Health
A great book, but the people who need it won’t read it
I mentioned this briefly before, but I’d like to mention it again: Suckers, by Rose Shapiro, is a wonderful demolition job of the alternative medicine racket.
Like all polemics, it sometimes crushes things that perhaps don’t deserve to be crushed - so it’s very hard on acupuncture, despite some indications that it can be useful in some circumstances - but the overwhelming majority of Shapiro’s targets deserve, and get, both barrels.
Here’s a short extract:
One American alternative practitioner and supplement salesman, Gary Null, tells us that “a solution to cancer would mean the termination of research programmes, the obsolescence of skills, the end of dreams of personal glory . . . Triumph over cancer would dry up contributions to self-perpetuating charities . . . It would mortally threaten the clinical establishments by rendering obsolete the expensive treatments in which so much money is invested . . . The new therapy must be disbelieved, denied, discouraged and disallowed at all costs”.
An imaginary researcher says: “Every year we must show you results. After all, you won’t support us if you don’t think we’re getting something done. On the other hand, we can’t be too successful — and we certainly can’t afford to come up with a cure. After all, if we did that, how could we come back to you next year and get more of your money?”
When in 2003 the US Food and Drugs Administration stopped Alpha Omega Labs selling Cansema, a worthless cancer cure, one supporter suggested that this was “no doubt because their products worked. The FDA has a long history of doing this to developers of successful cancer remedies”.
Alternative cancer therapists say their plant-based “cures” are overlooked by pharmaceutical companies because naturally occurring substances — rhubarb, for example — can’t be patented, precluding profit for “Big Pharma”. But David Colquhoun, Professor of Pharmacology at University College London, told me: “The kudos that a pharmaceutical company would get for finding an effective cure would be so enormous that it’s hard to imagine that they would decline to produce it, even if it didn’t make a lot of money. In any case, even when a plant-based substance (like Taxol, from yew) provides the initial lead, it is common for synthetic derivatives to be made that have better properties than the original.”
The book’s particularly good at characterising the typical alt-med consumer - well-educated, reasonably well-off women - and detailing the ways in which the alt-med industry targets them so effectively. Some bits had me jumping around in fury, and others were just desperately sad. Well worth reading.
Baby food bollocks from the department of transport
The Department of Transport (Aviation Security Domestic Branch) has replied to my query about air travel and baby food. I asked why all baby food had to be opened at security when it was potentially dangerous (baby food should be disposed of within two hours tops). The reply says:
The liquids requirements were introduced on 6 November 2006 to comply with EU legislation and apply equally across all EU Member States as well as the USA, Canada and others. Ready-made baby formula is not exempt from airport security checks. Although liquid baby food or sterilised water, sufficient for the journey, may be permitted in quantities greater than 100ml, the accompanying adult will be required to verify each by tasting before they can be taken airside. A small amount may be decanted from bottles for testing purposes.
Unfortunately, that isn’t true. The US rules are here, and in pretty much every other EU country the rules are that baby food “may” be tested - not that it *must* be tested, let alone that all of it must be tested.
It’s time for a crackdown on binge drinking… doctors
I’m sure this will be all over blogland, but I’m posting it anyway because it made me laugh.
The BMA, which condemned 24-hour drinking last week and called for higher taxes on alcohol, faces accusations of hypocrisy after complaints of drunken antics at its central London headquarters.
It has emerged that while blaming everyone else for Britain’s binge-drinking culture and demanding a general sobering-up, the BMA wants to stay open for two hours longer, until 1am. Its application to extend its drinking licence has attracted allegations of antisocial behaviour by partygoers.
…residents of nearby homes have complained of the guests “frolicking” on scaffolding outside the building, “urinating” outside neighbouring properties on Tavistock Square and “causing disturbances” in the early hours.
The Martian Death Flu survival kit
Martian Death Flu - or, as it’s known to women, “the cold” - is a rubbish thing to have, especially when you work in a creative job: you’re ill enough that your brain turns to cheese, preventing you from doing any work, but you’re not ill enough to get any sympathy whatsoever. So here’s what you need to fix it.
Covonia
The second-greatest cough medicine in the world is so effective that if you take too much, you’ll end up coughing up your own legs. I say the second greatest because Co-Op chesty cough linctus is even more effective, but it tastes like death.
Cold and Flu tablets
Decongestant, paracetamol and caffeine in one alarmingly orange tablet. Isn’t living in the 21st Century brilliant?
