Author: Jenny

I am a public health nutrition counselor with fifteen years experience in the field of prenatal and early child health and lactation education (breast feeding support). Autoimmune disease, Autism Spectrum Disorders, and genetic defects that can cause nutrient deficiencies are also research interests.
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series: Fracking, and lead are still bad for the environment

*This is several old posts copied onto one long page, some of my earliest blog posts, kind of a mess, shared for the purpose of education within the guidelines of Fair Use.

[ http://ecowatch.com/2014/01/08/shane-davis-fracking-colorado/]

Title: Fracking and lead are still bad for the environment (1/18/2013)


The magazine, Mother Jones, has an intriguing cover story for their Jan/Feb 2013 issue. The title on the cover suggested that a chemical might be a solution for reducing crime, raising IQ’s and reducing the deficit.  The toxic chemical on the cover turned out to be the lead additive, tetraethyl lead or Pb(CH2CH3)4, which was commonly used in gasoline for many decades. The additive was developed to reduce knocking and pinging noises in high performance engines. When the gasoline was burned the lead was released into the air. Cities and industrial areas that had more traffic also tend to have more contamination from lead in the soil. [1]Use of the lead based gasoline additive has been linked with the rate of violent crime in the United States and other countries. When compared over time, the rate of violent crime was seen to go up about twenty years after the lead based gasoline additive was widely put into use. The rates of violent crime then went down about twenty years after the lead based additive was phased out of use for protection of health and the environment. There are many factors involved in crime rates so the correlation was not suggested to prove a causative link. However the trend towards increased crime rates about one generation after the introduction of leaded gasoline followed by decreased crime rates about one generation after leaded gasoline use was stopped was seen at national and community levels. [1]


Lead exposure during childhood can increase the risk of behavior problems and learning disabilities. Lead exposure during early childhood is also associated with reduced income earning potential. Cleaning up gasoline may have helped improve many children’s futures. Cleaning up the remaining contaminated soil could help even more children. Older houses that still contain lead paint are more well known risks but soil is a problem over large areas. Paint or soil that contains lead needs to be removed and replaced without creating dust. Contaminated areas could also be sealed over with new paint or with artificial turf or concrete. Private business owners are required to disclose whether there is known contamination of the property but they aren’t required to test for lead contamination. Individual renters have to pay for the testing to prove there is lead contamination before landlords are required to clean up the site. [1, 2, 3]


This land is not always our land underground. If mining rights are leased by a property owner then shallow or deeper drilling may be possible without needing further permission from the landowner. Corporate and individual profit can  take precedence over long term risk. The lead based additive in gasoline is released into the air when the mixture is burned. The chemicals used in fracking, or hydraulic fracturing, are added to water which is pumped deep into oil bearing rock. The pressure from the steaming water and acidity from the chemicals causes the rock to fracture and releases the oil. The water and chemical mixture returns to the surface and may be stored in an open pond.


Mining with hydraulic fracturing techniques has become a risk for residents in Pennsylvania and other areas above the Marcellus Shale. The area of oil rich rock lies a mile underground and stretches across West Virginia, Pennsylvania and into New York state. [4] Environmental standards frequently do not apply to the oil and gas industry. [6] Benzene and other toxic chemicals that are used in hydraulic fracturing may not have to be reported and the companies may not be held legally liable for hazardous waste cleanup. The long term health of humans and the food supply [5] may be a hidden cost for a short term supply of fuel.


Individuals who live on the planet and care about water and air supplies may want to follow toxicologist Howard Mielke’s example of advocating for change. His perseverance and research helped get the tetraethyl lead out of gasoline in the 1970’s -“a campaign that was successful in part because he managed to sample the lead-contaminated soil in his legislators’ own backyards.” [2] Sometimes change waits until problems are visible in our own backyard.


Twenty years of oil leaves thirty years without oil in the next half century or eighty in the next century or 980 in the next thousand years. Electric cars are quiet so we don’t have to worry about excessive knocking or pinging or tetraethyl lead; we just have to worry about the silence. [7, 8]

  1. Drum K., “America’s Real Criminal Element: Lead.” (Jan/Feb 2013 issue) MotherJones.com [motherjones.com]
  2. Zhang S., “‘Just One Lick’: The Hidden Lead That Could Sicken Your Kids.” (Jan. 3, 2013) MotherJones.com [motherjones.com]
  3. Drum K., “Does Lead Paint Produce More Crime Too?” (Jan. 4, 2013) MotherJones.com [motherjones.com]
  4. Royte E., “Fracking the Amish.” (Jan. 16, 2013) MotherJones.com: [motherjones.com]
  5. Brownstone S., “Fracked Beef: It’s What’s for Dinner?” (Nov. 29, 2012) MotherJones.com: [motherjones.com]
  6. “Free Pass for Oil and Gas: Environmental Protections Rolled Back as Western Drilling Surges: Oil and Gas Industry Exemptions.” Environmental Working Group [ewg.org]
  7. Gara T., “The Silence Of Electric Cars: Our National Nightmare Is Almost Over.” (Jan. 7, 2013) The Wall Street Journal [blogs.wsj.com]
  8. Chorley M., “Quiet electric cars ‘pose no danger’ to visually impaired.” (July 24, 2011) [independent.co.uk] *The tires make noise against the road so the electric car was not that much quieter than the standard type of car.
/Disclaimer: Information presented on this site is not intended as a substitute for medical care and should not be considered as a substitute for medical advice, diagnosis or treatment by your physician./
 
Title: Fracking, water safety and lessons from lead (Jan 25, 2013)
 
We don’t always know the consequences of  the industrial use of chemicals so a cautious approach is sensible when regulating the use of potential toxins. The lead additive used in gasoline to reduce engine noise may have left several generations more at risk for health and behavior problems. See previous post: [Fracking and lead are still bad for the environment]  
 
Fracking is the hydraulic fracturing process used to release oil or natural gas from shale deep underground. The process may be bad for personal and environmental health due to the chemicals used and due to the unwanted chemicals that may be brought to the surface by the process or released into surrounding ground water. The fracking process adds potentially toxic chemicals to millions of gallons of water. Twenty times more water is used in fracking than in other types of natural gas wells, [1] and regulations for the industry are less stringent than for other industrial businesses. Up to six million gallons of water may be injected in one fracking well. Hydraulic fracturing techniques are used in roughly 90% of the 270,000 oil and natural gas wells in the West [2] and the process is moving east to the Marcellus Shale. The Environmental Protection Agency considered hydraulic fracturing exempt from the Safe Drinking Water Act:

“EPA considered hydraulic fracturing as exempt from the Safe Drinking Water Act following the act’s passage in 1974 (LEAF v. EPA 1997, EPA Fracturing Final 2004). The act sets standards and requires permits for the underground injection of hazardous substances so that these materials do not endanger Underground Sources of Drinking Water (SDWA 2008).” […] “In 2005, Congress exempted most hydraulic fracturing from the Safe Drinking Water Act but said the act would apply to fracturing with diesel fuel (SDWA Exemption 2005).” [2]

The hydraulic fracturing process has become more economical since the easier to reach supplies of oil and natural gas have become depleted. The process may not have seemed a large risk to ground water safety in 1974. It was not a primary method of extraction until more recently. Shale fields will also become depleted and the hydraulic fracturing techniques used in them may leave ground water supplies unsafe. The process injects water treated with hazardous substances into the ground and it shouldn’t be exempt from ground water safety standards.


We didn’t always know how bad lead was for health and we don’t know that the hydraulic fracturing process is safe for ground water supplies or for health. Children that were exposed to lead may have had lasting effects on their adult health even though the chemical is no longer present at elevated levels as an adult. In the child’s brain the toxic metal may interfere with the developing nerve connections between brain cells. Adults are less at risk from small amounts of lead and other toxins than a developing child.

Gasoline for automobiles was treated with a lead additive to reduce engine noise and the exhaust sent lead into the air. Small amounts of lead in the air may have increased behavior problems in generations of children. Lead fell from the air and contaminated soil. The lead in soil remains a risk if it becomes airborne in dust and is breathed or if it is eaten accidentally.


Fishermen may be exposed to lead from the weights, called sinkers, that help the fishing line reach the desired depth or casting distance. Fisherman’s lead sinkers get lost in fishing streams and the newer tungsten sinkers cost more. Until lead sinkers are made illegal only the environmentally aware fishermen are likely to spend the extra money for the safer weights made from tungsten or other metals. [7] Solder for welding metal used to be made from lead until it was regulated. Older homes may still have water pipes soldered with lead. [6] It is recommended to run the water in an older home for a few minutes before using it for drinking or cooking in case the water stored in the pipes overnight or all day had time to absorb lead.


