Food Safety Official's Ties to Monsanto Spur Petition to Ouster

From Bloomberg News.

"A top U.S. regulator’s ties to Monsanto Co. (MON), a maker of genetically modified food, are fueling an election-year recall push by consumer and public-interest groups flexing their clout on the Internet.

Michael Taylor, the Food and Drug Administration’s deputy commissioner for food safety, is at the center of a burgeoning dispute between opponents who have amassed more than 420,000 signatures on an online petition demanding he be fired and supporters who praise his efforts to curb foodborne illnesses.

At issue are the 16 months ending in 2000 that Taylor worked as St. Louis-based Monsanto’s vice president for public policy, between stints in the Clinton and Obama administrations. The petition reflects anger over the agency’s enforcement actions against small food producers and products such as raw milk and may prove embarrassing to a White House eager to distance itself from corporate interests, said Marion Nestle, a New York University professor.

Taylor is “a flashpoint for a lot of distrust about federal regulation,” said Nestle, a professor of nutrition at the Manhattan-based school. “The FDA is perceived as going after small farmers and leaving the larger ones alone. The White House doesn’t want the FDA making an issue that will cause trouble during an election year.”

Taylor’s broad expertise, including his experience in industry, benefits the agency, Siobhan Delancey, an FDA spokeswoman, wrote in an e-mail. Before Taylor worked at Monsanto, he served in the administration of then President Bill Clinton as the FDA’s deputy commissioner for policy from 1991 to 1994.

Transparency Goal

During his time at Monsanto, Taylor worked to improve transparency, leaving when “it became clear that the company’s management was not unified in its commitment to making such a change,” Delancey said in the e-mail.

Monsanto produces a wide range of seeds and biotechnology products with traits that help farmers control pests, and are sold to other agricultural producers. The U.S. Department of Agriculture is primarily responsible for regulating genetically modified crops and consults with the FDA on whether the products are substantially equivalent to what exists in nature.

The online petition, along with others circulated on Facebook and other social-media sites since at least August, blames Taylor for allowing genetically modified organisms into the U.S. food supply without requiring testing as to their effects while he served at the agency in the 1990s.

Taylor’s “legacy of supporting Monsanto to have free rein in U.S. food policy is a nightmare scenario,” the petition states.

Work Misrepresented

Taylor, in an interview, said his work is misrepresented, and the effort to have him fired “is more about Monsanto than about me. The claim is I was a Monsanto lobbyist, which paints a bad picture,” he said. “It doesn’t say what I did there or what I think about biotechnology.”

Taylor said he focused on outreach to biotech stakeholders and improving transparency about the company’s work.

Spokesmen for Monsanto declined to speak specifically about Taylor’s role, instead pointing to a company statement Monsanto’s website that rejects the idea of collusion among regulators and the industry.

“The public and private sectors benefit when employers have access to the most competent and experienced people,” Monsanto says on its website. Accusations of the “revolving door” leading to beneficial treatment “ignore the simple truth that people regularly change jobs to find positions that match their experience, skills and interests.”

Recused Himself

Taylor didn’t lobby for the company, the FDA’s Delancey said. In his current post since January 2010, he’s also recused himself from involvement in issues related to animal and plant biotechnology that may create an appearance of conflict, she said.

Taylor has garnered praise from food-safety advocates for efforts to curb foodborne illnesses. Supporters circulated a letter in February calling the attacks “a factually untrue Internet smear campaign.”

He’s been a proactive regulator, strengthening restrictions on strains of E. coli in meat instead of just reacting to outbreaks, according to the letter signed by members of the Washington-based Center for Science in the Public Interest, a consumer advocacy group, and others such as Bill Marler, a Seattle-based food safety lawyer.

Policy Chief

“If we want to complain about policy at FDA, take it up with his boss who’s up for election,” Marler said in an interview, referring to President Barack Obama. “In my dealings, Mike Taylor’s open and accessible.”

The petition is “terribly irresponsible,” said Michael Jacobson, the center’s executive director. “It’s an attack on government in general. They’re using Mike Taylor as a straw man to attack genetically modified foods. They picked the wrong straw man.”

Genetically modified food has been grown for more than 15 years and has been extensively tested by third parties, Lee Quarles, a Monsanto spokesman, said in an interview.

“The benefits of biotech are well established, as are the safety records of these products,” he said, adding that it’s one tool to help feed the growing world population.

Nestle said the FDA sided with agriculture and biotech interests by not requiring genetically modified food to be labeled as such in the 1990s. A petition calling on the FDA to require producers to label the products -- known as the Just Label It campaign -- has garnered about 850,000 responses with a goal of 1 million within months.

Food Labeling

Taylor has addressed labeling genetically modified products in the past. The European Union has embraced labeling as a way to allow consumers to identify such items, he noted in a 2003 article in Nature Biotechnology.

“By adopting a choice-based agenda, the U.S. can remake its leadership on biotechnology,” Taylor wrote, adding that agriculture and biotech companies that oppose choice by aggressively marketing the technology are “on the wrong side.”

“As with any new food technology, to be accepted, consumers feel the need to have a choice,” Taylor said, adding that any personal opinion is irrelevant since he recuses himself from decisions on genetically modified food.

Taylor said he is focused on implementation of the Food Modernization Safety Act, which Obama signed last year and marks the most sweeping reform to food safety laws in more than 70 years. Proposals are expected shortly that will set minimum standards for the safe production and harvest of fruits and vegetables. A proposal that designates high-risk foods subject to more requirements is also pending.

Nestle said Taylor’s future may hinge on whether Obama’s FDA is seen as beholden to corporate interests.

“It depends on how big and noisy this gets,” she said. “The question is, will it cause trouble for Obama? If it does, he’s gone. If not, he’ll stay. He comes with a lot of baggage.”

I wonder if anyone's studied the difference in outbreak occurrences between the U.S. and Jewish or Muslim dietary and/or butchering practices.

Selenium Supplements May Help--or Harm

From HealthDay News. Check your other supplements, as they may contain added selenium (such as Vitamin E caps).

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"While getting the right amount of selenium in your diet can boost your immune function and lower your risk of death, you can get too much of a good thing. Higher-than-normal levels of selenium may contribute to the development of type 2 diabetes, hair loss and certain cancers, a new review of evidence finds.

"There is a U-shaped relationship between selenium intake and health. As selenium intake goes up from a low value, health improves until the bottom of the U-shaped curve is reached, but then adverse -- or even toxic -- effects begin to be seen," said Margaret Rayman, the author of the review of selenium research, and a professor of nutritional medicine at the University of Surrey, in England.

Selenium is a mineral found in a variety of foods. The amount of selenium in foods depends largely on where you live, as the selenium content in the soil varies. Selenium enters the food chain through plants, Rayman said. And, when animals consume the plants, they also consume selenium. Common sources of selenium include Brazil nuts, fish, poultry and wheat. Selenium is also available in supplement form.

Intake of selenium is high in Venezuela, Canada, the United States and Japan, according to background information in Rayman's review, while it's lower in Europe and some areas of China.

The average daily intake recommendations for selenium are 60 micrograms per day for men and 53 micrograms per day for women, according to the research.

For the study, Rayman searched medical literature to find previously completed studies on selenium. The results of that review appear online Feb. 29 in The Lancet.

Rayman found that daily intake of selenium varied from as little as 7 micrograms per day to as much as 4,990 micrograms per day. In Europe, the average intake was 40 micrograms per day, and in the United States, the average daily intake was 93 micrograms for women and 134 micrograms for men. Selenium supplements are likely part of this intake, Rayman said. That may be especially true in the United States where about half the population takes dietary supplements. Selenium is often found in multivitamins.

