A wide variety of foods had been test for their ORAC values in the past, but the following chart is more current and reflects the 2007 results.  The importance of a food's high ORAC value is that it indicates a food's antioxidant value, and a high value is believed to be correlated in the Free-radical theory of aging. 

This more current list from 2007 was compiled by scientists within the United States Dept. of Agriculture and includes ORAC values for 277 foods commonly consumed in the USA (grains, seeds, nuts, spices, vegetables, fruits, etc.).  It's also considered to be more accurate than the previously published ORAC numbers because it shows that all plants have variable amounts of both hydrophilic (water-loving) phytochemicals and lipophilic (fat-loving) phytochemicals that contribute to total ORAC.

There has been a lot of excitement lately about Dan Buettner's The Blue Zones: : Lessons for Living Longer from the People Who've Lived the Longest. The book is a lively account of a research project that used several research disciplines to identify areas where people live happier, longer lives and assess some of the common denominators that link sardinian shepherds, japanese grandmothers and an enclave of Seventh-Day Adventists in Los Angeles. There are some unsurprising findings to do with diet (fruit and vegetables feature prominently) but also oddities such as the observation that these people tend to eat 2oz of nuts a day, 5 times a week or so. However, over-arching all of this was the sense of the importance of family, social interaction and other such factors.

Buettner says he has identified four things people can do that can potentially increase life expectancy: Create an environment that encourages physical activity, set up your kitchen in such a way that you're not overeating, cultivate a sense of purpose and surround yourself with the right people.

So, it was perhaps not too surprising that when Holford claimed that he and his research team scour the science to bring you useful information, every second month, you might guess that you will soon read something about longevity, with an emphasis on diet/nutrition rather than the important social factors. Oddly enough, you should look out for the very next 100%health newsletter because Holford and his team will report their findings that:

the six longest-living populations in the world all consume very high anti-oxidants-what's called 6000 ORACs a day. So, we've been looking at what are the 10-20 top ways to get these ORACs-2000 ORACs. And the answer is one-third of a teaspoon of cinammon a day is 2000. Half a teaspoon of oregano. [Use it in your pasta sauce.] Half a teaspoon of turmeric, you want to use turmeric a lot...3 squares of 70% cocoa dark chocolate. One-third of a glass of red wine. 8 blueberries. Half a cup of berries, like strawberries. 8 asparagus tips. A small serving of red lentils or red kidney beans. A spoonful of mustard.^[3]

Now, you might think that Holford's crack research team has been drudging away in a laboratory to bring you this information.^[2] After a few seconds of googling, HolfordWatch had located the latest ORAC values for foodstuffs in the USDA Nutrient Database (pdf) and learned that there is a downloadable database (MS Access). If HolfordWatch had wanted to create a list of "the 10-20 top ways to get these ORACs-2000 ORACs", we would probably compile it from these sources, but, then again, we're not a crack team of IONistas nor do we collect subscriptions for our value-added services.

You may recognise some of the food items that Holford named in Table 1 (pdf) which helpfully confirms that spices such as cinnamon, turmeric and mustard are high in ORAC values per 100g but when you consider conventional serving sizes, they lose their top rankings to unsweetened chocolate and fresh fruit.

HolfordWatch may be wrong, and it may prove that Holford is inviting people to mix and match among several dietary sources of ORACs a day, but we do wonder if there will be an addition to the Patrick Holford Biocare range, one that offers you the convenience of taking your ORACs in a capsule without trying to plan your meals around various spices. And, again, it might only be us, but talking about unfamiliar ORACs rather than the vitamins, anti-oxidants and minerals with which people are familiar, makes them sound as if they are an additional extra to your diet that has to be consciously incorporated, rather than something that is already present in substantial quantities.

If anybody is contemplating an uptick in their ORAC consumption, you might like to recall that lots of fruit and vegetables have good ORAC values (consult the above resources). However, we feel that we must mention that it is far from clear that high ORAC values in foodstuffs translate to higher plasma (blood) antioxidant capacity (AOC), far less any anti-ageing or chronic disease countering effects. E.g., although plums yield a high antioxidant content upon analysis, plums did not raise plasma AOC levels in volunteers who participated in an experiment where they ate them and then had their blood analysed after consumption. It seems as if "one of the major phytochemicals in plums is chlorogenic acid, a compound not readily absorbed by humans". Eating fruit and vegetables is A Good Thing and we would encourage that. However, as long as you eat an ample quantity and variety in a day, and select them from various parts of the colour spectrum, you may well be consuming all of the phytonutrients that you need without wondering about where you might obtain more (such as taking specially formulated capsules or especially potent extracts).

Apparently, we would be well on the way to a high anti-oxidant consumption if we were to drink modest amounts of the following: fruit juice at breakfast; coffee mid-morning; green tea at lunch; red wine with dinner and cocoa before bed. It is all a matter of personal dietary preferences and what suits personal schedules.

It almost seems as if the macro and micro nutrients look after themselves when you consume a varied, well-balanced diet. And all without concerning ourselves unduly about ORACs or other units that are not yet fully standardised or readily explicable.

What about the role of ORACs in longevity?

Overall, it seems as if Buettner summarised the quest for longevity well:

The idea of discovering a magic source of long life still has so much appeal...that charlatans and fools perpetuate the same boneheaded quest, whether it comes disguised as a pill, diet, or medical procedure. In an all-out effort to squash the charlatans forever, demographer S. Jay Olshansky of the University of Illinois at Chicago and more than 50 of the world's top longevity experts issued a position statement in 2002 that was as blunt as they could fashion it.

