The Gary Null Show

Cleveland Clinic, May 18, 2021

According to new study results, a team of researchers led by Cleveland Clinic's Thaddeus Stappenbeck, M.D., Ph.D., have found that a diet high in fat and sugar is associated with impaired intestinal immune cell function in mice. The findings, published in Cell Host & Microbe, provide novel insights into pathways linking obesity and disease-driving gut inflammation, and have implications for developing targets to treat inflammatory bowel diseases (IBD) in patients.

Using data from more than 900 patients, the researchers found that elevated body mass index is associated with abnormal Paneth cells among patients with Crohn's disease and non-IBD patients.

Paneth cells are a type of anti-inflammatory immune cell found in the intestines that helps to protect against microbial imbalances and infectious pathogens. Dysfunction of these cells is driven by a combination of genetic mutations and environmental factors. Dr. Stappenbeck and others have previously linked Paneth cell dysfunction to gut changes indicative of IBD in preclinical models and a subset of Crohn's disease patients from multiple cohorts around the world.

"With this understanding, we set out to investigate whether diet-induced obesity--specifically caused by a diet high in fat and sugar, or a 'western diet'--is one of the environmental factors that can lead to impaired Paneth cell function," said Dr. Stappenbeck, chair of Lerner Research Institute's Department of Inflammation & Immunity.

The researchers compared the effects of a western diet versus a standard diet. The team's western diet contained about 40 percent fat and an elevated level of simple carbohydrates, which better resembles the diet of an average U.S. adult than regimens prescribed in other preclinical studies.

After eight weeks, the group that ate the western diet had more abnormal Paneth cells than the group that ate a standard diet. In the western diet group, other changes become apparent two months after the Paneth cell defects, including increased gut permeability, where bacteria and toxins can enter the gut and which is well-linked with chronic inflammation. Notably, however, switching to a standard diet from the western diet completely reversed the Paneth cell dysfunction.

"When we started to look into large-scale datasets for the specific mechanisms that might connect the high-fat, high-sugar diet with the Paneth cell dysfunction, a secondary bile acid called deoxycholic acid caught our attention," said Dr. Stappenbeck. 

Deoxycholic acid is a metabolic byproduct of intestinal bacteria. Researchers found that consuming a western diet increased the bile acid in a region of the intestines called the ileum and, as a result, increased the expression of two downstream molecules, farnesoid X receptor (FXR) and type I interferon (IFN).

"For the first time, we showed how coordinated elevation of FXR and type I IFN signals in multiple cell types contribute to Paneth cell defects in response to a diet high in fat and sugar. In previous research, stimulating FXR has shown to help treat other diseases, including fatty liver disease, so we are hopeful that with additional research we can interrogate how the combination of elevated FXR and IFN signals can be targeted to help treat diet-induced gut infections and chronic inflammation."

Dr. Stappenbeck also explained that while the team was interested to learn that changing the diet regimen reversed the pathological changes, more research would be needed to determine if these changes also occur in patients.

In a recent study published in BMC Psychology, researchers from Ritsumeikan University and the National Institute of Information and Communications Technology (NICT), Japan, have explored a simple strategy to increase motivation in college students by nurturing a positive emotion: gratitude. Many studies have shown that even short "gratitude interventions," which are activities that increase an individual's awareness of feelings of gratitude, can have a lasting positive effect on that person's mood, satisfaction and well-being. However, based on previous studies, the available evidence on the effect of such interventions on academic motivation is inconclusive. This prompted the researchers to test the effects of a different type of gratitude intervention: daily gratitude journaling.

"Our main hypothesis was that engaging in an online gratitude journal by writing down up to five things one felt grateful for each day could make students be more aware of their academic opportunities—their 'blessings'—and help them re-evaluate their motives and goals, ultimately improving their motivation," explains Dr. Norberto Eiji Nawa from NICT, first author of the study. They recruited 84 participants, all Japanese college students, and divided them into a control group and an intervention group. Over the course of two weeks, students in both groups had to evaluate aspects of their daily life through online questionnaires each day, but only the intervention group had to keep the online daily gratitude journal. At the start of the intervention and after one and two weeks, and one and three months, the participants had to complete the Academic Motivation Scale (AMS), a tried-and-tested tool for measuring different aspects of academic motivation.

The results were promising; through statistical analyses, the researchers found that the gratitude intervention through daily journaling significantly increased the students' academic motivation. Most notably, this robust positive effect was not restricted only to the two-week period of the intervention, as the increased level of academic motivation was maintained even after three months. In addition, through an exploratory analysis, the researchers established that the enhancement in academic motivation was mostly driven by a decrease in "amotivation scores." Amotivation, in this context, refers to the state in which a person perceives that their own actions are irrelevant to the resulting outcomes, leading to feelings of helplessness and incompetence.

Academic motivation can be one of the primary determinants of both academic achievements and satisfaction with school life, and developing widely applicable intervention strategies is critical to foster student growth. "Online interventions have the advantage of being more accessible, scalable and affordable to large portions of the population. Gathering solid evidence to support their deployment will be essential to unleash their true potential in the future," concludes Professor Noriko Yamagishi from Ritsumeikan University. It appears that the positive impact of gratitude interventions extends well beyond the already documented effects on individual well-being.

This study was partly supported by a research grant from the Ritsumeikan Inamori Philosophy Research Center. This Center aims to promote multidisciplinary research on the management philosophy advocated by Dr. Kazuo Inamori, a prominent Japanese entrepreneur and renowned philanthropist. With this major goal in mind, Professor Yamagishi, alongside Dr. Nawa, have been working on the scientific elucidation of the emotions of "altruism" and "gratitude" from the perspective of cognitive psychology and neuroscience. This particular study was conducted as part of this more overarching research. Until the day these human emotions become clearer, we can safely give this piece of advice: remember to count your blessings.

Anglia Ruskin University, May 14, 2021

Getting in shape isn’t easy. But after all that hard work, how long do we actually maintain it? Turns out that even the great effort we put into training, taking a bit of time off can mean that we become “unfit” much faster than it took us to actually get in shape.

To understand how the body becomes “unfit”, we first need to understand how we become fit. The key to becoming fitter – whether that’s improving cardiovascular fitness or muscular strength – is to exceed “habitual load”. This means doing more than our body is used to. The stress that this has on our body makes us adapt and become more tolerant, leading to higher fitness levels.

The time it takes to get fit depends on a number of factors, including fitness levels, age, how hard you work, and even environment. But some studies do indicate that even just six sessions of interval trainingcan lead to increases in maximal oxygen uptake (V02 max) – a measure of overall fitness — and improve how efficiently our body is able to fuel itself using the sugar stored in our cells during exercise.

For strength training, some gains in muscle force can be shown in as little as two weeks, but changes in muscle size won’t be seen until around 8-12 weeks.

When we stop training, how quickly we lose fitness also depends on many factors – including the type of fitness we’re talking about (such as strength or cardiovascular fitness).

As an example, let’s look at a marathon runner, who is in peak athletic fitness and can run a marathon in two hours and 30 minutes. This person spends five to six days a week training, running a total of 90km. They’ve also spent the last 15 years developing this level of fitness.

Now let’s say they stopped training completely. Because the body no longer has the stresses of training forcing it to stay fit, the runner will start to lose fitness within a few weeks.

Cardiorespiratory fitness – indicated by a person’s V02 max (the amount of oxygen a person can use during exericse) – will decrease around 10% in the first four weeksafter a person stops training. This rate of decline continues, but at a slower rate over longer periods.

Intriguingly, though highly trained athletes (like our marathon runner) see a sharp decline in V02 max in the first four weeks, this decline eventually evens out, and they actually maintain a V02 higher than the average person’s. But for the average person, V02 max falls sharply, back to pre-training levels, in less than eight weeks.

The reason V02 max declines is due to reductions in blood and plasma volumes – which decrease by as much as 12% in the first four weeks after a person stops training. Plasma and blood volume decrease due to the lack of stress being put on our heart and muscles.

Plasma volume may even decrease by around 5% within the first 48 hours of stopping training. The effect of decreased blood and plasma volume leads to less blood being pumped around the body each heart beat. But these levels only drop to where we started – meaning we won’t get worse.

Of course, most of us aren’t marathon runners – but we’re also not immune to these effects. As soon as we stop exercising the body will start to lose these key cardiovascular adaptations at a very similar rate as highly trained athletes.

When it comes to strength, evidence shows that in the average person, 12 weeks without training causes a significant decrease in the amount of weight we can lift. Thankfully, research shows that you maintain some of the strength you gained before you stopped training. What is intriguing is that despite the significant decrease in strength, there’s only a minimal decrease in the size of the muscle fibres.

The reason we lose muscle strength largely has to do with the fact that we’re no longer putting our muscles under stress. So when we’re no longer working our muscles hard, the muscles become “lazy”, leading the number of our muscle fibres to decrease, and fewer muscles being recruited during an activity – making us less able to lift the heavy loads we used to.

The number of muscle fibres used during exercise decreases by around 13% after just two weeks of no training – though this appears not to be accompanied by a decline in muscular force. This implies that the losses observed across the longer periods of detraining are a combination of both this initial decline in the number of muscle fibres we use, but also the slower decline in muscle mass.

For the average gym goer who lifts weights, they would experience a drop in the size of their muscles – over time finding it harder to lift heavy loads as they have less muscle fibres being recruited.

So even after all that effort to get fit, we start losing cardiovascular fitness and strength within 48 hours of stopping. But we don’t start to feel these effects for at least two to three weeks for cardiovascular fitness and around 6-10 weeks for strength. Rates of “de-training” are similar for men and women, and even for older athletes. But the fitter you are, the slower you’ll lose your gains.

Doctors should consider more "social" prescribing of non-drug approaches for depression and loneliness, say researchers

Non-drug therapies, such as exercise, appear to be as, or more, effective than drugs for reducing symptoms of depression in people with dementia, suggests research published online in The BMJ.

The findings suggest that people with dementia will derive a clinically meaningful benefit from non-drug interventions, and the researchers say doctors should consider more "social" prescribing of non-drug approaches to treat symptoms of depression and loneliness.

Fifty million people worldwide have a diagnosis of dementia. About 16% of these people also have a diagnosed major depressive disorder, and 32% will experience symptoms of depression without a formal diagnosis.

Previous trials have shown that non-drug approaches, such as exercise, alleviate symptoms of depression in people with dementia, but it's not clear how effective they are compared with drugs to reduce symptoms of depression.

To address this uncertainty, researchers analysed the results of existing trials to compare the effectiveness of drug and non-drug interventions with usual care or any other intervention targeting symptoms of depression in people with dementia.

After screening 22,138 records, they focused on and reviewed 256 studies involving 28,483 people with dementia, with or without a diagnosed major depressive disorder.

Drug approaches alone were no more effective than usual care, but they found 10 interventions associated with a greater reduction in symptoms of depression compared with usual care.

These were cognitive stimulation, exercise, reminiscence therapy (a treatment to help people with dementia remember events, people and places from their lives), cognitive stimulation with a cholinesterase inhibitor (a drug used to treat dementia), massage and touch therapy, multidisciplinary care, psychotherapy combined with reminiscence therapy and environmental modification, occupational therapy, exercise combined with social interaction and cognitive stimulation, and animal therapy.

Three interventions -- massage and touch therapy, cognitive stimulation with a cholinesterase inhibitor, and cognitive stimulation combined with exercise and social interaction -- were found to be more effective than some drugs.

The authors acknowledge some study limitations, such as being unable to explore severity of depression symptoms or effects on different types of dementia. Nor did they look at the potential costs or harms of implementing drug and non-drug interventions.

However, notable strengths included the large number of articles reviewed and use of a recognised clinical scale for capturing symptoms of depression.

As such, they say in this systematic review, "non-drug approaches were associated with a meaningful reduction in symptoms of depression in people with dementia and without a diagnosis of a major depressive disorder.

And they add that everyone -- patients, caregivers, clinicians and policy makers -- have a role in translating these findings into practice

University of Pennsylvania, May 13, 2021

Incorporating omega-3, vitamins and mineral supplements into the diets of children with extreme aggression can reduce this problem behavior in the short term, especially its more impulsive, emotional form, according to University of Pennsylvania researchers who published their findings in the Journal of Child Psychology and Psychiatry.

Adrian Raine, the Richard Perry University Professor of Criminology, Psychology and Psychiatry, has spent his career looking at how the brain's biological functioning affects antisocial behavior. He focuses specifically on understanding these actions and learning how to modify them, whether with something benign like a child acting out or with something extreme, in the case of a homicidal killer.

"How do you change the brain to make people better?" he asked. "How can we improve brain functioning to improve behavior?"

These questions formed the foundation for work Raine had previously done with adolescents on the African island of Mauritius. In a randomized control trial, one group received omega-3 supplements for six months, the other didn't. Those taking the fish oil saw a reduction in aggressive and antisocial behavior.

"That was my starting point," he said. "I was really excited about the results we published there."

Mauritius, however, is a tropical climate and a different culture from the United States, so Raine, a Penn Integrates Knowledge Professor, decided to test a new version of the study in Philadelphia, to aim for more broadly applicable outcomes. He partnered with Therese Richmond, the Andrea B. Laporte Professor of Nursing and associate dean for research and innovation, and several other Penn faculty, including Rose Cheney of the Perelman School of Medicine and Jill Portnoy of the Criminology Department in the School of Arts & Sciences.

The Philadelphia randomized control study placed 290 11- and 12-year-olds with a history of violence into four groups: The first received omega-3 in the form of juice, as well as multivitamins and calcium for three months. For that same duration, a second group participated in cognitive behavioral therapy, or CBT, which included meeting weekly for an hour, with time split between the child, the parent and with both together.

"Sessions focused on the links between thoughts, feelings and behaviors and also practicing alternative actions the children could take to deal with difficult situations rather than to emotionally react to something," said Richmond, who supervised the clinical trial. "It's helping the child build a toolbox of ways to interact with others. For example, if I'm angry, how might I cope with anger other than physically striking out?"All participants got homework, too.

A third group in the study took the supplements and participated in CBT, and a fourth received resources and information targeted at reducing aggressive behavior. Blood samples at the experiment's start and conclusion measured omega-3 levels in each child.

"Immediately after three months of the nutritional intervention rich in omega-3s, we found a decrease in the children's reporting of their aggressive behavior," Richmond said. The team also followed up three and six months later.

At the first check-in, participants getting the combination of CBT and omega-3s reported less aggression than the control group and the therapy-only group. By the final check-in, however, any positive effects had dissipated. What remains unknown is whether continued use of omega-3s would lead to a long-term reduction in antisocial behavior.

There were other minor limitations to the research. For one, self-reporting completed by parents and children didn't line up. The 11- and 12-year-olds in the omega-3 and CBT-supplement groups noted fewer aggressive behaviors; their parents said such tendencies hadn't changed. Also, some participants dropped out before the study had finished.

Despite these challenges, Raine, Richmond and their colleagues said the findings provide some important insight.

"No matter what program you use, could adding omega-3s to your treatment help?" Raine asked. "This suggests it could."

And though the work answers some questions, it also creates new ones, which returns to a larger point regarding the mind-action connection: It's complicated.

