.C. We use it in making beer and as an additive to some processed foods.

In our bodies, maltose is formed as the first step in digestion of starchy foods. It is then broken down into glucose.

Lactose

Lactose is the sugar found naturally in milk.

Date Sugar

Date sugar is 100% dehydrated dates ground into small pieces. It is a whole food, high in fiber, vitamins, and minerals. Date sugar can be substituted for granulated sugar or brown sugar cup for cup, but it does not dissolve in liquids. Most alternative health practitioners consider Date Sugar to be a healthy sugar alternative.

Sugar Alcohols or Polyols

Maltitol, maltitol syrup, sorbitol, mannitol, xylitol, lactitol, lakanto, erythritol, and isomalt are examples of sugar alcohols. They occur naturally in plants but are usually manufactured from sugars and starches. Sugar alcohols have fewer calories than sugars because they are not completely absorbed by the body. They can ferment in the intestines and cause gas, bloating, and diarrhea.

Information on Xylitol from Natural News:

Health Claims

It is obvious to me, as it might be to you, that xylitol, in addition to killing bacteria, will probably kill just about anything. This clearly explains why it is only recommended to be used in small doses. Yet if you go to a health food store, you will see larger sized bags of xylitol on the shelf, promoting its many health uses.

Health Concerns

In lab tests, xylitol will kill a rat 50% of the time in a dosage of 16.5 grams of xylitol for every 1000 grams of rat. Medium rats weigh 100-120 grams, or say .25 pounds. That means, to kill a 100-gram rat, you need only to get the rat to consume, 1.65 grams of xylitol.

A typical xylitol piece of gum contains .7 – 1 gram of xylitol. About half the amount needed to kill a rat. I read of a study stating that humans consumed up to 400 grams of xylitol per day without any ill health effects. I find that hard to believe that such a study is accurate in comparison to the lab tests done as indicated on the material safety data sheets. If 1.65 grams can kill a rat, consuming 400 grams would be highly toxic to humans.

Glycemic Index

When carbohydrates are digested, glucose is released into the bloodstream. The glycemic index is a comparative measurement of the amount of glucose released by a particular food over a two to three-hour period.

Foods that rapidly release glucose rate high on the glycemic index (GI). Foods that slowly release glucose are low on the glycemic index. Mixing high and low GI foods can result in a moderate glucose release.

But the GI rating alone does not give you all of the information you need to determine a food’s effect on your blood sugar. It only tells you how quickly the carbs in a food should turn into sugar in your blood. The glycemic load or GL tells you how much of that carb the food contains. And of course the amount you eat of that particular food is also a huge factor in the rise of your blood sugar.

Foods ranked low on the GI scale release glucose slowly and steadily without a sudden spike of glucose in the blood.  A spike in glucose results in a large insulin release, which is more likely to store glucose as fat rather than use it as fuel. Plus a high release of insulin often results in a rapid drop in blood sugar, causing hunger. So you eat candy. Your blood sugar spikes. Insulin is released. Your blood sugar drops. You eat more candy. The sugar rollercoaster ride begins.

It is important to remember that the GI scale is simply a comparative scale; it compares one food’s blood glucose response to another. There are many other factors to consider when choosing your food. Start with the basic question. Is this food dense with nutrients?

The Best Sugars

When baking, or for coffee and teas, honey would not be used since the heat destroys the natural benefits. Stevia does not bake well and it has a funny aftertaste to most people, but we love it in lemonade and cranberry juice, as well as many teas. If forced to a favorite, sugar cane juice, maple syrup, and coconut palm sugar are our top choices when used sparingly. While we are not a fan of agave, sugar alcohols, or using very much of any refined sugars, a mix of them can be a healthier choice for baking and other recipes that call for sweeteners. Using a little bit of agave, some lactitol, some stevia, and sugar cane juice or coconut palm sugar can be a great way to lessen the adverse effects of any one type of surer while still getting a very nice, well-rounded sweet taste.

Please note that the glycemic index numbers here are estimates. There are many variables that help determine how quickly a sugar is absorbed. These numbers represent an average of many different respected studies. In addition, it is very important to note that the glycemic index and the glycemic load do not define what is a healthy sugar and what is an unhealthy sugar. There are many other variables.

If you’ve been eating too much sugar (and this includes those known as “healthier sugars,” check out How to Kill Candida and Balance the Inner Ecosystem. For a better understanding of how sugar interacts with the body, check out Gluten, Candida, Leaky Gut Syndrome, and Autoimmune Diseases.