"Our language on this matter must be unambiguous," they wrote. "There are no lifestyle changes, surgical procedures, vitamins, antioxidants, hormones, or techniques of genetic engineering available today that have been demonstrated to influence the processes of aging."

HolfordWatch is sure that you will weigh the relative research endeavours of the researchers in mind if you are fortunate enough to come across the panegyric to ORACs in the upcoming 100%health newsletter. Particularly if that newsletter or any accompanying material offers you the opportunity to purchase convenience in the form of ORACs in a special anti-oxidant formula.

Notes

[1] There are several ways to express ORAC units. Some evaluations report ORAC units per grams dry weight, others as wet weight and others find it more useful to report ORAC units per typical serving. ORAC values will vary according to the state of a food item. E.g., a raisin is high in ORACs because of its reduced water weight; the grape from which it originated will seem to have a lower ORAC because it retains its water.
ORAC values may vary according to: a cultivar (e.g., mexican, italian or greek mountain oregano); growing conditions (e.g., soil, climate); stage of maturation at harvesting; food processing and preparation (e.g., dried, demi-sec, whether a fruit juice has additives; fresh; freeze-dried or frozen); sampling methods and analytical procedures (for an example of how much these can vary, consult table 3 (pdf)).
Consider whether the ORAC value is based on reported lipophilic as well as hydrophilic values. Lipophilic estimates allow values to be calculated for lipid-soluble carotenoids in addition to the usual water-soluble (hydrophilic) phenolics.
USDA Database 2007 also relies upon fluorescein as the fluorescent probe and deprecates the usefulness of earlier studies that relied upon B-phycoerythrin (B-PE) as the probe.
Matters also become rather more complicated when several values have to be combined from different sources.

ORAC Values are reported for hydrophilic-ORAC (H-ORAC), lipophilic-ORAC (LORAC),
total-ORAC, and total phenolics (TP). H-ORAC, L-ORAC and total-ORAC are reported in μmol of Trolox Equivalents per 100 grams (μmolTE/100 g), while TP is reported in mg gallic acid equivalents per 100 grams (mgGAE/100 g). When only an HORAC value was available for a particular food item low in fat, H-ORAC value was also utilized for the Total ORAC value. In some cases values for H-ORAC, L-ORAC and Total-ORAC may come from different sources, and the sum of the average values for HORAC and L-ORAC may not equal the value for Total-ORAC. [pg. 4 pdf, pg 2 document USDA Nutrient Database (pdf)]

[2] Holford was encouraging people to sign up for 100%health membership so that they might continue to read his insights and interpretations of science that we need to improve our lives so that we enjoy 100%health. He laid it on the line that such excellence has to be paid for:

My job is to help people like you become 100%healthy. I have a company called 100%health. Our mission is to make people 100%healthy. I have a team of researchers. What I do is I write a newsletter, every other month, where we keep exploring the new science to give you something that you can use in your life...That's my job, to actually find stuff that you can use. [Join 100%health and receive my newsletter and other 100%health membership benefits like the hundreds of special reports that I've written.] Quite frankly, it's the way that I support paying my research team, that's really what it is about.

HolfordWatch wonders if it depends on whether you call a bit of Googling and text-skimming 'research' or think that it equates to an understanding of the science you are passing on to a wider audience. One would hope that this research team has some special understanding but, judging by the usual state of the claims in those newsletters, it doesn't seem so; it doesn't even look like someone vaguely brings their maths skills to bear. It's not even as if the claims in those special reports are up to date because they just seem to be cut and pasted from his books and nobody checks that they are still relevant.
[3] All quotations attributed to Holford taken from notes made during his Hidden Food Allergies talk at the Allergy and Gluten Free Show 2008. As such, the transcription may not be error-free and has not been verified.

This was confirmed when I heard the stories of some of my Team in Training team members.  One of them had a pneumonia after a fall marathon last year and another one, just this weekend, picked up a "bad cold" after her half-marathon.

I was very glad to learn all of this because I feel like, as a 50-something non-athlete just getting into training for a marathon, I'm a little disadvantaged.  Boosting my immunity and strength via antioxidants and good nutrition might be one way to give me a competitive edge. 

One doctor says that oxidation to your body is what an exhaust is to your car.  The exhaust is a by-product of the car's exhertion.  Oxidants are the by-products of your body's exertion.  You fight the oxidants with "anti-oxidants".

Our bodies produce their own antioxidants ("endogenous" antioxidants), but athletes need to supplement.

The body requires higher than normal levels of antioxidants to cope with the vastly increased quantities of free radicals produced during prolonged, strenuous exercise. One way of building up endogenous antioxidants is to exercise frequently. Athletes who train regularly have far greater quantities of endogenous antioxidants than those who exercise intermittently or not at all.

As a result of exercise-induced free radical overload endurance athletes also need to boost their intake of plant-derived antioxidants. A number of clinical studies have shown that taking a wide range of plant-based antioxidants can help to counter free radical damage in endurance athletes. In addition they improve post event recovery and accelerate muscle repair – especially in older athletes.   Dr. Keith Scott, medical doctor and keen cyclist

Pick a wide variety of antioxidants

Because your body produces a wide variety of oxidants, you need to supplement with a wide variety of antioxidants.  Don't pick just one, like a Vitamin E or quercetin.  Pick several.

Furthermore not all antioxidants can reach all the parts of every cell. For instance vitamin E functions primarily in the "fatty" parts of the cell while vitamin C can only access the "watery" areas. Some antioxidants cannot cross the 'blood-brain barrier' and therefore cannot provide protection for that vital organ.