The ancient Roman aqueducts used lead pipes and lined sections of the stone waterways with lead. Fresh water within a large city is essential to health and it is unfortunate that the soft easy to work metal may have been bad for the Roman citizen’s health over time. They may have been protected by a system that was based on constantly flowing water. Their aqueduct system was rarely turned off and flowing water may not absorb as much lead from soldered pipes or lead pipes. However the workers who made the lead pipes were reported to have health problems. [5, 8]


The water used in hydraulic fracturing of shale may have benzene and other toxins added and regulations don’t require full disclosure of the ingredients in order to protect proprietary information. The exemptions may protect industry secrets while leaving workers and future generations at risk from secret toxins. [2]
The chemicals used in hydraulic fracturing need to be recorded for monitoring their short-term and long-term effects on individual and environmental health. A nurse learned the hard way that secret toxins remain toxic. She suffered from liver, heart and respiratory failure after being exposed to fracking chemicals that were on the clothes of a worker who had come in for medical treatment. She survived even though the company responsible for making the Zeta Flow fluid that was on the worker’s clothing, refused to disclose to her physician what was in the chemical mixture. [2]


Stopping industry is unlikely so increasing the requirements for disclosure seems necessary for the safety of current workers and the future water supply. Chemicals released in amounts over 2000 pounds need to be recorded in the US for the EPA’s Toxics Release Inventory (TRI). In Colorado the amount required for disclosure was restored to the pre-2006 level of 500 pounds. [2] Requiring reporting of only the chemicals used in amounts greater than 500 or 2000 pounds may be inadequate. Smaller amounts of many different toxins may add up to a toxic load even though individually the toxins may be less toxic in small amounts. [3]


Benzene may be used during hydraulic fracturing and pockets of it may be released from ground supplies by the fracking process. [2] Benzene is a toxin at the microscopic parts per million (ppm) level; 500 pounds or 2000 pounds would be too much for health or ground water supplies. The permissible exposure level (PEL) for workplaces is 1 ppm. Unfortunately the benzene content in gasoline was increased when the lead additive was taken out. Benzene also reduces engine noise. [9] Benzene and other toxins are present at varying amounts within solvent mixtures so full disclosure of all toxins in use might be difficult for some industries unless each batch of petroleum based solvent was tested for all chemicals present in the mixture. [4]


Until regulations require all businesses that use the fracking process to make changes then it won’t be economically competitive for some of the businesses to make changes. Humans, plants and animals all need water to survive. Long ago the Romans charged larger industries to use water from the aqueducts. [5] Water has value and needs to be protected. The waste produced from hydraulic fracturing needs to be stored safely or purified. Disclosure requirements for toxins need to include all types of businesses, especially those injecting large amounts of toxic mixtures deep underground.

  1. “Marcellus Shale,” Pennsylvania Dept. of Conservation and Natural Resources [dcnr.state.pa.us]
  2. “Free Pass for Oil and Gas: Environmental Protections Rolled Back as Western Drilling Surges: Oil and Gas Industry Exemptions.” Environmental Working Group [link]
  3. “Interaction Profile for: Benzene, Toluene, Ethylbenzene, and Xylenes (BTEX).” U.S. Dept. of Health and Human Services, Public Health Service,  Agency for Toxic Substances and Disease Registry [atsdr.cdc.gov]  Excerpt: “No studies are available that directly characterize health hazards and dose-response relationships for exposures to “whole” mixtures of BTEX.  Exposure to each of the individual chemicals can produce neurological impairment via parent chemical-induced changes in neuronal membranes.  Benzene can additionally cause hematological effects, which may ultimately lead to aplastic anemia and acute myelogenous leukemia, and there is evidence that ethylbenzene is carcinogenic in other tissues.  No studies were located that directly examined joint toxic actions of benzene, toluene, ethylbenzene, and xylenes on the nervous system, but additive joint neurotoxic action is plausible for environmental exposures based on predictions from physiologically based pharmacokinetic (PBPK) modeling studies with BTEX and a ternary mixture of its components, and supporting data from neurotoxicity interaction studies of binary component mixtures.”
  4. “DHEC: Petroleum Based Solvent” (2004, pdf) DryCleanCoalition.org: [drycleancoalition.org]
  5. “Watering Ancient Rome.” (2/22/00) NOVA, pbs.org: [pbs.org]
  6. “Lead Solder.” Wikipedia: [en.wikipedia.org]
  7. “Fishing Sinker.” Wikipedia: [en.wikipedia.org]
  8. “Lead Poisoning and Rome.” [penelope.uchicago.edu]
  9. “Case Studies in Environmental Medicine: Benzene Toxicity.” (June 2000) Agency for Toxic Substances and Disease Registry: [atsdr.cdc.gov]

Title:  Protecting the environment became the public’s job in 2005 (Jan 29, 2013)


In 2005 legislation was passed that shifted the responsibility to the public to prove that a process was unsafe in oil or gas drilling before a company could be held accountable. The National Environmental Policy has been in place since 1969. In 2005 Congress exempted many activities in the oil and gas drilling industry from having to meet the policy’s requirements. [1]

 
So, since 2005, it has been the public’s job to protect the environment from actions of the oil and gas drilling industry. The public could start with keeping records of the level of pollutants found in water supplies before hydraulic fracturing techniques are first used in a region. Local water quality tests are available that show the purity of the water after it is processed. Information regarding the amount of contaminants that were removed would also be necessary. Tracking that data over time might show whether there was an increase in contaminants after a new oil or gas drilling operation started. That data would suggest safety concerns but might not be proof that the company caused the increase in pollutants. Health statistics would also need to be recorded over time and change in the level of pollutants would need to be linked to a change in health problems. Proving that pollutants caused a health problem would also be difficult.
 
Requiring the public to prove an operation is unsafe seems like a “don’t ask, don’t tell,” policy – the Bureau of Land Management seems to be saying that the oil and gas drilling industry can do whatever it wants as long as no obvious health hazards occur in the short term. Long term risks wouldn’t be available or obvious and it would be hard to prove they were caused by a drilling operation. The public doesn’t have the resources for monitoring and testing pollutants and we lack the proprietary information about what chemicals the oil or gas drilling company might be using.Taxpayers also became responsible for paying for the 1980/86 Comprehensive Environmental Response, Compensation, and Liability Act (CERCLA) hazardous waste cleanup. A Superfund had been created to pay for cleanup and was funded by an oil and gas industry tax, however the tax was canceled in 2008. [1]For more information see the National Environmental Policy Act Handbook, available as a pdf, 2008: [2] Sections regarding public involvement are included in the handbook.
 
  1. “Free Pass for Oil and Gas: Environmental Protections Rolled Back as Western Drilling Surges: Oil and Gas Industry Exemptions.” Environmental Working Group [link]      Excerpt: “The National Environmental Policy Act (NEPA), enacted in 1969, also exempts certain oil and gas drilling activities, obviating the need to conduct environmental impact statements (EIS) (BLM 2008). The exemption, enacted by Congress in 2005, effectively shifts the burden of proof to the public to prove that such activities would be unsafe. In 2006 and 2007, the BLM granted this exemption to about 25 percent of all wells approved on public land in the West (BLM Budget 2009).” [BLM – Bureau of Land Management] * See the link for examples of activities that were exempted.
  2. Bureau of Land Management, National Environmental Policy Act Handbook H-1790-1 (Jan 30, 2008) pdf [blm.gov]

Title: Reading about fracking and The Future (Feb 20, 2013)


Time flies when reading a good book or two. Books are nice because they don’t require a password or much electricity. Heat and electricity are wonderful but so are clean water and air. The hydraulic fracturing technique known as fracking is providing jobs and energy products but at a risk to our air and water supply.The book, “The Future, Six Drivers of Global Change,” written by former vice president Al Gore includes information about the fracking technique that is used in the oil and natural gas industry. An average of five million gallons of water is used per oil or natural gas well. Chemicals and sand are added to the water before it is injected deep underground. The fracking fluid that returns to the surface is more contaminated than the water that was injected. The contaminated waste water left from the hydraulic fracturing process can be an environmental risk if it is disposed of improperly or is stored in open holding ponds which can overflow in rainy conditions. [1]


The oil rich shale fields are generally much deeper than ground water supplies and so contamination of ground water isn’t considered a large risk. However pollutants known to be used in the process have been found in the water supply of some areas where fracking techniques were used. Proving that the fracking process was the source of the pollution is a challenge. The 2005 exemption for fracking activities from the Safe Drinking Water Act and the Clean Water Act makes it difficult for the Environmental Protection Agency to even investigate reports of pollution. The book, “The Future,” by Al Gore includes quotes regarding the hydraulic fracturing process from leaders in the industry. One CEO suggested that while a contaminated water well may be a large problem for the local area, it would be only a small price overall. However another veteran of the industry is an advocate for strict controls and increased government regulation of the process. [1]


A few communities with limited water supplies for agricultural and human use have had to contend with the added demand for water by the petroleum industry. Purifying the leftover fracking fluid isn’t required so the process is trading useful water for oil or natural gas.

 

A more common environmental hazard associated with hydraulic fracturing techniques may be the unwanted release of methane gas. More responsible oil and natural gas companies contain the methane before it can escape into the surrounding air. However old mine shafts located near a new fracking well may act as channels that allow methane to reach the surface in unexpected places. Methane is seventy-two times more potent than CO2 in trapping heat in the atmosphere. It breaks down into CO2 and water vapor within approximately ten years. Methane adds to the CO2 imbalance in the atmosphere and increases the risk of change in the average global temperature. [1]


The increased supply and decreased price of petroleum products is also a concern. Shale sources of petroleum products were not expected and were not used in the estimates of expected change in average temperatures and ocean levels. Burning the natural gas obtained from shale rock is likely to add to the CO2 level in the atmosphere. The temporarily reduced price of petroleum products makes solar or wind power more expensive in comparison. [1]


An average of five million gallons of water ruined per oil or natural gas well seems like a substantial price during a time when drought conditions have become more common. The risk of toxins seeping into ground water supplies is a concern but the process itself is directly adding unsafe toxins to large amounts of water. Due to the 2005 exemption law it is up to the public to prove that hydraulic fracturing is unsafe.