Vicks Vapo-rub
It’s easier and cheaper than divorce, and if you’re easily amused you can pretend you’re in an early 90s rave band. If you don’t want to spend the night sleeping on the sofa, cover yourself from head to foot in this stuff before tootling off to bed.
Good brandy
With the emphasis on “good”, because cheap brandy will give you a nasty hangover without any of the benefits. Good brandy clears the pipes and gets you quite spectacularly pissed to boot.
Boozy bosses
Chief executives of big companies and public sector organisations are coping with their stressful positions by drinking the equivalent of almost three bottles of wine a week, new research shows.
Three bottles a week? Lightweights!
There are quite a few stories like this one turning up in the papers, and you tend to see the same thing again and again. For example, in this Independent story it says:
Four in 10 men and a third of women exceeded the daily limits at least once a week.
This happens a lot: “recommended maximum” becomes “daily limit”. And those maximum figures are made up, because the committee charged with setting the recommendations simply plucked the numbers out of the air. But those “limits” make things sound pretty scary:
Men holding the highest positions drink an average of almost 23 units a week – more than 11 medium (175ml) glasses of wine.
According to the government’s Know Your Limits website, a pint of Kronenbourg contains 3 units and a bottle of 14% wine - which is pretty typical for half-decent supermarket reds - contains 10.5 units. So let’s reword, shall we?
Men holding the highest positions drink an average of almost 23 units per week - more than one bottle of red wine and four pints of lager. A week! Everybody panic!
I don’t mean to make light of alcohol abuse, alcoholism, cirrhosis or the various other lovely downsides to boozing, but really, with all the real booze-related problems we need to worry about (eg getting your face kicked off in a city centre), who gives a shit if bosses have a bottle of wine and a couple of pints per week? Given the current state of the economy it’s a miracle they aren’t knocking back a bottle of brandy before breakfast.
Excellent website needs excellent writer/editor
BestTreatments, the site that provides accurate information on what health stuff works and what doesn’t, is looking for an editor. It’s a permanent position based in central London.
You will write, edit and help to commission material, taking responsibility for sign-off through to publication and liaising with key contacts including clinical experts, colleagues and freelancers. We’re looking for someone with strong editorial and writing skills, who understands medical research and who will have the flair to explain complex studies in simple language to a lay audience. It’s likely that you have had several years of solid experience working as a medical journalist or editor or a writer in health communications. A degree in medicine, life sciences, public health or pharmacy would be an advantage. You’ll be self-motivated, have excellent communication skills and be able to work both autonomously and in a team.
The easy way to stop smoking - permanently
Want to stop smoking permanently? Then why not kill yourself? According to the Daily Mail, the stop-smoking wonder drug Champix can make some users suicidal.
It’s not a big surprise if true - I tried the previous wonder drug, Zyban, and stopped taking it after a few weeks because its side-effects terrified me - but I don’t know whether Champix has similarly suicidal effects. It’s hard to tell: I took it before and shortly after Baby Bigmouth was born in an unsuccessful attempt to stop smoking, and I did indeed feel like hurling myself under a lorry. But then, all new parents feel like that, don’t they?
Still no cure for colic (but there are a few things worth trying)
One for the parents and parents-to-be: one in five babies gets colic, which typically develops at about two weeks of age and hangs around until twelve weeks before disappearing as mysteriously as it arrived. Nobody really knows what causes it, but if you’ve experienced it (or are currently experiencing it) you’ll know how hellish it is.
For the uninitiated, colic is defined as inconsolable crying for three hours, three times a week, for a period of three weeks. That three hours - and in many cases it’s more - isn’t three hours on and off; it’s three hours of constant, heart-rending, teeth-grinding crying that you cannot do a single thing about (babies have two distinct cries: there’s crying, which is awful, and there’s full-on colicky bleating, which is an incredibly upsetting noise. If bad people don’t use recordings of colicky babies in their interrogations, they should).
It’s not fun, it usually starts in the evening and ends in the wee small hours - in other words, when you’re at your most tired and least able to cope with it - and having done quite a bit of looking into it I’m not surprised to discover that the rates of post-natal depression among women with colicky babies skyrockets. Sites that suggest colic is entirely the mum’s fault for not thinking positively enough don’t exactly help.