Rayman found several studies linking low selenium intake to a higher risk of dying from all causes as well as from cancer.

There's also some evidence that selenium levels can affect immune system function. Rayman found studies that suggest that selenium supplementation decreased hospital admissions due to infection for people who have HIV.

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Selenium also plays an important role in brain function, according to the review. In a study of adults older than 65, performance assessments of coordination were worse in people who had low selenium levels. There was also an increased incidence of Parkinson's disease in people with low selenium. Too little selenium may also increase the risk of dementia, the review found.

"Low selenium status has been associated with higher risk of mortality, poorer immune function and cognitive [brain] decline," Rayman said. "Increasing selenium intake can help our ability to handle viruses, increase successful male and female reproduction, and reduce the risk of autoimmune thyroid disease. There is also some evidence that selenium may reduce the risk of cancer."

But, higher levels of selenium don't come without risk. People with the highest levels of selenium intake may have a greater risk of type 2 diabetes, non-melanoma skin cancers, hair loss and skin rashes, according to Rayman.

A supplement industry spokesman weighed in on the findings.

"There are many established benefits of selenium, and if you don't get adequate intake, you may be forgoing those benefits. There's a small amount of evidence that too much of anything may have a risk, but there's a U-shaped curve, which means with too little, there are clear risks," said Duffy MacKay, vice president of scientific and regulatory affairs for the Council for Responsible Nutrition.

MacKay noted that Americans likely have normal or higher levels of selenium because they take supplements. "I wouldn't want these results to be interpreted to mean that people should stop taking supplements," he said.

So, how can you be sure you're getting adequate levels without getting too much? One way is to get a blood test to assess your current selenium levels.

However, if you don't get a blood test, Rayman said, "One can be fairly confident that in North America, additional selenium isn't needed, but the same may well not be true in Europe."

Rayman said that people generally don't need to be concerned about the amount of selenium in their diets. The only food that might provide higher-than-recommended amounts when consumed frequently is Brazil nuts, she said."

What they aren't telling you about those recommended daily intakes for men and women: you need to get those doses at least twice daily preferably about 8-12 hours apart, so we're looking at breakfast and dinner. This maintains the recommended level around the clock, and not just one short burst in the morning (or whenever you take supplements) that peters out by lunchtime.

U.S. Obesity, Chronic Disease Rates Stable in 2011

From Gallup Polls. The article is too full of graphs and charts that won't reproduce here, so I just give you the link.

I find it interesting that my state doesn't show up in ANY of the charts for highest or lowest of anything--I guess we really ARE middle-of-the-road.

At What Age Can You Give Up Dieting Forever?

From MSN NZ. The trick is to never get on the bandwagon to begin with--that way, you don't succumb to chronic disease, nutrient loss, or catabolism. If your parents ate right, you may never ever have to worry about it at all!

"Obesity contributes to the deaths of millions of people every year, reducing a person's lifespan by an average of six to seven years.

But a new study by Tel Aviv University found that the opposite is true after the age of 85, when excess fat starts to have a 'protective' effect.

Researchers say elderly people who were overweight had a lower risk of death than those who were underweight or had a normal body weight.

This is because heavier people have lower rates of osteoporosis — making them less likely to fall and injure themselves. Obesity also provides extra energy in times of trauma and stress, keeping older people alive for longer when they are unable to eat.

Researchers studied data on 1,349 people between the ages of 75 to 94. Twenty years after the information was collected, the participants were contacted again.

During the intervening 20 years, 95 percent of participants had died, leaving 59 still alive.

Of those still living, a large number were overweight or obese, suggesting that excess fat protected people once they turned 85, making them far less likely to die than their less-weighty counterparts.

Despite their findings, the study leaders warn that obesity is not something all seniors should strive for.

"Though obese people over the age of 85 may be less at risk of death, they may suffer more from obesity-related illnesses," Professor Jiska Cohen-Mansfield said. "There are other factors to consider, such as pain, multiple ailments, and mobility."

This study was published in the Journal of Aging Research."

I think it may be this article here, but I'm not sure--another title seemed to be a good candidate, but the text was only available for a fee.

Because excess nutrients are stored in fat cells, overweight people could theoretically cruise for quite a while on their fat before succumbing to catabolism.

Here is an interesting study about insulin effects and age.

Ancient Iceman Murder Victim was Lactose-Intolerant, Sickly

From the U.K. Register.

"Scientists sequencing the genome of the 5,000-year-old "Iceman" corpse found 20 years ago in the Tyrolean Alps, have discovered that he had brown eyes, was lactose-intolerant, prone to heart disease and had Lyme disease. The boffins also found that he may be related to some modern-day Northern Mediterraneans.

The results of their tests are published in the journal Nature Communications and unveil some of the characteristics of the ancient mountain roamer, the world's oldest glacier mummy.

Oetzi, who died of a flint arrow to the left shoulder and a blow to the head, also suffered from the tick-borne nervous system disorder Lyme disease, the scientists discovered after they found traces of an infection by the bacteria. It is the oldest documented case of Lyme disease in the world.

Despite a diet that was likely to be low in pork scratchings, the Iceman was also predisposed to coronary heart disease, the scientists found – confirming earlier findings that his arteries were found to be calcified. It's a discovery that shows it's not just modern lifestyles that are giving people heart attacks:

“The evidence that such a genetic predisposition already existed in Ötzi’s lifetime is of huge interest to us. It indicates that cardiovascular disease is by no means an illness chiefly associated with modern lifestyles. We are now eager to use these data to help us explore further how these diseases developed,” says anthropologist Albert Zink of Bolzano’s EURAC Institute for Mummies and the Iceman.

Oetzi may also have had trouble digesting milk products, as certain genes suggest he was lactose-intolerant – though that may have been the least of his troubles.

Oetzi's murder is described as the world's oldest murder case, and it's likely the Iceman was killed in a mountain-top skirmish between tribes as blood from other people was found on his clothes. He was found with a flint-bladed knife, a copper axe, and some berries and mushrooms (believed to be for medicinal use) on a string.

The gene-crunching also revealed some nuggets about Oetzi's ethnicity. One gene in particular suggested that Oetzi's ancestors migrated from the Middle East. The gene is uncommon in Europe but found in some modern day inhabitants of the Northern Mediterranean, including Italians but particularly the geographically isolated populations of Sardinia and Corsica."

Take out the CW medical crap, and you'd have a really good story.

If You Feel Okay, Maybe You Are Okay

From the NY Times.

"EARLY diagnosis has become one of the most fundamental precepts of modern medicine. It goes something like this: The best way to keep people healthy is to find out if they have (pick one) heart disease, autism, glaucoma, diabetes, vascular problems, osteoporosis or, of course, cancer — early. And the way to find these conditions early is through screening.

It is a precept that resonates with the intuition of the general public: obviously it’s better to catch and deal with problems as soon as possible. A study published with much fanfare in The New England Journal of Medicine last week contained what researchers called the best evidence yet that colonoscopies reduce deaths from colon cancer.

Recently, however, there have been rumblings within the medical profession that suggest that the enthusiasm for early diagnosis may be waning. Most prominent are recommendations against prostate cancer screening for healthy men and for reducing the frequency of breast and cervical cancer screening. Some experts even cautioned against the recent colonoscopy results, pointing out that the study participants were probably much healthier than the general population, which would make them less likely to die of colon cancer. In addition there is a concern about too much detection and treatment of early diabetes, a growing appreciation that autism has been too broadly defined and skepticism toward new guidelines for universal cholesterol screening of children.