The Superfund that was created to pay for cleanup of hazardous waste sites is also a taxpayer burden now. Originally a tax on petroleum and chemical products was created to fund the Superfund but that tax law expired in 1995. Restoring the Superfund tax was part of the Obama administration’s proposed 2013 budget changes. [4, 5]


Some opponents of the Superfund tax suggest that it is unfair to tax the chemical industry for cleanup of hazardous waste sites that weren’t directly related to the individual businesses. [6] Maybe it would seem more fair if some of the money was used to clean up soil contaminated with lead. Gasoline containing lead is still in use for some airplanes and race cars although NASCAR stopped using leaded gasoline starting in 2008. NASCAR teams had been found to have elevated blood lead levels. Leaded gasoline is still in use in a few countries for all cars. [7] When the gasoline is burnt the lead additive is vaporized and is spread to the surrounding land. The additive, tetraethyllead, and gasoline are both chemical products.


Taxpayer’s have also been subsidizing the petroleum industry through tax breaks. Eliminating tax preferences for fossil fuel businesses is in the Obama administration’s 2013 budget proposal. Twelve changes could add up to $41 billion in tax revenue between 2013 and 2022 for a average of $4.1 billion per year. [2]  Oil companies receive on average $8 billion in subsidies per year while the five largest companies made a total of $118 billion in profit last year. [3]


Humans have been enjoying energy derived from the remains of dinosaurs and ancient sea creatures for many years but it won’t last forever. The supply of fossil fuels will run out, that isn’t the question. The question is how can we slow down how soon that time arrives. Petroleum products include plastic and other commonly used items made out of fossil fuels. Burning the fossil fuel supply wastes its potential for other uses or for reuse as a solvent. Using less fossil fuel energy now would help the atmosphere and save more of the reserves in the ground for future generations.

  1. Al Gore, “The Future, Six Drivers of Global Change,” (Random House, 2013, New York) pp 329-332 [algore.com/]
  2. Budget Overview, Office of Management and Budget, The Whitehouse, [whitehouse.gov/omb] “Elimination of 12 tax breaks to oil, gas, and coal companies will raise $41 billion over 10 years.”
  3. Roland Hwang, “Ending oil subsidies can pay for Energy Security Trust,” (Feb. 13, 2012) National Resources Defense Council staff blog: [switchboard.nrdc.org]
  4. “Tax Proposals in the 2013 Budget,” TaxPolicyCenter.org, p 51, pdf: [taxpolicycenter.org]
  5. “Reinstate Superfund Taxes,” TaxPolicyCenter.org: [taxpolicycenter.org]
  6. “Superfund Taxes,” American Chemistry Council: [americanchemistry.com]
  7. “Tetraethyllead,” Wikipedia: [en.wikipedia.org]

/Disclosure: A gas powered snow blower was used twice during the writing of this post. Luxury is nice./

Title:  Fracking is bad for water quality, bit o news review (Jan 10, 2012)

As a public health dietitian it might seem like earthquakes are off nutrition topic but water quality and cancer in Ohio school children does fall within my field. I overextended with number of blogspots and am moving a few things around.Environmental toxin load from ground water combined with other issues may have been associated with the rash of mystery cancers that occurred in the Ohio area. No one toxin was found to be a cause, but a mixture of toxins, each found at a slightly lower amounts than official guidelines would rate as toxic may add up to equal toxic anyway. Cancers in the children varied.My brother’s pets also had cancer – every year I heard about one or another pet who got cancer and died that year. He lives in the northern Ohio/Medina area and there could be a correlation.  I noticed the story about the Ohio children with cancer because I had already found it odd that so many of my brother’s dogs, cats and goats had cancer over the years. Animals on my uncle’s dairy farm or my grandpa’s mixed farm while I was a child did not have cancer let alone 25% of them or so. (A guess from memory. )A mixture of toxic chemicals that are all present below “warning” levels may add up to a toxic total given one liver and one body of a child, dog or goat.

No specific cause of the cancers in the Ohio children was ever found – my concern is regarding the potential for unspecific variations of lower levels of toxins interacting in people or pets. Combine the toxins with a body that is allergic and inflamed and puffy with hypertension and cancer seems like the title on the top of that recipe card. As a dietitian I study recipes and a diet fortified with vitamin D increases my inflammation and my husband’s sarcoidosis and our pet also seems sensitive and she had almost died from infection with Parvo virus.
Too much calcium, and phosphorus and too little magnesium reduces the ability of white blood cells to protect us. An early symptom of magnesium deficiency in animal experiments is immature white blood cells and cells in the bone tissue that are similar to the abnormal ones found in the autoimmune condition that my husband has.

Excess vitamin D may be innocent in healthy people with healthy kidneys but I don’t think there are enough of those left to warrant the over supplementation and fortification of the food supply for everyone. Where are the specialty products for individuals with sarcoidosis or cancer of the parathyroid gland? – There is proof that those individuals need to limit intake of vitamin D.

There are enzymes that deactivate the hormone version of vitamin D. Too much active form can be dangerous.  The active form at elevated levels can lead to excess minerals leaving the bones which eventually can lead to osteoporosis which is weak bones, not strong bones. Excess active hormone D can also tip the intestines and kidneys into more calcium absorption and less magnesium absorption. White blood cells need plenty of magnesium to do the work of apoptosis – hunting down, killing and engulfing the waste left over from decaying normal cells (needing recycling), or infected or precancerous cells (reduced and reused).
Addition – too little vitamin D or active hormone D can also be a risk factor for cancer or autoimmune disease or infection as it is necessary for immune health. 

The immune function of sea squirts was found to be compromised by copper sulfate, creosote (found in wood treated to be water resistant) and TBTO (found in marine boat paint). Sea squirts are a very basic life form that may move and perform similarly to white blood cells – they are our mobile work force for repair and growth of new tissue and for killing and removing old, infected or pre-cancerous tissue. My article, Sea Squirts, Listeria, and Cantaloupe, Oh My, has a variety of links about those three toxins/group of toxins (creosote is a chemically mixed industrial waste product).

Plenty of clean water aids in cleaning out toxins simply by osmosis – leaking away in dilute urine.

Some physicians are recommending a moratorium on fracking be called until health investigations are performed on the ground water quality.  Excerpt:

 

The government has found anecdotal evidence that drilling can contaminate water supplies. In December, the EPA reported that underground aquifers and drinking wells in Pavillion, Wyoming, contained compounds that probably came from gas drilling, including glycols, alcohols, benzene and methane. The CDC has detected “explosive levels of methane” in two wells near gas sites in Medina, Ohio, Kapil said.

Hydraulic fracturing techniques have been in use for 65 years – all that briny, chemical-riddled water or wastewater might have left some residue in the ground and ground water over the years.
From a story on January 5, 2012 following an earthquake in the Ohio area,
Excerpt:

Rep. Tim Ryan, D-Ohio, praised his state’s Department of Natural Resources for the ban, issued a day after the Youngstown area suffered a 4.0-magnitude quake, the area’s 11th in 2011, all centered near a wastewater-injection well operated by D and L Energy Inc. Some experts have said the well almost certainly is to blame for the earthquakes.

The EPA is preparing standards for disposing of the briny, chemical-riddled wastewater from hydraulic fracturing, the process where mixtures of water, sand and chemicals are blasted into underground shale-rock formations to free up trapped oil and gas. The standards will likely focus on when treatment plants can accept the wastewater; drillers often put it into underground wells or recycle it as an alternative method of disposal.

Hydraulic fracturing itself hasn’t been linked to any of the earthquakes near Youngstown, and Ryan said he doesn’t think all the state’s 177 brine-injection wells should be shuttered over one localized incident. But he said the issue of disposing of wastewater from hydraulic fracturing and other oil-and-gas production methods “stands to be one of the most complicated challenges to safely developing the Marcellus and Utica Shales.”

  •  [link, Fuel Fix, Ohio lawmaker praises well ban has concern about fracturing waste water, story by Puneet Kollipara (Jan 5, 2012)]

Ohio cancer cluster story:

Since 1996, 35 children have been diagnosed — and three have died — of brain tumors, leukemia, lymphoma, and other forms of cancer — all within a 12-mile wide circle that includes two small towns and farmland just south of Lake Erie.

Air and water samples have not revealed any concerns around the Whirlpool plant or the Vickery Environmental waste site just outside town, where hazardous chemicals are injected into rock a half-mile below ground.

And in September, investigators said they found no radiation from homes, schools, or industries to link to the illnesses, ruling out the Davis-Besse nuclear plant, about 20 miles from Clyde, and NASA’s former nuclear reactor near Sandusky as a possible source.

  • [link, Clyde, Ohio, child-cancer cluster confounds parents and investigators, story by John Seewer, Associated Press, 12/30/2010]

A combination of low levels of pollutants may have struck different children and pets slightly differently  – the cancers weren’t the same types and the children didn’t all have the same water source or any patterns except northern Ohio – near Lake Erie and near hydraulic fracturing and near a nuclear power plant – fresh fish for dinner or goat kebabs?

*** No link between cancer and hydraulic fracturing has been found – I am only suggesting there may be an association – not saying any of these links are saying that.Fracking is bad for Water Quality (12/14/2011, story that was posted on my Bit-O-News site) ~ ~ ~ ~ ~Fracking is like blowing bubbles in the bottom of your water glass and it spilling over the top. Forcing anything at high pressure deep into the ground is bound to lead to problems – odd earthquake rumblings may or may not have been related to increased pressure from the hydraulic fracturing process but there is now a report regarding the effect fracking has on water quality. The link has video and more info [link]:

 

 
[desmogblog (4/ 21/11) Brendan Demille, Pennsylvania story]

Excerpt:

Hydraulic fracturing, or fracking, is a process in which water, sand and chemicals are injected deep into the ground to crack the shale rock and unleash natural gas. The process has sparked concern in part due to worries about its effect on drinking water.

