Thursday, September 11, 2014

Where Corn Is King, a New Regard for Grass-Fed Beef


REMINDER: In The Archive is all of the articles that I
have posted since I started this blog. There is TONS OF
INFORMATION there for you to learn from. It's the type
of information that not only saved my life...It also has
given me a better quality of life.

PLEASE PASS THIS BLOG ON AND PLEASE TWEET THIS BLOG.

+++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++

                       "Nature Cures Cancer" - Here are 10 examples
                                           http://bit.ly/1k1N4Bg

                                         Your Path To Wellness
                                            http://bit.ly/RGNZ0i



Where Corn Is King, a New Regard for Grass-Fed Beef


By Dr. Mercola


    In the grand scheme of all that is wrong with modern agriculture, the unnatural transition that turned cattle (which naturally eat grass) into grain-eating ruminants is at the top of the list.

    In the twisted realm of agribusiness, raising grass-fed cows, especially in the heart of ‘corn country’ (the Midwest) is now regarded as a specialty industry for the crazies, as the New York Times recently reported.

        Where the great cattle herds once roamed, grass finishing  an intricate and lengthy ballet involving the balance of protein and energy derived from the stalk, with the flavor rendered by earth, plants and even stress is a nearly lost art.

     ...said Fred Kirschenmann, a distinguished fellow at the Leopold Center for Sustainable Agriculture at Iowa State University The attitude out there is that grass-fed is for the crazies.

    Yet, far from being ‘crazy, grass-fed beef represents a sought-after solution to unsustainable agricultural practices  one that could not only drastically reduce pollution but also produce a nutritionally superior meat.

    While far from the norm at this point, a new appreciation for grass-fed meat, and all that it stands for, is steadily growing and these so-called unconventional ranchers are now becoming mainstays in the industry.

Change to the Cattle Industry Must Come From Educated People From the Outside

    Concentrated Animal Feeding Operations (CAFOs), in which the majority of US beef (and pork, chicken and eggs) is raised, contribute directly to global warming by releasing vast amounts of greenhouse gases into the atmosphere in fact, more than the entire global transportation industry.

    They also contribute to climate disruption by their impact on deforestation and draining of wetlands, and because of the nitrous oxide emissions from huge amounts of pesticides used to grow the genetically engineered corn and soy fed to animals raised in CAFOs.

    The cows are fattened for slaughter on giant feed lots as quickly as possible (on average between 14 and 18 months) with the help of grains, as CAFOs represent a corporate-controlled system characterized by large-scale, centralized, low profit-margin production, processing and distribution systems.

    Contrary to popular arguments, factory farming is not a cheap, efficient solution to world hunger. Feeding huge numbers of confined animals actually uses more food, in the form of grains that could feed humans, than it produces. For every 100 food calories of edible crops fed to livestock, we get back just 30 calories in the form of meat and dairy. That’s a 70 percent loss.

    With the Earth’s population predicted to reach 9 billion by mid-century, the planet can no longer afford this reckless, unhealthy and environmentally disastrous farming system. And as Prescott Frost, great-grandson of poet Robert Frost who has entered the grass-fed meat business, told the New York Times:

        If change is going to come to the cattle industry, it’s got to come from educated people from the outside, Mr. Frost said, quoting from Allan Nation, the publisher of The Stockman Grass Farmer, considered the grazier’s bible.

Grass-Fed Beef Is Better for You, Better for the Planet and Better for the Cows

    A joint effort between the US Department of Agriculture (USDA) and Clemson University researchers determined a total of 10 key areas where grass-fed is better than grain-fed beef for human health. In a side-by-side comparison, they determined that grass-fed beef was:

Lower in total fat
    
Higher in beta-carotene
    
Higher in vitamin E (alpha-tocopherol)

Higher in the B-vitamins thiamin and riboflavin    

Higher in the minerals calcium, magnesium and potassium    
Higher in total omega-3s

A healthier ratio of omega-6 to omega-3 fatty acids (1.65 vs 4.84)    
Higher in CLA (cis-9 trans-11), a potential cancer fighter    
Higher in vaccenic acid (which can be transformed into CLA)

Another troubling aspect of grain-fed cattle involves the well-being of the animal and, consequently, the health effect this has on you. Common consequences among grain-fed cattle include:

    Acidosis. During the normal digestive process, bacteria in the rumen of cattle produce a variety of acids. Saliva neutralizes the acidity from grass-based diets, but grain-based eating in feedlots prohibits saliva production. The net result is "acid indigestion."