As I’ve mentioned, nobody really knows what causes it but current thinking is that it’s a collection of various different factors. However, for what it’s worth I can recommend four things that really do seem to make a difference:
* Lactase. Some babies have difficulty digesting lactose, which is present in breast milk and formula milk alike. There’s an enzyme in their guts called Lactase, and its job is to break down lactose; unfortunately before 12 weeks some babies don’t produce enough because their digestive systems are still very immature. For those babies - and baby Bigmouth appears to be one of them - putting a few drops of lactase in each feed can dial down the colic so instead of three hours of constant crying, you get 20 minutes of yelling, a ten minute break, ten minutes of yelling… it’s a vast improvement.
Downside? it isn’t cheap. The main brand, Colief, is £10 for a teeny tiny little bottle that’ll last you about four or five days. Then again, two quid per day to reduce colic is a bloody bargain.
Incidentally, that doesn’t mean the baby has a lactose intolerance. That’s very rare, although judging by the shelf space supermarkets devote to soy formula lots of people clearly think their kids are intolerant.
* Slings. Carrying your little bundle of joy around in a sling seems to reduce colic. I’ve no idea why that should be the case, but it really does seem to work. The difference can be dramatic - it doesn’t guarantee that every night will be colic-free, but it means that a bad night is a relative rarity. As a bonus, slings also act as hands-free kits for kids so you can get on with other things, such as popping speed to keep you awake and drinking insane quantities of alcohol to improve your mood.
* Driving. Getting your little darling into the car and heading out just before colic o’clock can postpone the onslaught, and if you’re lucky reduce its duration to boot. And it means you get out of the house.
* Wireless headphones. Sometimes a colicky baby can’t be comforted at all, and all you can do is keep the baby close until the episode ends. Wireless headphones mean at least you can watch telly in the meantime.
As ever, your mileage may vary. I’m just sticking this up here on the off chance Dr Google brings a parent here rather than to one of the “it’s your fault for not being cheery enough” sites.
Wi-fi grows tits on bulls, or something
I’ve just been given a press release (thanks, Paul) showing that Wi-Fi may be linked to autism - if by “linked” you mean “not linked”. It’s toss, of course, based on studies by a nutritionist and the infamous Wi-Fi “expert” Dr Carlo, a regular subject of Ben Goldacre’s Bad Science blog. An extract:
The autistic children followed specific detoxification protocols in an environment that was mitigated with regard to sources of EMR including mobile phones and WiFi. Heavy metal excretions were monitored from hair, urine and feces over periods ranging from several weeks to several months. The researchers found that with protocols administered in the mitigated environment, heavy metals were cleared from the children?s bodies in a pattern dependent on time and molecular weight. The heaviest metals, such as mercury and uranium, cleared last. In many of the children, the decrease in metals was concomitant with symptom amelioration.
It’s a classic of its kind, actually. Not only does it have killer wi-fi, but it also has the heavy metals/autism link - which doesn’t exactly have a happy history:
An autistic boy died after receiving an unproven treatment that some people believe may cure the neurological and developmental disorder, officials said.
Abubakar Tariq Nadama, 5, had received his third treatment of chelation therapy at a doctor’s office Tuesday before going into cardiac arrest, said Deputy Coroner Larry Barr.
…Some people believe that autism can be linked to a mercury-containing preservative once commonly used in childhood vaccines, and these people sometimes advocate chelation therapy, which causes heavy metals to leave the body through urine.
…Howard Carpenter, the executive director of the Advisory Board on Autism-Related Disorders, said it was just a matter of time before there would be a death linked to the therapy.
“Parents of children with autism are desperate. Some are willing to try anything,” Carpenter said.
Buried in the wi-fi/autism study:
…the study was a retrospective observation based on subjects with severe autism whose parents chose to pursue alternative metal detoxification methods after other traditional approaches had failed.
In other words, desperate parents who were willing to try anything.
Expect to see it in the papers tomorrow.
ASA clouts Clarins for phone fear nonsense
Remember those Clarins ads for face cream to protect you against evil electromagnetic fields? They’ve just been spanked by the advertising standards authority.
We told Clarins not to state that electromagnetic waves generated by modern-day devices or domestic communications equipment could damage or age skin or to imply anti-ageing and pro-health efficacy claims for Expertise 3P unless they held robust scientific evidence to support that. We also told them not to make an undue appeal to consumers fear of the harm that could be caused by man-made electromagnetic waves.
[Via The Inquirer]