What foods have antioxidants in them?

Some well known dietary antioxidants are vitamins A, C, E; ß-carotene, selenium and plant based antioxidants such as curcumin, quercetin, resveratrol and rutin.

‡ORAC numbers from Jean Mayer USDA Human Nutrition Research Center on Aging at Tufts University.

My favorite antioxidant sources

I happen to be munching on sunflower seeds as I write!

But it was very interesting to see that many of the fruits in my favorite health drink are very high on the ORAC/antioxidant scale:  Acai, blueberries, cherries, blackberries, dark grapes, cranberries, kiwi.   

Perhaps this explains why, even before I started training, I rarely picked up the colds and flus that everyone around was picking up.  I guess from now on, it will be a more conscious decision for me to choose high antioxidant foods and supplements.

However, like most scientific or medical tests you have to put them into perspective based on many variables. There are numerous factors that can influence and determine the antioxidant content: the amount of water or fat, the temperature, how thick it is, when the fruits were harvested, how they are processed, how they were stored, how old the fruits are, etc. In a scientific study all these variables are controlled so that they can compare the same numbers against other numbers. In the real world we cannot control the variables, so looking at specific numbers makes no sense in comparing one product to another. It isn’t the specific number that is important; it is the range of values for a product.

Dark chocolate has very high antioxidant levels in terms of ORAC, NORAC, HORAC, total phenols, and epicatechins. The FDA has recommended that we digest a minimum of 4000-5000 ORAC a day. There is no maximum amount, but it is important to remember that each antioxidant is different and works at different sites in the body and at different times. A wide variety of antioxidants are needed to meet the body’s need. Dark chocolate and açai contain numerous types of high-quality antioxidants in large amounts. Cocoa can provide an excellent source of antioxidants, vitamins, minerals, and fiber to meet the daily needs of our bodies.

It has been estimated that less than 1% of Americans get enough antioxidants a day to meet their needs. The consumption of fruits and vegetables is very low in our country. The oxidative stress we face daily needs to be countered with a high-quality functional food. Healthy chocolate is a simple and very effective way of adding antioxidants to our diet.

Darker is better with any antioxidant food. Dark cocoa has a bitter taste because it is very high in antioxidants. Dark fruits like blueberries and açai berries also have a very high antioxidant content.

Incorporate these antioxidant-rich functional foods into your diet to boost your body’s ability to counter oxidative stress and the many illnesses that can be associated with that stress.

A sound scientist whose work is equally playful and rigorous, Pronsato deploys a canny use of space and idiosyncratically fashioned rhythms to disorient and build suspense-like some 21st-century Miles Davis or Eric Dolphy of the laptop. Despite being a minimal-techno artist, Pronsato offers a palette that's as full of unexpected patterns and meticulously rendered textures as a Wassily Kandinsky painting.

Pronsato's compositions unsettle in original ways, yet they also slyly tickle funnybones. Often both humorous and erotic, his cuts are the wild cards that adventurous DJs pull out when they want to take the dance floor to strange new levels of motion. Therefore, Pronsato's releases have become elite selectors' secret weapons of beguilingly baffling quirkiness that still move asses.

Unsurprisingly, 2006 is promising to be as eventful as last year. As demand for his music has waxed, Pronsato has accordingly increased his productivity while maintaining his usual exacting quality control standards. March will bring Pronsato's debut 12 for Hello? Repeat while summer 2006 will see EPs issued by Orac and Telegraph (watch for the last two editions of the four-part Limeworks series), plus another collaboration with Argentinean Franco Cinelli for Milnor Modern (Picaro, their first joint effort from late '05, contains some of Pronsato's most flavorful club bangers). A temporary residence in Holland will enable Pronsato to spend even more time in 2006 devastating European audiences with his uniquely psychedelic and funky techno live sets.

along with
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www.nektr-events.com
www.going.com/deepermoods_april
www.myspace.com/deepermoods
www.people.tribe.net/deepermoods

A scrolling Star-Wars style banner, with "Two hundred and fifty years ago a man became disillusioned with medicine and (...blah...blah...) now the second largest medical industry, etc..."

Bit of a Google - produces this undiluted bucket of bilge:

World Homœopathy Awareness Week 2008 29th April – 6th May 2008 : Theme – Homœopathy in Sports - NATIONAL CAMPAIGN

Yep, that was a 'classy 30 second cinema advert... set to a catchy African beat!' Maybe they think that African nations are deserving to be linked to claims that have so far shown that they are as effective as swallowing goldfish poo. Catchy indeed.

But wait! There's more!

...This year an 8 page A4-sized insert about homoeopathy will be featured in the Well Being magazine – April/May (No 114) edition... The feature is a very good source of information about homoeopathy.

As good as this source of information? Or this source? How about this source? Or Dr. Kimball Atwood's outline on the lack of scientific support for homeopathy in "Homeopathy and Evidence-Based Medicine: Back to the Future" (Part I, II, III, IV, V)?

Hold onto your dilutions... guess what their other tactics involve?

... Casperson’s Homoeopathic Books are providing libraries with a flyer about homoeopathy, details of WHAW 2008, and some recommended titles. The aim of the initiative is to increase awareness about homoeopathy and the potential for more homoeopathic books to be made available to the public through libraries.

or even

1st Aid Poster .... Homoeopathic First Aid Course – (Hom Fact Pack) Teaching Package on disc.

and... uh?