"We can't oversimplify the complexity of antisocial behavior. There are many causes," Raine said. "It's not just the brain. Is it a piece of the jigsaw puzzle? I think it is."

University of Stirling (Scotland), May 17, 2021

The COVID-19 lockdown was a catalyst for many older people to embrace technology, reconnect with friends and build new relationships with neighbours, according to University of Stirling research.

Understanding the coping mechanisms adopted by some over 60s during the pandemic will play a key role in developing interventions to help tackle loneliness, isolation and wellbeing in the future.

The study, led by the Faculty of Health Sciences and Sport, surveyed 1,429 participants - 84 percent (1,198) of whom were over 60 - and found many had adapted to video conferencing technology to increase online contact with existing social networks, while others reconnected with previous networks. Participants reported that lockdown had led them to engage with neighbours and other members of their communities for the first time, while several said social distancing had brought an additional meaning to life, by highlighting what was important to them.

Published in the International Journal of Environmental Research and Public Health, the paper comes six months after the study - funded under the Scottish Government Chief Scientist Office's Rapid Research in COVID-19 programme - reported in its preliminary findings that social distancing had increased feelings of loneliness in older people.

Professor of Behavioural Medicine, Anna Whittaker, who led the study, said: "Our research found that the COVID-19 lockdown triggered feelings of loneliness in older people - with many experiencing less social contact and support. However, the study also highlighted positive outcomes, for example, lockdown encouraged some older people to embrace and engage with technology - such as Zoom, Whatsapp or FaceTime - to stay in touch with loved-ones or participate in exercise classes or religious groups. Those who engaged in such activity were able to prevent high levels of loneliness, therefore, helping older adults to increase their digital literacy and use of remote social interactions could be a really important tool for addressing loneliness.

"Participants also reported actively looking for new social contact while restrictions were in place - such as contacting friends who they had not spoken to in years and increasing interactions with neighbours and other members of their communities. Significantly, many of our participants reported that social distancing has actually led them to find new sources of satisfaction in life.

"Our study also highlighted that encouraging safe social contact through physical activity and engaging with people in the community may be an effective way to reduce loneliness, improve wellbeing, increase social activity, and improve social support."

The study - which involved a survey conducted between May and July 2020 - examined the impact of social distancing during the pandemic on loneliness, wellbeing and social activity, including social support, in Scottish older adults.

Participants were asked about the strategies they adopted to increase social interaction during this time and reported that the way they interacted with their friends and family, faith, chosen group activities and, to a lesser extent, their employer and colleagues, had changed. More than 300 participants mentioned 'Zoom' - the video conferencing tool - in their answers.

More than 150 participants reported that their religious gatherings had moved online - replacing face-to-face gatherings - while 91 said that social gatherings with family and friends had changed in favour of online 'games nights'. New activities included bingo and quiz nights, while other activities moved online - such as bridge nights, book clubs, choir rehearsals, and dance and exercise classes.

The role of community - particularly neighbours - was mentioned by more than 300 participants and some reported the common experience of getting to know previously unknown neighbours and increase interaction with others in the community at local shops or parks. A pleasant Scottish summer also supported such interactions, several said.

At least 100 people said social interactions were linked to their physical activities - such as time spent outdoors while walking for exercise, walking the dogs or active commuting.

Professor Whittaker added: "Our research underlines the importance of addressing loneliness and social support in older adults - but particularly during situations where risk of isolation is high. Although specific to the pandemic, this study has wider implications of helping us to understand the impact of social distancing and social isolation on older people.

"The findings may be applicable in the future - both in and outwith pandemic situations. In Scotland, the recommendations for improvement may be through encouraging older adults to get to know their neighbours better, getting involved with local buddying systems and community initiatives, including via digital means, and engaging in physical activity, such as daily walks in the community."

Brian Sloan, Chief Executive of Age Scotland, said: "While it may prove difficult to consider any aspect of the pandemic positive as such, it is important and worthwhile to reflect on what it has taught us, both about ourselves and society and about the necessary tools to tackle Scotland's increased levels of loneliness and isolation.

"For example, we've seen first-hand how important the community response has been in terms of supporting older people throughout lockdown and it has been inspiring to witness how people across the country stepped in and stepped forward to help those in need around them. Even as restrictions ease, we hope to see this sense of community spirit continue. 

"The ongoing impact of COVID-19 has also demonstrated just how important increased digital inclusion is and how easily those without access to technology can feel out of the loop. It's reassuring to see so many older people reporting that they have been able to embrace and engage with technology to stay connected and active. 

"However, it's equally important to ensure those who are unable or do not wish to use the internet have alternative ways to stay connected to their communities and support networks.

"As we take steps towards recovery together, it is vital that no one is left behind and those most impacted are supported to play a full part in society again. 

"We know we will be living with the ongoing effects of lockdown loneliness for a long time to come, and this research will be incredibly valuable when considering how best to tackle loneliness and isolation and to improve the wellbeing of older people going forward."

Signs of Vitamin B12 Deficiency

World Health Net,  May 1, 2021

Modern nutritional research offers much more information about which nutrients are required for optimal health than in years past. The general opinion of most health care providers has been that patients should eat a balanced diet in order to make sure their nutritional needs are being met. Until the past few decades this was good advice, but the nutrients contained in most foods sold in grocery stores has been depleted, due to the way they were grown and processed. This means the nutrients most important to the proper functioning of the human body are best ingested through supplementation. Those who have a deficiency of vitamin B12 may be experiencing some serious health problems that they are not even aware of.

• Weakness

Health care providers may not be able to identify these problems as a deficiency of Vitamin B12, so a blood test may be needed, in order to reach a correct diagnosis. There are a few other less common symptoms that indicate a deficiency of the vitamin.

• Paranoia and hallucinations

Many people are not very well educated about their nutritional needs and the problems they may experience from various deficiencies. Most people have too much stress in their lives and struggle to find enough time in the day to get everything done. People often naturally think whatever fatigue or weakness they feel is the result of not enough time and rest, but symptoms could well be due to a Vitamin B12 deficiency. 

After receiving a bachelor’s degree from Baylor University, Dr. McCullough completed his medical degree as an Alpha Omega Alpha graduate from the University of Texas Southwestern Medical School in Dallas. He went on to complete his internal medicine residency at the University of Washington in Seattle, cardiology fellowship including service as Chief Fellow at William Beaumont Hospital, and master’s degree in public health at the University of Michigan. Dr. McCullough is a consultant cardiologist and Vice Chief of Medicine at Baylor University Medical Center in Dallas, TX. He is a Principal Faculty in internal medicine for the Texas A & M University Health Sciences Center. Dr. McCullough is an internationally recognized authority on the role of chronic kidney disease as a cardiovascular risk state with > 1000 publications and > 500 citations in the National Library of Medicine. His works include the “Interface between Renal Disease and Cardiovascular Illness” in Braunwald’s Heart Disease Textbook. Dr. McCullough is a recipient of the Simon Dack Award from the American College of Cardiology and the International Vicenza Award in Critical Care Nephrology for his scholarship and research. Dr. McCullough is a founder and current president of the Cardiorenal Society of America, an organization dedicated to bringing cardiologists and nephrologists together to work on the emerging problem of cardiorenal syndromes. His works have appeared in the New England Journal of Medicine, Journal of the American Medical Association, Lancet and other top-tier journals worldwide. He is the co-editor of Reviews in Cardiovascular Medicine, and associate editor of the American Journal of Cardiology and Cardiorenal Medicine. He serves on the editorial boards of multiple specialty journals. Dr. McCullough has made presentations on the advancement of medicine across the world and has been an invited lecturer at the New York Academy of Sciences, the National Institutes of Health, U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA), European Medicines Agency, and the U.S. Congressional Oversight Panel. 

The FDA, Shock Troops for the Pharmaceutical Industrial Complex

Richard Gale and Gary Null PhD

Progressive Radio Network, May 17, 2021

As of this week, over 194 million doses of the Covid-19 vaccines have been administered in the US. Consequently, a growing majority of Americans are delighted that life may return to normal because most believe they are now protected from infection. Clearly that is not the case. Bill Maher tested positive for Covid last week and had to cancel his television show for his first time since 1993. This was despite Maher having been fully vaccinated. Moreover the vaccines’ serious adverse effects are being downplayed by health officials and the media. Who will experience an adverse effect appears to be arbitrary; therefore, it is a game of Russian Roulette as to whether a person will be critically injured or be protected from the virus. One of the world’s most accomplished rock guitar musicians Eric Clapton received both doses of AstraZeneca’s Covid vaccine and had such severe reactions he feared he might never play the guitar again.  Clapton posted a message:

“About six weeks later [after receiving the first shot] I was offered and took the second AZ shot, but with a little more knowledge of the dangers. Needless to say the reactions were disastrous, my hands and feet were either frozen, numb or burning, and pretty much useless for two weeks, I feared I would never play again, (I suffer with peripheral neuropathy and should never have gone near the needle.) But the propaganda said the vaccine was safe for everyone.”

However it is not simply a miniscule few who are suffering undesirable Covid-vaccine events such as blood clots and other cardiovascular complications, anaphylaxis, severe allergic reactions, various neuropathies, abnormal menstrual bleeding and suspected miscarriages, extreme muscle weakness, fatigue, etc.  If this were the case, an argument could be made for siding with benefits over risks. Covid vaccines have only been administered for less than six months, and it is becoming increasingly clear that the risks may outweigh the benefits. Suspected numbers of miscarriages following Covid vaccines is especially worrisome. A government study published in the New England Journal of Medicine attempted to analyze and downplay the risk. Yet at the same time, the study observed a trend of 11.6% of spontaneous abortions occurring less than 13 weeks after the mRNA vaccination.  It is becoming increasingly obvious that these vaccines’ safety profiles is far less than Anthony Fauci, the FDA and the CDC are touting

More younger adults are experiencing adverse vaccine symptoms than from the risks due to acquiring a wild coronavirus. Worldwide reported adverse effects and deaths are escalating dramatically. In the CDC’s Vaccine Adverse Events Reporting System (VAERS), reported Covid-19 vaccine deaths have now reached 4.434 as of May 13th 2021 which is more vaccine-related deaths from conventional vaccines recorded in VAERS during the past 21 years.  Since VAERS is a passive reporting system, the actual serious adverse effect rate may be as high as 1in 10 shots. No other vaccine on the CDC’s vaccination schedule has such a poor record of safety.

As with Bill Maher, fully vaccinated people are still being infected and testing positive. Younger healthy adults, who earlier had an insignificant chance of becoming sick or dying from the SARS-CoV-2 virus, are now being injured and in some cases dying from the vaccines. 

A recent study published in JAMA observed delayed hypersensitivity vaccine reactions well after injections. The University of Pennsylvania estimates that between 5 to 10 percent of recipients of the mRNA vaccines have “severe adverse reactions” – an inordinately high percent compared to every other non-Covid vaccine. And a group of medical institutions including the University of Greifswald School of Medicine, and the Medical University of Vienna are proposing a new medical condition, “vaccine-induced prothrombotic immune thrombocytopenia,” now be associated with the AstraZeneca and Johnson and Johnson vaccines.

A recent paper warns about the dangers of vaccine-induced prion disease. The list of adverse effects continues to mount.  Pfizer document refers to the possibility of Covid vaccine shedding to the unvaccinated.  Doctors are coming forward and accusing the CDC of scrubbing the statistics of actual vaccine-related deaths. The risks were quite obvious in the vaccine makers’ own clinical trial documents before the FDA awarded Covid vaccines with emergency use approval to launch a nation-wide vaccination program. Whether or not health officials at the CDC or FDA thoroughly deliberated on the many warnings or simply ignored them is open to debate.  But the evidence strongly leans towards the latter.

Earlier, we presented the historical evidence of widespread corruption at the CDC; however, the FDA is far more influential because it is the final watchdog that determines a drug’s efficacy and safety profile. In the most perverse scenario, the FDA relies upon outside experts to sit on its advisory committees to review a drug’s or a vaccine’s safety. Many of these experts have a gross conflict of interests with the pharmaceutical industry.  This institutional dilemma is steeped into the FDA’s very DNA. As far back as 2006, Public Citizen discovered that 1 out of 3 of outside consultants and advisory members to the FDA had financial conflicts. The situation has only worsened over the years.

A Pogo investigation in October last year, uncovered several advisers on the FDA’s Vaccines and Related Biological Products Advisory Committee who had direct ties with the Covid-vaccine companies, including direct payments for consulting fees. Dr. Archana Chatterjee, for example, has received over $200,000 from agreements with these companies. The same is true for the Committee’s chairman, University of Michigan Dr. Arnold Monto who received fees from the largest vaccine firms including  Pfizer, Sanofi, GlaxoSmithKline and Novartis. The previous chair, Dr. Hana El Sahly from Baylor University, had to recuse herself due to her role in supervising Moderna’s Covid-19 vaccine clinical trials. Earlier, Monto was the principal investigator for Sanofi’s influenza vaccine. Another is the president of Meharry Medical College where coronavirus clinical trials were conducted. Three other Committee members likewise held close conflict-of-interest relationships with vaccine makers.  Shortly before issuing emergency use approval, a second Pogo analysis concluded that the FDA Committee whitewashed the warnings indicated by the Covid-19 vaccine trials. The meeting was adjourned by the FDA director for the Office of Vaccines Research and Review in favor of green-lighting the vaccines before Committee members suspicious of the clinical results could weigh-in. Prof. Carl Elliott, a medical ethicist at the University of Minnesota, summarized the problem of corporate bias now plaguing the FDA. “You do something positive for a company that you feel confident is going to pay you back for it later on,” Elliot stated. “And they do.”  The FDA‘s current rules regarding conflict of interest is strictly limited to the honor system.  In Europe, on the other hand, the European Medicines Agency strictly prohibits experts with ties to private industry from sitting on its advisory committees. 

Even with FDA efforts to crack down on conflicts of interests due to Congressional pressure, the industry has found other means to get their representatives onto advisory panels. And the heads of the agency willingly turn a blind eye.  A Science exposé reported on the growing strategy of “pay after” conflicts of interests. Outside advisors will declare no conflicts but then rule in favor of a drug or vaccine only to be reimbursed afterwards. The journal’s review of compensation records uncovered “pay after” schemes for the approval of 28 psychopharmacologic, arthritis, cardiac and renal drugs.” The investigation also uncovered:

“Of the more than $24 million in personal payments or research support from industry to the 16 top-earning advisers—who received more than $300,000 each—93% came from the makers of drugs those advisers previously reviewed or from competitors.”

Probing still deeper, the Pacific Legal Foundation released an analytical review of 2,952 rules issued by the Department of Health and Human Services over a 17-year period. The Foundation determined that 75 percent of these rules were unconstitutional and “issued by low-level officials and employees with no authority to issue rules.” With respect to the FDA dozens had no democratic controls and involved tens of millions of dollars ruled over by career bureaucrats.  

Every American who is prescribed a drug by a physician has the belief that the pill has undergone rigorous trials to scrutinize its safety and will be effective. And when there are known potential adverse effects, we blindly assume the attending physician knows these dangers. However, this is a myth perpetuated not only by drug makers but also by our own federal health agencies.