    Animals with this condition are plagued with diarrhea, go off their feed, pant, salivate excessively, kick at their bellies, and eat dirt. Over time, acidosis can lead to a condition called "rumenitis," an inflammatory response to too much acid and too little roughage and results in inefficient nutrient absorption.

    Liver abscesses. From 15 to 30 percent of feedlot cattle have liver abscesses, which result when bacteria may leak out through ulcerated rumen in cattle and are ultimately transported to the liver.

    Bloat. During digestion, cows produce gas and when they are on pasture, they belch up the gas without any difficulty. Grain-based feeding causes these gasses to become trapped, and results in bloat. In more serious cases of bloat, the rumen becomes so distended with gas that the animal is unable to breathe and dies from asphyxiation.

    Feedlot polio. A highly acidic digestive environment may result in the production of an enzyme called "thiaminase," which destroys vitamin B1, starving the brain of energy and creating paralysis.

    Dust pneumonia. In dry weather, the feedlot can become a dust bowl, which springs the cattle's immune system into action and keeps it running on a constant basis, ultimately resulting in respiratory ailments and even death.

Real Farmers Are Grass Farmers

     Virginia farmer Joel Salatin is a living example of how incredibly successful and sustainable natural farming can be. He produces beef, chicken, eggs, turkey, rabbits and vegetables. Yet, Joel calls himself a grass farmer, for it is the grass that transforms the sun into energy that his animals then feed on. By closely observing nature, Joel created a rotational grazing system that not only allows the land to heal but also allows the animals to behave the way the were meant to expressing their "chicken-ness" or "pig-ness," as Joel would say.

    Cows are moved every day, which mimics their natural patterns and promotes revegetation. Sanitation is accomplished by birds. The birds (chickens and turkeys) arrive three days after the cows leave via the Eggmobile and scratch around in the pasture, doing what chickens do best.

    No pesticides. No herbicides. No antibiotics. No seed spreading. Salatin hasn't planted a seed or purchased a chemical fertilizer in 50 years. He just lets herbivores be herbivores and cooperates with nature, instead of fighting it. It's a different and refreshing philosophy. When cows are raised on a salad bar of natural grasses, the meat takes on different flavors that cannot be achieved with grain. Frost told the New York Times:

        When the wine industry started out in California, nobody had a language for what a bouquet was, Mr. Frost, 55, said. Vintners had to come up with a way an audience could have a conversation about hints of raspberries, of chamomile. And that’s what we have to do with beef.

    Farming done in this type of sustainable manner can be incredibly profitable, too. Instead of making $150 per acre per year from a crop that produces food for three months, but lays fallow for the rest of the year, Salatin’s making $3,000 per acre by rotating crops throughout the year, thereby making use of his land all 12 months and maintaining its ecological balance at the same time. This generates complementary income streams for the small farmer and allows them to compete with CAFO operations, while protecting the land from ecological disasters.

Where Can You Find Grass-Fed Beef?

    Currently, meat in supermarkets will be labeled 100% grass-fed if it came from pasture, but if it contains no label it’s probably CAFO-raised. In 2013, a new alliance of organic and natural health consumers, animal welfare advocates, anti-GMO and climate-change activists will tackle the next big food labeling battle: meat, eggs and dairy products from animals raised on factory farms, or CAFOs.

    This campaign, which aims to have CAFO foods labeled, will start with a massive program to educate consumers about the negative impacts of factory farming on the environment, on human health and on animal welfare, and then move forward to organize and mobilize millions of consumers to demand labels on beef, pork, poultry and dairy products derived from these unhealthy and unsustainable so-called farming practices.

    In the meantime, you can boycott food products from CAFOs and choose to support farmers who produce healthful grass-fed meat, eggs and dairy products using humane, environmentally friendly methods. You can do this not only by visiting the farm directly, if you have one nearby, but also by taking part in farmer's markets and community-supported agriculture programs, many of which offer grass-fed beef. The following organizations can also help you locate grass-fed beef and other farm-fresh foods in your local area, raised in a humane, sustainable manner.



 God Bless Everyone & God Bless The United States of America.


Larry Nelson
42 S. Sherwood Dr.
Belton, Tx. 76513
cancercurehere@gmail.com

Have a great day...unless you have made other plans.

Tuesday, September 9, 2014

Doctors Perform Thousands of Unnecessary Surgeries: Are You Getting One of Them?

REMINDER: In The Archive is all of the articles that I
have posted since I started this blog. There is TONS OF
INFORMATION there for you to learn from. It's the type
of information that not only saved my life...It also has
given me a better quality of life.

PLEASE PASS THIS BLOG ON AND PLEASE TWEET THIS BLOG.