Arnica Montana 1st Aid Kit and CDRom. Designed by Catherine Diamantopoulo, in conjunction with the College of Homeopathy, Helios Pharmacy and the Red Cross. [emphasis mine] .... presentation tips... promotion advice... It is ideal for local promotions directed at Homoeopathy in Sports... Distribute to your local gym; to team sports; at sports injury clinics...

The only thing I can say that is in ANY way positive about this production - is have a look at what they're doing. See how they are approaching health claims from many different angles are using quite a range of resources?

There's a lesson there in regards to what we're up against and what strategies are available, to be frank. I'd suggest keeping an eye out as to what other efforts are being made during 'world homeopathic awareness week' and seeing what can be done about it.

It starts with a short history of the popularity of "bizarre, pseudomedical practitioners" and goes on to say:

Nothing has changed in recent years. In fact, the supplement and herbal industries had become so powerful by 1992 that their supporters were reputed to have sent an estimated two million letters to members of Congress, urging them to prevent the Food and Drug Administration from imposing restrictions on unsubstantiated health claims made on behalf of supplements and herbal products — restrictions that might have prevented the significant loss of life and thousands of adverse effects attributed to the herb ephedra, which was marketed as a weight-loss and athletic-performance supplement before it was finally banned a few years ago.

An interesting contrast to the recent shutting down of the BBC website for Complimentary Medicine due to public pressure. Maybe times are changing, in little ways.

What is new is the role of reputable institutions in propagating such nonsense: The NIH now awards both research and educational grants in alternative medicine. According to the Web site of the National Center for Complementary and Alternative Medicine, "the immediate goal" of the latter program is "to encourage and support the incorporation of [complementary and alternative medicine] information into medical, dental, nursing, and allied health professional school curricula, into residency training programs, and into continuing education courses. An important longer-term goal [is] to accelerate the integration of CAM and conventional medicine." Many medical schools now work with complementary and alternative clinics, offer fellowships in alternative medicine, and both include material on alternative medicine in required courses and offer optional courses about it.

This shouldn't come as a surprise to many, after a broad international recent market research study reporting that

The internet has had a large impact ... with consumers being given access to unlimited health information online. In the US for example, where we have seen a slow but steady increase in the proportion of people who say that they ‘prefer alternative medicine to standard medicine’ over the past five years, a third of the population now gathers healthcare information on the Internet. ... people aged 35 and over are generally more likely than their younger counterparts to turn to alternative medicine, and acceptance of the practice appears to increase with age.

So - should the Internet be emphasised as an important resource when it comes to promoting correct information about herbal remedies, et al? Certainly the network of science blogs and sites are supportive of each other's summarised investigations by links and references - such as outlining the lack of evidence regarding autism being linked to vaccinations, for example (she writes, demonstrating at the same time how easy it is to grab a whole buncha links and linky linky linky... !).

The issue that Bausell has revolves around the enormous amount of spending that goes into testing the efficacy (or not finding evidence of efficacy, as the results seem to indicate - placebos ahoy!) of the CAM-claims by the National Center for Complementary and Alternative Medicine - "Not surprisingly, almost all those trials found no difference between the two, but that information has not come cheaply: The NIH has allocated approximately $860-million to the center since the 2000 fiscal year alone."

The issue of testing such claims and the existence of the National Center was presented by Professor Barrie Cassileth and Professor Ray Lowenthal at the 2007 Australian Skeptics conference in Hobart. In their lectures, they gave an overview on the efforts of integrative oncology to investigate and use medicine that does work, researching and clarifying exactly what herbal remedies exist in popular use which do prove to have a scientific benefit - featured on the site www.mskcc.org/aboutherbs.

The article continues with:

Wouldn't it be wiser to allocate that money to other NIH agencies whose mission is to try to find an actual cure for a real disease, or to try to find better ways to manage patients' symptoms for those conditions that can't be cured? Or, if that is not politically feasible, in the spirit of transparency shouldn't the alternative-medicine center be renamed the National Center for the Study of Placebo Effects? And should we really keep this nonsense as part of our medical-school curricula?

About now I remember Daniel Loxton's essay featured on Skepticality in regards to paranormal claims - 'Because people get hurt.' And people indeed get hurt (as the site What's The Harm.net shows) and they will point at outdated reference papers and bad research continually.

I only have to remember comments on a YouTube video of a TV homeopathy debunking, posted up by Richard Saunders, where a persistent homeopathic supporter (persistently dreadful, I might add - referencing papers from the early 1900s as support for homeopathy? Sheesh...) kept up a barrage of 'it's true! It's true!' posts that made readers roll their eyes.

Sure, people will insist the claims have validity and have nothing beyond poor research and anecdote to back it up with. But it doesn't mean that there potentially couldn't be something behind some of the claims - hence the creation of integrative oncology.

Popularizing and emphasizing good research, rigorous studies and easy-to-find papers that show 'no, this particular claim just does NOT work and I have more than just skeptical sites that say so' could help when you're faced with the situation that James Randi writes about in SWIFT - reader Greg Stokley objected to a "naïve – if not simply fraudulent – report featured on TV station WKYC Channel 3, NBC-TV in Cleveland" that was touting pro-homeopathic claims, ending up with the JREF and CSICOP sites being slammed :

" ... you’re going to have to do better than cite James Randi and CSICOP as grounds to refute anything. Had you watched closely, you would have seen the homeopathic practitioner was an MD... Skepticism is fine, but huffing and puffing cynicism helps no one. If you are going to lambaste Ms. Robins’ reporting, your will need to offer far more than indignity and a couple of cultural websites." [emphasis mine]

Yes. We do need more. Because that is the attitude that people can have in regards to claims and many of us have faced that in casual conversations and professional interactions.