As we have reported on many occasions, iatrogenic deaths, deaths caused by medical error and prescribed medications is now the third leading cause of mortality in the US. The Institute of Medicine has warned about “the nation’s epidemic of medical errors.” A large percent of these errors are related to adverse drug events (ADEs). The FDA states, “ADRs are one of the leading causes of morbidity and mortality in healthcare.” Dr. Curt Furburg published an article in the Archives of Internal Medicine proposing sweeping changes throughout the FDA.  Furburg and his colleagues wrote, “We see eight major problems with the current system of assessment and assurance of drug safety at the FDA.” A fundamental problem is the FDA’s initial review for drug approval that often fails to detect serious ADRs: “A study by the US General Accountability Office (GAO) concluded that 51% of all approved drugs had at least one serious ADR that was not recognized during the approval process.”

A 2003 investigation published in The Independent in the UK reported “under pressure from the pharmaceutical industry, the FDA routinely conceals information it considers commercially sensitive, leaving medical specialists unable to assess the true risks [of approved drugs].” One case involved a very popular over-the-counter drug, the painkiller ibuprofen. The investigators’ search uncovered concealed data showing that ibuprofen increased heart attack risks by 25 percent. Even Freedom of Information (FOI) filings to the FDA do not produce all the information being requested. For example, a group of Swiss investigators filed an FOI to procure trial data about the musculoskeletal pain drug Celecoxib and received back only 16 of the 27 trials conducted on it. A separate FOI concerning a similar drug, Valdecoxib, had pages and paragraphs deleted because sections of the document were marked as “trade secrets.” An even worse case involving a leaked report concerning internal memos and secret FDA reports provided detailed evidence that the FDA approved 9 different antidepressants, representing a total of 22 studies enrolling 4,250 children, while knowing full well that the risk of “suicide-related events” was twice as high as children taking a placebo. These are just several examples among numerous others, which may best be summarized by a Forbes article entitled “The FDA is Basically Approving Everything.”

Isn't it time for real truth telling? The FDA, which was budgeted for $5.9 billion in FY 2019, is ruled and governed by a small group of political scientists who have abdicated their ethical responsibilities as physicians and medical professionals. With all the controversy and debate over the efficacy and safety of new mRNA vaccines and the aggressive emergency approval of the ineffective anti-Covid drug remdesivir, we may consider a Harvard University article published in the Journal of Law, Medicine and Ethics entitled “Institutional Corruption of Pharmaceuticals and the Myth of Safe and Effective Drugs.”  For the past four decades, the paper states, 

“patients have suffered from a largely hidden epidemic of side effects from drugs that usually have few offsetting benefits. The pharmaceutical industry has corrupted the practice of medicine through its influence over what drugs are developed, how they are tested, and how medical knowledge is created. Since 1906, heavy commercial influence has compromised Congressional legislation to protect the public from unsafe drugs. The authorization of user fees in 1992 has turned drug companies into the FDA’s prime clients, deepening the regulatory and cultural capture of the agency.”  

We are witnessing the pharmaceutical industry increasing its demands for shorter than average times for the FDA to review new drug submissions; alternatively they have an option to pay the FDA costly fees to have these drugs fast-tracked under its Accelerated Approval Program, thereby jumping over many regulatory hurdles to bring their products to market more quickly. According to a 2019 review of the Program, conducted by the University of Nebraska’s Institute for Operations Research, “from 1992 to 2008, 36% of post-market studies had not been completed, and 50% of the uncompleted studies took on average of 5 years to even begin.”  Yet throughout the duration of years, these drugs continued to be prescribed and reap enormous profits for the companies benefiting from the FDA’s loopholes. 

As a consequence, the FDA’s entire regulatory protocol has consistently deteriorated with each passing year. From a system originally mandated to function as a guardian to protect patients from dubious industry commercial interests, it has been transformed into an anti-preventative pipeline favoring drug companies’ bottom line and their shareholders. 

In 2013, the Union of Concerned Scientists released its investigative report, four years after the Obama administration launched a process to increase transparency in the federal sciences agencies --- another well-meaning Obama initiative that failed to make any fundamental change. The Union concluded that the  FDA had created a culture lacking scientific integrity, including no formal procedures for investigating scientific misconduct. 

The FDA’s serious failures to carry out its duties to monitor and regulate drug companies are well exemplified in the case of the North Carolina outsourcing firm Cetero.  After several years of gross negligence to thoroughly review pharmaceutical drugs, mostly generic knock-offs submitted for licensure, the agency finally uncovered Cetero’s five-year history of faking documents and data or early clinical trials and bioanalytics.  While we expect contractors who carry out clinical trials for large drug companies to be busy at work conducting research on the recorded trial data, on over 1,900 occasions there were no personnel in the Cetero facilities. Approximately 1,400 trials for roughly 100 drugs were faked. Whereas the FDA did little to conduct a thorough investigation, the European Medicines Agency on the other hand discovered that Cetero and its Big Pharm partners, including Roche and Genentech, failed to submit 80,000 reports on American approved drugs that killed over 15,000 Europeans. We need to consider that the Mayo Clinic is on record stating that the last ten years of cancer research are utterly useless due to systemic fraud, 

To understand the systemic rot eating away the FDA, we may take note of the research of Dr. Charles Seife and his students at New York University. Seife and his team undertook the task to investigate and analyze the extent to which the FDA covers up evidence of fraud and corruption in medical drug trials. They reviewed FDA documents for about 600 clinical trials. One of Seife’s primary questions was the frequency that FDA officials discover flagrant and intentional misconduct and subsequently decide to bury the evidence and prevent it from becoming public to the medical community.  He discovered such actions to be an official pattern within the agency. Given the high rate of content deleted or blacked out from the documents the FDA provided, the investigators could only determine which pharmaceutical company or drug was involved in 1 of 6 of the reviewed trials. For one trial alone, where FDA inspectors found significant fraud and misconduct, 78 different medical publications printed articles based upon that single study.  In an article for Slate, Seife writes, 

"Nobody ever finds out which data is bogus, which experiments are tainted, and which drugs might be on the market under false pretenses. The FDA has repeatedly hidden evidence of scientific fraud not just from the public, but also from its most trusted scientific advisers, even as they were deciding whether or not a new drug should be allowed on the market. Even a congressional panel investigating a case of fraud regarding a dangerous drug couldn't get forthright answers."

In one case, a new anti-blood clotting drug, rivaroxaban, involved four large trials recruiting thousands of patients in clinical sites in over a dozen countries. According to Seife, one of the trials "was a fiasco."  In half of the sixteen clinical sites, the FDA discovered "misconduct, fraud, fishy behavior or other practices so objectionable that the data had to be thrown out." One Colorado site falsified data. At the Mexican site, there was "systematic discarding of medical records." Despite these overwhelming problems, the drug trial was published favorably in the prestigious British journal The Lancet. The FDA found similar problems in the three other trials; in one the data was ruled "worthless." The FDA advisory committee of "expert" reviewers were only informed that inspectors discovered only "significant issues" at two sites in one of the trials. Rivaroxaban was nevertheless approved in 2011. Since then lawsuits for wrongful death from the drug continue to increase. 

One of the deeper flaws within the FDA’s mode of operations is that it solely relies on the studies and clinical trials conducted by drug makers without conducting any studies of its own. Consequently these private firms have complete control over the clinical data and can provide such data or not at their own discretion. For example, if a company conducts 20 clinical trials on a potential new drug and15 trials conclude it is absolutely useless or results in serious reactions and deaths, the company is only required to submit documentation for the 5 trials that are favorable. 

Over the years, Congressional subcommittees have voiced warnings to FDA officials to clean up their act. A House Government Reform Committee reported that both the CDC’s and FDA’s advisory committees for vaccines were thoroughly compromised with pharmaceutical conflicts of interest.  

One of the most glaring examples of FDA misconduct, deceit and cover-up to protect pharmaceutical interests in the agency’s history was the federal case against Merck and its anti-inflammatory drug Vioxx. Dr. David Graham, a former Associate Director for Science and Medicine in the FDA’s Office of Drug Safety, testified before the US Senate. Dr. Graham has impeccable credentials qualifying him as an expert on the failures of pharmaceutical drugs. He graduated from the Johns Hopkins University School of Medicine, and trained in Internal Medicine at Yale and in adult Neurology at the University of Pennsylvania. 

Dr. Graham told the Senate:

“During my career, I believe I have made a real difference for the cause of patient safety. My research and efforts within the FDA led to the withdrawal from the US market of Omniflox, an antibiotic that caused hemolytic anemia; Rezulin, a diabetes drug that caused acute liver failure; Fen-Phen and Redux, weight loss drugs that caused heart valve injury; and PPA (phenylpropanolamine), an over- the-counter decongestant and weight loss product that caused hemorrhagic stroke in young women.

“My research also led to the withdrawal from outpatient use of Trovan, an antibiotic that caused acute liver failure and death. I also contributed to the team effort that led to the withdrawal of Lotronex, a drug for irritable bowel syndrome that causes ischemic colitis; Baycol, a cholesterol-lowering drug that caused severe muscle injury, kidney failure and death; Seldane, an antihistamine that caused heart arrhythmias and death; and Propulsid, a drug for night-time heartburn that caused heart arrhythmias and death. . . .

“I have done extensive work concerning the issue of pregnancy exposure to Accutane, a drug that is used to treat acne but can cause birth defects in some children who are exposed in utero if their mothers take the drug during the first trimester. During my career, I have recommended the market withdrawal of twelve drugs. Only two of these remain on the market today—Accutane and Arava, a drug for the treatment of rheumatoid arthritis that I and a co-worker believe causes an unacceptably high risk of acute liver failure and death.”

The Los Angeles Times reported that witnesses told the Senate panel that Merck and the FDA knowingly had data well before the approval and licensure of Merck’s Vioxx painkiller that proved the drug’s serious cardiovascular health risks. Nevertheless, the FDA granted it approval without resolving the risks, and Vioxx was aggressively marketed.

Testifying about Merck’s Vioxx, Dr. Graham states:

"Today . . . you, we, are faced with what may be the single greatest drug safety catastrophe in the history of this country or the history of the world. We are talking about a catastrophe that I strongly believe could have, should have been largely or completely avoided. But it wasn’t, and over 100,000 Americans have paid dearly for this failure. In my opinion, the FDA has let the American people down, and sadly, betrayed a public trust."

According to Dr. Graham. “Not only did the FDA ignore known risks from Vioxx and related drugs but . . . it tried to prevent Graham and others from publicizing their own research that proved the extent of these risks.”

Members of Congress have echoed Graham’s concerns. Charles Grassley (R–Iowa) said he was concerned that the FDA “has a relationship with drug companies that is too cozy.”  Sen. Jeff Bingaman (D–New Mexico) said the problem was within the FDA’s own culture.“ This culture is one whereby the pharmaceutical industry, which the FDA is mandated to regulate, is the FDA’s most favored and lucrative client.

Sixteen years have passed since Dr. Graham’s public statements exposing the life-threatening policies and corruption that infest the FDA. It’s difficult to comprehend why the agency has been unable to clean up its act. Instead the FDA’s culture of deceit has only worsened. Nevertheless, the evidence clearly shows that our government health officials would rather support pharmaceutical profiteering than the health and safety and American citizens. In fact, 45 percent or $2.7 billion of its budget derives from private pharmaceutical “user fees.”

The disturbing data suggest that the FDA’s evaluation of pharmaceuticals for safety and efficacy may be so flawed that only 4% of all trial results are identified as such. As a result, FDA scientists and officials responsible for approving drugs to the market are kept largely uninformed about the egregious scientific misconduct involved in obtaining study data. Further, these erroneous and fraudulent studies are published in peer-reviewed scientific literature and accepted as valid science. The American public is ‘virtually defenseless’ if another medication proves to be unsafe after it is approved.

But it gets worse.  The agency has been warning against highly effective off-patent drugs to treat early SARS-CoV-2 infections such as hydroxychloroquine (HCQ) and ivermectin.  Shortly after the pandemic was formally announced, and with no promising treatment in sight, the FDA recommended HCQ but then reversed its decision in June after Anthony Fauci publicly announced the coming arrival of Gilead’s novel drug remdesivir. The FDA’s approval of remdesivir baffled many scientists, according to the journal Science, who were keeping a close watch on the drug’s clinical reports, which showed a “disproportionally high number of reports of liver and kidney problems”Nor did remdesivir lessen hospital stays or lower mortality rates.

Two months ago the agency issued a warning statement against the use of ivermectin. “The very next day,” reported the Alliance for Natural Health, “Merck announced positive results from a clinical trial on a new drug called molnupiravir in eliminating the virus in infected patients.”  Again, the FDA had been working in concert with the pharmaceutical industry to advance expensive experimental drugs rather than cheaper and proven drugs with decades of research to back their safety records. 

In addition, the FDA has waged a war against alternative medical systems for many decades, including natural supplements. Last September, the agency attempted to ban N-acetylcysteine (NAC) after it showed promise to reduce cytokine storms associated with SARS-CoV-2 infection. The supplement had already been shown to improve lung problems due to respiratory infections such as pneumonia and acute respiratory distress symptom. Three years ago, an FDA advisory committee met to consider banning five supplements made by specialized compounding pharmacies: alpha lipoic acid, CoQ10, pyridoxal-5-phosphate, creatine monohydrate  and quercetin dehydrate. Earlier the FDA had banned curcumin, boswellia and aloe vera from pharmacologic compounding. One of the key executors of the agency’s revitalized assault against supplements and the natural health industry was Trump’s appointment of Scott Gottlieb as FDA Commissioner. Following his two years at the FDA’s helm, Gottlieb quit and joined Pfizer’s Board of Directors.

The FDA’s argument is rather straightforward, albeit dubious; since supplements, including Vitamin C and D, Omega-3 fatty acids, and even minerals such as magnesium and zinc have not been formally submitted to the FDA for evaluation to be registered as “approved drugs,” it is against the law to make any health claims about their health benefits.  This is despite the thousands of peer-reviewed studies in the National Library of Medicine to support their efficacy. The average median cost to conduct clinical trials to meet FDA standards for approval, according to a Johns Hopkins University evaluation, is $19 million and upwards to $2-3 billion. In other words to get Vitamin D officially recommended as a viable preventative defense against Covid-19 would require a minimum of $19 million in addition to numerous fees and other legal costs prior to and after submission. And that doesn’t even address the problem of ownership since Vitamin D is a natural substance and excluded from patenting. In the meantime, supplement manufacturers are prohibited from stating the vitamin’s benefit to the public thereby contributing to a gross disservice. 

“Clearly these are the actions of an agency looking to restrict the supplement market,” according to the Alliance for Natural Health, “and remove as many products as possible in as many ways as possible.”  One reason is that if a vitamin or supplement were to go through the FDA licensure treadmill, the agency could potentially require a supplement’s access by prescription only. It would no longer be available over the counter. And this in turn would be another boon for the drug industry, which is already developing synthetic supplemental knock-offs that are patentable. 

Much of the blame lies on the shoulders of politicians on both sides of the aisle and the mainstream media who have enabled the FDA and CDC to run amok and then propagate the pharmaceutical industry’s nonsense. A recent Harvard University and Robert Wood Johnson Foundation survey reported that public trust in America’s health care system has rapidly fallen during the pandemic to 34 percent. Only 37 percent stated they had much trust in the FDA. 