The EPA constructed a pair of wells to test water quality in the Wyoming aquifer, near where natural gas firm Encana (ECA) has drilled. Within these wells, researchers found synthetic chemicals associated with the fracking process as well as high methane levels and benzene concentrations “well above” Safe Drinking Water Act standards.

As a precautionary step, the Department of Health and Human Services has advised local residents to use alternative sources of water for drinking and cooking and to use ventilation when showering, in order to air out potentially dangerous chemicals.

Emergency Preparedness links:

  1. [whitehouse.gov/the-press-office/2011/08/31/presidential-proclamation-national-preparedness-month]
  2. [foodsafety.gov/keep/emergency/index.html]

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Regarding the earthquakes in Oklahoma, a seismologist explains it pretty well – in the case of the November series of shakes and a bigger 4.7 quake and later a 5.6; the shaking wasn’t happening near in time or place to any hydraulic fracturing work.Earthquake activity that has been measured around sites of fracturing were shallow and only in the 2-2.5 range.
(this article prefers not to use the nickname fracking, I think)- video and article [tulsaworld.com/]

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Title:  Fracking is bad for water quality (12/15/2011)

Fracking is like blowing bubbles in the bottom of your water glass and it spilling over the top. Forcing anything at high pressure deep into the ground is bound to lead to problems – odd earthquake rumblings may or may not have been related to increased pressure from the hydraulic fracturing process but there is now a report regarding the effect fracking has on water quality. The link has video and more info:

 

 

http://money.cnn.com/2011/12/09/news/economy/epa_fracking_wyoming/index.htm
Excerpt:

Hydraulic fracturing, or fracking, is a process in which water, sand and chemicals are injected deep into the ground to crack the shale rock and unleash natural gas. The process has sparked concern in part due to worries about its effect on drinking water.

The EPA constructed a pair of wells to test water quality in the Wyoming aquifer, near where natural gas firm Encana (ECA) has drilled. Within these wells, researchers found synthetic chemicals associated with the fracking process as well as high methane levels and benzene concentrations “well above” Safe Drinking Water Act standards.

As a precautionary step, the Department of Health and Human Services has advised local residents to use alternative sources of water for drinking and cooking and to use ventilation when showering, in order to air out potentially dangerous chemicals.

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Regarding the earthquakes in Oklahoma, a seismologist explains it pretty well – in the case of the November series of shakes and a bigger 4.7 quake and later a 5.6; the shaking wasn’t happening near in time or place to any hydraulic fracturing work.Earthquake activity that has been measured around sites of fracturing were shallow and only in the 2-2.5 range.

~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~
Situationally Ironic Plan in Ohio (December 14, 2011, Bloomberg) :

Follow the Fluid

The state required D&L Energy to conduct a test using radioactive material to trace whether the fluid being injected in the well is going only to the areas allowed by its permit, said Tom Tomastik, deputy chief of the Division of Oil and Gas Resources Management.

  •  Story: Fracking Has Formerly Stable Ohio City Aquiver Over Earthquakes,
  • By Mark Niquette – Dec 14, 2011

 So we are going to test whether poisonous pollutants have escaped and gotten into the ground water by injecting radioactive material – this is sounding medical.

 
AliceStarkey blogspot, Court case in UK over noise level.

~ ! ~ ! ~! ~ ! ~! ~ ! ~
Time for some windmills – I heard Walmart uses solar windmills for part of their energy  – cool

  • (heard from the Environmental Defense fundraising phone call  – we chatted) – I thought that sounded odd – solar panels on a Lanoka Walmart in Lacey and wind turbines are proposesd and residents aren’t all pleased about the landscape. Consider instead if hydraulic fracturing and shallow 2.5 earthquakes came to town instead Or we could let Walmart lead the way in green technology and install some wind turbines (outside of major migratory bird routes I hope). [laceypatch.com] story by Elaine Piniat (October 14, 2011)
  • http://walmartstores.com/Sustainability/ several big projects and community investment info.

A change of view may be a good thing.

Oil rich rock is going to run out as well as oil wells.
 

Jane Davis, a qualified nurse, said one in five wind farms cause noise problems for the local people. “All I know is the amount of health problems people have suffered since [the turbines were put up] seem to be excessive in relation to what was happening,” she said. “Those symptoms include sleep deprivation, tinnitus, vertigo, depression, raised blood pressure, atrial fibrillation (abnormal heart beat), needing to go the lavatory at night more often than you would normally, pneumonia, ear infections, stomach disorders and psychological stress.”

Nutrition Notions about that:
That list of symptoms would fit fairly nicely on my magnesium deficiency list combined with increased needing to go to the lavatory could be increased acidity in the body needing to be excreted in the urine – rapid urge to go.
Living near and working near the really big electricity towers has negative health effects. Possible the sound vibrations may be effecting health also.The couple who want to be reimbursed for moving and other expenses live within 1000 meters, previous regulations have been 500 meters – this story is from the UK.


Electrical changes could be allowing too much magnesium/electrolytes and fluid to move through proton pumps in the cell membranes. The increased flow from inside cells would lead to increased urine and loss of electrolytes – more of the magnesium because the kidneys just don’t have all the save magnesium mechanisms that are in place for calcium. Sodium and potassium get conserved about equally and we need about equal amounts – they just aren’t found in the food supply in equal amounts – different topic.
*** New York Transit Museum Review article mentions windmills initially are more costly initially than other types of energy production; [link]

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Screening and testing for intra-cellular pathogens

An important sentence in my last post could have been entered in a longest sentence contest and so I would like to separate the sections and go into more detail:

“But to me it would be great if more experts and more individuals did become interested in looking into the information and maybe add further understanding and research,

and then maybe sooner than later we would  develop a national blood and organ supply that is tested for intra-cellular infectious pathogens;

and develop clear guidance about the importance of measuring both hormone D and vitamin D levels

in order to clearly see which patients are actually deficient in both the vitamin and hormone forms and would therefore need to increase their sun exposure or their intake of vitamin D

and which patients actually have elevated hormone D levels instead of being deficient.

Low vitamin D levels with elevated hormone D levels may suggest the person has an underlying infection with an intra-cellular pathogen and that person would actually benefit more by limiting their sun exposure and their intake of vitamin D – and they might be able to treat the underlying infection with Benicar and antibiotics.” [last post]

A few steps might be necessary for implementing this section: “and then maybe sooner than later we would  develop a national blood and organ supply that is tested for intra-cellular infectious pathogens;” The first step is for the medical and academic communities to admit that intra-cellular infectious pathogens have been found that can cause acute or chronic illness. Research scientists and medical professionals can put their careers at risk if they work on alternative theories instead of working on widely accepted theories. and funding for research regarding alternative topics is unlikely to be available.

Autoimmune disease was suggested to be a normal part of aging in a college textbook that I looked at within the last few years – I don’t remember the title or have the link but I was very sad to find that information in a current academic text. If autoimmune disease is part of aging then why would Rheumatoid Arthritis have a juvenile Rheumatoid Arthritis version? Why would a mother have RA and have a four year old child with juvenile RA – did the child age very rapidly or could RA be passed from mother to child during pregnancy? And more importantly, might they both go into remission if they were to take Benicar and antibiotics while avoiding vitamin D and sun exposure? That mother with RA who knows first hand how much pain her child with RA is likely to experience might really like to know that a cause and effective treatment may have been discovered.

Currently the treatments that are commonly used for RA are immune suppressing drugs which can have severe side effects. Some of the drugs are also used in chemotherapy.  Immune suppressing drugs are used in autoimmune  disease because much of the damage that is caused over time is due to overactive white blood cells. However if the overactive white blood cells are doing their best to try to find an underlying infection then killing them off with immune suppressing drugs is also killing off the body’s only defense against the infection. Intensive treatment with immune suppressing drugs may help make a patient more comfortable over the short term by suppressing symptoms caused by the overactive white blood cells but instead of leading to remission of the disease, the patient’s life expectancy may be shortened to only a few years because the medications are only addressing symptoms instead of treating an underlying cause.

Once the existence of intra-cellular pathogens is officially admitted then the second step to take towards “a national blood and organ supply that is (screened and) tested for intra-cellular infectious pathogens” would be fairly easy and inexpensive to implement. Changes in the screening of potential donors could be put in place before improved testing of the donated tissue might be possible.

I forgot to include the word screened in the original sentence. The problem with testing for the presence of the intra-cellular pathogens currently is that they are hard to grow and take a long time to grow with standard Petri dish agar cultures. However there is already extensive guidelines for screening blood and organ donors regarding their medical history before they are allowed to donate. If tuberculosis can be spread by carriers who haven’t had symptoms of TB then anyone who is known to have had TB in the past should probably never be allowed to donate blood or organs even if they aren’t actively sick anymore. [7 and atrainceu.com from  the post before the last post] And therefore if the autoimmune disease sarcoidosis, Crohn’s Disease, and Rheumatoid Arthritis all involve similar infectious mechanisms then anyone who has been known to have any of those diseases in the past should also not be allowed to donate blood or organs even if they aren’t actively sick anymore.

