December News

• Campaign hints at herbals ‘work around’
• Camexpo: Practitioners ‘see patients as people’ says Lewith
• Study: Multivitamins reduce premature birth risk
• Antibiotics being used as “cheap insurance” on Europe’s factory farms
• Cautious welcome for ground breaking Food Hospital
• Study shows pomegranate can slow ageing process
• US study links fizzy drinks with violent assaults

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Campaign hints at herbals ‘work around’

Dr Robert Verkerk from campaign group Alliance for Natural Health told a lively seminar audience at camexpo how they could ‘work around’ new European herbal regulation.

“What I worry about is that people seize up and get scared about giving information – but what we actually need is more information, not less,” he said.

“We’re going through a game change right now and for businesses it’s about being smart and working around the new rules.”

He explained how the new European health claims regulation doesn’t apply when herbals are talked about in a non-commercial way, which could include staff training, educational websites and expert-led magazine articles.

However, he warned that anything which directly tips a consumer in favour of buying a product would fall foul of regulators.

Camexpo: Practitioners ‘see patients as people’ says Lewith

Professor George Lewith kicked off a busy seminar programme at camexpo by explaining the benefits NHS patients get from CAM therapies.

“One of the themes of complementary medicine is that patients believe CAM practitioners treat them as people and give them their time,” he told a packed Nutri Centre Theatre.

He went on to explain how therapies like acupuncture can give cancer patients the time and space they need to assimilate what’s happening to them.

However, he spoke about how many practitioners have ‘mixed feelings’ about the NHS.

“Practitioners want to work within the NHS, often because it’s good for their salaries, but when they do so they don’t like how controlled it is,” he said.

He went on to explain how therapists’ holistic approach often jars with the NHS regime requiring a set number of standardized treatments. Lewith also warned that, because of the popularity of techniques such as massage, “People sometimes see complementary therapies as a treat rather than a treatment.”

Study: Multivitamins reduce premature birth risk

A new study from US and Danish universities reports that women who took a multivitamin supplement around conception reduced their risk of giving birth prematurely by sixteen per cent.

The study also found a link between taking multivitamin supplements and a reduced risk (seventeen per cent) of the baby being born underweight.
Simon Bandy from nutritional supplements company, Health Plus says “Women are usually advised to take folic acid before conception and during pregnancy but there is less advice about what additional supplements are beneficial for expectant mothers.

“Pregnant women have to be careful to avoid certain foods during pregnancy but at the same time, it is important that in doing so they don’t miss out on any vital nutrients. Although there is no substitute for a healthy, well-balanced diet, taking a good quality multivitamin can help to ensure that the nutritional needs of both mother and foetus are met.”

Antibiotics being used as “cheap insurance” on Europe’s factory farms

As leading public health experts call for urgent action on the growing threat of antibiotic resistant disease three prominent food and farming organisations have come together to form the Alliance to Save Our Antibiotics.

Last month’s European Antibiotic Awareness Day saw many leading experts speak out against the continuing overuse of antibiotics by doctors. The Government’s chief medical officer, professor Dame Sally Davies, said: “Many antibiotics are currently prescribed and used when they don’t need to be – meaning antibiotics lose their effectiveness at a rapidly increasing rate. Professor Laura Piddock, president of the British Society for Antimicrobial Chemotherapy (BSAC), meanwhile warned of the “spectre of untreatable infections”.

The Alliance to Save Our Antibiotics — formed by the Soil Association, Sustain and Compassion in World Farming (CIWF) — wants to ensure that the routine use of antibiotics in factory farming is also urgently addressed.

Joyce D’Silva, director of public affairs at CWIF, says: 
“Farm animals in the EU are being routinely treated with antibiotics as a cheap insurance policy. This indiscriminate overuse on the factory farm makes a world without effective antibiotics for humans ever more likely.”

Richard Young, Soil Association policy advisor, added: “Organic farmers have shown it is entirely possible to raise healthy animals with minimal use of antibiotics. We cannot get rid of factory farming overnight, but we could immediately start a Europe-wide programme of change to look after animals in ways that naturally keep them healthy.”

Cautious welcome for “ground-breaking” Food Hospital

Channel 4’s new eight-part Food Hospital series has been billed as “ground-breaking” by the programme makers.

But what reaction has the show been getting from the natural health sector — and could it create a similar uplift in sales as the ‘McKeith effect’?

With two programmes now screened, the reception from the natural health sector is probably best described as mixed but with the majority viewing it as a positive development.

Nutritionist Michèle Couzens-Eason told us: “Food Hospital is great in some ways in that it shows the link between food and health, but I worry that it may overlook the role of nutritional therapists who are not part of the NHS.”

Retailer Jeff Martin of As Nature Intended, concluded that overall the programme delivered an “overall positive message” about food and medicine. Amanda Heron of Pukka Herbs meanwhile suggests it should be seen as part of “a wider movement” for change.

Some retailers and manufacturers have reported receiving enquiries about specific supplements and nutrients following the screening of programmes 1 and 2 (probiotics fort hair loss and IBS, and vitamin B2 for migraine).

The Alliance for Natural Health (ANH) offers a more detailed analysis, having thoroughly deconstructed both programmes. While it has spotted “anomalies and inconsistencies” in each, it praises the programme for treating the ‘food as medicine’ concept seriously and for “achieving results that would have had the drugs industry shouting from the rooftops”.

Study shows pomegranate can slow ageing process

A new £2 million study has revealed how pomegranate could slow the ageing process, help to prevent heart disease and relieve stress.In the Spanish study, an extract of the whole fruit was given to 60 volunteers every day for a month as a capsule.

Researchers found a significant decrease in cell damage – which can cause problems with muscle, brain liver and kidney function.

Scientists believe this decrease slows down the oxidation, or ‘rusting’, of the DNA in cells.

US study links fizzy drinks with violent assaults

New research from US scientists shows that drinking more than five cans of fizzy drink a week is linked to significantly higher levels of violence among teenagers, reports The Times.

The findings — published in the journal Injury Prevention —were based on a survey of 1,878 teenagers aged 14 to 18 from 22 state schools in Boston. Participants were asked how many non-diet fizzy soft drinks they had had during the past week.
The researchers say that over 23% of those who drank one or no cans carried a gun or knife, but this rose to 43% of those drinking 14 or more cans.
Sara Solnick, of the University of Vermont, concluded: “There was a significant and strong association between soft drinks and violence.”
Seena Fazel, senior lecturer in forensic psychiatry at the University of Oxford, told The Times: “It does suggest that a trial of an intervention to reduce high soft-drink consumption may be worth considering in high-risk populations.

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