This trend may very likely continue as a growing number of physicians and medical experts are sounding alarms over the flagrant incompetence of our federal officials leading the national efforts against Covid-19 and the approval vaccines with highly questionable safety records and expensive novel drugs that fail to warrant use. Worldwide, tens of thousands of otherwise orthodox medical professionals are charging Anthony Fauci, the CDC, FDA and the World Health Organization with gross mishandling of the pandemic.  Lawsuits are underway against national health ministries around the world for deceiving their populations with fraudulent PCR testing, fake mortality rates and unwarranted public health policies that have produced extreme harm and suffering.  As the situation deteriorates more suits will be anticipated. 

Sadly there is no reason to expect the FDA to undergo a structural change. For decades Congressional committees have warned the agency about it’s ignoring the public health of Americans and its revolving door policies with drug makers. Yet matters continue to worsen. A complete overhaul by adopting policies similar to the European Medicines Agency such as independent leadership divorced from the pharmaceutical complex and full public funding, would be a decent start. Another  solution could be the creation of separate and independent National Drug Safety Board without ties to private industry or overlapping conflicts of interest with the existing health agencies in dire need of reform. However that tipping point has not been reached to expect any of our politicians to switch sides and for once serve the public’s health interests

Catholic University Louvain (Belgium). May 10. 2021

According to news reporting from Louvain la Neuve, Belgium, research stated, “A saffron extract has been found to be effective in the context of depression and anxiety, but its effect on sleep quality has not been investigating yet using objective approaches.”

The news reporters obtained a quote from the research from Catholic University Louvain (UCLouvain): “For this purpose, a randomized double-blind controlled study was conducted in subjects presenting mild to moderate sleep disorder associated with anxiety. Sixty-six subjects were randomized and supplemented with a placebo (maltodextrin) or a saffron extract (15.5 mg per day) for 6 weeks. Actigraphy was used to collect objective data related to sleep quality at baseline, at the middle and at the end of the intervention. Sleep quality was also assessed by completion of the LSEQ and PSQI questionnaires and quality of life by completion of the SF-36 questionnaire. Six weeks of saffron supplementation led to an increased time in bed assessed by actigraphy, to an improved ease of getting to sleep evaluated by the LSEQ questionnaire and to an improved sleep quality, sleep latency, sleep duration, and global scores evaluated by the PSQI questionnaire, whereas those parameters were not modified by the placebo.”

According to the news editors, the research concluded: “In conclusion, those results suggest that a saffron extract could be a natural and safe nutritional strategy to improve sleep duration and quality.”

University of Florida, May 6, 2021

Neurodegenerative diseases such as Alzheimer's, Parkinson's and ALS affect millions of adults, but scientists still do not know what causes these diseases, which poses a significant roadblock to developing treatments or preventative measures.

Recent research suggests that people with these conditions exhibit changes in the bacterial composition of their digestive tract. However, given the vast diversity of microbes found in the human body, identifying which bacteria may be associated with neurodegeneration is like finding a needle in a haystack.

Seeking that proverbial needle, scientists at the University of Florida are looking in an unexpected place: the digestive tract of a tiny, translucent worm called Caenorhabditis elegans.

New research published in PLOS Pathogens establishes, for the first time, a link between specific bacteria species and physical manifestations of neurodegenerative diseases. The study's lead author is Alyssa Walker, a microbiology and cell science doctoral candidate in the UF/IFAS College of Agricultural and Life Sciences.

"Looking at the microbiome is a relatively new approach to investigating what causes neurodegenerative diseases. In this study, we were able to show that specific species of bacteria play a role in the development of these conditions," said Daniel Czyz, Walker's dissertation advisor.

Czyz is the senior author of the study and an assistant professor in the UF/IFAS department of microbiology and cell science.

"We also showed that some other bacteria produce compounds that counteract these 'bad' bacteria. Recent studies have shown that patients with Parkinson's and Alzheimer's disease are deficient in these 'good' bacteria, so our findings may help explain that connection and open up an area of future study," he added.

All neurodegenerative diseases can be traced to problems with the way proteins are handled in the body. If proteins are misfolded, they build up and accumulate in tissues. These protein aggregates, as scientists call them, interfere with cell functioning and lead to neurodegenerative disorders.

Czyz and his co-authors wanted to know if introducing certain bacteria into the C. elegans worms would be followed by protein aggregation in the worms' tissues.

"That is, in fact, what we observed. We have a way of marking the aggregates so they glow green under the microscope. We saw that worms colonized by certain bacteria species were lit up with aggregates that were toxic to tissues, while those colonized by the control bacteria were not," Czyz said. "This occurred not just in the intestinal tissues, where the bacteria are, but all over the worms' bodies, in their muscles, nerves and even reproductive organs."

Surprisingly, the offspring of affected worms also showed increased protein aggregation—even though these offspring never encountered the bacteria originally associated with the condition.

"This is very interesting because it suggests that these bacteria generate some sort of a signal that can be passed along to the next generation," Czyz said.

Worms colonized by the "bad" bacteria also lost mobility, a common symptom of neurodegenerative diseases.

"A healthy worm moves around by rolling and thrashing. When you pick up a healthy worm, it will roll off the pick, a simple device that we use to handle these tiny animals. But worms with the bad bacteria couldn't do that because of the appearance of toxic protein aggregates," explained Walker, who developed this assessment method.

"You could compare the pick to an obstacle course: just as a person with a neurodegenerative disease will have trouble getting across, the same is true with these worms, just at a much smaller scale," Czyz added.

Fun fact: Human eyebrow hairs or eyelashes make for very good picks.

"The worms are very delicate, so you need a tool that won't damage them. They are also transparent and have a simple body plan. Studies like ours are possible because these worms normally feed on bacteria," Czyz said.

"The worms are only one millimeter long, and they each have exactly 959 cells," Czyz said. "But in many ways, they are a lot like us humans—they have intestines and muscles and nerves, but instead of being composed of billions of cells, each organ is just a handful of cells. They are like living test tubes. Their small size allows us to do experiments in a much more controlled way and answer important questions we can apply in future experiments with higher organisms and, eventually, people."

Currently the Czyz lab is testing hundreds of strains of bacteria found in the human gut to see how they affect protein aggregation in C. elegans. The group is also investigating how bacteria associated with neurodegeneration cause protein misfolding at the molecular level.

Czyz is also interested in possible connections between antibiotic-resistant bacteriaand protein misfolding.

"Almost all of the bacteria we found associated with protein misfolding are also associated with antibiotic-resistant infections in people. However, it will take many more years of research before we can understand what, if any, connection there is between antibiotic resistance and neurodegenerative diseases," Czyz said.

It is projected that up to 152 million people worldwide will be living with Alzheimer's disease (AD) by 2050. To date there are no drugs that have a substantial positive impact on either the prevention or reversal of cognitive decline. A growing body of evidence finds that targeting lifestyle and vascular risk factors have a beneficial effect on overall cognitive performance. A new review in the Journal of Alzheimer's Disease, published by IOS Press, examines research that finds spiritual fitness, a new concept in medicine that centers on psychological and spiritual wellbeing, and Kirtan Kriya, a simple 12-minute meditative practice, may reduce multiple risk factors for AD.

"The key point of this review is that making a commitment to a brain longevity lifestyle, including spiritual fitness, is a critically important way for aging Alzheimer's disease free," explain authors Dharma Singh Khalsa, MD, Alzheimer's Research and Prevention Foundation, Tucson, AZ, USA, and Andrew B. Newberg, MD, Department of Integrative Medicine and Nutritional Sciences, Department of Radiology, Marcus Institute of Integrative Health, Thomas Jefferson University, Philadelphia, PA, USA. "We hope this article will inspire scientists, clinicians, and patients to embrace this new concept of spiritual fitness and make it a part of every multidomain program for the prevention of cognitive disability."

Research reveals that religious and spiritual involvement can preserve cognitive function as we age. The authors observe that today, spirituality is often experienced outside the context of an organized religion and may be part of every religion or separate to it. Spiritual fitness is a new dimension in AD prevention, interweaving basic, psychological and spiritual wellbeing. The authors discuss the research on how these factors affect brain function and cognition. For example, psychological wellbeing may reduce inflammation, cardiovascular disease, and disability. Significantly, individuals who have a high score on a "purpose in life" (PIL) measure, a component of psychological wellbeing, were 2.4 times more likely to remain free of AD than individuals with low PIL. In another study, participants who reported higher levels of PIL exhibited better cognitive function, and further, PIL protected those with already existing pathological conditions, thus slowing their decline.

Stress and stress management are under-discussed topics in AD prevention, yet the authors point out that there is ample evidence that physical, psychological, and emotional effects of stress may elevate AD risk. Kirtan Kriya (KK) is a 12-minute singing meditation that involves four sounds, breathing, and repetitive finger movements. It has multiple documented effects on stress, such as improving sleep, decreasing depression, and increasing wellbeing. It has also been found to increase blood flow to areas of the brain involved in cognition and emotional regulation and increases gray matter volume and decreases ventricular size in long-term practitioners, which may slow brain aging. Research in healthy individuals, caregivers, and those with cognitive decline found that the practice improves cognition, slows memory loss, and improves mood.

The overall relationship between spiritual fitness and a person's complete physical and mental health is a topic of investigation in the emerging field of study called neurotheology. Early work has focused on the development of models regarding which brain areas are affected through spiritual practices such as meditation or prayer. Over the last 20 years, there has been an extensive growth in neuroimaging and other physiological studies evaluating the effect of meditation, spiritual practices, and mystical experiences. A neuroimaging study of KK found long term brain effects, during meditation and afterwards. Neurotheological studies can help understanding of how a practice such as KK can lead to more permanent effects in brain function that support spiritual fitness, according to Dr. Khalsa and Dr. Newberg.

"Mitigating the extensive negative biochemical effects of stress with meditation practices, in tandem with the creation of heightened levels of spiritual fitness, may help lower the risk of AD. Small shifts in one's daily routine can make all the difference in AD prevention," Dr. Khalsa and Dr. Newberg conclude. "We are optimistic this article will inspire future research on the topic of spiritual fitness and AD."

Many people spend large portions of their day sitting, which can cause a range of health problems. But many may not realise that sitting too much can also worsen certain health conditions, such as type 2 diabetes. Research shows that spending too much time sitting can cause problems with blood sugar levels – making it even more important for those with type 2 diabetes to get plenty of physical activity into their day.

Type 2 diabetes causes the level of sugar (glucose) in the blood to become too high. For someone with diabetes, high sugar levels in the blood can cause serious damage to your body, including the heart, kidneys, eyes, feet and nerves. Controlling blood sugar levels is important for avoiding the risk of serious health problems.

Lifestyle changes, such as adjusting diet and physical activity, and diabetes medications, such as metformin or gliptin, are used to lower blood sugar levels. Yet following recommended diets and taking diabetes medications aren’t always effective at controlling blood sugar levels, as our research found. This shows us there’s a need to re-think diabetes care and management.

As type 2 diabetes can be different for everyone, how well a person controls their blood sugar levels can be influenced by different factors, such as age, gender, activity levels, diet and weight. This makes it important to target new, modifiable lifestyle factors – such as how much time is spent sitting.

Research we’ve done, which looked at 37 adults with type 2 diabetes, found that over two weeks, prolonged sitting was associated with high blood sugar levels. But we also found that when people stood up or walked around between periods of sitting, they had lower blood sugar levels. Other studies have also had similar results.

Our research has also shown that sitting less or breaking up periods of sitting with bouts of activity could be a simple way to manage blood sugar levels – including high sugar levels before and after breakfast, which is a common problem for people with type 2 diabetes. We found that simply walking more often could be beneficial to blood sugar control throughout the day.

In fact, walking every 15 minutes for as little as three minutes each time at a person’s usual pace could be enough to help them control their blood sugar – and could even be as effective as standard diabetes medications. Other research has shown that keeping bouts of sitting shorter than 15 minutes is better for blood sugar levels.

The reason walking – and other types of exercise – are so good for regulating blood sugar is because they make the body’s muscles work. Movement causes muscles to contract, which subsequently starts the mechanisms that allow the sugar in the blood to enter cells and fuel the body. This reduces blood sugar levels as a result.

With many people continuing to spend large portions of their days sitting while working from home, it’s important for people with type 2 diabetes to stand and walk often. Of course, that is sometimes easier said than done. But even small changes in sitting patterns throughout the day may be beneficial to a person’s blood sugar control. For example, going to the kitchen to get water or make tea can be a great opportunity to walk around for a few minutes. Even standing or walking while taking calls or during meetings can be a good idea.

It’s still important for people with type 2 diabetes to follow the advice of their doctor and stick to any special diets or take any medications they’ve been prescribed. But adding extra movement into their day will not only improve blood sugar control, it may also improve other aspects of health – including heart health and bone density.

Chinese Academy of Sciences, May 10, 2021

According to news reporting based on a preprint abstract, our journalists obtained the following quote sourced from biorxiv.org:

“Aging causes functional decline of multiple organs and increases the risk of age-related pathologies.

“In advanced lives, accumulation of senescent cells, which develop the senescence-associated secretory phenotype (SASP), promotes chronic inflammation and causes diverse conditions.

“Here we report the frontline outcome of screening a natural product library with human primary stromal cells as an experimental model. Multiple candidate compounds were assayed, and grape seed extract (GSE) was selected for further investigation due to its leading capacity in targeting senescent cells.

“We found procyanidin C1 (PCC1), a polyphenolic component, plays a critical role in mediating the antiaging effects of GSE. PCC1 blocks the SASP expression when used at low concentrations. Importantly, it selectively kills senescent cells upon application at higher concentrations, mainly by enhancing production of reactive oxygen species (ROS) and disturbing mitochondrial membrane potential, processes accompanied by upregulation of Bcl-2 family pro-apoptotic factors Puma and Noxa in senescent cells. PCC1 depletes senescent cells in treatment-damaged tumor microenvironment (TME) and enhances therapeutic efficacy when combined with chemotherapy in preclinical assays. Intermittent administration of PCC1 to both senescent cell-implanted mice and naturally aged animals alleviated physical dysfunction and prolonged post-treatment survival, thus providing substantial benefits in late life stage. Together, our study identifies PCC1 as a distinct natural senolytic agent, which may be exploited to delay aging and control age-related pathologies in future medicine.”

This preprint has not been peer-reviewed.

Team Links Leaky Epithelial Barriers to 2 Billion Chronic Diseases

University of Zurich, May 7, 2021

Epithelial cells form the covering of most internal and external surfaces of the human body. This protective layer acts as a defense against invaders—including bacteria, viruses, environmental toxins, pollutants and allergens.

If the skin and mucosal barriers are damaged or leaky, foreign agents such as bacteria can enter into the tissue and cause local, often chronic inflammation with both direct and indirect consequences.

“The epithelial barrier hypothesis proposes that damages to the epithelial barrier are responsible for up to two billion chronic, non-infectious diseases,” says Cezmi Akdis, director of the Swiss Institute of Allergy and Asthma Research (SIAF), which is associated with the University of Zurich.

In the past 20 years, researchers at the SIAF alone have published more than 60 articles on how various substances damage the epithelial cells of a number of organs.