A third step towards a safer blood and organ supply would be adding the requirement to test donated tissue for the presence of intra-cellular pathogens. It is possible that advances in DNA screening might solve the problems with how difficult and long it takes to grow cultures of the pathogens. Advances in DNA screening [1] might make it possible eventually to simply screen a sample for the presence of DNA from the Mycobacterium tuberculosis pathogen or from the pathogen that Lida Mattman found involved in RA or Lou Gehrig’s Disease (ALS) or from her husband’s coronary.  [video  from  the post before the last post] Prof. Mattman was able to cause coronaries in lab animals by exposing them to the unidentified pathogen that she was able to culture from a tissue sample obtained from her husband after he had a coronary heart attack. In the video, ~19:30, her concern about the possibility of coronary disease being contagious was not just for hospital visitors but was also for other hospitalized patients. A healthy visitor might not be as much at risk as an immune compromised patient who is sharing a hospital room with someone who just had a coronary.

Aspergillosis fungal infections are common in patients with advanced HIV/AIDS and in transplant patients on long term immune suppressing drugs but for most people the fungus is a common contaminant that doesn’t lead to an infection because our immune system prevents it from multiplying.  [atrainceu.com and 2  from the post before the last post] Prof. Marshall’s protocol suggests focusing more on correcting the imbalance in the hormone D metabolism that allows the pathogens to survive intra-cellularly, rather than focusing on which specific pathogens might be present because there might be a mixture of different pathogens who all developed similar ways to invade and survive within human cells. His protocol focuses on restoring the body’s natural immune mechanisms so the healthy white blood cells can identify and destroy cells that are infected with any intra-cellular pathogen whatever type it might be. However his original goal was finding an effective treatment for sarcoidosis so the Benicar as an angiotensin receptor blocker may be effective in sarcoidosis if the pathogen in that disease developed the ability to make infected cells develop extra Angiotensin Receptor’s as a way to disguise themselves as normal cells but the Benicar might not help someone with Grave’s Disease who has bone marrow cells with abnormal Thyroid Stimulating Hormone (TSH) Receptors. Someone with Grave’s Disease might need a medication developed that blocks TSH Receptors instead of blocking Angiotensin Receptors.

I have the autoimmune hyperthyroid condition called Grave’s Disease. It involves abnormal bone marrow cells and may be similar to Rheumatoid Arthritis and it is associated with Lou Gehrig’s Disease (ALS) (19% comorbidity, 4), and the autoimmune dry eye syndrome, Sjögren’s syndrome. [3] Symptoms similar to those of ALS can also be found in patients with advanced HIV/AIDS and Lyme’s Disease, [4], both of which have disease processes that have been shown to interfere with the immune function of the Vitamin D Receptor.  [page 19, 1, from the post before the last post] Currently my thyroid condition is in remission but that is while avoiding gluten and dietary sources of iodine and vitamin D and avoiding too much sun exposure.

We do not have a large number of children with vitamin D deficiency rickets, which suggests to me, that for most people summer sunlight exposure and the current level of fortification of the food supply with vitamin D is adequate. Canada is farther north than most of the United States and yet their population’s average vitamin D level is normal (50 nmol/L). [5, 6] The number of Americans with vitamin D levels below 30 nmol/L increased between a study performed from 1988-1994 (45% > 30nmol/L, n=18,883) and one performed in 2004 (23% > 30nmol/L, n= 13,369) but there is some controversy over whether differences in how the lab test was processed might have skewed the results. [8] My fear is that some of the difference might represent an increase in the number of people with an underlying intra-cellular infection that causes depressed vitamin D levels and elevated hormone D levels rather than truly being deficient in both vitamin D and hormone D.

Hormone D levels are rarely measured because it is a more unstable chemical found in lower concentrations and current medical theory believes that the enzyme needed to convert the inactive form to the active form is only produced by the kidneys — but it is also produced by white blood cells during inflammatory conditions — autoimmune disease and heart disease are inflammatory conditions.

Magnesium deficiency and/or excess intake of calcium may be involved for some individuals. Zinc and B vitamins are also essential as cofactors for converting between the active and inactive forms of vitamin D so malnutrition in general may increase people’s susceptibility to an intracellular infection. Medical marijuana is also a controversial topic because the plant is categorized as not having medical uses at the federal level but within the healthy body different types of cannabinoids are made for use within membranes and as messenger chemicals. Genetic defects, older age, or malnutrition may prevent some individuals from making the cannabinoids internally. Hemp and some other foods in addition to the marijuana plant also can be an external source of cannabinoids but the amount and types produced may depend somewhat on the fertility of the soil.

I have tried to share this information because it could help improve health and quality of life for many people and reduce the amount of money and supplies being used for ineffective health care. We can’t afford health care that might be making individuals worse and may be spreading disease within contaminated blood, organs, or through procedures and screening tools that don’t recognize that more conditions may be contagious through blood-borne routes than was previously recognized.

While I do not have a PhD I do have a Bachelor’s Degree in Administrative and Clinical Dietetics and fifteen years of public health education experience. Selling products at a profit is not something I have experience at, giving away free health information, possibly along with a motivating freebie as an incentive, is where I do have professional experience.

Another famous quote has been a motivating force for me since I first got concerned about the controversy over vitamin D in 2010:

“And so, my fellow Americans: ask not what your country can do for you — ask what you can do for your country.” – President John F. Kennedy,  Inaugural Address, January 20, 1961 [9]

So, my  fellow Americans and any other readers: chances are if you don’t have rickets and do use some dairy products and breakfast cereals regularly, then you probably don’t have a deficiency of vitamin D but if your levels are below 20 nmol/L then you may have an intra-cellular infection. The possibility of an infection might seem like bad news but it is more informative than “We don’t know what causes your disease or how to cure it but we would love for you to take our side-effect inducing medications until you die or until we find a cure, whichever comes first, thanks so much for being a good sport about it in the meantime.”

And the good news would be that the olmesartan/Benicar and antibiotic protocol might be an effective treatment for the underlying cause if an intracellular pathogen was involved in your symptoms. At this stage of research it is not the standard treatment that a general practitioner would be likely to have heard of let alone recommend, but you can look into the protocol and talk to your physician about it yourself. The Marshall Protocol Knowledge Base provides information for patients and for physicians regarding the science behind the protocol and provides guidance for the patient and for the prescribing physician regarding prescriptions, timing of doses, side effects to watch for and other precautions.

Personally I was thrilled to get rid of my severe migraine problem with the use of olmesartan, antibiotics, and avoiding vitamin D foods and supplements and avoiding much time spent in bright sunlight — it wasn’t easy but the migraines were much worse. I was on the medication protocol for a year and half and had been having weekly migraines for over a decade — I was more than thrilled for myself I was thrilled for everyone else who might have migraines or might be tired of hearing “we don’t know what causes your autoimmune disease or how to cure it.” Migraines aren’t autoimmune disease but they can be a symptom of other conditions and more recently I have been diagnosed with autoimmune thyroid disease which can go back and forth between hypo- and hyper- phases for some patients.

More research is needed but a lot of research has occurred if you’re willing to go read more about it yourself. [mpkb.org]

Tangent: I’ve tried to share this information in the past because I believe it is necessary for public health and economic health and environmental health. Medications that have harsh side effects on human health are also likely to have harsh side effects on the environment. Anything we are pouring in our bodies or on our agricultural fields is likely to eventually reach the ground water supply or the ocean where increasing acidity is already beginning to affect the ability of shellfish to form shells – the shell material dissolves in higher acidity.

And so, my fellow Americans:  Yes, I had a Presidential campaign website in 2012 because I was as serious as a heart attack about my fears regarding our nation’s health and our food supply. The nutrient guidelines are used to make meals and formulas for people who may be incapable of eating to appetite. If the guidelines are not correct than the meals and formula nutrient balance may lead to chronic nutrient deficiencies. All the nutrients work together somewhat so research that only looks at vitamin D alone or calcium alone may be missing deficiencies of magnesium or zinc  or B vitamins or cannabinoids. Our government is responsible for meals for the military and for school children and people living in residential facilities who are on Medicaid or Medicare and for prisoners. the government doesn’t directly set nutrient guidelines but could probably fund research if the elected officials were working towards that goal.

I never claimed to be experienced in politics and there would be little point in my trying to get involved at the local level because nutrient and medical policies are made at the federal level and may be implemented at federal, state and local levels. My credibility and reputation have suffered some setbacks since I started writing online in 2010 but there is unlikely to be another person available who has had my combination of personal and professional health experiences — and so, my fellow Americans: if there are any of you who would like to vote for me in 2016 for President of the United States then I would do my best if elected to help our country become a healthier country which would likely help make it a wealthier country as well.

My campaign slogan was also serious: “A vote for me is probably a bad idea, but a vote for magnesium is a good idea.” I was trying to be clear that I know that I’m not a good role model for normal social skills or skilled at political networking and fundraising, but that I firmly believe that my nutrition platform is very important for the long term economic and physiologic health of our nation. Whether I’m married or divorced,* or how wealthy or broke I am, would probably not make any difference to a person suffering from Crohn’s Disease or ALS or RA or TB or sarcoidosis or HIV/AIDS.

So I’ll get FEC Form 2 filed before I receive $5000 in campaign contributions or within the next 15 days, whichever comes first.  ;-) That is an attempt at humor – I don’t expect to raise $5000 in contributions. The other reason that I ran for office was in protest of the Citizens United decision, so I was running as a write-in candidate in 2012 and hadn’t been aware of FEC Form 2 — I think voters should be able to vote for someone who isn’t underwritten by corporations and billionaires.

*I’ll let you know if my name changes again before Nov. 2016. I’m hitting Publish – with my fingers crossed that it works, but I also made a copy just in case. *The website’s software was due for an update — note to self: always update software as soon as prompted.