The battle does continue, regardless. I know that Michael Baum, Emeritus Professor of Surgery at University College London, caused a storm by criticizing Prince Charles’s support for the Royal London Homeopathic Hospital after a £20 million refurbishment with money that 'would have been better spent on drugs like Herceptin' - but this is working towards testing to ascertain what works and perhaps do find elements that work, rather than just blind faith support of homeopathy or herbs like ephedra; not taking away money that could be used for drugs that already have evidence for their efficacy.

In my opinion, because "...if even Benjamin Franklin couldn't stem the ever-rising tide of alternative medicine, no one can" doesn't mean that there isn't hope. The research that demonstrates that people can shut down a website in the case of the BBC's site (which is one key element in continuing the popularity of the claims) and the growing number of interactions between science blogs and networking... does it not help too in the theory that if it's the older generation which tend more towards "CAM" - then we could reflect upon how to appeal to the reasonings of the Internet-literate younger years too? What will make them be more skeptical than the older years? Could good research evidence online help?

And what if we're wrong? What if there's other elements that contribute to belief in homeopathic claims and the like? Then to at least have a bet-each-way, part of the diversification in addressing concerns about people's health should include a places that which prompts students how to look at "CAM" claims with the scientific method and produce well-written and well-researched papers that can demonstrate that science will test and does test - regardless if you get no evidence that it works - especially with students. Because that's still something that informs us. I certainly hope that places like the National Center for Complementary and Alternative Medicine will provide this need.

Because in the end - if this sort of product in the video here is touted alone as 'a great way combat credulous trusting of "CAM" claims' - we are not going to maintain the fight.

Don't miss this great opportunity to have a juice where the ORAC is soo high - you won't want to waste your money on anything else.

Email me if you would like to know when it's coming out to purchase. info@myitvhomejob.com

When having a lemon and using it is a good thing...

Source - Oprah.com; Muriella's Corner online newsletter

Your change to a newer, healthier life starts in your refrigerator. The first thing you need in there is plenty of foods rich in antioxidants.

But what are antioxidants? Why are they so good for anti-aging?

To explain, Dr. Oz compares apples to apples—one half of this apple was sprinkled with lemon juice and the other was not. While the lemony half remains new and crisp-looking, the untreated half becomes brown and shriveled because of exposure to oxygen, also called oxidation. "The same thing happens to our skin, to our heart, to our eyes," Dr. Oz says. "All of our bodies need to have the antioxidants."

As their name implies, antioxidants do to your body what the lemon juice does to an apple—help prevent the damage caused by oxygen exposure.

While lemons do have some anti-aging benefits—similar to onions—Dr. Oz says there are several foods that are much more potent. Read More Here on Oprah.com

There is a lot of discussion on antioxidants, those rascal free radicals, alkaliniity, ORAC (oxygen radical absorption capacity) etc., etc. David Wolfe (aka Mr Avocado) joins in throwing some light on these terms and issues and help us understand in more depth the importance of dealing with free radicals and of taking in antioxidants.

Read more about this in Muriella's Corner

Since wolfberries are the highest in antioxidants of any known food, and since the Chinese who have eaten them daily for centuries live to be 100 years or more, I personally drink a liter of Ningxia Red Juice almost every month, but some months I eat a bag of dried wolf berries instead. They are delicious, and so is NingXia Red [read about the latest ORAC and S-ORAC scores]. I keep the bag in my office near where I work and every time I pass by I grab a few and nibble on them. One bag lasts just about a month that way.

The berries arrive dried from Young Living and can become even drier after the bag has been opened. I have found that putting a slice of fresh bread in the bag and sealing it tightly plumps up the berries and makes them seem almost fresh. Try it. You’ll like the way they make the berries soft and sweet.

In addition to regular consumption of wolf berry juice, NingXia Red Juice, or the berries themselves, I also take 10-12 drops of clove oils in a capsule almost every day [2 - 4 drops are recommended for the newbie so you can discover what works for you]. Read more about safe use guidelines of therapeutic-grade essential oils here. NOTE: never ingest any essential oil that is not therapeutic-grade, they are not safe for internal or topical applications!

Clove oil is actually 400 times more potent as an antioxidant than wolfberries. [Read more about the antioxidant values of some foods, essential oils and drinks] But of course you can’t drink a cup of clove oil or it would be too much. Sometimes, especially during the flu season, I add 4-5 drops of oregano to the capsule of clove since oregano is an oil that creates a hostile environment for harmful microbes.

In any event, by consuming wolf berries in one form or another and by taking clove oil into my body system on a regular basis, I should live to 120 at least. Dried wolf berries, Ninxgia Red Juice, and the oils of clove and oregano are all obtainable from Young Living.

YOU NEED ADDITIONAL INCOME! AM I RIGHT? OF COARSE I AM! BUT WHAT YOU DON'T WANT IS ANOTHER JOB! YOU HATE THE ONE YOU HAVE!!!

WHATS THE ANSWER! YOU FIND SOMETHING TO GENERATE MORE INCOME WITHOUT GETTING ANOTHER JOB! AND HOW DO YOU DO THAT? YOU CONTACT ME AND I SHOW YOU HOW! JUST LIKE I HAVE FOR THOUSANDS OF OTHER PEOPLE IN THE SAME SITUATION AS YOU! I SHOW YOU WHAT YOU CAN DO TO MAKE MORE MONEY, HAVE FUN DOING IT AND HELP PEOPLE AT THE SAME TIME!

