What is in Those Supplements?

- By Anahad O'Connor - February 3, 2015 - The New York Times

The New York State attorney general’s office accused four national retailers on Monday of selling dietary supplements that were fraudulent and in many cases contaminated with unlisted ingredients.

The authorities said they had run tests on popular store brands of herbal supplements at the retailers — Walmart, Walgreens, Target and GNC — which showed that roughly four out of five of the products contained none of the herbs listed on their labels. In many cases, the authorities said, the supplements contained little more than cheap fillers like rice and house plants, or substances that could be hazardous to people with food allergies.

At GNC, for example, the agency found that five out of six samples from the company’s signature “Herbal Plus” brand of supplements “were either unrecognizable or a substance other than what they claimed to be.” In pills labeled ginkgo biloba, the agency found only rice, asparagus and spruce, an ornamental plant commonly used for Christmas decorations.

At Target, the agency tested six herbal products from its popular “Up and Up” store brand of supplements. Three out of six – including ginkgo biloba, St. John’s wort and valerian root, a sleep aid – tested negative for the herbs listed on their labels. But the agency did find that the pills contained powdered rice, beans, peas and wild carrots.

Here are the products that were analyzed by the attorney general, along with the test results that were described in cease-and-desist letters that the agency sent to the four retailers.  Meanwhile we, the consumers should boycott: Walmart, Walgreens, Target and GNC.

From GNC, Herbal Plus brand:

Gingko Biloba:

• No gingko biloba found
• Did detect allium (garlic), rice, spruce and asparagus

St. John’s Wort

• No St. John’s Wort found
• Did detect allium (garlic), rice and dracaena (a tropical houseplant)

Ginseng

• No ginseng found
• Did detect rice, dracaena, pine, wheat/grass and citrus

Garlic

• Contained garlic

Echinacea

• No echinacea found
• Did detect rice in some samples

Saw Palmetto

• One sample contained the clear presence of palmetto
• Other samples contained a variety of ingredients, including asparagus, rice and primrose

From Target, Up & Up brand

Gingko Biloba

• No gingko biloba found
• Found garlic, rice and mung/French bean

St. John’s Wort

• No St. John’s Wort found
• Found garlic, rice and dracaena (houseplant)

Garlic

• Contained garlic
• One test identified no DNA

Echinacea

• Most but not all tests detected Echinacea
• One test identified rice

Saw Palmetto

• Most tests detected saw palmetto
• Some tests found no plant DNA

Valerian Root

• No valerian root found
• Found allium, bean, asparagus, pea family, rice, wild carrot and saw palmetto

From Walgreens, Finest Nutrition brand

Gingko Biloba

• No gingko biloba found
• Did detect rice

St. John’s Wort

• No St. John’s Wort found
• Detected garlic, rice and dracaena

Ginseng

• No ginseng found
• Detected garlic and rice

Garlic

• No garlic found
• Detected palm, dracaena, wheat and rice

Echinacea

• No echinacea found
• Identified garlic, rice and daisy

Saw Palmetto

• Contained saw palmetto

From Walmart, Spring Valley brand

Gingko Biloba

• No gingko biloba found
• Found rice, dracaena, mustard, wheat and radish

St. John’s Wort

• No St. John’s Wort found
• Detected garlic, rice and cassava

Ginseng

• No ginseng found
• Found rice, dracaena, pine, wheat/grass and citrus

Garlic

• One sample showed small amounts of garlic
• Found rice, pine, palm, dracaena and wheat

Echinacea

• No echinacea or plant material found

Saw Palmetto

• Some samples contained small amounts of saw palmetto
• Also found garlic and rice

Related: “New York Attorney General Targets Supplements at Major Retailers”

Related: “Letters Outlining What Was Found in Herbal Supplements”

France law bans Wi-Fi in daycares, restricts wireless infrastructure

- By Pierre Le Hir - Le Monde, France - February 1, 2015

Two years in the works, a new law governing public exposure to electromagnetic fields generated by wireless technology (including base stations, mobile phones, tablets, and WiFi) was adopted by the Members of the National Assembly (MNAs) on Thursday, January 29. It was passed by a majority vote, while the UDI Party abstained – except Bertrand Pancher (Meuse), who voted in favor. The UMP voted against it, seeing it as an barrier to the development of digital industries.

This new law – the first in France to establish a precautionary approach addressing the potential health risks of radio frequencies – is the result of a real obstacle course, during which its initial ambitions were seriously downgraded. The Bill, filed in January 2013 by the MNA for Val-de-Marne Laurence Abeille (Europe Ecologie-Greens) had been referred to committee by the Socialists, before returning to the National Assembly in January 2014, under a watered-down form, and then to be adopted in first reading by the Senate in June 2014.

