Category Archives: Health Care & Medicare

Wake-Up Wal-Mart Bus Tour in Iowa

Posted on August 9, 2006 by bfiacarolinevernon

  Wake-Up Wal-Mart Bus Tour in Iowa – Get on Board the Bus! – Information Update! http://www.wakeupwalmart.com The WakeUpWalMart.com bus tour has been a huge success so far (see clips below to give you a sense of some of the … Continue reading →

Posted in Calls to Action, Candidates, Chet Culver, Corporate Greed, DFQC, Health Care & Medicare, Iowa in the News, Jobs, Labor, Local Events, Main Page, National News, Progressive Community | Comments Off on Wake-Up Wal-Mart Bus Tour in Iowa

Working Toward Economic Justice in the QC

Posted on April 19, 2006 by bfiacarolinevernon

      Working Toward Economic Justice in the QC: By Caroline Vernon “Tax-Day” Leadership planning session and Wake-Up Walmart Demonstration We couldn't have asked for a more beautiful day to “get active“. Over a dozen community leaders and concerned citizens started … Continue reading →

Posted in Bush Tax, Calls to Action, Corporate Greed, Environment, Health Care & Medicare, Iowa in the News, Jobs, Labor, Local Events, Main Page, National News, Progressive Community | Comments Off on Working Toward Economic Justice in the QC

Tax-Day Wal-Mart Demonstration in the Quad Cities

Posted on April 14, 2006 by bfiacarolinevernon

  Tax Day Walmart Demonstration by Caroline VernonTax- Day Walmart Demonstration – in the Quad CitiesMaking a push for the Fair Share For Health Care Bill Saturday, April 15th12:30pm – 1:30pmNortheast corner of 53rd & Elmore(parking at Staples)DavenportFriends,Iowa needs our … Continue reading →

Posted in Big Government, Calls to Action, Corporate Greed, DFQC, Environment, Health Care & Medicare, How You Can Help, Iowa in the News, Jobs, Labor, Local Events, Main Page, National News, Progressive Community | Comments Off on Tax-Day Wal-Mart Demonstration in the Quad Cities

Fallon Reschedules Health Care Tour for Thursday and Friday of This Week

Posted on February 22, 2006 by bfialindathieman

Fallon Reschedules Health Care Tour for Thursday and Friday of This Week State Representative and gubernatorial candidate Ed Fallon (D-Des Moines) will visit 8 cities in central and eastern Iowa on Thursday and Friday to introduce his plan for universal … Continue reading →

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Report on Health Care Lobby Day in Des Moines

Posted on February 16, 2006 by bfiacarolinevernon

   Report on Health Care Lobby Day in Des Moines by Caroline Vernoncontributions by Karen Metcalf On February 7th, many health care advocates from across the state came together in association with Democracy For America, Democracy For Iowa and Iowa … Continue reading →

Posted in Calls to Action, Corporate Greed, DFQC, Health Care & Medicare, How You Can Help, Iowa in the News, Local Events, Main Page, Progressive Community | Comments Off on Report on Health Care Lobby Day in Des Moines

Iowa Legislature: Invalidating Natural and Alternative Healing

Posted on February 9, 2006 by bfialindathieman

  Iowa Legislature: Invalidating Natural and Alternative Healing by Larry Hanus, Waterloo Iowa Health Freedom Stand up for your freedom to make your own health care choices. Stand up for SF 2095.   Yesterday 9 members of the Iowa Health … Continue reading →

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Where Has Health Freedom Gone in Iowa? WHO Radio, Feb. 7

Posted on February 6, 2006 by bfialindathieman

  Where Has Health Freedom Gone in Iowa?  WHO Radio, Feb. 7 Iowa Health Freedom on Jan Mickelson Show  Feb. 7 WHO Talk Radio with Jan Mickelson.  Channel AM 1040. Feb. 7, Tues.  10:00 AM.    Where has Health Freedom … Continue reading →

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Iowa Health Freedom Coalition Day at the Capitol Mon., Feb. 13

Posted on February 4, 2006 by bfialindathieman

  Iowa Health Freedom Coalition Day at the Capitol Monday, Feb. 13   The Iowa Health Freedom Coalition, http://www.IowaHealthFreedom.org, enthusiastically invites you to attend our Day at the Capitol for consumers and practitioners interested in the growth of the healing … Continue reading →

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Most Offspring Died When Mother Rats Ate GM Soy Diet

Posted on January 27, 2006 by bfialindathieman

Most Offspring Died When Mother Rats Ate GM Soy Diet

By Jeffrey M. Smith, author of Seeds of Deception

The Russian scientist planned a simple experiment to see if eating genetically modified (GM) soy might influence offspring. What she got, however, was an astounding result that may threaten a multi-billion dollar industry.