AND YES, IT WILL COST YOU SOME MONEY! $39 TO GET IN AND SOME PRODUCT TO SHARE. BUT I PROMISE YOU IT WILL BE THE MOST EXCITING THING YOU EVER DID AND THE MOST SATISFIEING THING YOU EVER DID AND THE MOST REWARDING THING YOU EVER DID.

OR YOU CAN STAY IN DEBT, FEEL SORRY FOR YOURSELF, GET HARRASED EVERY DAY, STAY BROKE, WATCH YOUR CREDIT GO TO HECK, OR GET THAT SECOND JOB AND WORK 16-20 HOURS A DAY AND THATS YOUR LIFE!!!

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READ MY OTHER ARTICALS THEN CONTACT ME!

email drtbolt1956@aol.com

THE NUMBER ONE SUPER FOOD IN THE WORLD, THE BRAZILIAN ACAI BERRY AND 18 OTHER NUTRIENT DENSE FRUITS FROM THE 4 CORNERS OF THE WORLD. HIGH IN ANTIOXIDANTS,PHYTONUTRIENTS,ESSENTIAL FATTY ACIDS (OMEGA 3), AMINO ACIDS,VITAMINS AND MINERALS,COMPLEX CARBOHYDRATES, DIETARY FIBER , TRACE MINERALS, (D-GLUCOSAMINEHYDROCLORIDE, ESTERFIED FATTY ACIDS (COMMONLY KNOWN AS CELADRIN),( GREEN LABEL ONLY ) AND POTASSIUM SORBATE A NATURAL PRESERVATIVE. THAT'S IT, NO SECRETE INGREDIENTS, ALL NATURAL AND ORGANICALLY GROWN.

IF YOU FOUND OUT TODAY THAT YOU HAD CANCER! THE TREATMENT PROTOCOL WOULD BE FOR YOU TO INCREASE YOUR CONSUMPTION OF FRUITS AND VEGETABLES, AS MUCH AS YOU CAN GET DOWN, ALONG WITH THE REST OF THE TREATMENT. WHY FRUITS AND VEGETABLES, BECAUSE RESEARCH HAS SHOWN THAT ALL THE THINGS I DESCRIBED IN THE PREVIOUS PARAGRAPH ARE ESSENTIAL TO OVER COMING THE CANCER, SICKNESS AND ILLNESS!!!!! IT INCREASES YOUR CHANCES OF SURVIVING A DEVASTATING DISEASE!

EVERYTHING I HAVE STATED IS FACT, BACKED UP BY RESEARCH, STUDY AFTER STUDY. THE UNIVERSITY OF FLORIDA RESEARCH DEPARTMENT, DID A STUDY ON THE ACAI BERRY. THEY TREATED LIVE LEUKEMIA CANCER CELLS IN THE LAB WITH THE ACAI BERRY USED IN MONAVIE, AND UP TO 86% OF THE CANCER CELLS WHERE ERADICATED, KILLED, DIED! LOOK IT UP! FACT. FDA, USDA, PRIVATE RESEARCH HAS ALL SHOWN THAT ALL THESE FRUITS IN MONAVIE HAVE EXTRAORDINARY HEALING POWERS. PEOPLE FROM ALL AROUND THE WORLD FOR THOUSANDS OF YEARS HAVE BEEN USING THESE FRUITS TO TREAT ILLNESS AND SICKNESS. SURE YOU CAN GO TO THE GROCERY STORE AND BUY SOME OF THESE FRUITS, BUT NOT ALL ARE AVAILABLE AND BECAUSE THEY ARE PICKED BEFORE THEY RIPEN.  THEY DON'T HAVE THE PROPER NUTRITIONAL VALUE THEY SHOULD IF LEFT TO RIPEN! SO YOU BOUGHT A CAR WITH NO ENGINE. GOOD LUCK WITH THAT! I CAN'T STOP AGEING, NO ONE CAN! BUT I CAN AGE SLOWER, KEEPING MY HEALTH AND MY NEW FOUND YOUTH. SINCE I STARTED DRINKING MONAVIE I SLEEP BETTER, FEEL BETTER,LOOK BETTER, DO MORE, DON'T NEED ARTHRITIS MEDICINE ANYMORE, NO VIAGRA NEEDED. I FEEL LIKE I DID OVER 30 YEARS AGO. EVERYONE WHO DRINKS MONAVIE HAS THEIR OWN STORY AS TO WHAT IT HAS DONE FOR THEM AND YOU COULD TO. EMAIL ME AT DRTBOLT1956@AOL.COM  FOR MORE INFORMATION. YOU ONLY HAVE ONE LIFE SO WHY NOT MAKE THE BEST OF IT AND GET ON THE RIGHT TRACK TO ENJOYING IT BY BEING AND LIVING HEALTHIER.

 I have recently come across this new sort of fad ORAC Oxygen Radical Absorbance Capacity. All indicate that foods high in ORAC can forestall aging? This is interesting to me... So many people seek this figurative "fountain of youth" and all this time it is in food? I guess the old cliche, "you are what you eat" isn't so cliche after all. Here is an FDA article about ORAC. http://www.ars.usda.gov/is/AR/archive/feb99/aging0299.htm

Smile & Think Healthy,

 Cameron

The good thing about the blog Respectful Insolence is that its surgeon scientist author, Orac (a nom-de plume) is relentless in his pursuit of quackery in themainstream media; the bad thing is that it's like reading Medieval Times.