Despite these successive setbacks, the environmental group decided to submit the Bill to a vote as is, to prevent its return to the Senate where it would have suffered new delays and probably additional knife strokes. Its adoption is thus final. Ms. Abeille stated, “the application decrees will be able to be taken without further delay”.

Not Lowering the Limits

The new law, “An Act on Sobriety, Transparency, Information and Consultation for Exposure to Electromagnetic Waves”, is a compromise between the supporters of a stricter supervision of the sector and wireless phone operators, opposed to any regulatory obstacle. “This present text does not fully address all the issues,” recognizes the Green MNA. “However, it is an essential first step.”

A major point is the introduction into French law a principle of “sobriety” of public exposure to electromagnetic fields. However, virtuous as it is, this principle remains vague and non-binding: while the original Bill was aimed to scale back radiation exposure to“as low as reasonably possible” or 0.6 volts per meter, or V/m (approx 0.1 µW/cm2), this was not successfully included in the final version. Depending on the frequency, the limit of radiation exposure in France is between 41 and 61 V/m (approx 455-955 µW/cm2).

Hot Spots

The National Frequency Agency (AFNR) will nevertheless make every year a national census of “atypical points” or “places where the level of public exposure substantially exceeds that generally observed at the national scale”. Network operators will have to remedy them within six months, “subject to technical feasibility”.

The average exposure in France is now about 1 V/m, but a study of the Operations Committee on mobile waves (Copic), covering sixteen municipal representative of the French territory and published in 2013, reported some exposure peaks “up to 10 V/m at maximum transmitter power”, even if the levels remained below 0.7 V/m in 90% of cases. The AFNR considers up to now as atypical places where exposure exceeds 6 V/m (approx 9.5 µW/cm2).

To establish transparency, the installation of antennas will now be subject to prior notice to mayors and presidents of regional-municipal bodies, who may if they choose organize a consultation with residents. In addition, a campaign of “awareness and information on the responsible and rational use of mobile devices” will be conducted.

Wi-Fi Prohibited in Daycare Centers

A section of the Act is devoted to the protection of babies. Wireless devices will be banned in “the spaces dedicated to the care, resting and activities of children under 3 years”, that is to say, nurseries and daycare centers. However, contrary to the initial desire of safety proponents, Wi-Fi will remain permitted in primary schools. It will however be disabled for activities other than “digital educational activities“.

Finally, the often-dramatic situation of people suffering from electro-hypersenitivity receives a first consideration. The government will have to submit a report to Parliament on this issue within a year.

Even though there was much comprised in the end, leading advocates consider the glass half full rather than half empty. “This act, which is the first dedicated to the issue of electromagnetic waves and their impact on the environment and health, marks a first step in the legal recognition of the need to regulate the development of mobile phone communications and all wireless applications,” says the association for the regulation of mobile phone base stations (Priartem). In its view, “this first legislative effort must be an encouragement to go further in protecting people”.

Calls for Caution

This act arrives in a context of accelerated development of sources of electromagnetic fields, in particular with the deployment of very high-speed 4G mobile communications. Aa of January 1st 2015, ANFR indicates the number of 4G base station sites authorized in France was, for all operators, 18,699 – compared to 12,525 a year earlier – and 15,424 are in service.

While there is still no official scientific consensus around the potential health risks from radiofrequencies, many studies and opinions have called for caution. In 2011, the World Health Organization (WHO) classified them as “possibly carcinogenic” . And in 2013, the National Agency Health Safety of Food, Environment and Labour (ANSES) recommended to “limit exposure of the population to radiofrequencies – especially from mobile phones – especially for children and heavy users”. It also called for “controlling the overall exposure from base stations”.

Those Vaccinated Spreading Measles: WHO, Merck, CDC Documents Confirmed

- By Sayer Ji - Friday, January 30th, 2015

20 years ago, the MMR vaccine was found to infect virtually all of its recipients with measles. The manufacturer Merck's own product warning links MMR to a potentially fatal form of brain inflammation caused by measles. Why is this evidence not being reported?

The phenomenon of measles infection spread by MMR (live measles-mumps-rubella vaccine) has been known for decades. In fact, 20 years ago, scientists working at the CDC's National Center for Infectious Diseases, funded by the WHO and the National Vaccine Program, discovered something truly disturbing about the MMR vaccine: it leads to detectable measles infection in the vast majority of those who receive it.