+++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++

                     "Nature Cures Cancer" - Here are 10 examples
                                     http://bit.ly/1k1N4Bg

                                    Your Path To Wellness
                                      http://bit.ly/RGNZ0i


Doctors Perform Thousands of Unnecessary Surgeries: Are You Getting One of Them?



By Dr. Mercola


    If your physician tells you that you need surgery, unless it is an emergency, I would strongly recommend to get a second opinion first.

    In many cases, you may find that you don’t need surgery after all, saving not only a considerable amount of money but also avoiding the potentially deadly risks that any surgery carries.

    In fact, according to a new USA Today review of government records and medical databases, tens of thousands of patients undergo unnecessary surgery each and every year!1 And according to some experts, that number may actually be in the millions. According to USA Today:

    It's a very serious issue, (and) there really hasn't been a movement to address it, says Lucian Leape, a former surgeon and professor at the Harvard School of Public Health. Leape, a renowned patient safety expert...

        He began studying unnecessary surgery after a 1974 congressional report estimated that there were 2.4 million cases a year, killing nearly 12,000 patients. Leape's take today? "Things haven't changed very much.

Many Doctors ‘Lack the Competence to Know When a Surgery Isn’t Necessary

    There are multiple reasons why unnecessary surgeries take place. In some cases they’re the result of criminal acts, in which surgeons intentionally prey on patients, performing surgeries even though they know they are not medically justified.

    USA Today cited the case of Michael Rosin, a dermatologist who was sentenced to 22 years in prison and fines of more than $7 million for intentionally misdiagnosing his patients with skin cancer so he could perform surgeries to remove benign lesions.

    Far more often, however, are the physicians who perform unnecessary surgeries out of incompetence or a lack of training in less-invasive alternatives. Many health care providers may believe that surgery is the only answer, even when the success rates are minimal and better non-surgica treatment options exist.

    Then there are those providers who perform the surgery simply because the profit will increase their income, and they can justify them as medically ‘necessary. USA Today reported:

    I think there are a very small percent of doctors who are crooked, maybe 1 or 2%,' says John Santa, a physician and former health system administrator who became director of the Consumer Reports Health Ratings Center in 2008.

    I think there's a higher percentage who are not well trained or not competent to determine when surgery is necessary, Santa says. Then you have a big group who are more businessmen than medical professionals  doctors who look at those gray cases and say, Well, I have enough here to justify surgery, so I'm going to do it.

    Personally, I think USA Today is being very kind in their low-ball estimate of 1-2%. Those numbers seem quite low and from my experience I suspect it is significantly higher.

Six Common Surgeries That Are Often Unnecessary

    It’s worth getting a second opinion before you have virtually any non-emergency surgery. However, if you’re scheduled for one of the following procedures, it becomes even more imperative to seek another expert’s opinion, as these surgeries carry a high risk of being done without medical necessity.3

    Yes I realize there is a cost and significant hassle factor, but I strongly encourage to do your due diligence. The extra time and resources you invest in confirming the necessity of the surgery could have a major impact on your ability to enjoy the rest of your life.

    1. Cardiac Angioplasty, Stents

        This invasive procedure involves inflating a thin balloon in a narrowed artery to crush plaque deposits; a stent (a wire mesh tube) is often then left behind to keep the vessel open. When used during a heart attack, an angioplasty can quickly open a blocked artery to lessen the damage to your heart, and when used in this way can be lifesaving.

        However, oftentimes heart disease patients receive angioplasties even though they have not had a heart attack -- a decision that goes against the latest medical guidelines. One 2011 study found that 12 percent of all angioplasty procedures (in cases that did not involve an acute heart attack) were not medically necessary. Separate research also revealed that angioplasty offers no benefit compared to less invasive treatment of heart disease.

    2. Cardiac Pacemakers

        Pacemakers are used to correct heartbeat irregularities, but research shows that more than 22 percent of these implants may be unnecessary.

    3. Spinal Fusion Back Surgery

        If you have low back pain and see different specialists you will get different tests: rheumatologists will order blood tests, neurologists will order nerve impulse tests, and surgeons will order MRIs and CT scans. But no matter what tests you get, you'll probably end up with a spinal fusion because it's one of the "more lucrative procedures in medicine," author Shannon Brownlee says even though the best success rate for spinal fusions is only 25 percent!

        According to one review, more than 17 percent of patients told they needed spinal surgery actually showed no abnormal neurological or radiographic findings that would require surgery.

    4. Hysterectomy

        The surgical removal of the uterus may be recommended inappropriately in 70 percent of cases, often because of a lack of adequate diagnostic evaluation and failure to try alternative treatments before the surgery. Some surgeons also remove healthy ovaries during hysterectomy as a precaution, sometimes without the patient providing their consent or being informed as to the severe adverse effects the ovariectomy may produce on their remaining quality of life.