Actress Jenny McCarthy is the latest media-blessed avatar of a pre-scientific mindset by virtue of writing a book about how she dealt with her son’s autism. As Orac writes:

“While contemplating the burning stupidity that is Jenny McCarthy over the weekend as she mindlessly parroted some of the worst misinformation of the antivaccine movement and assured an interviewer that she would , all the while solemnly proclaiming that, were she to have another child she ""wouldn't vaccinate at all, never, ever," all the while objecting to her being portrayed as "antivaccine," I couldn't help but notice perhaps an uptick in the use of a favorite antivax question in reference to vaccines:

"Why are we injecting TOXINS into our babies?"

Jenny McCarthy repeated that question (or variants thereof) multiple times in her interview, while piously proclaiming herself "antitoxin" not "antivaccine" and demanding that the CDC "get all the toxins" out of the vaccines. Her protestations otherwise, McCarthy had latched on to a favorite antivaccination trope that is trotted out with some regularity to try to scare parents…”

In a nutshell, anti-vaccination activists comb through the ingredients in vaccines, seek out the studies which found the adverse effect level, and then cite these studies as proof that the ingredient is a toxin, and, well, babies shouldn’t be injected with toxins. As Orac notes, this kind of scaremongering is both “deceptive” and “as dumb as it gets.”

Why? Because the dosage makes the poison. (Orac helpfully goes through the relevant ingredients to show how deceptive and dumb the claims made about their toxicity are).

The surge of interest in these ingredients comes as the anti-vaccination activists find themselves on the end of a losing battle with "their previous favorite bogeyman vaccine ingredient" thimerosol, which voluminous research has failed to connect to autism.

"Consequently, they're branching out to other scary-sounding ingredients in vaccines and invoking vague (and, conveniently enough, almost impossible to demonstrate) "environmental toxins." Heck, Jenny McCarthy is even ignorant enough to go on and on in interviews about how there are--gasp!--viruses in vaccines. My first thought was: How else would Dr. McCarthy suggest that we provoke the desired immunity?"

Somehow it has escaped Jenny McCarthy’s attention that the vaccination is responsible for eradicating such devastating diseases as smallpox – and for a massive reduction in cases and deaths in the U.S. from diphtheria; pertussis (whooping cough); tetanus; polio; measles; mumps; rubella (German measles); invasive Haemophilus influenza type b (Hib); acute hepatitis B; hepatitis A; varicella (chickenpox); Streptococcus pneumoniae (pneumococcal); and smallpox.

As a recent study by the Centers for Disease Control noted,

“…for immunizations developed prior to 1980, there was a 92 percent reduction in vaccine-preventable illnesses and a 99 percent or greater decline in deaths due to vaccine-preventable diseases.”

And what is the basic building block of a vaccine? A weakened version of the virus or bacteria responsible for the infection which triggers an immune response without inducing the actual infection.

What is ORAC - Oxygen Radical Absorbance Capacity ?

There are several methods which have been developed to measure the total antioxidant capacity of biological samples. But the ORAC (Oxygen Radical Absorbance Capacity) method is unique, acording to developer Guohua Cao.

ORAC measures the degree to which a sample inhibits the action of an oxidizing agent and also how long it takes to do so.
Then it integrates the two measurements into a single unit.
This provides an accurate and reproducible measurement for the different types of antioxidants having different strengths.

ORAC stands for Oxygen Radical Absorbance Capacity. This is it's capacity for fighting free radicals which are the cause of cancers, reduced immune system capabilities and other diseases.

One of the best ways to fight free radicals is by choosing the right foods.
This is where ORAC is important. ORAC is a way to measure how many free radicals a specific food can absorb. The more free radicals a food can absorb, the higher its ORAC score. The higher its ORAC score, the better it is at helping our bodies fight diseases like cancer and heart disease and other diseases.

Interesting!

So the higher the ORAC value the more antioxidants our bodies are able to use to help our bodies do what they were created to do. This makes sense. The better we eat (among other things) the better our bodies can fight what needs to be fought and restore what needs to be restored.

ORAC VALUES
OF FRUITS & VEGETABLES
(per 100 grams, or 3.5 ounces)

ORAC values refer to the Oxygen Radical Absorbance Capacity of a food, as determined by the U.S. Department of Agriculture. By testing the ability of foods and other compounds to subdue oxygen free radicals, the DOA was able to determine each compound's antioxidant capability. The ORAC values in the following chart reflect these findings.

Source: Agriculture Research, February 1999

So how many of us are actually able to consume a good volume of these foods? And do those of us who do consume these foods compromise in other areas - such as fiber, protein, etc? How realistic is it for us to consume a good ORAC value in our daily diets with our fast paced and instant lifestyles?

Not all of us make our own breads or raise our own animals for meat and other products. Not all of us grow our own fruits and vegetables and amend our soils to ensure that our produce is able to grow in the richest of soils. So what do we do?

Our family has been using a product that we really like. The product is called The Feast. What makes this product unique is it's processing and it's contents. This is a whole food product which is grown, mostly organic, in rich soil and juiced within hours of harvesting. The drying process is done at a low temperature so the vital nutrients in the foods are not destroyed. Then the powder of over 176 natural ingredients is mixed together into one product that you can add to your glass of juice as often as you like. Just two scoops of The Feast yield an ORAC value of 3,980. We think it tastes great in orange juice.

What have we noticed since we've been using The Feast on a regular basis? We have noticed a more regulated and balanced level of energy throughout the day. Where we used to have peaks and valleys of energy throughout the day we now notice that our energy levels are consistent through the day. We also have just come through the first bout of seasonal viruses. The mono virus was running through our home. YUCK! But this dreaded virus that often can take anywhere from a week to several months to kick and sometimes lands people in the hospital lasted only a week for each individual in our home who contracted this nasty virus. A week from start to finish. Amazing. Is this due to The Feast? I cannot say. But I can say that having a healthy lifestyle and eating healthy foods was very likely a major cause for this virus running so quickly through our family. Everyone is back to normal with no remnant effects of this nasty bug. We do honestly believe that with The Feast as part of our daily routine we were better able to fight off this nasty invader and return to normal health much quicker and without any lagging effects.

