The information contained on this website is not intended to be prescriptive. Any attempt to diagnose or treat an illness should come under the direction of a physician who is familiar with nutritional therapy.

After thirty years of a rigorous side-by-side comparison, the Rodale Institute confidently concludes organic methods are improving the quality of our food, improving the health of our soils and water, and improving our nation’s rural areas. Organic agriculture is creating more jobs, providing a livable income for farmers, and restoring America’s confidence in our farming community and food system.

< Read The Report Here >

Dayna, a friend, writes:

Thanks again for taking some of your time to speak to me this morning . . . I know time is precious for you, especially right now. As promised, I have pasted below the link to the video I mentioned.  In case the link doesn´t work (you never know!), just go to YouTube and type in “My Potato Project” or “organic sweet potato” - - it will come up either way.   This so impressed me and my friends in Florida that I have been much more conscientious about buying organic ever since.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=exBEFCiWyW0

Gas fracking in Arkansas / What will fracking do to our food supply?
For sustainable agriculture, fracking is a disaster!

READ MORE

We are getting ready to release the just-updated EWG's Shopper's Guide to Pesticides in partnership with renowned medical expert on natural health and wellness Dr. Andrew Weil. But first, we wanted to give loyal EWG supporters like you an exclusive first look at the latest Dirty Dozen and Clean 15 lists.

Our exclusive EWG's Shopper's Guide to Pesticides lists fruits and vegetables based on their levels of pesticide residue. Because you're an EWG fan, you can see the guide before anyone else and find out how favorites like apples, spinach and potatoes -- and for the first time ever, blueberries -- rank.

Click here to watch a video from Dr. Andrew Weil explaining why he uses EWG's Shopper's Guide to Pesticides, then download your own!

Ready to eat fewer pesticides? We at EWG always recommend eating more fruits and veggies and buying them organic if you can, but we know that sometimes they're too expensive or flat-out unavailable.

That's why we created EWG's Shopper's Guide to Pesticides -- so you know which fruits and vegetables have the lowest pesticide residues and which you should try to always buy organic.

Click here to see what Dr. Andrew Weil has to say about how EWG's Shopper's Guide to Pesticides saves you time and money, then download the exclusive list for yourself.

Sincerely,

Ken Cook
President, EWG

The Environmental Working Group is a non-profit, non-partisan research organization dedicated to using the power of information to protect human health and the environment. The EWG Action Fund is a legislative advocacy organization that uses EWG research to promote healthy and sustainable policies.

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Roundup Weed Killer more toxic than originally believed!



Lawn Care Chemical’s Deadly Secret
Report: A labeling loophole means the world’s most common herbicide is even more toxic than originally believed.
By Leah Zerbe
What you can do:

Don’t turn to chemicals to get rid of weeds. Find many secrets to keeping your lawn and garden naturally weed-free at OrganicGardening.com.

RODALE NEWS, EMMAUS, PA—If you ever turn over a bottle of Roundup, one of the most popular chemical weed killers in the world, you’ll see glyphosate listed as the active ingredient. What you won’t see is a list of inactive ingredients. And that’s problematic. Because researchers who recently tested the product’s active ingredient in combination with certain inert ones found the combo makes this weed killer much more toxic than previously disclosed. “It’s not as benign as people are led to believe,” says Greg Bowman, editor of the Rodale Institute’s New Farm online publication, which focuses on nontoxic farming methods. And even the listed ingredient may be more dangerous than was previously thought. “More and more studies by medical and agricultural specialists are revealing the subtle, low-level impact that Roundup’s main ingredient, glyphosate, has on wildlife, soil life, and—directly and indirectly—people themselves,” Bowman says.

THE DETAILS: Researchers tested four combinations of Roundup on cultured human cells, and found that one inert ingredient in particular, polyethoxylated tallowamine, or POEA, significantly boosted the toxic effects of the main ingredient, glyphosate. In the study, the combination of the two killed or damaged many more of the cells than glyphosate alone. The study was published in the journal Chemical Research in Toxicology.