Recommended Reading:

• Heal Cavities, Gum Disease, Naturally with Organic Oral Care – Toothpaste recipes included
• Total Nutrition – Make your own Homemade Multivitamin and Mineral Formula
• Still Have Candida? How Mercury Fillings Cause Candida Overgrowth

America’s health care system is highly flawed. So much so that many refer to it as a “sick” care system. Covid-19 has only amplified the problems in our American health care system, and the problem with American health. Having chronic health conditions makes one much more susceptible to Covid-19. Reports from the CDC show that 94% of Covid deaths occurred in patients who had an average of 2.6 additional conditions.

There are complex factors behind the U.S.’s high premature death rate. But it is a mistake to believe that the country’s abominable health outcomes are highly dependent on, say, preserving or repealing the Affordable Care Act. That’s because the U.S. health care system is really a “sick” care system that treats people after their health has declined.

Make America healthy again by paying more attention to nutrition

America has the highest per capita death rate of Covid-19 among other wealthy countries. America is, in many ways, the unhealthiest of any wealthy country in the world, while simultaneously spending more money on health care than any other country. More than 42% of adults in America are obese, in addition to nearly 20% of American children. America has the 12th highest obesity rate in the world.

It’s estimated that half of the deaths in the U.S from heart disease, stroke, and type 2 diabetes are associated with diet. In reality, nearly all deaths like these can be prevented with healthy a diet, and I would imagine that at this rate, mainstream science with figure this out soon. Research has shown that excess weight avoidance is the most important factor for preventing cancer, among those who don’t smoke. With information like this becoming mainstream, it feels as though it’s only a matter of time before everyone knows how important gut health is in preventing disease.

Less than 1% of lecture time in medical schools is devoted to nutrition. A survey of 12,000 doctors showed that only 15% of doctors feel “totally prepared” to give nutritional guidance to patients when needed.

Even in the time of a pandemic, we can’t get health officials to prioritize the importance of a healthy diet over social distancing. It’s just another indicator that America’s health care system is highly flawed. The average American doesn’t even consume one serving of fruit per day, but twice as many servings of sugary beverages. American health officials should prioritize proper health education, and making sure that all Americans have access to healthy affordable produce.

Joel Salatin is an American farmer and author. He owns Polyface Farms, which is known for its small scale unconventional farming methods. Months ago I heard Joel on a Joe Rogan podcast and was immediately blown away. It’s not very often that we hear people discuss the gut microbiome on one of the most popular podcasts in the country.

Here’s that podcast. I highly recommend listening to it if you have the time.

Along with discussing the gut microbiome, Joel talked about his farm, Polyface Farms. Polyface Farms is located in Virginia, and they do things a little differently than most. The land that is now Polyface farms was purchased by Joel’s parents in 1961. They’re all about regenerative farming through sustainable practices, like pasture-raised meat, carbon sequestration, and working in a seasonal cycle.

In short, it’s a dream come true for someone like myself who is all about organic eco-friendly agriculture, so naturally, I had to ask Joel a couple of questions.

The older generation is a big fan of talking about life when they were young. My grandfather loves to talk about the fact that he was raised on cow’s milk, and he turned out “just fine.” The difference, of course, is that the milk he was raised on was unpasteurized small scale cows milk. What encouraged you to get into small scale sustainable farming? Does it relate back to how you were raised or did you have some sort of revelation in life? Feel free to comment on how things have changed if you have any thoughts on that.

My paternal grandfather was a charter subscriber to Rodale’s Organic Gardening and Farming Magazine when it came out in the late 1940s.  He always wanted to farm but never did.  He had a very large garden, though, and sold extra produce to neighbors and corner grocers.  My dad received his no-chemical indoctrination, then, from Grandpa, so I’m the third generation in the compost tradition.  My Dad was a financial wizard and did accounting work all his life.  After flying Navy bombers in WWII, he went to Indiana University on the GI bill and then headed off to Venezuela, South America as a bilingual accountant with Texas Oil Company.  His long-range goal was a farm in a developing country and Venezuela seemed as good as any.  After about 7 years he’d saved up enough to buy 1,000 acres in the highlands of Venezuela and began farming.  The goal was dairy and broilers. My older brother and I were born during that time, and things looked bright.  But then came a junta and the ouster of Peres Jimenez and animosity toward anything American; we fled the back door as the machine guns came in the front door; lost everything and after exhausting all attempts at protection, (we) came back to the U.S. Easter Sunday 1961, landing in Philadelphia. Mom grew up in Ohio and Texas and all their family was in Ohio and Indiana, but Dad’s heart was still in Venezuela and he hoped after the political turmoil settled to be able to return to our farm.  

