If you don't hear as well as you used to, you might just need a boost.
A new study finds that older people with poor hearing are missing out on two of the key vitamins I've been urging you to take anyway: B12 and folate.
In a study of 126 seniors, the researchers tested hearing and took blood samples, and found that those with hearing loss had folate levels between 32 percent and 35 percent lower than patients with no hearing problems.
They wrote in Otolaryngology - Head and Neck Surgery that those with hearing loss were also more likely to suffer from low B12 levels. If this holds up, you might be able to prevent, halt or even reverse hearing loss with a couple of common vitamins.
Notice I said "might" -- if you're a kid with an iPod plugged directly into your skull, no supplement in the world is going to save your hearing. But since you're already used to having something in your ear 24/7, at least the inevitable hearing aid will feel perfectly natural.
For everyone else, don't stop at B12 and folate -- add B6 and the rest of the B vitamins to the mix and you'll save your brain as well as your hearing.
Vitamin D really does prevent cancer, autoimmune diseases
Study after study keep confirming the value of vitamin D for immune health in the battle against multiple sclerosis, diabetes, rheumatoid arthritis, Chron's disease, and leukemia. As reported in NaturalNews, a new study out of Oxford University pinpoints vitamin D deficiency as a culprit in serious illnesses like cancer and autoimmune disorders. According to the report, which was recently published online in the journal Genome Research, genetic receptors throughout the body need adequate vitamin D levels to prevent these and other serious illnesses from developing.
Multiple sclerosis, diabetes, rheumatoid arthritis, Chron's disease, leukemia -- these and many more diseases are often caused by a lack of vitamin D. Your genes literally have receptors that need vitamin D in order to properly express themselves. If there is not enough of the vitamin, serious illness is prone to develop.
The Oxford team made specific observations about the importance of vitamin D in the genome regions associated with autoimmune diseases and cancer, noting that the nutrient is absolutely vital in helping to prevent these diseases from forming.
"Considerations of vitamin D supplementation as a preventative measure for these diseases are strongly warranted," expressed Sreeram Ramagopalan, author of the study.
However, current recommendations for vitamin D intake are unacceptably low, and many nations are considering updating their guidelines. The U.S. Institute of Medicine, for example, recommends getting a mere 200 to 600 international units (IU) of vitamin D a day, an amount far too low to have much therapeutic effect.
Since summer sun exposure creates about 20,000 IU of vitamin D in the skin in just 15 minutes, supplementation with at least 5,000 IU of vitamin D daily, particularly during the winter, is preferable. Healthy blood levels of vitamin D are somewhere between 50 and 80 nanograms per milliliter (ng/ml), so many natural health professionals recommend having a "25 OH Vitamin D" blood test performed to check these levels.
Vitamin D proven far better than vaccines at preventing influenza infections
(As reported by NaturalNews) If scientists discovered something that worked better than vaccines at preventing influenza, you'd think they would jump all over it, right? After all, isn't the point to protect children and adults from influenza?
A clinical trial led by Mitsuyoshi Urashima and conducted by the Division of Molecular Epidemiology in the the Department of Pediatrics at the Jikei University School of Medicine Minato-ku in Tokyo found that vitamin D was extremely effective at halting influenza infections in children. The trial appears in the March, 2010 issue of the American Journal of Clinical Nutrition (Am J Clin Nutr (March 10, 2010). doi:10.3945/ajcn.2009.29094)
The results are from a randomized, double-blind, placebo-controlled study involving 334 children, half of which were given 1200 IUs per day of vitamin D3. In other words, this was a "rigorous" scientific study meeting the gold standard of scientific evidence.
In the study, while 31 of 167 children in the placebo group contracted influenza over the four month duration of the study, only 18 of 168 children in the vitamin D group did. This means vitamin D was responsible for an absolute reduction of nearly 8 percent.
Flu vaccines, according to the latest scientific evidence, achieve a 1 percent reduction in influenza symptoms (http://www.naturalnews.com/029641_v...).
This means vitamin D appears to be 800% more effective than vaccines at preventing influenza infections in children.