WHAT IT MEANS: In the U.S. alone, farmers and homeowners use an estimated 100 million pounds of the Roundup herbicide a year. The problem is, weeds are becoming resistant to the chemical, so farmers are forced to apply more and more of it. Between 1994 and 2005, the use of glyphosate increased 1,500 percent. And while the manufacturer and the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency say the product is safe, a growing body of nonindustry-funded scientific research suggests otherwise. When the active ingredient alone is tested—which is standard procedure in toxicology testing—the product may seem relatively safe. But when all the chemicals in the product are tested together, which provides a realistic snapshot of the product’s safety, the results suggest much more toxicity.

A recent Rodale Institute article on pesticides like Roundup highlighted some of the research showing the detrimental effects this type of weed killer has on people and amphibians:

• In May 2009, a group of environmental lawyers in Argentina filed a petition to ban glyphosate after a study linked it to embryonic mutations affecting the nervous system and skeletal development in amphibians.

• Government-funded research out of Argentina also found higher-than-normal rates of birth defects and cancer rates in people in areas with glyphosate fumigation.

• In 2005, a study published in Environmental Health Perspectives found Roundup to be toxic to placental cells at concentrations lower than that used in agriculture.

You don’t need nasty chemicals to keep your lawn and garden looking gorgeous—try these techniques and keep dangerous chemicals away.

• Go natural and save money. Protect your family and the environment (and save money in the process) by using tried and true organic techniques from OrganicGardening.com. Hint: Corn meal gluten could be your new secret weapon.

• Get off the Roundup treadmill. A product that becomes less and less effective, forcing consumers to buy more and more of it, may be profitable for the manufacturers. But it’s not so great for your budget. The nonprofit Rodale Institute, a pioneer organization in organic farming, recently investigated the topic of superweeds, ones that have grown resistant to glyphosate-based herbicides like Roundup. The U.S. Department of Agriculture–named “worst weed in the world,” Johnsongrass, is among them. Switch to chemical-free methods for a better bargain.

Link to page of origin




Maybe coating your lawn with poison isn't such a good idea.

Lyme Disease Hearing May Lead to Major Shift

By Leah Zerbe

UPDATE: (5 p.m.): The hearing just finished up, and members of The Infectious Diseases Society of America Lyme Disease Review Panel will consider the different points made during the hearing, revisit studies referenced in testimonies, and write a report up regarding new guidelines. The panel hopes to do this by the end of 2009. For more information on the hearing and the possible impact it will have regarding diagnosing and treating Lyme disease, visit Rodale.com tomorrow.

UPDATE (1 p.m.): The Lyme hearing in Washington, D.C., is still in progress, but here are some of the interesting things we’ve seen so far:

-Current guidelines suggest prescribing a single dose of doxycycline if a person finds an attached tick on their body; however, one researcher pointed out that it won't effectively block out infection, and it could also lead to false negative blood tests.

-The blood tests of people who are chronically ill with Lyme disease may come back negative because of past antibiotic use, namely, azithromycin. This is problematic, because current guidelines rely on those blood tests to confirm Lyme, if an infected person doesn't have a bull's eye rash.

-Some Lyme patients record pain similar to people suffering from heart failure or osteoarthritis.

-A Brown University statistics expert ripped apart two studies heavily relied on to create current Lyme guidelines. (The current guidelines are under scrutiny because members of the group that drafted them, Infectious Diseases Society of America, have been linked to financial conflict of interest with vaccine makers, pharmaceutical companies, and insurance companies. She found inadequate statistical analysis in the trials that helped form the current guidelines, recommended by the U.S. Centers for Disease Control.

UPDATE (11:30 a.m.):There’s no definition for chronic Lyme, according to Phillip Baker, PhD, of the American Lyme Disease Foundation. Well, let’s get one!

-There are more than 100 different strains of the bacteria that causes Lyme disease, which could explain why some people with Lyme actually test negative on screening tests, or respond a certain way to treatment.