/Update: I didn’t fill out the FEC Form 2 or FEC Form 1 which I learned of once I started reading the instructions. The forms are only required if a candidate’s campaign expenditures or donations are reaching or exceeding $5000. I wrote more about this topic:

  • “What’s a chad? or Confession is said to be good for the soul” August 24, 2015.
  • “Secretary of Health and Human Services, an additional note, and Fringe Topic: Parvo Virus” August 31, 2015.

Caring a lot is important but so is experience and good health and I have limited supplies of both of those – I will continue to care and will post updates on health or other topics as I learn more.

/Disclosure: This information is provided for educational purposes within the guidelines of fair use. While I am a Registered Dietitian this information is not intended to provide individual health guidance. Please see a health professional for individual health care purposes./

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Fringe reports; Elevated hormone D levels and irritability

I found an interesting article about mainstream media while looking for the source of a quote by Ted Koppel. I didn’t find the source of the quote but it is included towards the end of the article “A citizens guide to understanding corporate media propaganda techniques,” by George Orwell for earthblognews, Jan. 9, 2010:

“People shouldn’t expect the mass media to do investigative stories. That job belongs to the ‘fringe’ media.” – Ted Koppel – (American broadcast journalist, best known as the anchor for Nightline) [1]

A book that also included the quote by Ted Koppel also states that most newspapers do take his “advice seriously,” and the chapter continues with a quote by politician Donald Rumsfeld which may suggest that sensible people in positions to know things also know enough not to talk to the media. And on the next page a quote by Thomas Jefferson, the third president of the U.S., gives the impression that a lack of information in newspapers has been a concern for many years: “The man who reads nothing at all is better educated than the man who reads nothing but newspapers.” [3, from the first two pages of Chapter Six of “Extreme Money: The Masters of the Universe and the Cult of Risk,” By Satyajit Das]

So news may not become news in the mainstream media until the subject is already being talked about by enough members of the public to suggest to the mainstream media that there will be plenty of viewers who are interested enough in the news story to be willing to sit through paid advertisements. Commercial advertisements and product placement fees are what pay for salaries and supplies for the news industry. Cigarette commercials were banned from television when the negative health risks became clear but it took decades for the change to occur. Cigarettes were advertised with physician endorsements and images of beautiful people in beautiful places – smoking was represented as sexy and smart by the popular media for many decades before the health risks became overwhelmingly clear.

Direct to consumer advertising for prescription medications is only allowed in two nations, in New Zealand since 1981 and in the United States since 1997. There is some concern that commercials for prescription drugs may lead to their being over prescribed to consumers who may not need the medication but who became worried enough by the ad to ask their physician for a prescription.  [4] I would also be concerned that allowing ads for prescriptions might have led to changes in the programs as well. Producers might encourage writers to incorporate more prescription drug references within TV shows in order to sell more commercial time to the companies who market the prescription medications.

The use of the non-euphoric cannabidiol oil (CBD) that can be extracted from some strains of medical marijuana has been found very effective for some children with severe types of epilepsy. Children may have seizures non-stop for hours regularly for years and may have tried many prescriptions that may cause their own negative side effects. More parents and young adults are speaking out about the effectiveness and safety of the CBD oil for seizures. Parents can lose custody of their children for helping the child use medical cannabis products and parents may also lose custody if it becomes known that they are using medical marijuana for their own health condition. One of the parents  in the following article lost custody of her child when it became publicly known that she was using medical marijuana to help control her Crohn’s Disease, which is an autoimmune inflammatory bowel condition. [2] THC, the euphoric part of medical marijuana has been found helpful for suppressing inflammation which might be helpful for autoimmune conditions with inflammation such as colitis. [3]

Crohn’s Disease was one of the autoimmune conditions listed in yesterday’s post as a disease that may be caused by an infectious bacteria that may be able to survive within human cells and cause elevated hormone D levels.

As a high risk nutrition counselor I have learned professionally about the difficulty patients suffer from Crohn’s Disease. It is an inflammatory bowel disease that can greatly shorten lifespan and can be so devastating to quality of life that patients may not leave their house much in order to stay near a bathroom. During flair ups a patient may have explosive diarrhea randomly throughout the day many times. Severe weight loss and multiple nutrient deficiencies due to poor absorption in the intestines can occur. Shortened lifespan is common, patients may not make it to their fifties. So if Benicar, antibiotics, and avoiding vitamin D could help patients with Crohn’s Disease go from a disease flair up into a state of remission, then I think most patients with Crohn’s Disease would really like to know about the treatment earlier in their lives rather than suffer many uncomfortable years first.

But health professionals can’t really legally/ethically make recommendations to patients about an alternative protocol until it becomes accepted by the mainstream medical industry. Until a therapy is widely accepted as the standard of care it would be considered potentially dangerous for a health professional to recommend and therefore unethical for them to recommend. A health professional would be less at risk legally or ethically if they simply were providing information to a patient so the patient could look into it and learn more about it on their own.

So according to the quote by Ted Koppel reporting on the news is the job of fringe investigators – and so my work may fall into that category too. In the last post I tried to share what could be life saving information about autoimmune disease and the complicated interaction of vitamin D, hormone D, calcium and magnesium .)

So is there something in it for me? Not directly — talking about topics that aren’t mainstream can be dangerous for one’s career. Fact checking the work of the fringe is probably part of the job of the mainstream and it can be common to try to discredit alternative information with the publication of negatively slanted stories. [1]

But to me it would be great if more experts and more individuals did become interested in looking into the information and maybe add further understanding and research, and then maybe sooner than later we would  develop a national blood and organ supply that is tested for intracellular infectious pathogens; and develop clear guidance about the importance of measuring both hormone D and vitamin D levels in order to clearly see which patients are actually deficient in both the vitamin and hormone forms and would therefore need to increase their sun exposure or their intake of vitamin D and which patients actually have elevated hormone D levels instead of being deficient. Low vitamin D levels with elevated hormone D levels may suggest the person has an underlying infection with an intracellular pathogen and that person would actually benefit more by limiting their sun exposure and their intake of vitamin D – and they might be able to treat the underlying infection with Benicar and antibiotics.

I’ve written about this topic for several years because I know from my own illness how uncomfortable it is to have even moderately elevated levels of hormone D. It causes increased loss of calcium from the bones and can lead to osteoporosis over time, and excess free calcium in soft tissue can cause muscle cramps and headaches in the short run and lead to calcification of soft tissue over time, such as atherosclerosis, a type of hardening of the arteries. Elevated hormone D can also affect the mood and may cause extreme irritability – I learned about this directly one summer when I tried tanning booths for the first time. It was before I had learned about the Marshall Protocol or had my own vitamin D and hormone D levels checked. I got a nice all over tan but that summer I was irritated at everything, like silly minor things like rattling-silverware-noise or seconds-too-slow-wait-service, things that I wouldn’t normally be annoyed about. I recognized the feelings weren’t real anger and did my best not to let my internal irritable mood leak out to others.

I learned about the vitamin D/infection theory later that year and after sharing the research with my family physician I was able to follow the Marshall Protocol with his help. I took medications for the treatment for a year and a half and since then I haven’t had the severe migraines that I’d been having regularly for over a decade. I’ve continued to avoid having much sun exposure though and avoiding vitamin D sources since and my autoimmune thyroid condition is currently in remission, thank goodness and thank search engines which had led me to the medication protocol in the first place.

The Marshall Protocol was first developed for treating sarcoidosis but has been used successfully for a variety of conditions. It is still not widely accepted in the medical industry but progress has been made; the FDA did approve use of the blood pressure medication for use with the antibiotic protocol, making it easier for physicians to order for patients who want to try the protocol. [See the last post for more information about the Marshall Protocol and vit.D]

Note/ Updates added at 2 and 3 pm. The save Draft feature hasn’t been working well and Publish is a different software feature that allows edits after posting.

/Disclosure: This information is provided for educational purposes within the guidelines of fair use. While I am a Registered Dietitian this information is not intended to provide individual health guidance. Please see a health professional for individual health care purposes./

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Whether to be compliant or to be healthy seems like an easy question to answer

*I made a significant correction to this post today, so I’m moving it to the front page today.

— but it may not be that easy of a question for a patient of the current medical industry. Personally, I do like to be compliant and agreeable with other people but I also prefer to be healthy and agreeable rather than sick and agreeable. The terms compliant and non-compliant are used in the medical field when documenting how thoroughly a patient is following the recommendations of the medical team. However if the medical team’s recommendations are based on limited knowledge or incorrect information, then complying with the recommendations might not seem like a good idea to a patient. If an industry claims to not know what causes a disease or how to cure it then why should a patient be expected to believe that the same industry knows if a treatment will actually be adding to making the patient worse instead of helping them get better as is hoped? Some of their recommendations might be making the underlying, not well-understood, problem much worse.

The terms compliant and non-compliant may also be used in legal cases when there is conflict between a medical team’s recommendations and the parent’s decisions regarding the care of a child. Painful and possibly ineffective chemotherapy or other cancer treatments might be recommended to try to save a child’s life but if those treatments are just making the last few months, days, or years of the child’s life more miserable then who is being helped? The child and family are missing out on the quality  of life during their last days together and frequently with a significant financial cost. Paying for hope of a last chance cure at the cost of daily enjoyment seems like pretty expensive hope. The pharmaceutical industry’s profit margin may be helped but the child’s last days might be spent in more pain and nausea with less time to spend enjoying the company of their family.

