LA TIMES– For more than a decade, Cheryl Clark has lived with the chronic pain that accompanies fibromyalgia. After years of suffering with severe flu-like aches and pains, she finally found some relief — but it didn’t come from a pill or a shot. It came from exercise.

Several times a week, Clark heads to the warm-water pool and the gym at Casa Colina Centers for Rehabilitation in Pomona. Her pain, she says, has gone from a six or seven on a 10-point scale scale down to a one or two.

“It would kill me to walk from the car to the doctor’s office. I was using a cane. I didn’t have the mind-set that moving is the key … I really got my life back.”

Movement-based therapies such as yoga, tai chi, qigong and more mainstream forms of exercise are gaining acceptance in the world of chronic pain management. Many pain clinics and integrative medicine centers now offer movement-based therapy for pain caused by cancer and cancer treatments, rheumatoid arthritis, fibromyalgia, multiple sclerosis, and other diseases and conditions. And Loyola Marymount University in Los Angeles offers a three-year yoga therapy course as part of the school’s yoga studies program.

Several small studies in peer-reviewed journals attest to the effectiveness of these therapies.

Continue reading about Movement Therapies May Reduce Chronic Pain. 

© LA Times, 2010

Photo by flickr user DVIDSHUB

REUTERS– Americans spend twice as much as residents of other developed countries on healthcare, but get lower quality, less efficiency and have the least equitable system, according to a report released on Wednesday.

The United States ranked last when compared to six other countries – Britain, Canada, Germany, Netherlands, Australia and New Zealand, the Commonwealth Fund report found.

“As an American it just bothers me that with all of our know-how, all of our wealth, that we are not assuring that people who need healthcare can get it,” Commonwealth Fund president Karen Davis told reporters in a telephone briefing.

Previous reports by the nonprofit fund, which conducts research into healthcare performance and promotes changes in the U.S. system, have been heavily used by policymakers and politicians pressing for healthcare reform.

Davis said she hoped health reform legislation passed in March would lead to improvements.

The current report uses data from nationally representative patient and physician surveys in seven countries in 2007, 2008, and 2009. It is available here

In 2007, health spending was $7,290 per person in the United States, more than double that of any other country in the survey. Australians spent $3,357, Canadians $3,895, Germans $3,588, the Netherlands $3,837 and Britons spent $2,992 per capita on health in 2007. New Zealand spent the least at $2,454.

Continue reading about US Scores Dead Last Again in Healthcare Study.

© Reuters, 2010

Photo by flickr user morrissey

ELEPHANT JOURNAL– A convenience “cooking” method that was invented by the Nazis, refined by the notorious company Raytheon and banned by Russia in the 70’s, the microwave has no place in my kitchen.

Some are still convinced that these radiation boxes are safe, nuke hot meals with efficiency and have no side-effects. Really? There are some scary facts that prove otherwise. If these don’t provoke you to adopt slower cooking methods, not sure what will.

1. Remember the lawsuit that involved a hospital warming blood in a microwave prior to a blood transfusion, resulting in the death of a womyn prior to a hip surgery?

2. Research has proven that heating breast milk or baby formula in a microwave destroys vital vitamins and nutrients.

3. Heating prepared meats in a microwave sufficiently for human consumption created:

* d-Nitrosodiethanolamine (a well-known cancer-causing agent)

* Destabilization of active protein biomolecular compounds

* Creation of a binding effect to radioactivity in the atmosphere

* Creation of cancer-causing agents within protein-hydrosylate compounds in milk and cereal grains;

4. Microwave emissions also caused alteration in the catabolic (breakdown) behavior of glucoside – and galactoside – elements within frozen fruits when thawed in this way;

5. Microwaves altered catabolic behavior of plant-alkaloids when raw, cooked or frozen vegetables were exposed for even very short periods;

Continue reading about 10 Reasons to Ditch the Microwave.

© Elephant Journal, 2010

Photo by flickr user Robert Couse-Baker

NATURAL NEWS– Municipalities all across America are currently dripping fluoride chemicals into their public water supply, dosing over a hundred million Americans with a chemical that they claim “prevents cavities.”

What’s interesting here is that this biological effect of “preventing cavities” is a medical claim, according to the FDA. And as such, making this claim instantly and automatically transforms fluoride into a “drug” under currently FDA regulations.

This means that cities and towns all across America are now practicing medicine without a license by dripping liquid medication into the public water supply without the consent of those who are swallowing the medication.

If you or I did this, we would be arrested and tried as either terrorists (because contaminating the water supply is an act of terrorism) or felons practicing medicine without a license. So what allows cities and towns to get away with these very same crimes?

Cities openly violate state and federal law

Keep in mind that a medication can only be legally prescribed to someone after they have been diagnosed with a medical need. In other words, a doctor can’t legally prescribe you some pharmaceutical unless he examines you and determines you actually need it. But fluoride is medicating everyone whether they need it or not, without any medical diagnosis whatsoever.

And that means those children or adults who already have high exposure to fluoride (from swallowing toothpaste or drinking fluoridated bottled water, for example) may now be exposed to too much fluoride from the added amounts in the tap water. Excess fluoride can cause serious health problems such as bone fractures and dark spots appearing on your teeth (dental fluorosis).

Continue reading about Why the Fluoridation of Public Water Supplies is Illegal.

© Natural News, 2010

Photo by flickr user Dottie Mae

Other resources to check out:
Fluoride Action Network
www.FluorideAlert.org

Citizens for Safe Drinking Water
www.NoFluoride.com

IAOMT (dentists opposing mercury)
www.iaomt.org

NATURAL NEWS– The Obama administration’s Department of Agriculture (USDA) is attempting to downplay the risks of genetically modified alfalfa, a crop previously banned by numerous federal courts.

In 2007, a federal court rejected the Bush USDA’s approval of alfalfa plants genetically engineered for resistance to the Monsanto herbicide Roundup. The court ruled that the USDA had not properly considered the risks posed by the crop. These risks included the possibility that the genetically modified (GM) crops could swap genetic material with related species, thus contaminating neighboring fields or producing non-agricultural “super weeds.”

Monsanto continues to appeal the decision, even though the Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals has ruled against it twice. The case is now pending consideration by the Supreme Court.

Alfalfa is the first perennial crop to be genetically modified. Because it does not die after a year but can regenerate itself from even its roots, the risk of genetic contamination is higher than even that from GM annual crops, which have already been documented to spread beyond the fields they are planted in.

Continue reading about Obama’s USDA Deceives Americans Over GM Crops.

© Natural News, 2010

Photo by flickr user Tim Psych