The basic strategy behind early diagnosis is to encourage the well to get examined — to determine if they are not, in fact, sick. But is looking hard for things to be wrong a good way to promote health? The truth is, the fastest way to get heart disease, autism, glaucoma, diabetes, vascular problems, osteoporosis or cancer ... is to be screened for it. In other words, the problem is over-diagnosis and over-treatment.

Screening the apparently healthy potentially saves a few lives (although the National Cancer Institute couldn’t find any evidence for this in its recent large studies of prostate and ovarian cancer screening). But it definitely drags many others into the system needlessly — into needless appointments, needless tests, needless drugs and needless operations (not to mention all the accompanying needless insurance forms).

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This process doesn’t promote health; it promotes disease. People suffer from more anxiety about their health, from drug side effects, from complications of surgery. A few die. And remember: these people felt fine when they entered the health care system.

It wasn’t always like this. In the past, doctors made diagnoses and initiated therapy only in patients who were experiencing problems. Of course, we still do that today. But increasingly we also operate under the early diagnosis precept: seeking diagnosis and initiating therapy in people who are not experiencing problems. That’s a huge change in approach, from one that focused on the sick to one that focuses on the well.

Think about it this way: in the past, you went to the doctor because you had a problem and you wanted to learn what to do about it. Now you go to the doctor because you want to stay well and you learn instead that you have a problem.

How did we get here? Or perhaps, more to the point: Who is to blame? One answer is the health care industry: By turning people into patients, screening makes a lot of money for pharmaceutical companies, hospitals and doctors. The chief medical officer of the American Cancer Society once pointed out that his hospital could make around $5,000 from each free prostate cancer screening, thanks to the ensuing biopsies, treatments and follow-up care.

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A more glib response to the question of blame is: Richard Nixon. It was Nixon who said, “we need to work out a system that includes a greater emphasis on preventive care.” Preventive care was central to his administration’s promotion of health maintenance organizations and the war on cancer. But because the promotion of genuine health — largely dependent upon a healthy diet, exercise and not smoking — did not fit well in the biomedical culture, preventive care was transformed into a high-tech search for early disease.

Some doctors have long recognized that the approach is a distraction for the medical community. It’s easier to transform people into new patients than it is to treat the truly sick. It’s easier to develop new ways of testing than it is to develop better treatments. And it’s a lot easier to measure how many healthy people get tested than it is to determine how well doctors manage the chronically ill.

But the precept of early diagnosis was too intuitive, too appealing, too hard to challenge and too easy to support. The rumblings show that that’s beginning to change.

Let me be clear: early diagnosis is not always wrong. Doctors would rather see patients early in the course of their heart attack than wait until they develop low blood pressure and an irregular heartbeat. And we’d rather see women with small breast lumps than wait until they develop large breast masses. The question is how often and how far we should get ahead of symptoms.

For years now, people have been encouraged to look to medical care as the way to make them healthy. But that’s your job — you can’t contract that out. Doctors might be able to help, but so might an author of a good cookbook, a personal trainer, a cleric or a good friend. We would all be better off if the medical system got a little closer to its original mission of helping sick patients, and let the healthy be."

Here's the flip-side: without good BASIC diagnosis, the treatment won't begin to happen until the disease is well out of the course of mere food and exercise as deterrents and minimizers. Take my kidney patient cat for example: if my original vet hadn't been afraid to take blood and urine for analysis, I'd still be stuffing my cat with a high-protein diet, and shrinking his kidney capacity every day.

The real problem is we're too worried about the wrong stuff: cholesterol, triglycerides, and such that Big Pharma has managed to nail down as profit centers for at least a decade (until the patents expired) are meaningless in the larger picture, so why spend money, time, and stress worrying about them, or even diagnosing and treating them, when there may be larger issues behind it--like a bad diet, too little exercise, too much toxin exposure, etc.

The only PREVENTIVE medicine you need is right in the grocery store (or wherever you buy your fresh food). All you need to know is WHICH foods to use, HOW MUCH of them to use, and HOW OFTEN. You don't need insurance to cover that!

Come next year, we'll have no choice but to have insurance...and all insurance will essentially be the same except for cost, and the brand name on the policy. Then we'll see a dietary turn just like the U.K., where people eat whatever the hell they want, drink however they want, get no exercise, and just let the National Health System pick up the slack. Now, Britain's looking to get out of the health care business altogether--is it any wonder why?

What Doctors Don't Understand About Anesthesia

From Yahoo Health. One thing I learned from the animal world is that it can throw a beloved pet into heart disease if used to long or too frequently. I don't know if this happens in humans too.

"Today anesthetics are considered as routine as a trip to the dentist. They have been around at least since the 18th century when a talented chemist named Humphry Davy discovered the mysterious effect of nitrous oxide (laughing gas). Davy, young and ambitious, set out to rigorously test the gas’s effect, inhaling nitrous oxide daily for several months. Under slightly less rigorous conditions, Davy shared the gas with a distinguished group of friends including Samuel Taylor Coleridge, James Watt, and Robert Southey—who wrote in a letter that “the atmosphere of the highest of all possible heavens must be composed of this gas.” These early trials laid the foundation for anesthesia’s emergence in medicine today. Yet in the modern era, despite tremendous advances in the quality and selectivity of anesthetics, we still have a poor understanding of how anesthetics work in the brain.

Highlighting these fundamental gaps in knowledge, a group of researchers recently made a surprising discovery about how we transition out of consciousness and back. The common view holds that going under (induction) and coming back up (emergence) are the same process, albeit in different directions. However, a recent study published in the journal PLoS ONE suggests that going under is not the same as coming back up.

The researchers, led by Dr. Max Kelz at the University of Pennsylvania School of Medicine, observed that less anesthetic is required to keep the brain anesthetized than to induce unconsciousness. To explain these observations, the researchers have introduced a concept they call “neural inertia,” referring to the brain’s resistance to transitions between consciousness and unconsciousness. Elucidating the mechanisms of neural inertia could be critical to the task anesthesiologists perform every day, namely preventing patients from experiencing pain or awareness during surgery and in helping those patients who exhibit delays returning to the conscious state. This line of research could also provide insights into disrupted states of consciousness like coma.

According to the common model, an anesthetic drug reaches its site of action in the central nervous system, causing the patient to become unconscious. Over time, as the anesthetic is passively eliminated from the system, the patient comes back up. If this assumption is true then concentrations of anesthetic should be the same at entrance and emergence. Researchers performed a simple experiment in mice and fruit flies to test this idea. They measured the concentration of anesthetic in the brain going under and the concentration in the brain coming back up from the anesthetized state. They found that the concentration of anesthetic at emergence was lower than the concentration entering the anesthetized state —indicating a delay in, or resistance to, returning to the waking state.

Clinical observations in humans also provide evidence for neural inertia. Narcolepsy with cataplexy is a sleep disorder marked by intense daytime sleepiness coupled with sudden losses of muscle tone. These patients can take as long as eight hours to emerge from general anesthesia, whereas the typical patient emerges in minutes. Their disorder is known to be caused by reduced amounts of a protein called hypocretin, which helps regulate wakefulness and REM sleep. In another experiment, the researchers tested mice with mutations in a hypocretin gene causing sleep disturbances similar to humans with narcolepsy. The mutant mice did indeed show a significant delay in emerging from unconsciousness, but no difference entering into the anesthetized state, indicating that only emergence is dependent on the hypocretin system.