Published in 1995 in the Journal of Clinical Microbiology and titled, "Detection of Measles Virus RNA in Urine Specimens from Vaccine Recipients," researchers analyzed urine samples from newly MMR vaccinated 15-month-old children and young adults and reported their eye-opening results as following:

• Measles virus RNA was detected in 10 of 12 children during the 2-week sampling period.
• In some cases, measles virus RNA was detected as early as 1 day or as late as 14 days after the children were vaccinated.
• Measles virus RNA was also detected in the urine samples from all four of the young adults between 1 and 13 days after vaccination.

The authors of this study used a relatively new technology at that time, namely, reverse transcriptase polymerase chain reaction (RT-PCR), which they believed could help resolve growing challenges associated with measles detection in the shifting post-mass immunization epidemiological and clinical landscape. These challenges include:

• A changing clinical presentation towards 'milder' or asymptomatic measles in previously vaccinated individuals.
• A changing epidemiological distribution of measles (a shift toward children younger than 15 months, teenagers, and young adults)
• Increasing difficulty distinguishing measles-like symptoms (exanthema) caused by a range of other pathogens from those caused by measles virus.
• An increase in sporadic measles outbreaks in previously vaccinated individuals.

Twenty years later, PCR testing is widely acknowledged as highly sensitive and specific, and the only efficient way to distinguish vaccine-strain and wild-type measles infection, as their clinical presentation are indistinguishable.

Did the CDC Use PCR Testing On The Disneyland Measles Cases?

The latest measles outbreak at Disney is a perfect example of where PCR testing could be used to ascertain the true origins of the outbreak. The a priori assumption that the non-vaccinated are carriers and transmitters of a disease the vaccinated are immune to has not been scientifically validated. Since vaccine strain measles has almost entirely supplanted wild-type, communally acquired measles, it is statistically unlikely that PCR tests will reveal the media's hysterical storyline -- "non-vaxxers brought back an eradicated disease!" -- to be true. Until such studies are performed and exposed, we will never know for certain.

Laura Hayes, of Age of Autism, recently addressed this key question in her insightful article "Disney, Measles, and the Fantasyland of Vaccine Perfection":

"Has there been any laboratory confirmation of even one case of the supposed measles related to Disneyland? If yes, was the confirmed case tested to determine whether it was wild-type measles or vaccine-strain measles? If not, why not? These are important questions to ask. Is it measles or not? If yes, what kind, because if it's vaccine-strain measles, then that means it is the vaccinated who are contagious and spreading measles resulting in what the media likes to label "outbreaks" to create panic (a panic more appropriately triggered by our 25 year history of epidemic autism).

It would be what one might call vaccine fallout. People who receive live-virus vaccines, such as the MMR, can then shed that live virus, for up to many weeks and can infect others. Other live-virus vaccines include the nasal flu vaccine, shingles vaccine, rotavirus vaccine, chicken pox vaccine, and yellow fever vaccine."

Additional Evidence That the Vaccinated Are Not Immune, Spread Disease

The National Vaccine Information Center has published an important document relevant to this topic titled "The Emerging Risks of Live Virus & Virus Vectored Vaccines: Vaccine Strain Virus Infection, Shedding & Transmission." Pages 34-36 in the section on "Measles, Mumps, Rubella Viruses and Live Attenuated Measles, Mumps, Rubella Viruses" discuss evidence that the MMR vaccine can lead to measles infection and transmission.

Cases highlighted include:

• In 2010, Eurosurveillance published a report about excretion of vaccine strain measles virus in urine and pharyngeal secretions of a Croatian child with vaccine-associated rash illness.^[1] A healthy 14-month old child was given MMR vaccine and eight days later developed macular rash and fever. Lab testing of throat and urine samples between two and four weeks after vaccination tested positive for vaccine strain measles virus. Authors of the report pointed out that when children experience a fever and rash after MMR vaccination, only molecular lab testing can determine whether the symptoms are due to vaccine strain measles virus infection. They stated: "According to WHO guidelines for measles and rubella elimination, routine discrimination between aetiologies of febrile rash disease is done by virus detection. However, in a patient recently MMR-vaccinated, only molecular techniques can differentiate between wild type measles or rubella infection or vaccine-associated disease. This case report demonstrates that excretion of Schwartz measles virus occurs in vaccinees."
  