The epithelial barrier hypothesis provides an explanation as to why allergies and autoimmune diseases have been increasing for decades—they are linked to industrialization, urbanization, and westernized lifestyle.

Today many people are exposed to a wide range of toxins, such as ozone, nanoparticles, microplastics, household cleaning agents, pesticides, enzymes, emulsifiers, fine dust, exhaust fumes, cigarette smoke, and countless chemicals in the air, food, and water.

“Next to global warming and viral pandemics such as COVID-19, these harmful substances represent one of the greatest threats to humankind,” Akdis says.

Local epithelial damage to the skin and mucosal barriers lead to allergic conditions, inflammatory bowel disorders, and celiac disease. But disruptions to the epithelial barrier can also be linked to many other diseases that are characterized by changes in the microbiome.

Either the immune system erroneously attacks “good” bacteria in healthy bodies or it targets pathogenic—i.e., “bad”—invaders.

In the gut, leaky epithelial barriers and microbial imbalance contribute to the onset or development of chronic autoimmune and metabolic diseases such as diabetes, obesity, rheumatoid arthritis, multiple sclerosis, or ankylosing spondylitis.

Moreover, defective epithelial barriers have also been linked to neurodegenerative and psychiatric diseases such as Parkinson’s disease, Alzheimer’s disease, autism spectrum disorders, and chronic depression, which may be triggered or aggravated by distant inflammatory responses and changes in the gut’s microbiome.

“There is a great need to continue research into the epithelial barrier to advance our understanding of molecular mechanisms and develop new approaches for prevention, early intervention and therapy,” says Akdis.

Novel therapeutic approaches could focus on strengthening tissue-specific barriers, blocking bacteria or avoiding colonization by pathogens. Other strategies to reduce diseases may involve the microbiome, for example through targeted dietary measures. Last but not least, the focus must also be on avoiding and reducing exposure to harmful substances and developing fewer toxic products.

The paper appears in Nature Reviews Immunology

Adding Portobello or shiitake powder to a high-fat diet may protect arteries from the detrimental effects of a high fat diet, according to findings presented at the recent Experimental Biology event.

Scientists from Jean Mayer USDA Human Nutrition Research on Aging at Tufts University report that supplementing the diets of lab mice with the mushroom powders had lower body weight gains, compared to animals fed an unsupplemented high-fat diet.

“Despite the low body weight gains, EchoMRI analysis of body composition revealed that the overall lean mass was not affected as significantly as fat mass, indicating a plausible positive effect of mushrooms on fat metabolism and lipid profiles,” wrote the researchers in their abstract, published in the FASEB Journal .

Mushrooms

Consumer interest in mushrooms and their potential health benefits has been growing in recent years, with demand for Reishi, Chaga, Shiitake, Maitake, and the rest has never been higher and the global market was pegged at $18 billion in 2014 (up from $6 billion in 1999).

SPINS data shows surging sales of products with various types of mushrooms as primary ingredients across the natural, specialty and conventional multi-outlet retail channels. Reishi was up 91% for the 52 weeks ending September 4, 2016 versus the previous 52 weeks. Impressive growth is also being posted for Chaga (up 46%), Cordycep (up 19%) and Shiitake (up 26%),

“While several types of mushrooms have been studied for their effects on serum lipid profiles, few studies have demonstrated edible mushrooms’ effects on atherogenesis,” explained the Tufts researchers in their abstract.

Study details

L-ergothioneine was first isolated as a natural compound from rye ergot (Claviceps purpurea) in 1909. It is naturally present in small amounts in food sources like mushrooms, some varieties of black and red beans (Phaseolus vulgaris) and cereals.

The human body has a dedicated transporter for the molecule, which is a potent antioxidant. 

Lab mice were divided into one of five groups: A low-fat control group (4% fat); a high fat control group (8% fat); a high-fat diet supplemented with Portobello mushroom powder; a high fat diet supplemented with shiitake mushroom powder; or a “control mixture”, which matched to the average nutrient levels of the mushroom powders.

After 16 weeks of feeding, the results showed that animals from both mushroom groups had reduced body weight gains, compared to the other dietary groups, with the weight gain lower in the shiitake group compared to the Portobello group.

Additional analyses showed that only mice fed the shiitake powder had significantly fewer aortic lesions compared to the high fat control mice and the control mixture.

“These results further support the potential role of high levels of bioactive compounds such as ergothioneine, a strong antioxidant in [shiitake mushroom], on suppression of dietary fat induced atherosclerosis, an inflammatory disease of arteries,” wrote the researchers.

The study was funded by the USDA and the Mushroom Council.

The study reveals that the social distancing guidelines employed throughout much of the world for over a year have done nothing to limit the spread of COVID-19, suggesting that the adaption of the guidelines did not stop the spread of the of the China-originated virus, and it can only be slowed with the employment of severe lockdowns. Paradoxically, states and cities that have engaged in severe lockdowns have seen the largest spikes of COVID-19.

“We argue there really isn’t much of a benefit to the 6-foot rule, especially when people are wearing masks,” MIT professor Martin Z. Bazant said, as reported by NBC. “It really has no physical basis because the air a person is breathing while wearing a mask tends to rise and comes down elsewhere in the room so you’re more exposed to the average background than you are to a person at a distance.” In other words, widespread mask wearing may simply change the physical vectors of transmission within a given room rather than stop it, effectively making six foot distancing rules pointless.

In their study, Bazant and the other researchers declare, “Adherence to the Six-Foot Rule would limit large-drop transmission, and adherence to our guideline, [of limiting time spent in densely populated areas], would limit long-range airborne transmission.” In the guideline, the researchers write, “To minimize risk of infection, one should avoid spending extended periods in highly populated areas. One is safer in rooms with large volume and high ventilation rates. One is at greater risk in rooms where people are exerting themselves in such a way as to increase their respiration rate and pathogen output, for example, by exercising, singing, or shouting.”

Bazant also told the media, “What our analysis continues to show is that many spaces that have been shut down in fact don’t need to be. Often times the space is large enough, the ventilation is good enough, the amount of time people spend together is such that those spaces can be safely operated even at full capacity and the scientific support for reduced capacity in those spaces is really not very good.” He added, “I think if you run the numbers, even right now for many types of spaces you’d find that there is not a need for occupancy restrictions.”

This comes on the heels of a study that suggests the Pfizer vaccine could cause severe neurodegenerative diseasescaused by brain prions created by the mRNA-style vaccine. National File reported, “‘The current RNA based SARSCoV-2 vaccines were approved in the US using an emergency order without extensive long term safety testing,’ the report declares. ‘In this paper the Pfizer COVID-19 vaccine was evaluated for the potential to induce prion-based disease in vaccine recipients.’ Prion-based diseases are, according to the CDC, a form of neurodegenerative diseases, meaning that the Pfizer vaccine is potentially likely to cause long term damage and negative health effects with regards to the brain.”

Zhejiang University (China), May 7, 2021

In a recent study, Chinese researchers explored the anti-fibrotic effects of curcumin, the active component of turmeric. Specifically, they looked at how curcumin affects epithelial-mesenchymal transition (EMT) and the activation of the phosphatidylinositol 3-kinase (PI3K)/Akt pathway. EMT refers to epithelial cells undergoing molecular changes and gaining new characteristics, such as an enhanced ability to produce ECM components. Meanwhile, the PI3K/Akt pathway is one of the major cell signaling pathways that regulate fibrosis.

The researchers reported their findings in an article published in the journal Biological and Pharmaceutical Bulletin.

According to several animal studies, curcumin can protect the kidneys by preventing the development of renal fibrosis. However, the mechanisms underlying this activity are still unknown.

To explore these mechanisms and the anti-fibrotic activities of curcumin, the researchers treated human kidney tubular epithelial cells (HKCs) with transforming growth factor-B1 (TGF-B1), curcumin and a combination of both. TGF-B1 is a protein that’s involved in many cellular functions, including cell growth, proliferation, differentiation and death, as well as the induction of EMT.

The researchers used 3-(4,5-dimethylthiazol-2-yl)-2,5-diphenyltetrazolium bromide (MTT) assay to assess the effect of curcumin on cell proliferation. They also used immunocytochemistry, real-time PCR and Western blot to analyze the expression of epithelial cell markers (E-cadherin and cytokeratin), mesenchymal cell markers (vimentin, alpha smooth muscle actin (a-SMA) and fibroblast-specific protein 1 (FSP1)) and key proteins involved in the Akt/mammalian target of rapamycin (mTOR) pathway.

The researchers found that low-dose curcumin (3.125 and 25?micromol/L) effectively promoted HKC proliferation. After 72 hours of incubating HKCs with TGF-B1 and curcumin, curcumin caused the cells to maintain epithelial morphology in a dose-dependent manner. It also decreased the expression of EMT-related proteins, such as vimentin, a-SMA and FSP1, and increased the expression of E-cadherin and cytokeratin. In addition, the researchers noted that curcumin reduced Akt, mTOR and P70S6K phosphorylation, which effectively suppressed the activation of the Akt/mTOR pathway in HKCs.

Based on these findings, the researchers concluded that curcumin is an effective alternative treatment for renal fibrosis because it can promote HKC proliferation and stop EMT by inhibiting the activation of the Akt/mTOR pathway activity.

Swansea University, May 12, 2021

The ability to connect and feel a sense of belonging are basic human needs but new Swansea University research has examined how these are determined by more than just our personal relationships.

Research led by psychologist Professor Andrew Kemp, of the College of Human and Health Sciences, highlights the importance of taking a wider approach to wellbeing and how it can be influenced by issues such as inequality and anthropogenic climate change.

Professor Kemp worked with Ph.D. student Jess Mead and consultant clinical psychologist Dr. Zoe Fisher, of the University's Health and Wellbeing Academy, on the study which presents a transdisciplinary framework to help understand and improve wellbeing.

Professor Kemp said: "We define wellbeing as positive psychological experience, promoted by connections to self, community and environment, supported by healthy vagal function, all of which are impacted by socio-contextual factors that lie beyond the control of the individual."

The researchers say their latest findings, which have just been published in Frontiers in Psychology, are particularly topical as society looks to recover and learn from COVID-19.

He said: "Our framework has already contributed to a better understanding of how to protect wellbeing during the pandemic and has led to the development of an innovative wellbeing science intervention, targeting university students and people living with acquired brain injury."

Professor Kemp added: "We feel our invited paper is timely as it not only aligns with a post-pandemic future that requires societal transformation, but it also picks up on global efforts to promote planetary wellbeing.

"Globalization, urbanization and technological advancements have meant that humans have become increasingly disconnected from nature. This continues despite research showing that contact with nature improves wellbeing."

The research reveals the advantages to health and wellbeing derived from connecting to oneself, others and nature and emphasizes a need for focused efforts to tackle major societal issues that affect our capacity for connection.

He added: "The poorest are disproportionally impacted by major societal challenges including increasing burden of chronic disease, societal loneliness and anthropogenic climate change.

"Economic inequality has adverse impacts on the entire population, not just the poor, so improving economic inequality is fundamental to improving population wellbeing."

Taking a transdisciplinary approach to the topic of wellbeing is something currently reflected across Swansea University, particularly since the opening of the Morgan Advanced Studies Institute (MASI) which is dedicated to supporting transformative interdisciplinary research.

University of Vale do Paraiba (Brazil), May 10, 2021

According to news reporting based on a preprint abstract, our journalists obtained the following quote sourced from biorxiv.org:

“Alzheimer’s disease (AD) is a type of dementia that affects millions of people. Although there is no cure, several study strategies seek to elucidate the mechanisms of the disease. Recent studies address the benefits of taurine. Thus, the present study aims to analyze the neuroprotective effect of taurine on human neuroblastoma, using an in vitro experimental model of oxidative stress induced by hydrocortisone in the SH-SY5Y cell line as a characteristic model of AD.

“The violet crystal assay was used for cell viability and the evaluation of cell morphology was performed by scanning electron microscopy (SEM). After pretreatment with taurine, the SH-SY5Y cell showed an improvement in cell viability in the face of oxidative stress and improved cell morphology. Thus, the treatment presented a neuroprotective effect.”

This preprint has not been peer-reviewed.

Mazandaran University of Medical Sciences (Iran), May 4, 2021

According to news originating from Sari, Iran, by NewsRx correspondents, research stated, “Migraine is a disabling disorder that affects the quality of life of patients. Different medications have been used in prevention of migraine headache.”

Our news journalists obtained a quote from the research from the Mazandaran University of Medical Sciences, “In this study, we evaluated the effectiveness of magnesium oxide in comparison with valproate sodium in preventing migraine headache attacks. This is a single-center, randomized, controlled, crossover trial which is double-blind, 24-week, 2-sequence, 2-period, 2-treatment. After patient randomization into two sequences, the intervention group received magnesium oxide 500 mg and the control group received valproate sodium 400 mg two tablets each day (every 12 h) for 8 weeks. The primary efficacy variable was reduction in the number of migraine attacks and number of days with moderate or severe headache and hours with headache (duration) per month in the final of 8 weeks in comparison with baseline. Seventy patients were randomized and seven dropped out, leaving 63 for analysis. In an intention-to-treat analysis, 31 patients were in group 1 (magnesium oxide-valproate) and 32 patients were in group 2 (valproate-magnesium oxide). The mean number of migraine attacks and days per month was 1.72 +/- 1.18 and 2.09 +/- 1.70, with a mean duration of 15.50 +/- 21.80 h in magnesium group and 1.27 +/- 1.27 and 2.22 +/- 1.96, with a mean duration 13.38 +/- 14.10 in valproate group.”

According to the news editors, the research concluded: “This study has shown that 500 mg magnesium oxide appears to be effective in migraine prophylaxis similar to valproate sodium without significant adverse effect.”

This research has been peer-reviewed

University of Massachusetts, May 10, 2021

A new study led by epidemiologists at the University of Massachusetts Amherst's School of Public Health and Health Sciences suggests that high intake of dietary vitamin D and calcium may be modestly associated with lower risk of early menopause, the cessation of ovarian function before age 45. Early menopause affects about 10 percent of women and is associated with higher risk of cardiovascular disease, osteoporosis and early cognitive decline.

Epidemiology doctoral candidate Alexandra Purdue-Smithe and her advisor Elizabeth Bertone-Johnson, with colleagues at Brigham and Women's Hospital, Boston, and Harvard Medical School, evaluated how vitamin D and calcium intake is associated with incidence of early menopause in the prospective Nurses' Health Study II. The study population includes 116,430 female U.S. registered nurses who were 25-42 years old when they responded to a baseline questionnaire.

Diet was assessed five times over the 20-year study, allowing the researchers to capture changes in food and nutrient intake over time, Purdue-Smithe notes. Participants in the study contributed more than 1 million person-years of follow-up, during which 2,041 women experienced early menopause.

The authors report the hazard ratio for early menopause comparing the highest vs. lowest dietary vitamin D intake groups was 0.83 (95% confidence interval = 0.72-0.95) and for dietary calcium 0.87 (95% CI=0.76-1.00). Details of the study, supported by the National Institutes of Health, appear in the current early online edition of the American Journal of Clinical Nutrition.