Research efforts are just beginning to illuminate the neural circuits underlying neural inertia, but they have the potential to make a significant impact on the field. As an anesthesiologist, Dr. Kelz sees a key function of neural inertia, namely keeping the patient unconscious. A small percentage of patients report experiencing awareness during surgery—estimates are low (around 1 in 1000 cases), but significant if you consider the number of patients who undergo general anesthesia every day. On the other end of the spectrum, patients with certain neurological conditions may not wake up for an extended period after general anesthesia. Future investigations of the circuits involved in neural inertia may give the anesthesiologist more control over anesthesia at the bedside.

A recent article in the New York Times Magazine described a series of astonishing cases in which doctors successfully woke some patients from coma after years of unresponsiveness. The discovery came accidentally when a coma patient was given an insomnia drug to improve sleep quality. To everyone’s surprise, the patient woke up and recognized his mother after three years of unresponsiveness. Since the discovery, subsequent investigations have yielded similar effects in a subset of patients declared vegetative. While the effects are temporary, with continued use some patients have fully regained consciousness. Nobody understands exactly how the insomnia drugs work for these patients, but studies that begin to untangle the complex biology of neural inertia may help illuminate the transitions between conscious states that most of us take for granted."

More Americans Seeking Dental Treatment at the ER

From Yahoo Health. You're about to learn the value of brushing with an ADA-approved toothpaste, some floss, and a decent diet.

"More Americans are turning to the emergency room for routine dental problems — a choice that often costs 10 times more than preventive care and offers far fewer treatment options than a dentist's office, according to an analysis of government data and dental research.

Most of those emergency visits involve trouble such as toothaches that could have been avoided with regular checkups but went untreated, in many cases because of a shortage of dentists, particularly those willing to treat Medicaid patients, the analysis said.

The number of ER visits nationwide for dental problems increased 16 percent from 2006 to 2009, and the report released Tuesday by the Pew Center on the States suggests the trend is continuing.

In Florida, for example, there were more than 115,000 ER dental visits in 2010, resulting in more than $88 million in charges. That included more than 40,000 Medicaid patients, a 40 percent increase from 2008.

Many ER dental visits involve the same patients seeking additional care. In Minnesota, nearly 20 percent of all dental-related ER visits are return trips, the analysis said.

That's because emergency rooms generally are not staffed by dentists. They can offer pain relief and medicine for infected gums but not much more for dental patients. And many patients are unable to find or afford follow-up treatment, so they end up back in the emergency room.

"Emergency rooms are really the canary in the coal mine. If people are showing up in the ER for dental care, then we've got big holes in the delivery of care," said Shelly Gehshan, director of Pew's children's dental campaign. "It's just like pouring money down a hole.

"It's the wrong service, in the wrong setting, at the wrong time," she said.

The center in Washington, D.C., is a division of the nonprofit Pew Charitable Trusts.

Pew researchers analyzed hospital information from 24 states, data from the federal Agency for Healthcare Research and Quality and studies on dental care.

Not all states collect data on ER visits for dental care, but those that do reveal the trend, Gehshan said.

In 2009 alone:

— Fifty-six percent of Medicaid-enrolled children nationwide received no dental care.

— South Carolina ER visits for dental-related problems increased nearly 60 percent from four years earlier.

— Tennessee hospitals had more than 55,000 dental-related ER visits — five times as many as for burns.

Using emergency rooms for dental treatment "is incredibly expensive and incredibly inefficient," said Dr. Frank Catalanotto, a professor at the University of Florida's College of Dentistry who reviewed the report.

Preventive dental care such as routine teeth cleaning can cost $50 to $100, versus $1,000 for emergency room treatment that may include painkillers for aching cavities and antibiotics from resulting infections, Catalanotto said.

These infections can be dangerous, especially in young children, who may develop fevers and dehydration from preventable dental conditions. In Florida, for example, 200 children were hospitalized in 2006 for those types of infections, he said.

The recession has contributed to the trend, Catalanotto added. When a family member loses a job, dental care may take a back seat to food and other necessities.

Part of the problem is low Medicaid fees for dentists. In Florida, only about 10 percent of dentists participate in the state Medicaid program, he said.

The numbers also are rising in hospitals in Illinois, where dentists have complained about low Medicaid reimbursements.

Pekin Hospital in the central Illinois town of Pekin has seen a significant increase in ER patients with "very poor dental health," said Cindy Justus, the hospital's ER nursing director. They include uninsured patients and drug abusers, and many are repeat patients.

"There's just not a lot of options" for them, Justus said.

Shortages of dentists, especially in rural areas, have contributed to the problem, Gehshan said.

She said the Pew center is working with states to develop training for dental hygienists and other non-dentists in treating cavities and other uncomplicated procedures. Other potential steps include increasing water fluoridation and use of dental sealants.

Putting plastic sealants on molars can prevent cavities, but "children at the lowest risk are most likely to get them. It needs to be the opposite," Gehshan said."

This is why Hubby and my cats have annual dental visits at the vet--preventative care heads off a whole host of other, ore expensive-to-treat problems. I go three times a year--I'm a tartar-producer, in spite of tartar-control toothpaste.

Brain Power Tied to Omega-3 Levels

From the NY Times. What happpens when you take so much fish oil, you start growing gills?

"Low blood levels of omega-3 fatty acids are associated with smaller brain volume and poorer performance on tests of mental acuity, even in people without apparent dementia, according to a new study.

In the analysis, published online Monday in the journal Neurology, scientists examined 1,575 dementia-free men and women whose average age was 67. The researchers analyzed the fatty acids of the subjects’ red blood cells, a more reliable measurement than a plasma blood test or an estimate based on diet. They used an M.R.I. scan to measure brain volume and white matter hyperintensities, a radiological finding indicative of vascular damage.

People in the lowest one-quarter for omega-3 levels had significantly lower total cerebral brain volume than those in the highest one-quarter, even after adjusting for age, body mass index, smoking and other factors. They also performed significantly worse on tests of visual memory, executive function and abstract memory than those in the highest one-quarter. There was no significant association with white matter hyperintensity volume.

“We feel that omega-3’s reduce vascular pathology and thus reduce the rate of brain aging,” said Dr. Zaldy S. Tan, the lead author and associate professor of medicine at the University of California, Los Angeles.

Few in the study were taking omega-3 supplements, Dr. Tan said. The main reason that some had higher blood levels of omega-3’s was that they ate more fatty fish.

Several of the authors have financial relationships with pharmaceutical companies. "

For those allergic to fish, or vegan, there are alternatives: vegetation (although you'd have to eat a truckload of it), calamari oil (squid is neither finfish nor shellfish), or algae oil.

Foragers Find Food, Sustainable Lifestyle in Dumpsters and Gardens

From the Orion (Chico College, CA). This isn't exactly Paleo, but it will give some ideas to those struggling to become and remain Paleo.

"Recent Chico State graduate Cody Beratlis and his friend went to WinCo and filled a trash bag full of past date produce.

He chopped up the day-old peppers and made a breakfast scramble. He mixed the rest of the veggies into salad, and ate good fruit for three days.

“We didn’t even eat all the food they gave us,” he said, “We had to throw some of it away.”

Last month, Beratlis experimented with being a freegan, one of many who find alternative sources of food rather shopping in stores. This may include trash bin diving, bartering or trading, foraging for food, sharing and gardening.

Consumers are conditioned to discard old products and buy new ones to increase store revenue, according to freegan.info. This produces so much waste that people can be fed and supported simply on trash.

Chico Natural Foods, a grocery store on Main Street, doesn’t throw any food away, said store manager Janae Lloyd. The vegetable scraps from Chico Natural Foods are given to farmers, small bundles of excess food are given to employees, and the rest is donated to the Salvation Army.

“We never have people Dumpster-diving for food because there’s no food in our dumpsters,” she said.