  
• In 2012, Pediatric Child Health published a report describing a healthy 15-month old child in Canada, who developed irritability, fever, cough, conjunctivitis and rash within seven days of an MMR shot.^[2] Blood, urine and throat swab tests were positive for vaccine strain measles virus infection 12 days after vaccination. Addressing the potential for measles vaccine strain virus transmission to others, the authors stated, "While the attenuated virus can be detected in clinical specimens following immunization, it is understood that administration of the MMR vaccine to immunocompetent individuals does not carry the risk of secondary transmission to susceptible hosts.
  
  
• In 2013, Eurosurveillance published a report of vaccine strain measles occurring weeks after MMR vaccination in Canada. Authors stated, "We describe a case of measlesmumps-rubella (MMR) vaccine-associated measles illness that was positive by both PCR and IgM, five weeks after administration of the MMR vaccine." The case involved a two-year-old child, who developed runny nose, fever, cough, macular rash and conjunctivitis after vaccination and tested positive for vaccine strain measles virus infection in throat swab and blood tests.^[3] Canadian health officials authoring the report raised the question of whether there are unidentified cases of vaccine strain measles infections and the need to know more about how long measles vaccine strain shedding lasts. They concluded that the case they reported "likely represents the existence of additional, but unidentified, exceptions to the typical timeframe for measles vaccine virus shedding and illness." They added that "further investigation is needed on the upper limit of measles vaccine virus shedding based on increased sensitivity of the RT-PCR-based detection technologies and immunological factors associated with vaccine-associated measles illness and virus shedding." In addition to this evidence for the disease-promoting nature of the measles vaccine, we recently reported on a case of a twice vaccinated adult in NYC becoming infected with measles and then spreading it to two secondary contacts, both of which were vaccinated twice and found to have presumably protective IgM antibodies.

This double failure of the MMR vaccine renders highly suspicious the unsubstantiated claims that when an outbreak of measles occurs the non- or minimally vaccinated are responsible. The assumption that vaccination equals bona fide immunity has never been supported by the evidence itself. We have previously reported on a growing body of evidence that even when a vaccine is mandated, and 99% of a population receive the measles vaccines, outbreaks not only happen, but as compliance increases vaccine resistance sporadic outbreaks also increase -- a clear indication of vaccine failure.

There is also the concerning fact that according to the MMR vaccine's manufacturer Merck's own product insert, the MMR can cause measles inclusion body encephalitis (MIBE), a rare but potentially lethal form of brain infection with measles. For more information you can review a case report on MIBE caused by vaccine strain measles published in the journal Clinical Infectious Diseases in 1999 titled "Measles inclusion-body encephalitis caused by the vaccine strain of measles virus."

Global Measles Vaccine Failures Increasingly Reported

China is not the only country dealing with outbreaks in near universally vaccinated populations. Between 2008-2011, France reported over 20,000 cases of measles, with adolescents and young adults accounting for more than half of cases.^[4] Remarkably, these outbreaks began when France was experiencing some of their highest coverage rates in history. For instance, in 2008, the MMR1 coverage reached 96.6% in children 11 years of age. For a more extensive review of measles outbreaks in vaccinated populations read our article The 2013 Measles Outbreak: A Failing Vaccine, Not A Failure to Vaccinate.

Given that clinical evidence, case reports, epidemiological studies, and even the vaccine manufacturer's own product warnings, all show directly or indirectly that MMR can spread measles infection, how can we continue to stand by and let the media, government and medical establishment blame the non-vaccinated on these outbreaks without any concrete evidence?

References:

^[1] Kaic B, Gjenero-Margan I, Aleraj B. Spotlight on Measles 2010: Excretion of Vaccine Strain Measles Virus in Urine and Pharyngeal Secretions of a Child with Vaccine Associated Febrile Rash Illness, Croatia, March 2010. Eurosurveillance 2010 15(35).

^[2] Nestibo L, Lee BE, Fonesca K et al. Differentiating the wild from the attenuated during a measles outbreak. Paediatr Child Health Apr. 2012; 17(4).

^[3] Murti M, Krajden M, Petric M et al. Case of Vaccine Associated Measles Five Weeks Post-Immunisation, British Columbia, Canada, October 2013. Eurosurveillance Dec. 5, 2013; 18(49).

^[4] Antona D, Lévy-Bruhl D, Baudon C, Freymuth F, Lamy M, Maine C, Floret D, Parent du Chatelet I. Measles elimination efforts and 2008-2011 outbreak, France. Emerg Infect Dis. 2013 Mar;19(3):357-64. doi: 10.3201/eid1903.121360. PubMed PMID: 23618523; PubMed Central PMCID: PMC3647670. Free full text Related citations