    5. Knee and Hip Replacement, and Arthroscopic Knee Surgery

        Patients who were informed about joint replacements and alternative treatments had 26 percent fewer hip replacements and 38 percent fewer knee replacements than those who did not. Arthroscopic knee surgery for osteoarthritis is also one of the most unnecessary surgeries performed today, as it works no better than a placebo surgery.

        Proof of this is a double-blind placebo-controlled multi-center (including Harvard’s Mass General Hospital) study published in one of the most well-respected medical journals on the planet, the New England Journal of Medicine (NEJM) over 10 years ago.

        Recent research has also shown arthroscopic knee surgery works no better than placebo surgery, and when comparing treatments for knee pain, physical therapy was found to be just as effective as surgery, but at significantly reduced cost and risk. And yet another study showed exercise is just as effective as surgery for people with chronic pain in the front part of their knee, known as chronic patellofemoral syndrome (PFPS), which is also frequently treated unnecessarily with arthroscopic surgery.

    6. Cesarean Section

        Cesarean delivery is the most commonly performed surgical procedure in the US and rates are increasing. But research shows rates vary 10-fold among hospitals, even among low-risk pregnancies, suggesting that practice patterns, not necessity, are driving these high surgery rates.

        According to the World Health Organization, no country is justified in having a cesarean rate greater than 10 percent to 15 percent. The US rate, at nearly 32 percent, is the highest rate ever reported in the US and is higher than in most other developed countries.

Diagnostic Errors Permanently Injure or Kill Up to 160,000 Americans a Year

    Unnecessary surgeries are only one problem facing the conventional medical system. Medical errors are also alarmingly common, and diagnosis errors, in particular, appear to be occurring at very high rates. Researchers recently wrote in BMJ Quality & Safety:

    Among malpractice claims, diagnostic errors appear to be the most common, most costly and most dangerous of medical mistakes. We found roughly equal numbers of lethal and non-lethal errors in our analysis, suggesting that the public health burden of diagnostic errors could be twice that previously estimated.

    The study involved more than 350,000 malpractice claims, of which nearly 29 percent involved a missed, wrong or delayed diagnosis. Such errors may account for the permanent injury or death of up to 160,000 patients each year, the study found, with researchers noting that it is probably a lot higher than that. Case in point, when all medical errors, not just diagnosis errors, are taken into account, the rate of medical harm occurring in the US is estimated to be over 40,000 harmful and/or lethal errors each and EVERY day.

Hospitals Profit Off of Surgical Errors and Medical Mishaps

    Part of the problem is that hospitals and providers have little incentive to change, as the more surgeries performed, the more money they make. And if complications are involved, so much the better from a financial perspective.

    One revealing JAMA study found that major surgical complications actually earn hospitals more money on privately insured or Medicare-covered patients. This isn’t exactly shocking, of course, since the more complications suffered, the longer the hospital stay and the more associated medications, tests and procedures that will be ordered. Hospitals are a business, after all, and the more services used by any one patient, the more money they make.

    Where money is concerned, a hospital therefore has no incentive to reduce surgical errors and other medical mishaps, which may actually be a key moneymaker for them. And, as the Health Business Blog astutely reported,18 unlike most businesses, which suffer financially when mistakes occur, hospitals get to charge you even more money to treat you for avoidable complications or mistakes they make. Decreasing surgical complications may therefore have adverse financial consequences for many hospitals, the researchers concluded, and the same goes for reducing unnecessary surgery rates, as well.

It’s Your Body: Take Control of Your Health

    My primary suggestion is to avoid hospitals and surgeries unless it's an absolute emergency and you need life-saving medical attention. If you're going to have an elective medical procedure, always get a second opinion—and possibly a third and fourth.

    The other KEY is to be proactive and start pursuing a healthy lifestyle today so you don't become a victim of an unnecessary medical procedure. I have compiled my best tips in a customized 100-page nutrition plan to help you take control of your health. It is customized to three different levels and you can start at any level, but be sure and read from the beginning, as reviewing the basics is the best way to reinforce healthy patterns.

    As much as possible, be proactive in using a healthy lifestyle to support and protect your health and, if illness does occur, use natural methods that will allow your body to heal itself without the need for unnecessary surgery, drugs or other invasive medical procedures.


Thank You  Dr. Mercola


 God Bless Everyone & God Bless The United States of America.


Larry Nelson
42 S. Sherwood Dr.
Belton, Tx. 76513
cancercurehere@gmail.com

Have a great day...unless you have made other plans.