Freeganism makes sense, A.S. Recycling coordinator Eli Goodsell said. “It’s an issue about society,” Goodsell said. “Look at the system. Why is edible food being thrown away?”

Going through a grocery store’s trash bin isn’t illegal, Chico police Sgt. Dave Britt said. Police don’t worry about it unless the owner of the bin complains.

Many freegans aren’t homeless, said Mark Stemen, a professor of geography and planning. Most freegans he has known are in their last years of college or recently graduated and have realized how many free resources are out there. “I don’t know anybody who lives out of Dumpsters,” Stemen said.

Stores throw out items that need to be sold by a certain date, but that doesn’t mean the items are bad, Stemen said.

During move-out day one spring semester, some of Stemen’s students went out and filled 23 trucks with discarded items, he said. They hauled it to his house, had a yard sale and made a few hundred dollars.

Stemen calls move-out time the “ultimate freegan harvest.”

Now that Beratlis has completed first foray into foraging, he would definitely do it again, he said. “If you were to do this every day, you’d have a full fridge for sure,” he said."

This is called urban foraging, and Paleos (and those just wishing for a more healthy, affordable life) can do it too--not just food, but items to make your own private workout gym, like heavy things to lift, push, pull, jump on/off, etc. I wrote frequently about this in my Frugal Living days, and it's good for just about anything you want--food, clothes, furniture, knick-knacks, whatever. If you care to read it, just enter "foraging" or "dumpster diving" in the search bar. Rescuing and reselling discarded items makes for a dandy second job...or maybe enough to be your first and only job.

Speaking of jobs, I wrote about my one-time sideline: yard sales. Other people dumpster-dive for scrap metal, plastic, glass, paper, and just about anything else to turn in to the recycler for cash, and some make enough to live on.

To answer the Freegans' question of why perfectly good stuff is being thrown away, it has to do with the tax code--you get a tax deduction for "losses", and things that live in the stores past their USDA-given expiration date (even though it might not be the REAL expiration date) must be discarded to obtain that tax write-off. Mickey D's (and fast food in general) has got to be the champ of discarding perfectly good "food" that could be used to feed starving Third Worlders for that precious tax deduction...when a hamburger sits in the pickup chute for more than 10 minutes, it's gone "bad", even though it never got unwrapped or touched. They carefully separate meat from bun, put them in separate bags, then weigh them each day and record the weight for tax purposes.

Ask me how I know. Both Mickey and the King do this.

Cancer's Growing Burden--The High Cost of Care

From Yahoo Health.

"Patti Tyree was afraid that cancer would steal her future. Instead, the cost of treating it has.

She had hoped to buy a small farm with money inherited from her mother. But copayments for just one $18,000 round of breast chemotherapy and one shot of a nearly $15,000 blood-boosting drug cost her $2,000.

Bills for other treatments are still coming, and almost half of her $25,000 inheritance is gone.

"I supposedly have pretty good insurance," said Tyree, 57, a recently retired federal worker who lives near Roanoke, Va. "How can anybody afford this?"

Forty years after the National Cancer Act launched the "war on cancer," the battle is not just finding cures and better treatments but also being able to afford them.

New drugs often cost $100,000 or more a year. Patients are being put on them sooner in the course of their illness and for a longer time — sometimes for the rest of their lives. The latest trend is to use these drugs in combination, guided by genetic tests that allow more personalized treatment but also add to its expense.

It's not just drugs: Radiation treatment is becoming more high-tech, and each leap in technology has brought a quantum leap in expense. Proton therapy is one example — it costs twice as much as conventional radiation and is attracting prostate cancer patients despite a lack of evidence that it is any better.

The financial strain is showing: Some programs that help people pay their bills have seen a rise in requests, and medical bills are a leading cause of bankruptcies.

"Patients have to pay more for their premiums, more for their copayments, more for their deductibles. It's become harder to afford what we have, and what we have is becoming not only more costly but also complex," said Dr. Michael Hassett, a cancer specialist and policy researcher at Dana-Farber Cancer Institute in Boston.

Insurers also are being squeezed by laws that require coverage and restrict raising premiums. And the burden is growing on Medicare, which in some cases is paying for treatments and tests that have not been shown to benefit patients.

Why have costs escalated so much? To some extent, it's the price of success.

Cancer deaths have been declining in the United States since the early 1990s. Two out of 3 people now live at least five years after a cancer diagnosis, up from 1 out of 2 in the 1970s, according to the American Society of Clinical Oncology, doctors who treat the disease. Nine out of 10 women with early-stage breast cancer are alive five years after their diagnosis and are probably cured.

Modern treatments have fewer side effects and allow patients to have a greater quality of life than chemotherapy did in the past. But they are far more toxic financially.

Of the nation's 10 most expensive medical conditions, cancer has the highest per-person price. The total cost of treating cancer in the U.S. rose from about $95.5 billion in 2000 to $124.6 billion in 2010, the National Cancer Institute estimates. The true tab is higher — the agency bases its estimates on average costs from 2001-2006, before many expensive treatments came out.

Cancer costs are projected to reach $158 billion, in 2010 dollars, by the year 2020, because of a growing population of older people who are more likely to develop cancer.

That's the societal cost. For individual patients, costs can vary widely even for the same drug. Dr. Bruce Roth, a cancer specialist at Washington University in St. Louis, tells of Zytiga, a prostate cancer medicine approved last year. It costs $6,100 a month and insurers differ on how much they cover.

"I've had one patient pay $1.50 copay a month and another patient be quoted $5,943," Roth said. Now whenever he hears about a promising new cancer drug, he worries it will be another case "where finances end up determining who gets it."

Tyree, the woman from Virginia, said the hospital billed her insurer $14,865 for Neulasta, a shot to boost white blood cells and help her tolerate chemotherapy. Several cancer specialists said Neulasta usually costs less than half that amount, but the charge was $12,000 for Tyree's friend and blog postings by other cancer patients tell similar stories.

The worst part: A much cheaper alternative is available — a different formulation of Neulasta — but many patients aren't offered that option. There's even a cheaper way to get Neulasta, but hospitals make a lot of money giving the shot instead of teaching a patient or a caregiver how to do that.

Tyree said doctors told her Neulasta was "completely routine and everybody got it." She had no idea how much she and her insurer would have to pay for it until the bill came.

A recent American Cancer Society survey found that one-quarter of U.S. cancer patients put off getting a test or treatment because of cost, the group's chief medical officer, Dr. Otis Brawley, writes in his new book "How We Do Harm," which discusses costs and argues for more rational use of health care. One out of 5 survey respondents over 65 said they had used all or much of their savings on cancer care.

The burden hits hard on the middle class — people too well off for programs that cover the poor but unable to afford what cancer care often costs.

Dr. Amy Abernethy, director of the cancer care research program at Duke University, did a study of 250 such patients from around the country. Most were women with breast cancer, including Tyree. All but one had insurance, and two-thirds were covered by Medicare. The vast majority also had prescription drug coverage.

Their out-of-pocket expenses averaged $712 a month for doctor visits, medicines, lost wages and travel to appointments. To pay for cancer drugs, half spent less on food and clothes, and 43 percent borrowed money or used credit. Also, 26 percent did not fill a prescription, 22 percent filled part of one and 20 percent took less than prescribed.

"Patients don't just have cancer, and that's becoming more and more of a problem" because they also are struggling to buy medicines for heart disease, diabetes and other conditions, Abernethy said.

The challenge will grow as the newest trend in cancer care takes hold: using the new, gene-targeting drugs in combination. There has been limited success using them one at a time — they tend to buy a few more months or a year or two of life but usually are not cures.