Getting back to the study, another fascinating result from the trial is that if you remove those children from the study who were already being given vitamin D by their parents, so that you are only looking at children who started out with no vitamin D supplementation before the trial began, the results look even better as vitamin D reduced relative infection risk by nearly two-thirds.
More than six out of ten children who would have normally been infected with influenza, in other words, were protected by vitamin D supplementation.
Vitamin D also significantly reduced asthma in children
Also revealed in the study: vitamin D strongly suppressed symptoms of asthma. In children with a previous asthma diagnosis, 12 of those receiving no vitamin D experienced asthma attacks. But in the vitamin D group, only 2 children did.
While this subset sample size is small, it does offer yet more evidence that vitamin D prevents asthma attacks in children, and this entirely consistent with the previous evidence on vitamin D which shows it to be a powerful nutrient for preventing asthma.
Well this Sunlight news is refreshing...
After years of warning against the dangers of sunlight, at least one mainstream researcher has caught up to reality.
He's Angus Dalgleish, M.D., a medical oncologist and professor at St. George's University of London. For most of his life he's always avoided sunlight, covering up whenever he was outside and using plenty of sunblock.
As a "fair-haired Scot" (his own description), he always feared that too much sun might result in melanoma -- the deadly form of skin cancer.
But his thinking began to change about 15 years ago. As part of a research team that tested vitamin D to treat breast cancer, he found that D could speed up the death of tumor cells and target tumors in many other ways.
Jump ahead a few years and Dr. Dalgleish was shocked when he started testing his cancer patients' D levels. He expected 30 percent would be deficient. But his discovery that the percentage was closer to 90 "changed everything for me."
Writing in a recent edition of the Daily Mail, he says he now believes that avoiding sun exposure increases rather than reduces skin cancer risk.
Welcome to the light side, Dr. Dalgleish. We have room for your colleagues, too.
Talcum Powder is Linked to Ovarian Cancer
(As reported by NaturalNews) Every year approximately 13,850 women die of ovarian cancer with 21,880 new cases of the disease reported every year. What makes ovarian cancer so deadly is the fact that it's a silent disease. Many women won't even know they have it until it's too late. For years people have known there are several risk factors for getting ovarian cancer: being overweight, hormone replacement therapy and fertility drugs. But there is another risk factor that the majority of the public is unaware of - Talcum powder.
Talcum powder is widely used from the time we are infants all through adulthood. And the makers of these talc products (those who make baby products, women's personal care products and the makers of latex products) all know of the dangers but refuse to put it on the label.
Scientists have known since the late 1960's that talc is dangerous. In one study done in 1971 researchers found particles of talc in 75 percent of the ovarian tumors they studied. In another study done by 19 scientists in 8 different countries, research showed that there is a 30-60 percent increased risk of ovarian cancer if talc is used in the genital area. Study after study for the last 50 years shows that talc is dangerous.
Johnson and Johnson said in an article in 1982 that they are aware of the many publications on the dangers of talcum powder and they were aware of a specific publication that said that the "frequent genital application of talc was responsible for a three-fold increased risk of ovarian cancer." If you check the National Cancer Institute's website and search ovarian cancer it even comes up under "risk factors" that talcum powder is known to cause ovarian cancer. So why aren't there warning labels on products containing talc? It's because the U.S. Food and Drug Administration does not think this is a real issue, despite the many studies.
A group of several doctors have been trying for the last few years to get labels put on talc products with no success. The group wants a warning label such as the following placed on products that contain talc: "Frequent application of talcum powder in the female genital area substantially increases the risk of ovarian cancer."
Ovarian cancer is the 4th most common fatal cancer in women after colon, breast and lung cancers. Prevention is as easy as discontinuing the use of any products that contain talcum powder.
Until next time, stay healthy and happy
JD Roma
The information on this blog is provided for educational purposes only. It is not a substitute for professional medical care, and medical advice and services are not being offered. If you have, or suspect you have, a health problem you should consult your physician (preferably a Naturopath).
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