Purdue-Smithe says, "Laboratory evidence relating vitamin D to some of the hormonal mechanisms involved in ovarian aging provided the foundation for our hypothesis. However, to our knowledge, no prior epidemiologic studies have explicitly evaluated how vitamin D and calcium intake may be related to risk of early menopause. We found that after adjusting for a variety of different factors, vitamin D from food sources, such as fortified dairy and fatty fish, was associated with a 17 percent lower risk of early menopause when comparing the highest intake group to the lowest intake group."

Because higher intake of vitamin D and calcium from foods may simply act as a marker for better nutrition and overall health, Purdue-Smithe says, the researchers took into account other factors such as intake of vegetable protein and alcohol, as well as body mass index and smoking. She adds, "The large size of this study allowed us to consider a variety of potential correlates of a healthy lifestyle that might explain our findings; however, adjusting for these factors made almost no difference in our estimates."

The nutritional and reproductive epidemiologist notes that "in addition to placing women at higher risk of adverse future health outcomes, early menopause is also problematic as women are increasingly delaying childbearing into their later reproductive years. Fertility declines drastically during the 10 years leading up to menopause, so early menopause can have profound psychological and financial implications for couples who are unable to conceive as they wish. As such, it is important to identify modifiable risk factors for early menopause, such as diet."

Because associations were stronger for vitamin D and calcium from dairy sources than from non-dairy food sources in the study, and Purdue-Smithe plans further analyses investigating individual dairy foods and other components of dairy and how they may be associated with early menopause.

Brigham Young University, May 10, 2021

\Despite their best efforts, no scientist has ever come close to stopping humans from aging. Even anti-aging creams can't stop Old Father Time.

But new research from Brigham Young University reveals you may be able to slow one type of aging--the kind that happens inside your cells. As long as you're willing to sweat.

"Just because you're 40, doesn't mean you're 40 years old biologically," Tucker said. "We all know people that seem younger than their actual age. The more physically active we are, the less biological aging takes place in our bodies."

The study, published in the medical journal Preventive Medicine, finds that people who have consistently high levels of physical activity have significantly longer telomeres than those who have sedentary lifestyles, as well as those who are moderately active.

Telomeres are the protein endcaps of our chromosomes. They're like our biological clock and they're extremely correlated with age; each time a cell replicates, we lose a tiny bit of the endcaps. Therefore, the older we get, the shorter our telomeres.

Exercise science professor Larry Tucker found adults with high physical activity levels have telomeres with a biological aging advantage of nine years over those who are sedentary, and a seven-year advantage compared to those who are moderately active. To be highly active, women had to engage in 30 minutes of jogging per day (40 minutes for men), five days a week.

"If you want to see a real difference in slowing your biological aging, it appears that a little exercise won't cut it," Tucker said. "You have to work out regularly at high levels."

Tucker analyzed data from 5,823 adults who participated in the CDC's National Health and Nutrition Examination Survey, one of the few indexes that includes telomere length values for study subjects. The index also includes data for 62 activities participants might have engaged in over a 30-day window, which Tucker analyzed to calculate levels of physical activity.

His study found the shortest telomeres came from sedentary people--they had 140 base pairs of DNA less at the end of their telomeres than highly active folks. Surprisingly, he also found there was no significant difference in telomere length between those with low or moderate physical activity and the sedentary people.

Although the exact mechanism for how exercise preserves telomeres is unknown, Tucker said it may be tied to inflammation and oxidative stress. Previous studies have shown telomere length is closely related to those two factors and it is known that exercise can suppress inflammation and oxidative stress over time.

"We know that regular physical activity helps to reduce mortality and prolong life, and now we know part of that advantage may be due to the preservation of telomeres," Tucker said.

We've all been isolated from many family members and friends during the pandemic. If you've been having a harder time remembering things or processing information since the pandemic began, it could be an isolation side effect.

"It's something I'm seeing clinically. Some people were okay before the pandemic and now they're having faster cognitive decline," says Dr. Joel Salinas, a behavioral neurologist and faculty member of the Harvard Center for Population and Development Studies.

Dr. Salinas says we don't have a lot of evidence yet to back up a clear association between pandemic lockdowns and a change in memory or thinking skills. One small 2020 study found that 60% of people with mild cognitive impairment or Alzheimer's disease experienced worsening cognition and delirium during the lockdown.

But the link between isolation and cognitive decline is more than speculation.

Isolation (being cut off from social contact) was a problem for older adults long before the pandemic began. Life circumstances — such as living far from friends and family, losing a partner, or being unable to drive — often create unanticipated situations in which we find ourselves isolated. That sometimes puts health in jeopardy.

"In studies of people, isolation is associated with an increased risk for dementia, although it's unclear how high the risk is," Dr. Salinas says. "In lab animals, isolation has been shown to cause brain shrinkage and the kind of brain changes you'd see in Alzheimer's disease — reduced brain cell connections and reduced levels of brain-derived neurotrophic factor, which is important for the formation, connection, and repair of brain cells."

Isolation is also associated with elevated risks for heart attack, stroke, chronic inflammation, depression, anxiety, perceived stress, and loneliness.

People who feel lonely (disconnected from others) have been shown to have faster rates of cognitive decline than people who don't feel lonely. Loneliness is also tied to risks of losing the ability to take care of yourself and early death.

We don't exactly know why being isolated sometimes leads to cognitive decline. Possibilities include

• a lack of access to crucial resources or help with daily needs

"Having access to others for emotional support or listening to you seems to have a protective brain health effect — increased levels of brain-derived neurotrophic factor, and reduced risks for dementia or stroke," Dr. Salinas says.

In the pandemic, you may also be experiencing high stress levels, which can affect your brain's processing skills. "We're not good at being focused when there's danger," Dr. Salinas says. "It's the 'fight or flight' mode all the time."

If family members are noticing that you seem to be experiencing cognitive changes, Dr. Salinas says it could be a new problem — or it could be that you're spending more time together and they're picking up on changes that were already occurring before the pandemic.

University of Glasgow (Scotland), May 10. 2021

Vegetarians appear to have a healthier biomarker profile than meat-eaters, and this applies to adults of any age and weight, and is also unaffected by smoking and alcohol consumption, according to a new study in over 166,000 UK adults, being presented at this week's European Congress on Obesity (ECO), held online this year. 

Biomarkers can have bad and good health effects, promoting or preventing cancer, cardiovascular and age-related diseases, and other chronic conditions, and have been widely used to assess the effect of diets on health. However, evidence of the metabolic benefits associated with being vegetarian is unclear. 

To understand whether dietary choice can make a difference to the levels of disease markers in blood and urine, researchers from the University of Glasgow did a cross-sectional study analysing data from 177,723 healthy participants (aged 37-73 years) in the UK Biobank study, who reported no major changes in diet over the last five years. 

Participants were categorised as either vegetarian (do not eat red meat, poultry or fish; 4,111 participants) or meat-eaters (166,516 participants) according to their self-reported diet. The researchers examined the association with 19 blood and urine biomarkers related to diabetes, cardiovascular diseases, cancer, liver, bone and joint health, and kidney function. 

Even after accounting for potentially influential factors including age, sex, education, ethnicity, obesity, smoking, and alcohol intake, the analysis found that compared to meat-eaters, vegetarians had significantly lower levels of 13 biomarkers, including: total cholesterol; low-density lipoprotein (LDL) cholesterol--the so-called 'bad cholesterol; apolipoprotein A (linked to cardiovascular disease), apolipoprotein B (linked to cardiovascular disease); gamma-glutamyl transferase (GGT) and alanine aminotransferase (AST)--liver function markers indicating inflammation or damage to cells; insulin-like growth factor (IGF-1; a hormone that encourages the growth and proliferation of cancer cells); urate; total protein; and creatinine (marker of worsening kidney function).

However, vegetarians also had lower levels of beneficial biomarkers including high-density lipoprotein 'good' (HDL) cholesterol, and vitamin D and calcium (linked to bone and joint health). In addition, they had significantly higher level of fats (triglycerides) in the blood and cystatin-C (suggesting a poorer kidney condition). 

No link was found for blood sugar levels (HbA1c), systolic blood pressure, aspartate aminotransferase (AST; a marker of damage to liver cells) or C-reactive protein (CRP; inflammatory marker). 

"Our findings offer real food for thought", says Dr Carlos Celis-Morales from the University of Glasgow, UK, who led the research. "As well as not eating red and processed meat which have been linked to heart diseases and some cancers, people who follow a vegetarian diet tend to consume more vegetables, fruits, and nuts which contain more nutrients, fibre, and other potentially beneficial compounds. These nutritional differences may help explain why vegetarians appear to have lower levels of disease biomarkers that can lead to cell damage and chronic disease."

The authors point out that although their study was large, it was observational, so no conclusions can be drawn about direct cause and effect. They also note several limitations including that they only tested biomarker samples once for each participant, and it is possible that biomarkers might fluctuate depending on factors unrelated to diet, such as existing diseases and unmeasured lifestyle factors. They also note that were reliant on participants to report their dietary intake using food frequency questionnaires, which is not always reliable.

German Center for Neurodegenerative Diseases, May 6, 2021

In Alzheimer's disease, neurons in the brain die. Largely responsible for the death of neurons are certain protein deposits in the brains of affected individuals: So-called beta-amyloid proteins, which form clumps (plaques) between neurons, and tau proteins, which stick together the inside of neurons. The causes of these deposits are as yet unclear. In addition, a rapidly progressive atrophy, i.e. a shrinking of the brain volume, can be observed in affected persons. Alzheimer's symptoms such as memory loss, disorientation, agitation and challenging behavior are the consequences.

Scientists at the DZNE led by Prof. Michael Wagner, head of a research group at the DZNE and senior psychologist at the memory clinic of the University Hospital Bonn, have now found in a study that a regular Mediterranean-like dietary pattern with relatively more intake of vegetables, legumes, fruit, cereals, fish and monounsaturated fatty acids, such as from olive oil, may protect against protein deposits in the brain and brain atrophy. This diet has a low intake of dairy products, red meat and saturated fatty acids.

A nationwide study

A total of 512 subjects with an average age of around seventy years took part in the study. 169 of them were cognitively healthy, while 343 were identified as having a higher risk of developing Alzheimer's disease - due to subjective memory impairment, mild cognitive impairment that is the precursor to dementia, or first-degree relationship with patients diagnosed with Alzheimer's disease. The nutrition study was funded by the Diet-Body-Brain competence cluster of the German Federal Ministry of Education and Research (BMBF) and took place as part of the so-called DELCODE study of the DZNE, which does nationwide research on the early phase of Alzheimer's disease - that period before pronounced symptoms appear.

"People in the second half of life have constant eating habits. We analyzed whether the study participants regularly eat a Mediterranean diet - and whether this might have an impact on brain health ", said Prof. Michael Wagner. The participants first filled out a questionnaire in which they indicated which portions of 148 different foods they had eaten in the past months. Those who frequently ate healthy foods typical of the Mediterranean diet, such as fish, vegetables and fruit, and only occasionally consumed foods such as red meat, scored highly on a scale.

An extensive test series

The scientists then investigated brain atrophy: they performed brain scans with magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) scanners to determine brain volume. In addition, all subjects underwent various neuropsychological tests in which cognitive abilities such as memory functions were examined. The research team also looked at biomarker levels (measured values) for amyloid beta proteins and tau proteins in the so-called cerebrospinal fluid (CSF) of 226 subjects.

The researchers, led by Michael Wagner, found that those who ate an unhealthy diet had more pathological levels of these biomarkers in the cerebrospinal fluid than those who regularly ate a Mediterranean-like diet. In the memory tests, the participants who did not adhere to the Mediterranean diet also performed worse than those who regularly ate fish and vegetables. "There was also a significant positive correlation between a closer adherence to a Mediterranean-like diet and a higher volume of the hippocampus. The hippocampus is an area of the brain that is considered the control center of memory. It shrinks early and severely in Alzheimer's disease," explained Tommaso Ballarini, PhD, postdoctoral fellow in Michael Wagner's research group and lead author of the study.

Continuation of nutrition study is planned

"It is possible that the Mediterranean diet protects the brain from protein deposits and brain atrophy that can cause memory loss and dementia. Our study hints at this," Ballarini said. "But the biological mechanism underlying this will have to be clarified in future studies." As a next step, Ballarini and Wagner now plan to re-examine the same study participants in four to five years to explore how their nutrition - Mediterranean-like or unhealthy - affects brain aging over time.

University of Southern Denmark, May 11, 2021

Social isolation among older adults is associated with poor health and premature mortality, but the connection between social isolation and physical functioning is poorly understood. New research generates more robust evidence about the associations between social isolation and physical functioning and how this accelerates over time, reports the American Journal of Preventive Medicine, published by Elsevier. It also highlights the importance of incorporating strategies to reduce social isolation and promote successful aging.

"Physical functioning is understood to influence the health of individuals. And social isolation is prevalent among older adults," explained lead investigator Borja del Pozo Cruz, PhD, Centre for Active and Healthy Ageing, Department of Sports Science and Clinical Biomechanics, University of Southern Denmark, Odense, Denmark. "However, the true extent of the relationship between social isolation and physical functioning was not fully understood. We needed to shed some more light on this relationship, as it plays an important role in individual aging."

As individuals age, physical functioning declines, which can result in a loss of functional independence, onset of disability, and increased mortality, with significant personal, community, and economic costs. Older adults who are socially integrated may be more likely to engage in physical activity, which would in turn elicit improvements in their physical functioning.

Social isolation is a significant problem facing the health and well-being of individuals across the life course. Individuals who are socially isolated are more likely to experience mental health problems, develop dementia, and have increased risk of premature mortality. Social isolation is particularly worrisome among older adults, with data from the United States indicating that one in four older adults is isolated or severely isolated. Given the worldwide trends in population aging, social isolation among older adults is likely to become an increasing burden in years to come.

To examine the longitudinal associations between social isolation and physical functioning, investigators used nine waves of panel data from 2011 to 2019 from the National Health and Aging Trends Study (NHATS), a large US-representative sample of adults 65 or older. This means that the results can be generalized to the US population of older adults. The study analyzed observations from 12,427 NHATS participants to measure how individual changes in social isolation were associated with individual changes in objectively assessed physical functioning. Social isolation was captured through the Social Isolation Index (SII). Physical functioning was assessed using the NHATS version of the Short Physical Performance Battery (SPPB). The analytic sample encompassed 54,860 observations, meaning that respondents were observed 4.41 times on average.

These findings add to a growing evidence base demonstrating the negative consequences of social isolation, specifically the acceleration of aging decline trajectories in physical functioning. Investigators were able to identify with a high degree of granularity how the association between social isolation and physical functioning shifts over old age and exacerbates the decline in physical functioning associated with aging. The results showed that the older individuals are, the greater the extent to which social isolation impacts their health.

A small but growing number of observational studies in the UK, Japan, and China have identified negative associations between social isolation and physical functioning in samples of older adults. The current study resonates with and complements those results. However, the robust data generated by this national rather than community-based study enable findings to be generalized to a national population.

"Physical functioning is a well-established marker of general health and it has been previously correlated with morbidity and mortality," noted Dr. del Pozo Cruz. "We demonstrate in this study that social isolation has a profound impact on the physical functioning in older adults. Mandated social contact restrictions and lockdowns due to COVID-19, coupled with more severe consequences of contagion among older adults, have likely exacerbated this trend.