"Almost certainly we will have to use multiple drugs" to shut down all of a tumor's pathways rather than just the main one attacked by a single drug, said Dr. Allen Lichter, the oncology society's chief.

Ironically, "one of the answers to making cancer therapy more cost-effective is to find these targeted agents" and use genetic tests to narrow down which patients really benefit instead of giving them to everyone with a particular type of cancer, Lichter said. For example, the new lung cancer drug Zalkori targets a gene that is present in only 5 percent of lung cancers, but it helps 60 percent of those patients.

Here's where things get sticky: desperate patients often demand treatments that have a very small chance of helping them. And many doctors feel they have a duty to offer anything that might help, regardless of the cost to insurers and society, said Hassett, the policy researcher from Boston.

An example is the outcry over the government's recent withdrawal of approval of Avastin for breast cancer. Studies showed the drug did not improve survival for most women and there are no biomarkers to identify the few it does help. Many doctors and patients still want access to the drug, and Medicare is still paying for it.

But denying "useless" treatment isn't just about saving money — it's about avoiding harm and false hope, Brawley writes in his book. "A rational system of health care has to have the ability to say no, and to have it stick," he contends.

Cost can still be a concern long after initial treatment. Many breast cancer patients take medicines for five years to prevent a recurrence. Tyree, the woman from Virginia, is about to start on one of these, Arimidex. It is newer and somewhat more effective than tamoxifen, a medicine long used to prevent cancer's return, but it is also more expensive.

If insurance covers only part of it, "I'll have to pay," Tyree said. "And I don't have any idea how much it is."

Part of the problem-along with the price of success--is the price of failure...when it comes to drug development. We're paying for both when we insist on heroic treatment for wholly preventable diseases. By the time you get diagnosed with cancer, it's already too late--you've managed to fill your body with so much toxic junk that the cells have gone ballistic trying to deal with it. You wouldn't pay for decent food to eat BEFORE you got sick (which would've been the cheap route), but by golly you (and your family) will cough up for the effects of toxic foods AFTER they've made you sick--and boy is it expensive comparatively!

What's worse: a study found women who survived their cancer the first time often relapsed into old lifestyle habits, and had cancer recurrences. When a recurrence happens, you're really at your rope's end, because the cancer is now drug-resistant. This drug resistance is what's spurring on Big Pharma to create more heroic, last-ditch drugs to eke out a few more months of life.

...and you say you can't afford to eat produce, or organics, or even cut the various sources of sugar in your diet. Compared to the cost of chemo, radiation, and miracle drugs, organic food and cutting sugar from all sources is VASTLY cheaper. How badly do you want to live, and for how long?

This stuff is what Obamacare was set up to deal with, but it doesn't deal with the real cause: eating badly, or the other cause: the high price of drug development failure. It DOES, however, deal with one problem: patients asking for too much too late (when there is realistically little hope left). To some people, denying even the most expensive, futile care has become akin to being a death panel.

This is how we got here in the world of medicine.

Three Important Range-of-Motion Exercises for an Athlete

From Yahoo Sports. These also work for arthritis sufferers.

"An athlete needs to perform various range of motion exercises daily, which can help him or her prevent injuries on the field. There is a variety of range of motion exercises available for an athlete, which can keep his or her joints flexible, and can also prevent discomfort after intense physical activity.

Here are three important range of motion exercises that an athlete should be doing, in order to prevent injuries, and maintain overall flexibility.

Leg Rotations

An athlete will need to perform leg rotations regularly, which can help keep the joints in the knees and hips flexible. Leg rotations will help an athlete maintain strength in the legs, prevent injuries, and can help him or her increase coordination.

For this exercise, you want to lie down on a bed or on the floor, extend the legs out, and keep the feet flexed. You then want to turn the feet so they are pointing outward, and act like you are trying to reach the ground with your small toe. Rotate the right leg inward, then rotate the leg outward, and then move back to starting position.

You want to repeat this exercise 10 times with the right leg, take a small break, and then repeat the exercise 10 times with the left leg. This is one of the simplest range of motion exercises that an athlete can do for his or her legs, and it can keep him or her from suffering a potentially serious knee injury on the field.

Neck Rotations

A neck roll rotation is one of the most important range of motion exercises that an athlete should perform regularly, since the neck is often prone to injuries during athletic activity. An athlete that performs various neck rolls will see an increase in his or her neck flexibility, which can help him or her perform better during sports, and it can alleviate pain around the neck area.

For this exercise, you want to start with your head straight in the middle of your chest, and then look down to the floor, which will allow the chin to almost rest on your chest. You want to move your head gradually up toward the ceiling, so that it looks like you were nodding your head, but in a more extended manner. You want to hold each motion for 10 seconds, repeat the exercise 10 times, and then go back to starting position. You then want to move your head in the other direction, so that it looks like you are shaking your head no at something. You should turn your head to the left as far as you can, hold the position for 10 seconds, and then turn your head to the right as far as possible, making sure to hold that position for 10 seconds.

You want to keep repeating the no movement 10 times, making sure that you do not move too quickly, since that could cause serious neck injuries.

Back Bends

An athlete also needs to increase his or her range of motion in his or her back, which is done by performing back bends. An athlete that performs back bends on a regular basis will notice less back pain during or after sports, and he or she will have less low back discomfort throughout the day. For this exercise, you should stand with your legs shoulder length apart, and place your hands on your hips. You want to begin by bending the back as far as you can, which means that if you feel pain or discomfort, you have bent your back too far.

Once you have reached your maximum back bend, you want to hold this position for 10 seconds, move back to starting position, and repeat the exercise 10 times. When you perform a back bend, you might feel like you are going to fall, so it is important to practice with cushions or a bed underneath you just in case you do. Once you get used to the feeling of a back bend, and realize your own limitations, it will become easier to balance your body weight during the exercise."

Why Doctors Die Differently

From the Wall St. Journal.

"Years ago, Charlie, a highly respected orthopedist and a mentor of mine, found a lump in his stomach. It was diagnosed as pancreatic cancer by one of the best surgeons in the country, who had developed a procedure that could triple a patient's five-year-survival odds—from 5% to 15%—albeit with a poor quality of life.

Charlie, 68 years old, was uninterested. He went home the next day, closed his practice and never set foot in a hospital again. He focused on spending time with his family. Several months later, he died at home. He got no chemotherapy, radiation or surgical treatment. Medicare didn't spend much on him.

It's not something that we like to talk about, but doctors die, too. What's unusual about them is not how much treatment they get compared with most Americans, but how little. They know exactly what is going to happen, they know the choices, and they generally have access to any sort of medical care that they could want. But they tend to go serenely and gently.

Doctors don't want to die any more than anyone else does. But they usually have talked about the limits of modern medicine with their families. They want to make sure that, when the time comes, no heroic measures are taken. During their last moments, they know, for instance, that they don't want someone breaking their ribs by performing cardiopulmonary resuscitation (which is what happens when CPR is done right).

In a 2003 article, Joseph J. Gallo and others looked at what physicians want when it comes to end-of-life decisions. In a survey of 765 doctors, they found that 64% had created an advanced directive—specifying what steps should and should not be taken to save their lives should they become incapacitated. That compares to only about 20% for the general public. (As one might expect, older doctors are more likely than younger doctors to have made "arrangements," as shown in a study by Paula Lester and others.)

Why such a large gap between the decisions of doctors and patients? The case of CPR is instructive. A study by Susan Diem and others of how CPR is portrayed on TV found that it was successful in 75% of the cases and that 67% of the TV patients went home. In reality, a 2010 study of more than 95,000 cases of CPR found that only 8% of patients survived for more than one month. Of these, only about 3% could lead a mostly normal life.