Irina Ermakova, a leading scientist at the Institute of Higher Nervous Activity and Neurophysiology of the Russian Academy of Sciences (RAS), added GM soy flour (5-7 grams) to the diet of female rats. Other females were fed non-GM soy or no soy at all. The experimental diet began two weeks before the rats conceived and continued through pregnancy and nursing.

Ermakova's first surprise came when her pregnant rats started giving birth. Some pups from GM-fed mothers were quite a bit smaller. After 2 weeks, 36% of them weighed less than 20 grams compared to about 6% from the other groups.

But the real shock came when the rats started dying. Within three weeks, 25 of the 45 (55.6%) rats from the GM soy group died compared to only 3 of 33 (9%) from the non-GM soy group and 3 of 44 (6.8%) from the non-soy controls.

Ermakova preserved several major organs from the mother rats and offspring, drew up designs for a detailed organ analysis, created plans to repeat and expand the feeding trial, and promptly ran out of research money. The $70,000 needed was not expected to arrive for a year. Therefore, when she was invited to present her research at a symposium organized by the National Association for Genetic Security, Ermakova wrote 'PRELIMINARY STUDIES' on the top of her paper. She presented it on October 10, 2005 at a session devoted to the risks of GM food.

Her findings are hardly welcome by an industry already steeped in controversy.

GM Soy's Divisive Past

The soy she was testing was Monsanto's Roundup Ready variety. Its DNA has bacterial genes added that allow the soy plant to survive applications of Monsanto's 'Roundup' brand herbicide. About 85% of the soy grown in the US is Roundup Ready. Since soy derivatives, including oil, flour and lecithin, are found in the majority of processed foods sold in the US, many Americans eat ingredients derived from Roundup Ready soy everyday.

The FDA does not require any safety tests on genetically modified foods. If Monsanto or other biotech companies declare their foods safe, the agency has no further questions. The rationale for this hands-off position is a sentence in the FDA's 1992 policy that states, “The agency is not aware of any information showing that foods derived by these new methods differ from other foods in any meaningful or uniform way.”[1] The statement, it turns out, was deceptive. Documents made public from a lawsuit years later revealed that the FDA's own experts agreed that GM foods are different and might lead to hard-to-detect allergens, toxins, new diseases or nutritional problems. They had urged their superiors to require long-term safety studies, but were ignored. The person in charge of FDA policy was, conveniently, Monsanto's former attorney (and later their vice president). One FDA microbiologist described the GM food policy as “just a political document” without scientific basis, and warned that industry would “not do the tests that they would normally do” since the FDA didn't require any.[2] He was correct.

There have been less than 20 published, peer-reviewed animal feeding safety studies and no human clinical trials' in spite of the fact that millions of people eat GM soy, corn, cotton, or canola daily. There are no adequate tests on “biochemistry, immunology, tissue pathology, gut function, liver function and kidney function,”[3] and animal feeding studies are too short to adequately test for cancer, reproductive problems, or effects in the next generation. This makes Ermakova's research particularly significant. It's the first of its kind.

Past Studies Show Significant Effects

Other studies on Roundup Ready soy also raise serious questions. Research on the liver, the body's major de-toxifier, showed that rats fed GM soy developed misshapen nuclei and other cellular anomalies.[4] This indicates increased metabolic activity, probably resulting from a major insult to that organ. Rats also showed changes in the pancreas, including a huge drop in the production of a major enzyme (alpha-amylase),[5] which could inhibit digestion. Cooked GM soy contains about twice the amount of soy lectin, which can also block nutrient assimilation.[6] And one study showed that GM soy has 12-14% less isoflavones, which are touted as cancer fighting.[7]
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What’s Good about Choice in Iowa?

Posted on January 22, 2006 by bfialindathieman

  What’s Good about Choice in Iowa? To top off Blog for Iowa’s contribution to Blog for Choice day, here is a round-up of some of the positive choice-related things in Iowa that our few remaining freedoms still bring us, … Continue reading →

Posted in Choice, Health Care & Medicare, Main Page, Progressive Community | 2 Comments