Study findings suggest that public health interventions should turn their attention to the social environments in which older people are embedded, in particular for those at risk of isolation.

"Social isolation is one of the biggest challenges that societies face in the 21st century. We have to start thinking about this issue now to avoid more serious consequences down the track," added Dr. del Pozo Cruz.

Uppsala University (Sweden), May 7, 2021

Depressive symptoms are more common in teenage girls than in their male peers. However, boys' mental health appears to be affected more if they suffer from obesity. Irrespective of gender, bullying is a considerably greater risk factor than being overweight for developing depressive symptoms. These conclusions are drawn by researchers at Uppsala University who monitored adolescents for six years in a questionnaire study, now published in the Journal of Public Health.

"The purpose of our study was to investigate the connection between body mass index (BMI) and depressive symptoms, and to take a close look at whether being subjected to bullying affects this relationship over time. We also wanted to investigate whether any gender differences existed," says Sofia Kanders, a Ph.D. student at Uppsala University's Department of Neuroscience.

In the study, young people born in Västmanland County, replied to questions about their height, weight and depressive symptoms on three separate occasions (2012, 2015 and 2018). The respondents' mean age was 14.4 years on the first occasion and 19.9 years on the last.

Based on BMI, the adolescents were divided into three groups: Those with normal weight, those who were overweight and those with obesity respectively. They were also grouped according to the extent of their depressive symptoms.

Overall, regardless of their weight, the girls stated more frequently that they had depressive symptoms. In 2012, 17 percent of the girls and 6 percent of the boys did so. By 2015, the proportions of adolescents with these symptoms had risen to 32 percent for the girls and 13 percent for the boys. The corresponding figures for 2018 were 34 and 19 percent respectively.

A higher BMI did not, as far as the researchers could see, affect the girls' mental well-being to any great extent. Among the boys, however, the pattern observed was entirely different.

"When we analyzed girls and boys separately, we saw that for boys with obesity in 2012, the risk for having depressive symptoms in 2015 was, statistically, five times higher than for normal-weight boys. In the girls we found no such connection," Kanders says.

The study has been unable to answer the question of what causes this gender difference, and the researchers think more research is needed in this area.

The young respondents were also asked about bullying—for example, to state whether, in the past year, they had been physically exposed to blows and kicks, teased or excluded, subjected to cyberbullying (abusive texting or other electronic or web bullying), or bullied by an adult at school.

In every analysis, exposure to bullying was associated with a higher risk of depressive symptoms. This connection was also evident six years later, especially in overweight boys. The researchers believe that these results seem to indicate a gender difference in how BMI and bullying together drive development of future depressive symptoms.

"One key conclusion and take-home message from our study is that bullying can affect mental illness for a long time to come, which therefore makes preventive measures against bullying in schools extremely important," Kanders says.

Mazandaran University of Medical Sciences (Iran), May 4, 2021

According to news originating from Sari, Iran, by NewsRx correspondents, research stated, “Migraine is a disabling disorder that affects the quality of life of patients. Different medications have been used in prevention of migraine headache.”

Our news journalists obtained a quote from the research from the Mazandaran University of Medical Sciences, “In this study, we evaluated the effectiveness of magnesium oxide in comparison with valproate sodium in preventing migraine headache attacks. This is a single-center, randomized, controlled, crossover trial which is double-blind, 24-week, 2-sequence, 2-period, 2-treatment. After patient randomization into two sequences, the intervention group received magnesium oxide 500 mg and the control group received valproate sodium 400 mg two tablets each day (every 12 h) for 8 weeks. The primary efficacy variable was reduction in the number of migraine attacks and number of days with moderate or severe headache and hours with headache (duration) per month in the final of 8 weeks in comparison with baseline. Seventy patients were randomized and seven dropped out, leaving 63 for analysis. In an intention-to-treat analysis, 31 patients were in group 1 (magnesium oxide-valproate) and 32 patients were in group 2 (valproate-magnesium oxide). The mean number of migraine attacks and days per month was 1.72 +/- 1.18 and 2.09 +/- 1.70, with a mean duration of 15.50 +/- 21.80 h in magnesium group and 1.27 +/- 1.27 and 2.22 +/- 1.96, with a mean duration 13.38 +/- 14.10 in valproate group.”

According to the news editors, the research concluded: “This study has shown that 500 mg magnesium oxide appears to be effective in migraine prophylaxis similar to valproate sodium without significant adverse effect.”

This research has been peer-reviewed

University of Massachusetts, May 10, 2021

A new study led by epidemiologists at the University of Massachusetts Amherst's School of Public Health and Health Sciences suggests that high intake of dietary vitamin D and calcium may be modestly associated with lower risk of early menopause, the cessation of ovarian function before age 45. Early menopause affects about 10 percent of women and is associated with higher risk of cardiovascular disease, osteoporosis and early cognitive decline.

Epidemiology doctoral candidate Alexandra Purdue-Smithe and her advisor Elizabeth Bertone-Johnson, with colleagues at Brigham and Women's Hospital, Boston, and Harvard Medical School, evaluated how vitamin D and calcium intake is associated with incidence of early menopause in the prospective Nurses' Health Study II. The study population includes 116,430 female U.S. registered nurses who were 25-42 years old when they responded to a baseline questionnaire.

Diet was assessed five times over the 20-year study, allowing the researchers to capture changes in food and nutrient intake over time, Purdue-Smithe notes. Participants in the study contributed more than 1 million person-years of follow-up, during which 2,041 women experienced early menopause.

The authors report the hazard ratio for early menopause comparing the highest vs. lowest dietary vitamin D intake groups was 0.83 (95% confidence interval = 0.72-0.95) and for dietary calcium 0.87 (95% CI=0.76-1.00). Details of the study, supported by the National Institutes of Health, appear in the current early online edition of the American Journal of Clinical Nutrition.

Purdue-Smithe says, "Laboratory evidence relating vitamin D to some of the hormonal mechanisms involved in ovarian aging provided the foundation for our hypothesis. However, to our knowledge, no prior epidemiologic studies have explicitly evaluated how vitamin D and calcium intake may be related to risk of early menopause. We found that after adjusting for a variety of different factors, vitamin D from food sources, such as fortified dairy and fatty fish, was associated with a 17 percent lower risk of early menopause when comparing the highest intake group to the lowest intake group."

Because higher intake of vitamin D and calcium from foods may simply act as a marker for better nutrition and overall health, Purdue-Smithe says, the researchers took into account other factors such as intake of vegetable protein and alcohol, as well as body mass index and smoking. She adds, "The large size of this study allowed us to consider a variety of potential correlates of a healthy lifestyle that might explain our findings; however, adjusting for these factors made almost no difference in our estimates."

The nutritional and reproductive epidemiologist notes that "in addition to placing women at higher risk of adverse future health outcomes, early menopause is also problematic as women are increasingly delaying childbearing into their later reproductive years. Fertility declines drastically during the 10 years leading up to menopause, so early menopause can have profound psychological and financial implications for couples who are unable to conceive as they wish. As such, it is important to identify modifiable risk factors for early menopause, such as diet."

Because associations were stronger for vitamin D and calcium from dairy sources than from non-dairy food sources in the study, and Purdue-Smithe plans further analyses investigating individual dairy foods and other components of dairy and how they may be associated with early menopause.

Brigham Young University, May 10, 2021

\Despite their best efforts, no scientist has ever come close to stopping humans from aging. Even anti-aging creams can't stop Old Father Time.

But new research from Brigham Young University reveals you may be able to slow one type of aging--the kind that happens inside your cells. As long as you're willing to sweat.

"Just because you're 40, doesn't mean you're 40 years old biologically," Tucker said. "We all know people that seem younger than their actual age. The more physically active we are, the less biological aging takes place in our bodies."

The study, published in the medical journal Preventive Medicine, finds that people who have consistently high levels of physical activity have significantly longer telomeres than those who have sedentary lifestyles, as well as those who are moderately active.

Telomeres are the protein endcaps of our chromosomes. They're like our biological clock and they're extremely correlated with age; each time a cell replicates, we lose a tiny bit of the endcaps. Therefore, the older we get, the shorter our telomeres.

Exercise science professor Larry Tucker found adults with high physical activity levels have telomeres with a biological aging advantage of nine years over those who are sedentary, and a seven-year advantage compared to those who are moderately active. To be highly active, women had to engage in 30 minutes of jogging per day (40 minutes for men), five days a week.

"If you want to see a real difference in slowing your biological aging, it appears that a little exercise won't cut it," Tucker said. "You have to work out regularly at high levels."

Tucker analyzed data from 5,823 adults who participated in the CDC's National Health and Nutrition Examination Survey, one of the few indexes that includes telomere length values for study subjects. The index also includes data for 62 activities participants might have engaged in over a 30-day window, which Tucker analyzed to calculate levels of physical activity.

His study found the shortest telomeres came from sedentary people--they had 140 base pairs of DNA less at the end of their telomeres than highly active folks. Surprisingly, he also found there was no significant difference in telomere length between those with low or moderate physical activity and the sedentary people.

Although the exact mechanism for how exercise preserves telomeres is unknown, Tucker said it may be tied to inflammation and oxidative stress. Previous studies have shown telomere length is closely related to those two factors and it is known that exercise can suppress inflammation and oxidative stress over time.

"We know that regular physical activity helps to reduce mortality and prolong life, and now we know part of that advantage may be due to the preservation of telomeres," Tucker said.

Why are Hydroxychloroquine and Ivermectin Being Officially Suppressed

 Richard Gale and Gary Null PhD

Had the FDA and Anthony Fauci’s National Institute for Allergies and Infectious Disease (NIAID) started approving existing clinically-proven and inexpensive drugs for treating malaria, parasites and other pathogens at the start of the pandemic, millions of people would have been saved from experiencing serious infections or dying from the SARS-CoV-2 virus. Why federal health officials never followed this strategy is a question the mainstream media refuses to ask. 

Read More

Why are Hydroxychloroquine and Ivermectin Being Officially Suppressed

Richard Gale and Gary Null PhD

Progressive Radio Network, May 10, 2021

Had the FDA and Anthony Fauci’s National Institute for Allergies and Infectious Disease (NIAID) started approving existing clinically-proven and inexpensive drugs for treating malaria, parasites and other pathogens at the start of the pandemic, millions of people would have been saved from experiencing serious infections or dying from the SARS-CoV-2 virus. Why federal health officials never followed this strategy is a question the mainstream media refuses to ask. 

Another question that the medical establishment, let alone our compliant media, is why have they failed to ask whether there are reliable studies in the peer-reviewed literature and testimonies from thousands of day-to-day clinical physicians worldwide who treat Covid-19 patients with these drugs, in particular hydroxychloroquine (HCQ) and Ivermectin. In most nations, there has been enormous success in treating Covid patients at the early and moderate stages of infection. However, in the US, Anthony Fauci, Bill Gates, the FDA and our institutional medical leaders have categorically denied their use.  In fact they are quick to erect obstacles to prevent them from being prescribed.

When these questions are posited as a general argument for advocating expedient measures to protect public health during this pandemic, would it not have been wise to have prioritized HCQ, Ivermectin, and other remedies with a record of curtailing Covid, such as the antibiotic azirthromicin, zinc, selenium, Vitamins C and D, and melatonin as a first line of defense?  There was absolutely no need to have waited for experimental vaccines or experimental drugs such as Remdesivir before the pandemic became uncontrollable.  But this is what Fauci and Trump permitted to happen.

If this strategy of medical intervention had been followed, would it have been successful?  The answer is likely an unequivocal “yes”.  Both HCQ and, even better, Ivermectin have been prophylactically prescribed by physicians working on pandemic’s front lines with enormous success.  Yet those American physicians struggling to get this urgent message out to federal health officials are being marginalized and ridiculed en masse. Only in the US, the UK, France, South Africa and several other developed nations has there been a stubborn hubris to deny their effectiveness, and where there have been concerted efforts to undermine these cheaper alternative remedies. The World Health Organization recommends Ivermectin for Covid-19 so why not the US and these other nations? Under oath, multiple physicians and professors at American medical schools have testified before Congress to present the scientific evidence supporting HCQ and Ivermectin.  These are otherwise medical professionals at the very heart of treating Covid-19 patients. 

Today, American journalism is in shambles. In fact, it is a disgrace.  The American public is losing its trust the media. Whether it is CNN, the New York Times, the Washington Post, NPR or PBS, they each have unlimited resources to properly investigate the federal and institutional machinery behind the government health policies being thrust upon us.  Yet no mainstream journalist has found the moral compass to bring this truth to the public. 

In the meantime, we are allowing millions to die, and countless others to be seriously affected from a severe infection because of professional medical neglect and a healthcare system favoring the pharmaceutical industry’s frantic rush to develop expensive novel drugs and experimental vaccines. The incentive by the drug makers is to take every advantage available within the FDA’s emergency use loopholes to get their products approved as quickly as possible.  The primary advantage is that these novel drugs and vaccines can then leap over regulatory hurdles, which otherwise would require them to conduct lengthy and thorough clinical trials to prove their efficacy and safety. The consequence is that none of the new pharmaceutical Covid-19 interventions have been adequately reviewed.

On the other hand, HCQ and Ivermectin have an established legacy of prior research and have been on the market for decades. Worldwide, it is not unreasonable to claim that billions of people have been treated with these drugs.  

Below is a breakdown of the studies conducted so far for HCQ, Ivermectin and Vitamin D specifically for combatting the SARS-CoV-2 virus

Hydroxychloroquine

291 studies, 218 peer-reviewed have been conducted specifically for Covid-19

241 have been clinical trials that involved 3,875 scientists and over 366,000 patients

33 were randomize controlled trials

65% improvement in 26 early treatment trials

72% improvement in 11 early stage infection treatment mortality results

22% improvement in 164 late stage infection treatment trials (patients in serious condition)

Full list of HCQ studies and details:  https://c19hcq.com

Ivermectin 

92 studies, 52 peer-reviewed have been conducted specifically for Covid-19

54 have been clinical trials that involved 442 scientists and over 17,600 patients

27 were randomized controlled trials 

85% improvement in 14 prophylaxis trials

80% improvement in 20 early stage infection treatment trials

47% improvement in 20 late stage infection treatment trials

74% improvement in 20 mortality results

Full list of Ivermectin studies and details:  https://c19ivermectin.com

Vitamin D

74 studies conducted by over 650 scientists

52 sufficiency studies with 12,000 patients

23 treatment trials with 23,000 patients

53% improvement in 23 treatment trials

53% improvement in 52 sufficiency studies

63% improvement in 14 treatment mortality results

Full list of Vitamin D studies and details:  https://c19vitamind.com

Please share this information. The inept policies and measures being taken by our federal health officials and by both the former Trump and present Biden administrations are unparalleled in American healthcare history. And never before has the media been so willing to self-censor and been so grossly irresponsible to hide the published science and the truth. 

The Fatty Acids and Outcomes Research Consortium, April 28 2021. 

An analysis of prospective studies published on April 22, 2021 in Nature Communications uncovered a decreased risk of mortality during an average of 16 years among men and women who had higher red blood cell or plasma levels of omega-3 fatty acids. 