Unlike previous eras, when doctors simply did what they thought was best, our system is now based on what patients choose. Physicians really try to honor their patients' wishes, but when patients ask "What would you do?," we often avoid answering. We don't want to impose our views on the vulnerable.

The result is that more people receive futile "lifesaving" care, and fewer people die at home than did, say, 60 years ago. Nursing professor Karen Kehl, in an article called "Moving Toward Peace: An Analysis of the Concept of a Good Death," ranked the attributes of a graceful death, among them: being comfortable and in control, having a sense of closure, making the most of relationships and having family involved in care. Hospitals today provide few of these qualities.

Written directives can give patients far more control over how their lives end. But while most of us accept that taxes are inescapable, death is a much harder pill to swallow, which keeps the vast majority of Americans from making proper arrangements.

It doesn't have to be that way. Several years ago, at age 60, my older cousin Torch (born at home by the light of a flashlight, or torch) had a seizure. It turned out to be the result of lung cancer that had gone to his brain. We learned that with aggressive treatment, including three to five hospital visits a week for chemotherapy, he would live perhaps four months.

Torch was no doctor, but he knew that he wanted a life of quality, not just quantity. Ultimately, he decided against any treatment and simply took pills for brain swelling. He moved in with me.

We spent the next eight months having fun together like we hadn't had in decades. We went to Disneyland, his first time, and we hung out at home. Torch was a sports nut, and he was very happy to watch sports and eat my cooking. He had no serious pain, and he remained high-spirited.

One day, he didn't wake up. He spent the next three days in a coma-like sleep and then died. The cost of his medical care for those eight months, for the one drug he was taking, was about $20.

As for me, my doctor has my choices on record. They were easy to make, as they are for most physicians. There will be no heroics, and I will go gentle into that good night. Like my mentor Charlie. Like my cousin Torch. Like so many of my fellow doctors.

I've had a health care directive for over a decade.

Healthy for 100 Years

From the Huffington Post.

"One of us is a 100-year-old physician who has been in an ongoing research study since 1917, and the other is a baby-boomer health researcher who has been heavily involved in conducting that remarkable study. This is a unique case in which we have a lifetime study of unparalleled scope and a physician-participant who lived through it.

It was near the end of the first World War that 7-year-old Ephraim Engleman was identified as a bright child and music prodigy, met psychologist Lewis Terman and began an extensive set of interviews and assessments. Eph and 1,527 other boys and girls have been followed ever since by a group of scientists, including myself, studying longevity. This project is thus different from the usual centenarian study that locates and studies a group of non-perishables who have seen the full century. The problem with most such research is that we don't really want to see if centenarians eat yoghurt, are super-cheery, or take naps; rather, we need to know what they were doing 40, 60 and 80 years ago that led step-by-step to their current good health!

Entering its tenth decade and now called The Longevity Project, the study has collected millions of data points throughout the years. Although the research methods and statistical analyses for studying 1500 individuals across 90 years are mind-bogglingly complex, the good news for laypersons is that the emerging findings are remarkably well-captured by the examples of a life like Dr. Engleman's. There are a variety of paths to a healthy old age but a few core principles raise your chances of beating the odds. The startling thing is their relevance to policy.

Neither of us recommends the usual do-nothing retirement, and in fact Eph is still hard at work at 100. Worried about being a go-getter? The research clearly reveals that the responsible and successful achievers thrived in every way, especially if they were dedicated to things and people beyond themselves. Even at 100.

Of course healthy food, physical activity and prudent decisions matter, but not in the ways you might first think. Both of us love bananas, although Eph no longer buys green bananas. It is clear that eating and activity are parts of -- not the causes of -- a healthy life, and a balanced diet works fine for most people. Neither of us likes inactivity (get out of your chair after reading this!), but we are reasonable with the risks we take. It was a sparsely-travelled rural interstate where Eph got a speeding ticket for doing his age.

But how does one stay responsible, involved, and focused? Here is where the Longevity Project really points to something often overlooked. It is our social ties -- whether through good friendships, or meaningful work or community organizations -- that naturally facilitate the other elements of healthy thriving. For men, a generous, happy marriage helps a lot, and Eph has been married for over 70 years. Women benefit also, but often do quite well if they get rid of the troublesome men in their lives. If you are a master violinist like Eph, keep playing in your chamber group, even at 100. But any social organization involved with bringing out the best in human nature will do; Eph stays active and keeps young in the club dedicated to the arts that he joined in 1937.

Larger image here.

No doubt many patients suffer due to bad luck, and we all have our vulnerabilities. There is no point in blaming the victim, but one of the striking findings is the surprising extent to which educated individuals can make their own good or bad luck. It is not an illusion that some people are catastrophes waiting to happen.

Could we have a world filled with many productive, healthy 100-year-olds? It is not so far-fetched. Good genetic endowment is of course important to health and long life, but not as much as most people imagine. Scientists estimate that 20 to 50 percent of the variation in longevity is due directly to the genes we are born with. A lot is due to how we proceed step-by-step through the years, a process that depends on community. A key reason some places (like Okinawa, Japan) have so many centenarians is that they have so many 60- and 70-year-olds on healthy pathways. Although our policymakers give lip service to the idea that health depends on lifestyle, it is now much clearer what comprises that lifestyle or how to get there.

What are the lessons of this almost century-long study for good health in this disharmonious election year? They are the amazing health consequences -- yes, health consequences -- and associated economic benefits of promoting a world of responsible individuals thriving in loving relationships, with meaningful, dignified work and cohesive communities. This is a mantra that those of us working for the public health increasingly chant, but perhaps it takes a 100-year-old example in a 90-year study to serve as an inspirational reminder."

A "Gardening Geek" Helps Grow Plants Instead of Money

From the Napa Valley Register (CA).

"Given his signature bib overalls, his youthful farm-boy looks and an aw-shucks demeanor reminiscent of Jimmy Stewart, Jere Gettle could be just another backyard sodbuster looking to plant his spring garden. We’re standing in the cavernous lobby of the Seed Bank in Petaluma amidst racks and rows containing thousands of seed packets carrying exotic names like Metki White Serpent Melon and Turkish Striped Monastery Tomato.

Gettle seems like a kid in a candy store, his eyes flashing from one packet to another as he mutters tidbits of information about each variety. He locks on a packet of lettuce seeds.

“Here’s one that Thomas Jefferson grew,” Gettle gushed.

To the 31-year-old self-proclaimed “gardening geek,” the Seed Bank is more than just a well-stocked starting point for bountiful harvests to come. The store is a repository of horticultural history and, in many cases, America’s agricultural heritage. It is also part of a thriving, coast-to-coast heirloom seed business founded by Gettle when he was 17.

Baker Creek Heirloom Seeds is headquartered at the Gettle ranch in Mansfield, Mo., with retail stores in Petaluma and Wethersfield, Conn. The company stocks more than 1,300 varieties of heirloom vegetable, flower and herb seeds. The Baker Creek heirloom selection is recognized as the largest in the U.S.

“I basically started out of my bedroom when I was 17,” Gettle said. “It was a hobby. I’d been trading seeds or a number of years. When I was small I’d always look through Henry Field’s and Gurney’s and all of the seed catalogues and imagined what it must be like to work with a seed company and all of the different types of seed.”

Gettle planted his first garden at the age of 3 and, he admits, has been hooked ever since. During his youth, he eschewed video games and other typical kid’s stuff, opting instead for more natural pursuits.