Intravenous vitamin C has been used effectively against a variety of types of cancer at the Linus Pauling Institute for decades but vitamin C isn’t profitable because it can’t be patent protected. — A review article suggests there is some anti-tumor effects from the high dose intravenous vitamin C treatment but that it is not a miracle cure and is providing such a high dose, approximately 200 oranges worth twice a week, that it could be dangerous to a patient who had kidney problems. [8] 

Patents allow companies to charge higher prices for products because they are the only supplier. Generic products and natural products have market competition to help keep the price down for consumers.

A for-profit prison industry requires prisoners and tax-payer funding to finance their care and provide the profit, and a for-profit medical industry needs people to take medicine, whether they are sick or whether they are trying to prevent sickness. Requiring people to take maintenance medicine for chronic symptom control for years or for the rest of their life will add up to more profit for the medical industry over time compared to providing patients with effective preventive guidance or with a treatment that actually cures their underlying condition.

While I am fortunate not to have cancer I have been struggling with autoimmune and allergy symptoms for as long as I can remember and in my experience as a patient if currently available lab tests don’t reveal any diagnoses that are currently accepted within mainstream medical standards then your symptoms might be labeled psychosomatic – all-in-your-head physical symptoms that may be caused by mental stress or other emotional problems. That might be helpful for a patient who actually has psychosomatic problems but it isn’t very helpful for the long term treatment of a patient with an autoimmune disease.

Unfortunately though, in the current medical industry even if you receive an autoimmune diagnosis the cause is still considered unknown and immune suppressing chemotherapy drugs are frequently the only treatment available. However the good news is that the cause of some types of autoimmune disease has actually been discovered, but the news hasn’t made it into mainstream media or medical practice yet; and more good news, an effective therapy protocol has also been developed and life threatening chemotherapy drugs are not part of the medication protocol.

Severe migraine headaches every week were my worst health symptom, but I also had chronic fatigue and multiple muscle cramps similar to those described by patients with fibromyalgia, and I was sensitive to a variety of food and environmental allergens. I’ve only had a couple migraines since I tried the newly developed medication protocol. I spent a year and a half taking antibiotics every other day, and an angiotensin receptor blocker (olmesartan/Benicar) everyday, and avoiding vitamin D foods, supplements and sunlight everyday. This was not easy or comfortable, the antibiotics cause allergy like symptoms from the increased load of toxins that results from the remains of infected cells that healthy white blood cells were able to kill while on the combination of antibiotics and olmesartan, but the allergic symptoms were not as bad as having migraines that feel like a railroad spike pounding into your skull over and over for three days every week, never mind the muscle cramps, fatigue and other symptoms that I’d had off most of my life.

Not having weekly migraines and other daily symptoms was so wonderful that I wanted to share the good news but I found that it is difficult to get people to see past the mental block of “we don’t know what causes autoimmune disease or how to cure it.” — And we will never know what causes it or how to cure it if we keep ignoring the people who are making advances in figuring out what causes it and how to cure it.

Lida Mattman is a research scientist who conclusively showed that Rheumatoid arthritis is caused by a bacteria but that breakthrough hasn’t reached the patient yet. Some types of bacteria can survive in a modified form within the interior of some types of human cells. The form is hard to grow in normal agar gel cultures but Lida Mattman developed techniques that are able to culture the cell wall deficient microbes. She discusses the pathogens that cause Lyme’s Disease and Lou Gehrig’s Disease and other stealth pathogens at the Autoimmunity Research Foundation’s Chicago Conference, March 12, 2005, in this video link: (video, at ~19:30 she recommends not visiting people who had just suffered a coronary/heart attack in person at the hospital, just send a card, as evidence has shown that a infectious but unidentified pathogen is involved in some coronaries and therefore probably also in cerebral strokes which occur in the same way – but she probably doesn’t really mean not to visit your loved ones. She gets a laugh from the crowd as she shared a story about getting a sample to test after her husband had a coronary – so she probably did visit him but the point may also be that we don’t know what we don’t know and it might be dangerous, at least to the immune compromised).

Some types of pathogens, including the virus that causes HIV/AIDS, have forms that can actually enter human cells and survive and grow within the cell. This sets up an inflammatory condition with overactive white blood cells that may be looking for the infection but instead attack other healthy tissue – ‘auto-immune’ – attacking self. Lida Mattman found cell wall deficient bacteria involved in Rheumatoid Arthritis and Lyme’s Disease and other diseases. The bacteria that causes tuberculosis also has a form that can live within cells. The textbookofbacteriology.net site uses the term faculative intracellular parasite in their description of the pathogen that causes tuberculosis. [7]

The specialized pathogens developed ways to disguise the infected cells from healthy immune cells. The angiotensin receptor blocker medication olmesartan is normally given once a day for high blood pressure but for the auotimmune treatment protocol it is given three to four times per day every six to eight hours in order to keep the levels steady all day and night because the infected cells hide by developing angiotensin receptors – blocking the receptors takes away the disguise. I think – this is my rough understanding of how the medication helps in the protocol developed by Trevor Marshall, a biomedical engineer. Blocking the angiotensin receptor disguise somehow allows the healthy immune cells to identify and kill the infected cells instead of continuing to ineffectively attack other healthy tissue (such as finger joints in Rheumatoid arthritis or lung tissue in sarcoidosis).

Correction, (9/16/2015): The part about the angiotensin receptor blocker medication was wrong. The medication olmesartan (Benicar) is not only acting as a angiotensin receptor blocker (which can help reduce the production of inflammatory cytokines which cause pain and fatigue and can help prevent fibrotic tissue from forming). It also acts as an agonist, an activator, of the vitamin D receptors (VDRs). By activating the VDRs the medication is allowing the healthy immune cells to do their normal functions. The pathogens had developed a variety of ways to block the vitamin D receptors in order to ‘hide’ by disabling the immune cell’s normal immune functions that are controlled by the active VDR. It transcribes over 1000 genes that are involved not only in calcium balance but also in cancer metastasis and many other functions. MPKB: Science behind olmesartan (Benicar).

Prof. Marshall is not a medical doctor but he is a biomedical researcher who did not choose to be compliant when he was diagnosed with sarcoidosis and was told that he probably only had a year and a half left to live – over a decade ago. Instead he developed  his specialized medical protocol and then sought and received orphan drug approval by the U.S. FDA so that olmesartan/Benicar can be prescribed for use with the antibiotic Marshall Protocol in addition to it being able to be prescribed for its normal use for treating high blood pressure. Using the blood pressure medication three to four times per day may increase the risk of feeling light headed when standing up quickly but taking it 3-4 times per day doesn’t cause the blood pressure to drop 3-4 times lower than normal. (I did have to catch my balance occasionally and fainted once or twice while taking olmesartan three times per day for a year and a half. Fainting is weird but fifteen years of migraines is worse.)

A three day migraine or chronic arthritic degeneration seems worse to me than feeling light headed when standing up quickly – and the medication protocol isn’t needed for the rest of life as many medications are prescribed for patients with chronic illnesses. While the protocol reduces symptoms after a year or two on the medications, an autoimmune patient might need to follow Trevor Marshall’s protocol for a year or two more than once over their lifetime because autoimmune diseases tend to flair up and go in remission with the patient’s overall level of health or stress or environmental toxin load – there really is a lot we don’t know about autoimmune disease. Having good and bad times, remissions and relapses, may be common in autoimmune disease because just a few remaining infected cells may linger over the years and then multiply again during a stressful or otherwise unhealthy time of life.

Tuberculosis is a disease that has been shown to be caused by a type of bacteria able to live within human cells and the infection can be spread through air-borne respiratory droplets when actively sick patients cough or sneeze. The disease can remain dormant for years in healthy people and the sickness can be spread by people who never got sick themselves and therefore don’t realize that they are carriers. A continuing education session for health professionals recommends using Universal Precautions, in order to protect staff and to help prevent spread of infection between patients, health professionals are recommended to wear adequate masks and gloves and treat all patients as if they were potentially contagious because anyone might be a carrier of a dormant infection. The course, Infection Control and Prevention, Module 5, Element II: Mechanism of Transmission available at atrainceu.com [atrainceu.com] has more information about Universal Precautions.

“Every year, more than 9 million people worldwide develop TB and nearly 2 million people die from the disease. Tuberculosis is a bacterial infection caused by Mycobacterium tuberculosis and is spread in airborne droplets when people with the disease cough or sneeze. Most people with healthy immune systems infected with M. tuberculosis never become ill. However, the bacteria remain dormant within the body and can cause tuberculosis years later if host immunity declines.” – atrainceu.com, Infection Control and Prevention, Module 5, Element II: Mechanism of Transmission [atrainceu.com]

Tuberculosis, I learned recently, is also a type of infection that interferes with normal vitamin/hormone D metabolic pathways. The vitamin D receptor (VDR) plays a role in the ability of white blood cells to kill infected cells and cancerous cells. Some pathogens have developed ways to suppress the Vitamin D Receptor’s activity so white blood cells aren’t able to effectively resist the infection process. Other pathogens that have been shown to reduce the activity of the Vitamin D Receptor, in addition to the pathogen that causes Tuberculosis, include the mold Aspergillus, the viruses that cause Epstein-Barr chronic fatigue syndrome and HIV/AIDS, and the autoimmune diseases sarcoidosis, Crohn’s Disease, and Rheumatoid Arthritis. Elevated levels of 1, 25(OH)2D are seen with the bacterial infections: “Elevated 1,25(OH)2D appears to be evidence of a disabled immune system’s attempt to activate the VDR to combat infection.” [page 19, 1]

The Infection Control and Prevention course provides more information about Aspergillus. It is a fairly common mold that generally only becomes a problem for immuno-compromised individuals, [atrainceu.com], but interestingly those at increased risk also include people who have advanced cases of HIV/AIDS and those who have been on long term corticosteroid therapy (which acts similarly to having elevated levels of 1, 25(OH)2D, which is the active hormone form of vitamin D, and is actually not a vitamin. It is a seco-steroid based on a molecule of cholesterol). [2]

It seems to me that people with advanced cases of HIV/AIDs, whether they also have opportunistic aspergillosis or not, might like to know that taking olmesartan/Benicar daily and avoiding vitamin D foods, supplements and sunlight [1] might help their healthy white blood cells to be able to work more effectively again or might at least not add any negative symptoms that can occur when there is elevated levels of hormone D. The elevated hormone level itself is a health risk itself because it is telling the bones to release their stored calcium which can lead to osteoporosis of bones and calcification of soft tissue. The article [1]  doesn’t suggest that AIDS patients might be helped by Benicar because it is a review of research that has already occured article – research has shown that Benicar is helpful for autoimmune diseases like sarcoidosis but more research is needed to find out how the HIV and Epstein-Barr viruses and aspergillus mold suppress the Vitamin D Receptor and how to stop the down-regulation.