With that in mind, he wanted to be within a day’s drive of Washington D.C. so he could get to the Venezuelan Embassy quickly and easily to do paperwork and return. That never happened, but it’s why we ended up in Virginia’s Shenandoah Valley.  When I hit 41, I remember thinking: “If I lost it all, would I start over?” That’s what Dad and Mom did in 1961. I was 4.  Dad did his accounting work, and Mom was a high school health and physical ed teacher; that off-farm income paid the mortgage and within 10 years the land was paid off.  Dad combined his ecology with his economic understanding to create some broad principles: animals move; mobile infrastructure; direct marketing; carbon-driven fertility.  I had my first flock of laying hens when I was 10 years old and then added a garden.  By 14 years old, I was our main salesman at the local Curb Market, a Depression-era hold-over that foreshadowed today’s farmers’ markets.  With only 3 vendors, it struggled but after a couple of years, we had a growing and steady clientele for our pastured meats, poultry, eggs, produce, and dairy products (yogurt, butter, cottage cheese). We closed it down when I went off to college and the other two elderly matrons at the market quite as well so by the time I came home, that market and all of its wonderful grandfathered food safety exemptions were gone forever.

I’ve always said we were about 20 years ahead of our time.  Operating that market during my teen years of early 1970s as the nascent back-to-the-land hippie movement germinated was not easy, but the lessons were invaluable when I returned to the farm and started building a clientele on my own in 1980, long before modern farmers’ markets. Teresa and I married in 1980, remodeled the attic of the farmhouse, and lived there for 7 years until Mom and Dad moved out from downstairs to a mobile home parked outside the yard.  My Mom’s mother had lived there for 10 years and passed away, making that spot available.  As an investigative reporter at the local daily newspaper, I realized every business was desperate for people who would show up on time, put in a full days’ work without whining, and actually creatively think through better ways of doing things all made me highly employable.  Living on $300 a month, driving a $50 car, growing all of our own, cutting our own firewood for winter warmth, not having a TV—all these things enabled us even without a high salary to squirrel away half the paycheck.  Within a couple of years we had saved enough to live on for a year.  I walked out of that office Sept. 24, 1982, with a one-year cash nest egg and the jeering of every person I knew”  “He’s throwing his life away.”  “All that talent and he’s going to waste it on a farm.” “Don’t you know you can’t make any money farming?”

We succeeded. 

While we were watching the podcast you did with Joe Rogan, my dad and I had several “Wow!” moments listening to you. One of us would be in the kitchen, and we would run into the living room where the podcast was playing, and share a look of absolute awe. “This guy is talking about the stuff that we talk about! And he’s on Joe Rogan!” We don’t know many people who talk about gut health the way we do. How did you learn about the importance of the body’s microbiome? Is there a correlation between your knowledge of the microbiome and how you run your farm? 

Perhaps the most profound truth in life is that everything we see floats in an ocean of invisible beings.  With electronic microscopes, we can now see many of these things, but because we can’t see them with the naked eye, they are not in our momentary conscience.  It’s hard to forget the microbes floating in the air, on our skin, in our eyes, nostrils, and intestines.  Our farm’s wellness philosophy stems from Antoine Béchamp, the French contemporary and nemesis of Louis Pasteur.  While Pasteur promoted the germ theory and busied himself destroying and sterilizing, Beauchamp advanced the terrain theory and encouraged people to think about basic immunity.  Rather than sterilization, he encouraged sanitation.  He encouraged folks to get more sleep, drink more and better water (much of the water at that time was putrid) and eat better food.  Along came Sir Albert Howard half a century later adding the soil dimension to this basic wellness premise.

In general, we believe nature’s default position is fundamentally wellness and if it’s not well, we humans probably did something to mess it up.  That’s a far cry from assuming wellness is like catching lightning in a bottle, and some sort of sickness fairy hovers over the planet dropping viral stardust willy nilly.  Sickness and disease, whether in humans, plants, or animals are not the problem in and of themselves; they simply manifest weaknesses developed in the unseen world.  Every sickness or disease we’ve ever had on our farm was our fault.  We may have selected the wrong seedstock, crowded things, created incubators for pathogens.  You can stress things a lot of different ways.  But our assumption when confronted with non-wellness is not to assume we missed a vaccine or a pharmaceutical, but rather to ask “what did we do to break down the immunological function of this plant or animal?”  That leads to far more profound truth than assuming we didn’t select the right connection from the chemistry lab.