“I liked seeds and anything natural,” he said. “I liked to fish or collect rocks or look at birds. It was always outdoors stuff and gardening in particular interested me because of the genetic diversity and the history behind the seeds, especially the old seeds. You know, this is a Japanese heirloom or this is one that Thomas Jefferson grew, this one dates back to the time of the Romans and so forth … it was just all fascinating.”

That fascination with seeds led him to publish the company’s first, small seed catalogue in 1998. Today, the Baker Creek Heirloom Seed Catalogue includes more than 200 pages and each year is mailed to more than 300,000 gardeners throughout the U.S. It is also available for downloading from the company’s website rareseeds.com.

The catalogue reads like a who’s who of heirloom seeds. Detailed descriptions, histories and photos provide plenty of promise for winter-bound gardeners yearning for spring. Many of the heirloom varieties have been passed down by families who have grown the particular vegetable or flower for generations. Stories about these human hosts often appear alongside horticultural descriptions of the seed varieties. According Gettle, many families consider Baker Creek a living museum that will keep their personal horticultural legacy alive.

“A lot of times, people will send us something and say ‘I’m the only one left in my family growing this and I’m 92. Will you try and keep this alive?’ We also travel some and there are always other people picking up stuff for us.”

According to Gettle, the term “heirloom” generally refers to seed varieties that have not been hybridized or genetically modified and, in the end, deliver vegetables with better taste and nutrition than non-heirloom varieties. Moreover, heirloom varieties are open-pollinated, usually more than 50 years old and typically have been passed down through generations of growing and seed saving. A seed saved from an heirloom varietal and replanted will yield the identical plant and produce from year to year.

Gettle said that commercially mass-produced seeds are usually hybrids or genetically modified, processes intended to combine or manipulate characteristics from various pure varieties. Seeds produced from these plants, if saved and replanted, will produce a different plant that resembles one or the other parent. This not only ensures repeat business for hybrid or GMO seeds each year but, Gettle said, also results in produce with compromised flavor and nutrition.

A growing public concern about industrialized food production and its relationship to health has fueled the market for purer, locally grown pantry alternatives, Gettle said.

“It’s come to the point where a lot of people are starting to think about what real food used to be,” Gettle said. “Fifty or a hundred years ago food used to come from a local farm or a farm that was at least located in your state. Now so much of it is shipped in and packaged … almost all the commercially raised produce you buy now is flavorless. And when the flavor goes, in general the nutrition is going with it.”

Gettle said that flourishing farmers markets and the resurgence of smaller, localized farming is a direct result of this consumer trend toward healthier, tastier food. He added that this has also gotten many people back to the soil and into the seed catalogue.

“Over the past 10 years our orders have increased year-to-year anywhere from 20 to 100 percent,” he said. “The overall trend has gone much more to vegetables. We have about 500 seed racks out in nurseries and 90 percent of the nurseries are not interested in flowers now. Fifteen or 20 years ago, flowers were the biggest thing on seed racks.”

Riding the wave of this gardening trend, a few years ago Gettle, his wife Emilee, and young daughter Sasha traveled west from their Missouri home to establish a West Coast retail outlet. Scoping out California coastal towns from San Diego north, the Gettles discovered the vacant but majestic 1920s-era bank building in the heart of downtown Petaluma. Originally the home of Sonoma County National Bank and later Bank of America, the historic structure dominates the intersection of Petaluma Boulevard and Washington Street. The company opened the Seed Bank at the location in 2009. Shortly after, Baker Creek bought the historic Comstock, Ferre seed company in Connecticut, housed in a group of 19th-century buildings.

“We love historic buildings and we don’t really like to put the seeds into contemporary structures if we can help it. It just doesn’t feel right.”

In Petaluma, the spacious lobby of the former bank is now full of colorful seed packets, an unimaginable collection of obscure varieties and variations.

“A lot of people can’t believe there is even a seed store anymore, especially in a big building like this,” Gettle said. “People who aren’t gardeners come in here and they’re in shock.”

As if growing a seed company wasn’t enough for his heirloom-filled plate, Gettle and his wife wife “The Heirloom Life Gardener,” a hardcover book that serves as a “comprehensive guide to cultivating heirloom vegetables.” More than just a gardening guide, the book is a treatise for the grow-your-own-food movement as well as an enlightening indictment against GMO crops and industrialized food production. Regarding the latter, Gettle has strong opinions.

“Everything about the modern food system, as far as I’m concerned, has issues or questions,” Gettle bristled. “Everything from genetic engineering to the unprecedented use of chemicals … chemicals not only for insect control but chemicals just to make the fruit last or ripen at the right time. We’re using (chemicals) for everything. Before you plant the seed it’s treated with chemicals Before that the seeds are sometimes engineered to have their own pesticides … then they’re sprayed again and many fruit varieties are sprayed so they ripen at a certain time. Then (the fruit) is coated with petroleum so they look nice in the grocery store.”

Clearly an activist in this area, Gettle said subsidized, large-scale agriculture and industrialized food production is at the root of many problems Americans face today.

“The U.S. is the most unhealthy Western country,” he continued. “Everybody throughout our country is starting to realize that we have to do something. They may not have the same idea but they know something needs to be done.”

Gettle said that as more people become aware of healthier alternatives in food and food production, pressure to change the status quo will continue to build. In part, that was Gettles motivation to organize the first National Heirloom Exposition, held in September 2011 in Santa Rosa. Nearly 11,000 people attended the three-day event along with 200 “pure food” vendors and 70 educational speakers. Much of the focus at the Exposition was in showcasing the diversity of heirloom fruit and vegetable varieties.

“At the Expo there were all of these different people working on different categories, whether it’s walnuts, peaches, apples, watermelons or whatever...people are working to bring these old varieties back,” Gettle said. “A lot of diversity has kind of disappeared and it’s good to see all of the effort to bring it back.”

The Heirloom Exposition will be “even bigger” when it returns this year to the Sonoma County Fairgrounds Sept. 11-13, Gettle said.

Meanwhile, Gettle and his family split their time between their bi-coastal seed stores and the home farm in Missouri. Ever the gardening geek, Gettle admits that his idea of relaxing is a few hours spent weeding or cultivating. The company actively supports the growing trend in school garden projects and each year donates seeds to a wide variety of organizations throughout the world.

“We basically support any type of non-profit organization that has a gardening type side to it or wants to have a gardening project,” he said. “Everything from churches to the Birmingham Foundation to prisons … you name it.”

As with many successful entrepreneurs, Gettle’s continuing passion for his product seems to be the fertile ground supporting the vigorous growth of Baker Creek Heirloom Seeds.

“To be honest, it’s more of a hobby than a business,” he said. “I love being able to meet so many people with different projects, learn about all of the different varieties and collect new varieties. People are always coming in and telling me about their great grandmother and how she rode across the prairie or whatever and this bean she brought with her and how her granddad had it in his family. I’m always hearing stories about these old varieties and where they came from. They mean a lot to a lot of people, and I’m just trying to keep that alive.”

I grew up in Petaluma, and have been in the exact 1920's-era bank building he speaks of--only then, it was the main branch of the bank coupled with the main branch of the post office. Sadly, I left Petaluma well before it became the mecca for organic and heirloom foods. When I knew it, it was still known as Chicken Town because of the large poultry processing plant and huge flocks there.

Would I go back there? Not on your life--I'd probably get charged for crossing the state border.

If you're looking for food a little closer to real caveman food, this is as close as you're going to get--heirloom seeds. As you can see by some of the photos, there used to be more blue foods than there are today, making eggplants, peppers, and other "superfoods" as well as the ubiquitous blueberry.