Our medical industry uses donated blood and organs that are screened for many diseases but they can’t screen for diseases that don’t officially have a known infectious agent. Dormant tuberculosis can cause carriers to become sick years after they were exposed and in all those years as a carrier the person might also have been a regular blood donor. Sarcoidosis patients who are in remission are allowed to donate blood and plasma yet there have been organ transplant patients who got sarcoidosis only after receiving the organ transplant. If the organ donor wasn’t known to have active sarcoidosis then the medical industry may not realize that the person might be a carrier of infected cells that could cause symptoms in a more immuno-compromised person. All organ transplant patients are purposely given immune suppressing medications in order to prevent the body’s own immune defenses from attacking the transplanted organ.

The longer autoimmune disease is treated as something without a known cause the longer we may be spreading it through contaminated blood and organ donations. The longer autoimmune disease is treated as something without a known cure the longer patients have to suffer reduced quality of life and shortened lifespans.

  • Tuberculosis: annually worldwide, 9 million infected and 2 million deaths, [atrainceu.com]
  • Epstein-Barr virus (EBV): According to the Centers for Disease Control about 90% of adults have antibodies against EBV, suggesting a current infection or history of exposure. The disease can be spread before a person has active symptoms and the virus can remain in a latent/inactive phase for years and can become active again at any time. [cdc.gov]
  • HIV/AIDS virus: According to the Centers for Disease Control there are about 50,000 people in the U.S. infected with HIV/AIDS each year and there are about 1.2 million people currently in the U.S. with an HIV/AIDS infection. About 12.8% of them may not be aware of their disease status. [cdc.gov]
  • Aspergillosis: According to the Centers for Disease Control the exact prevalence of opportunistic aspergillosis is unknown because it is not required to be reported in the U.S. however it is a common type of fungal infection found in organ transplant patients with a cumulative incidence of 19% over twelve months during a 2001-2006 study. It may also be a problem for up to 15% of patients with cystic fibrosis and 2.5% of patients with asthma, which represents 4.8 million people worldwide, 400,000 of whom might have a more severe form of aspergillosis.  There are 1.2 million people estimated to have aspergillosis as a complication of their tuberculosis disease and there may be 70,000 people who have aspergillosis as a complication of their sarcoidosis disease. [cdc.gov]
  • Sarcoidosis: According to a study of U.S. Navy personnel, “Sarcoidosis Among U.S. Navy Enlisted Men, 1965-1993,” the rate of disease incidence dropped over the time period but was significantly more of a risk for enlisted men who were assigned to aircraft carriers. The study was made at the request of a veteran who wondered if his case of sarcoidosis might have been due to an environmental contaminant.  “Although 70% of case-patients and 66% of controls had ever served on ships, 26% of case-patients and 17% of controls had ever served specifically on aircraft carriers.” (case-patients, n=1121) [3] *Living within the confined quarters of a ship or aircraft carrier may have affected risk of sarcoidosis infections if the disease can remain dormant similarly to tuberculosis. Exposure to the blood or body fluids of a seemingly healthy person might be able to be a source of latent infection for an immuno-compromised individual if the disease is carried within infected white blood cells.
  • Crohn’s Disease: I haven’t found statistics regarding the prevalence of this type of inflammatory bowel disease but the Mayo Clinic site at least mentions that an infectious agent might be involved: [4] Unfortunately they also recommend vitamin D and calcium supplements to help counteract the risk of osteoporosis if steroid therapy is used. [5] This would be bad if the patient actually has elevated levels of hormone D (1, 25(OH)2D) because levels above 42 pg/ml are a signal for calcium to leave the bones which ultimately increases the risk of osteoporosis and calcification of soft tissue. “In fact, there is ample evidence that elevated 1,25(OH)2D leads to bone loss. Brot et al. [53] found that elevated levels of 1,25(OH)2D were strongly associated with decreased bone mineral density and content, and increased bone turnover. When levels are above 42 pg/ml 1,25(OH)2D stimulates bone osteoclasts. This leads to osteoporosis, dental fractures and calcium deposition into the soft tissues [54]. Vanderschueren et al. [55] found that a combination of high 1,25(OH)2D and low 25(OH)D is associated with the poorest bone health.” [1] Adequate magnesium is very important when elevated calcium levels are a problem because it helps the kidneys to excrete excess calcium.
  • Rheumatoid Arthritis: Infection is also mentioned as a possible cause of Rheumatoid Arthritis on the Mayo Clinic site. [6]

That is an incomplete list of statistics but the point was that many people may be affected by pathogens that have developed ways to manipulate our immune system’s normal Vitamin D Receptor metabolism.

Trevor Marshall doesn’t recommend that people who are using his protocol with the help of their physician worry too much about what specific pathogens might be the cause of their own abnormal vitamin D/hormone D levels. Comparing the level of the inactive vitamin D, 25 (OH) D, with the level of the active hormone D, 1, 25 (OH)2D, can suggest infection when the inactive form is low but the active form is normal or elevated. Healthy individuals can remain at 30 pg/ml of the hormone while they are getting plenty of sun exposure and dietary supplies of the vitamin form. Elevated levels are not normal. Elevated levels during active autoimmune disease can be in the 100s while the vitamin level remains low and tends to remain low even when large dose supplements are taken regularly.

The problem is that the infection process has inhibited breakdown of the active hormone and/or causes over production of the enzyme that converts the vitamin into the hormone form so all the large dose vitamin is being converted into the active hormone form which wouldn’t be noticed if only the vitamin level was being measured by the lab – as is the routine currently. The hormone level is a more unstable form that is more expensive to process. The mainstream medical recommendation is based on the theory that the enzyme that can convert the vitamin into the hormone is under careful control by the kidneys, which may be true for healthy people but might not be true for someone with sarcoidosis or Rheumatoid arthritis.

Personal Impact

My own was hormone D level was 55 pg/ml recently which is within the range considered normal but it is towards the high end of the range. It has remained around that level even while limiting dietary sources and exposure to sunlight. The vitamin level was below 10 which is low, above 20 to 30 is the low end of the normal range for the vitamin form of D. So do I have low levels, normal levels or elevated levels?  My endocrinologist’s recommendation that was sent with the vitamin D/hormone D lab report was to start taking vitamin D and calcium in order to help reduce osteoporosis risk but if all levels over 42 pg/ml are causing calcium to leave my bones already then adding extra vitamin D is more likely to add to the infection risk. The use of Benicar and reduced intake of vitamin D and sun exposure is mentioned in this review article about Vitamin D and infection: [1]

My own medical history includes an episode of Epstein-Barr virus/mononucleosis during college and more recently a diagnosis of Grave’s Disease, which is an autoimmune thyroid condition related to Rheumatoid Arthritis in that bone marrow cells become labeled with a thyroid receptor and infiltrate the thyroid gland. The thyroid can become overactive and overproduce thyroid hormone and sometimes the bone marrow cells become mislabeled in a slightly different way and infiltrate the fatty area behind the eye sockets and cause the eyeballs to protrude. 

Professional Impact:

I would like professional guidance about abnormal vitamin/hormone D metabolism iin infection for myself and family and for feeling comfortable about counseling nutrition clients. Without knowing both the vitamin and hormone D levels of a client I can’t really know whether a low vitamin D level alone means the client isn’t getting enough of the nutrient or sun exposure or whether they might have an underlying infection that hasn’t been diagnosed. But without the professional ‘evidence-based’ guidance from the mainstream medical industry I can’t really recommend alternative strategies to a client legally. A professional code of ethics encourages us to do no harm in the health industry but during the earlier phases of medical research it can be more difficult to figure out what might be helpful and what might be harmful.

*I may add to this later but I’m going to try to post it now because I’m having trouble saving it. 2:12pm post was successful, update added, and at 10:54pm.

9/16/2015 correction added. A type of gastro intestinal bacteria, Prevotella copri, has been found to be more prevalent in the GI tracts of people with rheumatoid arthritis.  Intestinal bacteria linked to rheumatoid arthritis (Nov. 5, 2013).

This post is continued on the next two posts:

/Disclosure: This information is provided for educational purposes within the guidelines of fair use. While I am a Registered Dietitian this information is not intended to provide individual health guidance. Please see a health professional for individual health care purposes./