The fact that today people actually talk about the microbiome in polite company is a fantastic societal breakthrough. Hopefully, it will continue.

The current “pandemic” resulted in a total collapse of our food chain at big grocery stores. While things have since calmed down and straightened out, many people are now aware of just how weak our food supply chain is. The obvious solution- buy small- scale, buy local. The obvious problem- buying meat the right way, (small scale and local) is expensive. Here where I am in Detroit we’ve got a great meat guy, but a couple of weeks ago I found myself at the Dekalb farmers market in Atlanta. I spent $9 for one pound of organic, grass-fed ground beef. What are your thoughts for people who are concerned about the costs of shopping ethically? On a broader scale, do you have any solutions to this? 

Price; it’s one of the biggest and most common questions.  So let’s tackle it on several fronts.

1.  Whenever someone says they can’t afford our food, I grab them by the arm and say “take me to your house.” Guess what I find there? Take-out, coffee, alcohol, sometimes tobacco, Netflix, People magazine, iPhones, flat-screen TV, tickets to Disney, lottery tickets—you get the drift. Very seldom does “I can’t afford it” carry any weight. We buy what we want, and that includes many folks below the poverty line.  

2.  Buy unprocessed. That $9 ground beef is still less than a fast food meal of equal nutritional value. Domestic culinary skills are the foundation of integrity food systems, and never have we had more techno-gadgetry to make our kitchens efficient. The average American spends fewer than 15 minutes a day in their kitchen. Nearly 80 percent of Americans have no clue at 4 p.m. what’s for dinner. In fact, the new catchphrase for millennials is “what’s dinner?” not “what’s for dinner?” So cooking from scratch is the number one way to reduce costs. Right now you can buy a whole Polyface pastured broiler, world-class, for less a pound than boneless skinless breast Tyson chicken at Wal-Mart. The most expensive heirloom Peruvian blue potato at New York City green markets is less per pound than Lay’s potato chips across the street. It’s about the processing.

3.  Buy bulk. Get a freeze and buy half a beef or 20 chickens at a time.  Buy a bushel of green beans and can them.  We buy 10 bushels of apples every fall and spend two days making applesauce; it’s cheaper than watery junk at the supermarket and is real food.  That’s not a waste of time; it’s kitchen camaraderie.  On our farm, we give big price breaks for volume purchasing because it’s simply more efficient to handle a $500 transaction than 25 $20 transactions.  This means, of course, that you must have a savings plan.  Half of all Americans can’t put their hands on $400 in cash.  That’s not an expensive food problem; that’s an endemic and profound failure to plan

Q: Here at OLM we’re a big fan of systems. We also have 10,000 square foot urban farm right in our back yard and are getting chickens very soon. Developing a farm feels a bit like an optimal opportunity to create the “perfect” system. I’m curious as to how the farm is systemized to be self-sustainable. I’m wondering if the farm is carbon neutral or carbon negative? Do you let your chickens work on your compost pile? Do you monitor cow grazing for optimum carbon sequestration? What advice do you have for the many people including us, who have just started growing our food after the current crisis?

Perhaps the starting point is to think of integration rather than segregation.  How many different species of things can you hook together for symbiosis?  So we follow the cows with the laying hens in Eggmobiles to scratch through the cow dung, spread out the manure as fertilizer, and eat the fly larvae out of the cowpats (this mimics the way birds always follow herbivores in nature).  We build compost with pigs (we call them pig aerators).  We have chickens underneath rabbit cages, generating $10,000 a year in a space the size of a 2-car garage and making the most superb compost in the world.  We see trees as carbon sinks to integrate with open land; industrial commercial chippers enable us to chip crooked, diseased, and dying trees for compost carbon.  The kitchen and gardening scraps go to the chickens.  Hoop houses for rabbits, pigs, and chickens in the winter double up as vegetable production in the spring, summer, and fall, creating pathogen dead-ends for the plants and animals growing there at different times of the year.  Integration is everything.

In half a century, we’ve moved our soil organic matter from 1 percent to 8.2 percent.  I don’t know if we’re overall carbon-neutral, but we’ve done this without buying an ounce of chemical fertilizer and using 800 percent less depreciable infrastructure per gross income dollar than the average U.S. farm.  That creates resilience.  Over the years we’ve installed 8 miles of waterlines from permaculture style high ponds that catch surface run-off and gravity feed to the farmland below.  And the rocks and gullies now grow vegetation where none grew before.  This is not pride; it’s a humble acknowledgment of a Creator’s benevolent and abundant design; it’s our responsibility to caress this magnificent womb.