The analysis was conducted by William S. Harris and The Fatty Acids and Outcomes Research Consortium (FORCE). Dr Harris is a codeveloper of the Omega-3 Index, which measures omega 3 levels in red blood cell membranes. The team examined 17 prospective studies that evaluated associations between the risk of death from all causes and levels of the omega-3 fatty acids alpha linolenic acid (ALA), eicosapentaenoic acid (EPA), docosapentaenoic acid (DPA), docosahexaenoic acid (DHA), and EPA plus DHA. 

During the studies’ follow-up periods, 15,720 deaths occurred among a total of 42,466 men and women. Subjects whose EPA, DPA, DHA, and EPA plus DHA levels were among the top 10% of participants experienced a 9% to 13% reduction in mortality from all causes during follow-up compared to men and women whose levels were among the lowest 10%. When cause-specific mortality was examined, having EPA, DPA, DHA, or EPA plus DHA levels among the highest 10% was associated with a lower risk of cardiovascular mortality, cancer mortality and mortality from all other causes combined (with the exception of the association between DHA and reduced cancer mortality, which was not considered significant). 

"Since all of these analyses were statistically adjusted for multiple personal and medical factors (i.e., age, sex, weight, smoking, diabetes, blood pressure, etc., plus blood omega-6 fatty acid levels), we believe that these are the strongest data published to date supporting the view that over the long-term, having higher blood omega-3 levels can help maintain better overall health," Dr Harris concluded.

University of California at Los Angeles, May 4, 2021 

In a randomized, controlled study* published online in the journal, Nutrients, researchers found that including mixed tree nuts in a weight management program resulted in significant weight loss and improved satiety.

Researchers at UCLA compared 95 overweight/obese men and women (BMI 27.0-35.0 kg/m2) ages 30-68 years who consumed either 1.5 ounces of mixed tree nuts or a pretzel snack. Both snacks provided the same number of calories, as part of a hypocaloric weight loss diet (500 calories less than resting metabolic rate) over 12 weeks. This was followed by an isocaloric weight maintenance program for an additional 12 weeks. 

Participants experienced significant weight loss (12 weeks: -1.6 kg and -1.9 kg and 24 weeks: -1.5 kg and -1.4 kg) in the tree nut and pretzel snack groups, respectively. Both groups also showed a significant decrease in BMI at 12 weeks, compared to baseline. However, satiety was significantly higher at the end of week 24 in the mixed tree nut group, and there was a trend toward greater weight maintenance compared to the pretzel group. Moreover, the dropout rate was significantly lower in the mixed tree nut group (16.4%) compared to the pretzel (35.9%) group. And, heart rate was decreased significantly, compared to baseline, in those consuming tree nuts, but not pretzels. 

"Tree nuts (almonds, Brazil nuts, cashews, hazelnuts, macadamias, pecans, pine nuts, pistachios and walnuts) are a great source of protein, healthy fats and fiber," explained lead researcher, Zhaoping Li, MD, PhD, Professor of Medicine and Chief of the Division of Clinical Nutrition at UCLA. "This makes them so satiating and may be a major reason why we saw less weight gain in the tree nut group during weight maintenance, and a significantly lower dropout rate compared to the pretzel group." 

Recent research has shown that more than 40 percent of Americans are overweight or obese.** During the past year many Americans have gained weight while sheltering in place, partly due to less exercise and more snacking. One study estimates a weight gain of 1.5 pounds per month.*** "We know most people get about 25% of their calories each day from snacks and a large proportion come from desserts, sugar-sweetened beverages, sweets and salty snacks," states Dr. Li. "By replacing just one of those snacks with 1.5 ounces of tree nuts may result in a positive impact on weight and overall health."

According to Maureen Ternus, M.S., R.D.N, Executive Director of the International Tree Nut Council Nutrition Research & Education Foundation (INC NREF), "This latest study adds to a growing body of evidence showing that nut consumption may be a useful tool in weight management."

Catholic University of Valencia (Spain), April 30. 2021

According to news reporting originating from Valencia, Spain, research stated, “Multiple sclerosis (MS) is pathogenically characterized by high oxidative stress and symptomatically by progressive muscle loss and increased body fat associated with the presence of depression. Epigallocatechin gallate (EGCG) (particularly present in green tea) and ketone bodies (in particular beta-hydroxybutyrate (BHB)), whose main source is coconut oil, have shown emotional benefits and body fat loss.”

The news journalists obtained a quote from the research from Catholic University of Valencia: “The aim of this study was to assess the impact of EGCG and coconut oil on cortisol activity related to fat loss and depression in MS patients. The study involved 51 MS patients who were randomly divided into an intervention group or a control group. The intervention group received 800 mg of EGCG and 60 mL of coconut oil, which were included in their daily diet for four months. The control group received placebo and all patients followed an isocaloric diet. A blood sample was collected before and after the four-month period, and levels of cortisol, albumin and BHB were measured in serum. In addition, immediately before and after the intervention, anthropometric variables were measured: waist-to-hip ratio (WHR), body fat mass percentage, fat weight, total weight, and muscle mass percentage. Depression was assessed with the Beck Depression Inventory II (BDI-II). No significant changes were obtained in cortisol levels in any of the groups, and there was a significant increase in albumin in the blood of the intervention group only that could lead to a decrease in serum free cortisol. In addition, it was observed a significant decrease in levels of depression and abdominal fat.”

According to the news reporters, the research concluded: “EGCG combined with coconut oil increase the concentration of albumin in blood and produce less depression in MS patients.”

University of Manchester (UK), May 5, 2021

Older people who are clinically vulnerable to COVID-19 are at greater risk of deterioration in health and social well-being during the pandemic, according to a new study.

The research, published in the Journal of Epidemiology and Community Health, found that older people were more likely to report worse health outcomes than those with no clinical vulnerabilities, including greater depression and anxiety and lower quality of life, even when taking into account pre-pandemic levels of health and social well-being.

The findings highlight the need for policymakers to consider the mental and physical health consequences of the pandemic for those at higher risk from coronavirus, particularly for those asked to shield.

Professor Debora Price from The University of Manchester and Dr. Giorgio Di Gessa from UCL compared data from 2020's English Longitudinal Study of Aging with data from the previous year. They analyzed responses from over 5000 people aged 52 and over in private households in England.

The study revealed that during the pandemic, respondents classified as clinically vulnerable were more likely to report poor self-rated health, lower levels of physical activity, depression, anxiety, lower quality of life as well as loneliness and receipt of care, compared to those without clinical vulnerabilities.

This was true within each age group. Among people in their 70s, the odds of being depressed and anxious for those clinically vulnerable were around 50% higher than for those without clinical vulnerabilities. Those in their 80s—regardless of clinical vulnerability—were much more likely to have unmet care needs and to have little contact with friends and family by text, email, or videocall.

Although older adults' health and social well-being have been impacted by shielding, the researchers found that it was those who were clinically vulnerable and shielding who reported the most substantial rises in anxiety, depression, poor self-rated health and receipt of formal care, as well as decreases in well-being and physical activity.

"Older people with underlying health conditions, even before the pandemic, faced challenges in terms of access to healthcare services and social contact," said Professor Debora Price. "They also experienced greater emotional distress, higher risk of loneliness and poorer quality of life than non-vulnerable individuals."

"While policies focusing on shielding clinically vulnerable older people reduce rates of hospitalization and death from COVID-19, policymakers need to acknowledge that there may be adverse consequences of this measure and address the wider needs of these vulnerable groups," added Dr. Giorgio Di Gessa.

"It's vital that policymakers are aware that when advised to stay at home, a host of health and social risks for this group, already poor, are likely to be exacerbated."

Trinity College Dublin (Ireland), May 5, 2021

A new study from scientists at The Irish Longitudinal Study on Aging (TILDA) at Trinity College Dublin reveals important findings, indicating that being overweight or obese significantly reduces blood flow in the brain. The study also shows that increased physical activity can positively modify, or even negate, this reduction in brain blood flow.

The study contains relevant information which is of great interest to the general public; since reduced blood flow in the brain, or 'cerebral hypoperfusion," is an early mechanism in vascular dementia and Alzheimer's disease.

Obesity and health challenges

According to the World Health Organization (WHO), obesity is a worsening health crisis that has reached epidemic proportions globally, with over 1 billion adults overweight—and at least 300 million clinically obese. It continues to be a major contributor to global rates of chronic disease and disability, affecting overall quality of life, while placing increased strain on the immune system which is of the upmost importance given the current COVID-19 situation. Obesity is also a significant public health concern given its negative impact on physiological function, especially as we age. Finding easily implemented and cost-effective ways to tackle the impact of obesity is particularly important to help protect against negative health outcomes in later life.

What are the findings of the TILDA study?

The study investigates three different measures of obesity—body mass index (BMI), waist-to-hip ratio and waist circumference, as well as physical activity, in adults over 50 years.

Brain blood flow was measured using cutting-edge MRI scanning and analysis techniques. The findings reveal that being overweight or obese is associated with reduced blood supply to the brain. Whereas brain blood flow is known to decline with age, in this study the negative influence of obesity on brain blood flow was shown to be greater than that of age. However, being physically active helps to cancel out the negative effects of obesity on brain blood flow.

Key Findings

• ncreased BMI, waist-to-hip ratio, and waist size are associated with less blood supply to the brain.

Recommendations

The study recommends at least 1.5 to two hours of 'being active' throughout the day, engaging in activities that require moderate effort. These include activities that cause one to breathe harder than normal, such as fast walking or cycling. However, any increase in physical activity, particularly if integrated into daily or weekly habits, such as gardening, should help maintain and potentially improve brain blood flow.

Dr. Silvin Knight, Research Fellow at TILDA and lead author, said:

Consistent, healthy blood supply to the brain is critical, as it ensures that the brain is provided with enough oxygen and nutrients to function correctly. If brain blood flow becomes impaired, it can lead to serious health issues as we age, such as increasing the risk of dementia and Alzheimer's disease. We know that obesity can predispose a person to age-related conditions, illness, and disease, and even reduce life expectancy by up to six years in men and seven years in women, after the age of forty. Our study reveals clear associations between obesity and reduced blood supply to the brain in an older population. The study also shows the importance of being physically active for older overweight or obese individuals, as this may help to protect against reduced brain blood flow and the poor health outcomes that can arise from this.

Professor Rose Anne Kenny, Principal Investigator of TILDA, and co-author of the study, said: "Many experts have shown that obesity and aging have very similar effects on the biology of aging; diseases associated with obesity are similar to those of aging and age-related diseases—heart disease, diabetes, high blood pressure, kidney failure, arthritis, susceptibility to infections- including COVID-19."

Our study not only shows that there is a link between obesity and reduced brainblood flow, but also that it is possible to protect against the negative consequences of obesity through regular physical exercise. Whereas these findings are of relevance in the global context, because of the rapidly evolving global burden of obesity, the research is especially important to Irish adults because obesity and being overweight is a considerable health issue in Ireland.

Previous TILDA research has shown that over one-third of Irish adults aged 50 and older are obese and a further 43% overweight. As we prepare our society for a growing aging population, we can use this evidence to prepare meaningful public health policies that will promote impactful and positive lifestyle habits, such as regular physical activity, to mitigate against some of the negative consequences of the growing obesity crisis.

Shanghai Health Commission Key Lab of Artificial Intelligence (AI)-Based Management of Inflammation and Chronic Diseases, May 2, 2021

In this study we execute a rational screen to identify Chinese medical herbs that are commonly used in treating viral respiratory infections and also contain compounds that might directly inhibit 2019 novel coronavirus (2019-nCoV), an ongoing novel coronavirus that causes pneumonia.

There were two main steps in the screening process. In the first step we conducted a literature search for natural compounds that had been biologically confirmed as against sever acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus or Middle East respiratory syndrome coronavirus. Resulting compounds were cross-checked for listing in the Traditional Chinese Medicine Systems Pharmacology Database. Compounds meeting both requirements were subjected to absorption, distribution, metabolism and excretion (ADME) evaluation to verify that oral administration would be effective. Next, a docking analysis was used to test whether the compound had the potential for direct 2019-nCoV protein interaction. In the second step we searched Chinese herbal databases to identify plants containing the selected compounds. Plants containing 2 or more of the compounds identified in our screen were then checked against the catalogue for classic herbal usage. Finally, network pharmacology analysis was used to predict the general in vivo effects of each selected herb.

Of the natural compounds screened, 13 that exist in traditional Chinese medicines were also found to have potential anti-2019-nCoV activity. Further, 125 Chinese herbs were found to contain 2 or more of these 13 compounds. Of these 125 herbs, 26 are classically catalogued as treating viral respiratory infections. Network pharmacology analysis predicted that the general in vivo roles of these 26 herbal plants were related to regulating viral infection, immune/inflammation reactions and hypoxia response.

Of course, it should be pointed out that Chinese herbs that have not been identified through this screening process may still have beneficial effects. Further, considering that the biologically validated natural compounds reported in the literature cannot cover all antiviral natural compounds, and the natural compounds included in the Chinese medicine database are not complete, the process that we have followed may have excluded herbs that would be well suited to this treatment. Nevertheless, the purpose of this screening was to provide a rational approach for selecting Chinese herbal medicines with a high potential efficacy in treating 2019-nCoV and related viruses. The specific dosage and usage of each herb should be determined based on patients’ manifestations. Finally, the key step in this screening was molecular docking. The 3D structures of the proteins used here are based on reported gene sequences. If the virus mutates during transmission, a new screening is recommended.

In conclusion, this work has identified several Chinese medicinal plants classified as antiviral/pneumonia-effective that might directly inhibit the novel coronavirus, 2019-nCoV. Additionally, we propose screening principles and methods which may provide guidance in screening antiviral drugs from other natural drug databases.

Chinese University of Hong Kong, May 4, 2021

According to news reporting from Hong Kong, People’s Republic of China, research stated, “Osteoporosis is characterized by reductions in bone mass, which could be attributed to the dysregulation of bone homeostasis, such as the loss of balance between bone-resorbing osteoclasts and bone-forming osteoblasts. Elevated levels of oxidative stress increase bone resorption by promoting osteoclastogenesis and inhibiting the osteogenesis.”

The news correspondents obtained a quote from the research from the Chinese University of Hong Kong, “Ginkgolide B (GB), a small natural molecule from Ginkgo biloba, has been reported to possess pharmacological activities by regulating reactive oxygen species (ROS) in aging-related degenerative diseases. Herein, we assessed the therapeutic effects of GB on the bone phenotypes of mice with osteoporosis induced by (I) aging, (II) ovariectomy, and (III) glucocorticoids. In all three animal models, oral gavage of GB significantly improved bone mass consistent with the increase in the OPG-to-RANKL ratio. In the in vitro experiments, GB promoted osteogenesis in aged mesenchymal stem cells (MSCs) and repressed osteoclastogenesis in aged macrophages by reducing ROS. The serum protein profile in GB-treated aged mice revealed moderate rejuvenating effects; signaling pathways associated with ROS were also regulated. The anabolic and anti-catabolic effects of GB were illustrated by the reduction in ROS. Our results indicate that GB is effective in treating osteoporosis.”

According to the news reporters, the research concluded: “The use of GB in patients with osteoporosis is worthy of further clinical investigation.”

This research has been peer-reviewed.