RODALE NEWS, EMMAUS PA—Is Lyme disease a short-term bacterial infection or a long-lasting syndrome that can include chronic pain and disability? Even as the incidence of Lyme disease has risen over the past several years, arguments in the medical community about how handle the ailment have deepened. As part of an antitrust settlement brought by the Connecticut Attorney General to address alleged serious flaws in the Infectious Diseases Society of America’s (IDSA) Lyme disease guidelines, IDSA will hold a panel review hearing all day today. The nearly 20 speakers testifying will include patients, physicians, and research scientists. The panel’s findings could lead to new, and possibly very different, recommendations for doctors and patients faced with the increasingly prevalent disease. If nothing else, it will raise awareness, which could hopefully spur more independent, academic research on the complex disease.

Infectious Diseases Society of America
Lyme Disease Review Panel Hearing Webcast

Popular Herbicide Affects Sexual Development in Frogs, Research Finds

ScienceDaily (Dec. 5, 2009) — The controversy surrounding the unintended effects of herbicide and pesticide use has intensified as researchers from the University of Ottawa's Department of Biology have identified that atrazine, a heavily-used herbicide, alters the sexual development in frogs.

There have been numerous scientific and journalistic reports on the detrimental effects of herbicides, including atrazine, yet investigations by other research teams report no adverse effects of the popular herbicide.

In an attempt to help resolve differences between the various reports, Dr. Vance Trudeau and his team at the University of Ottawa's Centre for Advanced Research in Environmental Genomics developed a system to evaluate the effects of a commercial formulation of atrazine. Specifically, PhD student Valérie Langlois applied it to outdoor tanks where tadpoles of leopard frogs were kept for an entire spring and summer. Under these semi-natural conditions in mesocosms, the levels of atrazine were low and comparable to those measured in the Canadian environment.

At the end of the summer, the results showed that atrazine levels in the tanks were at levels within currently acceptable guidelines. However, researchers also found that the herbicide reduced the number of tadpoles reaching the froglet stage. Also noteworthy was that atrazine had a feminizing effect on the animal, resulting in sex ratios favouring females, with a reduced number of males.

This study, recently available online in the journal Environmental Health Perspectives, raises important questions about the level of atrazine in the environment, and its negative effects on animal development.

Atrazine is one of the top selling herbicides used worldwide and was designed to inhibit weed growth in cornfields. It is so widely used that it can be detected in many rivers, streams and in some water supplies. This has raised the alarm on the possibility of other serious detrimental environmental effects.

Honey is the only food on the planet that will not spoil or rot. It will do what some call turning to sugar. In reality honey is always honey. However, when left in a cool dark place for a long time it will do what I rather call "crystallizing" .

When this happens I loosen the lid, boil some water, and sit the honey container in the hot water, off the heat and let it liquefy. It is then as good as it ever was.

Never boil honey or put it in a microwave. To do so will kill the enzymes in the honey.

Facts on Honey and Cinnamon:

It is found that a mixture of honey and Cinnamon cures most diseases. Honey is produced in most of the countries of the world.. Scientists of today also accept honey as a 'Ram Ban' (very effective) medicine for all kinds of diseases.

Honey can be used without any side effects for any kind of diseases.

Today's science says that even though honey is sweet, if taken in the right dosage as a medicine, it does not harm diabetic patients..

Weekly World News, a magazine in Canada , in its issue dated 17 January,1995 has given the following list of diseases that can be cured by honey and cinnamon as researched by western scientists:

HEART DISEASES: Make a paste of honey and cinnamon powder, apply on bread, instead of jelly and jam, and eat it regularly for breakfast. It reduces the cholesterol in the arteries and saves the patient from heart attack. Also, those who have already had an attack, if they do this process daily, they are kept miles away from the next attack. Regular use of the above process relieves loss of breath and strengthens the heart beat.. In America and Canada , various nursing homes have treated patients successfully and have found that as you age, the arteries and veins lose their flexibility and get clogged; honey and cinnamon revitalize the arteries and v eins.

ARTHRITIS: Arthritis patients may take daily, morning and night, one cup of hot water with two spoons of honey and one small teaspoon of cinnamon powder. If taken regularly even chronic arthritis can be cured. In a recent research conducted at the Copenhagen University , it was found that when the doctors treated their patients with a mixture of one tablespoon Honey and half teaspoon Cinnamon powder before breakfast, they found that within a week, out of the 200 people so treated, practically 73 patients were totally relieved of pain, and within a month, mostly all the patients who could not walk or move around because of arthritis started walking without pain.

BLADDER INFECTIONS: Take two tablespoons of cinnamon powder and one teaspoon of honey in a glass of lukewarm water and drink it. It destroys the germs in the bladder.

CHOLESTEROL: Two tablespoons of honey and three teaspoons of Cinnamon Powder mixed in 16 ounces of tea water, given to a cholesterol patient, was found to reduce the level of cholesterol in the blood by 10 percent within two hours. As mentioned for arthritic patients, if taken three times a day, any chronic cholesterol is cured. According to information received in the said Journal, pure honey taken with food daily relieves complaints of cholesterol.

COLDS: Those suffering from common or severe colds should take one tablespoon lukewarm honey with 1/4 spoon cinnamon powder daily for three days. This process will cure most chronic cough, cold, and clear the sinuses.

UPSET STOMACH: Honey taken with cinnamon powder cures stomach ache and also clears stomach ulcers from the root.

GAS: According to the studies done in India and Japan , it is revealed that if Honey is taken with cinnamon powder the stomach is relieved of gas.

IMMUNE SYSTEM: Daily use of honey and cinnamon powder strengthens the immune system and protects the body from bacteria and viral attacks. Scientists have found that honey has various vitamins and iron in large amounts. Constant use of Honey strengthens the white blood corpuscles to fight bacterial and viral diseases.

INDIGESTION: Cinnamon powder sprinkled on two tablespoons of honey taken before food relieves acidity and digests the heaviest of meals.

INFLUENZA: A scientist in Spain has proved that honey contains a natural ' Ingredient' which kills the influenza germs and saves the patient from flu.

LONGEVITY: Tea made with honey and cinnamon powder, when taken regularly, arrests the ravages of old age. Take four spoons of honey, one spoon of cinnamon powder, and three cups of water and boil to make like tea. Drink 1/4 cup, three to four times a day. It keeps the skin fresh and soft and arrests old age. Life spans also increase and even a 100 year old, starts performing the chores of a 20-year-old.

PIMPLES: Three tablespoons of honey and one teaspoon of cinnamon powder paste. Apply this paste on the pimples before sleeping and wash it next morning with warm water. If done daily for two weeks, it removes pimples from the root.

SKIN INFECTIONS: Applying honey and cinnamon powder in equal parts on the affected parts cures eczema, ringworm and all types of skin infections.

WEIGHT LOSS: Daily in the morning one half hour before breakfast on an empty stomach, and at night before sleeping, drink honey and cinnamon powder boiled in one cup of water. If taken regularly, it reduces the weight of even the most obese person. Also, drinking this mixture regularly does not allow the fat to accumulate in the body even though the person may eat a high calorie diet.

CANCER: Recent research in Japan and Australia has revealed that advanced cancer of the stomach and bones have been cured successfully. Patients suffering from these kinds of cancer should daily take one tablespoon of honey with one teaspoon of cinnamon powder for one month three times a day.

FATIGUE: Recent studies have shown that the sugar content of honey is more helpful rather than being detrimental to the strength of the body. Senior citizens, who take honey and cinnamon powder in equal parts, are more alert and flexible. Dr. Milton, who has done research, says that a half tablespoon of honey taken in a glass of water and sprinkled with cinnamon powder, taken daily after brushing and in the afternoon at about 3:00 P.M. when the vitality of the body starts to decrease, increases the vitality of the body within a week.

BAD BREATH: People of South America , first thing in the morning, gargle with one teaspoon of honey and cinnamon powder mixed in hot water, so their breath stays fresh throughout the day.

HEARING LOSS: Daily morning and night honey and cinnamon powder, taken in equal parts restores hearing. Remember when we were kids? We had toast with real butter and cinnamon sprinkled on it!