Another product with a high ORAC value is Beyond Berries . With an ORAC value of 4,410 according to the suggested use and being made of fruits and berries, it tastes great!

The Feast or Beyond Berries, along with a healthy diet and active lifestyle, is a good way to ensure that you are getting a good amount of antioxidants in your diet. And after learning a bit about the benefits of Oxygen Radical Absorbance Capacity (ORAC) and it's potential health benefits we are pleased that these products are part of our daily diet. I'm all for increasing my physical capacity for fighting free radicals which are the cause of cancers, reduced immune system capabilities and other diseases.

Now you can order your Special Introductory “Starter Pack” and enjoy, Special savings, FREE gifts, and an iron-clad no-risk guarantee.

Oxygen Radical Absorbance Capacity (ORAC) And Acai Extract 

The Gentle Art of Homeopathic Killing

By The Quackometer

The Society of Homeopaths (SoH) are a shambles and a bad joke. It is now over a year since Sense about Science, Simon Singh and the BBC Newsnight programme exposed how it is common practice for high street homeopaths to tell customers that their magic pills can prevent malaria. The Society of Homeopaths have done diddly-squat to stamp out this dangerous practice apart from issue a few ambiguously weasel-worded press statements.

The SoH has a code of practice, but my feeling is that this is just a smokescreen and is widely flouted and that the Society do not care about this. If this is true, then the code of practice is nothing more than a thin veneer used to give authority and credibility to its deluded members. It does nothing more than fool the public into thinking they are dealing with a regulated professional.

As a quick test, I picked a random homeopath with a web site from the SoH register to see if they flouted a couple of important rules:

48: • Advertising shall not contain claims of superiority. • No advertising may be used which expressly or implicitly claims to cure named diseases.

72: To avoid making claims (whether explicit or implied; orally or in writing) implying cure of any named disease.

The homeopath I picked on is called Julia Wilson and runs a practice from the Leicestershire town of Market Harborough. What I found rather shocked and angered me.

Straight away, we find that Julia M Wilson LCHE, RSHom specialises in asthma and works at a clinic that says,

Many illnesses and disease can be successfully treated using homeopathy, including arthritis, asthma, digestive disorders, emotional and behavioural difficulties, headaches, infertility, skin and sleep problems.

Well, there are a number of named diseases there to start off. She also gives a leaflet that advertises her asthma clinic. The advertising leaflet says,

Conventional medicine is at a loss when it comes to understanding the origin of allergies. ... The best that medical research can do is try to keep the symptoms under control. Homeopathy is different, it seeks to address the triggers for asthma and eczema. It is a safe, drug free approach that helps alleviate the flaring of skin and tightening of lungs...

Now, despite the usual homeopathic contradiction of claiming to treat causes not symptoms and then in the next breath saying it can alleviate symptoms, the advert is clearly in breach of the above rule 47 on advertising as it implicitly claims superiority over real medicine and names a disease.

Asthma is estimated to be responsible for 1,500 deaths and 74,000 emergency hospital admissions in the UK each year. It is not a trivial illness that sugar pills ought to be anywhere near. The Cochrane Review says the following about the evidence for asthma and homeopathy,

The review of trials found that the type of homeopathy varied between the studies, that the study designs used in the trials were varied and that no strong evidence existed that usual forms of homeopathy for asthma are effective.

This is not a surprise given that homeopathy is just a ritualised placebo. Hopefully, most parents attending this clinic will have the good sense to go to a real accident and emergency unit in the event of a severe attack and consult their GP about real management of the illness. I would hope that Julia does little harm here.

However, a little more research on her site reveals much more serious concerns. She says on her site that 'she worked in Kenya teaching homeopathy at a college in Nairobi and supporting graduates to set up their own clinics'. Now, we have seen what homeopaths do in Kenya before. It is not treating a little stress and the odd headache. Free from strong UK legislation, these missionary homeopaths make the boldest claims about the deadliest diseases.

A bit of web research shows where Julia was working (picture above). The Abha Light Foundation is a registered NGO in Kenya. It takes mobile homeopathy clinics through the slums of Nairobi and surrounding villages. Its stated aim is to,

introduce Homeopathy and natural medicines as a method of managing HIV/AIDS, TB and malaria in Kenya.

I must admit, I had to pause for breath after reading that. The clinic sells its own homeopathic remedies for 'treating' various lethal diseases. Its MalariaX potion,

is a homeopathic preparation for prevention of malaria and treatment of malaria. Suitable for children. For prevention. Only 1 pill each week before entering, during and after leaving malaria risk areas. For treatment. Take 1 pill every 1-3 hours during a malaria attack.

This is nothing short of being totally outrageous. It is a murderous delusion. David Colquhoun has been writing about this wicked scam recently and it is well worth following his blog on the issue.

Let's remind ourselves what one of the most senior and respected homeopaths in the UK, Dr Peter Fisher of the London Homeopathic Hospital, has to say on this matter.

there is absolutely no reason to think that homeopathy works to prevent malaria and you won't find that in any textbook or journal of homeopathy so people will get malaria, people may even die of malaria if they follow this advice.

Malaria is a huge killer in Kenya. It is the biggest killer of children under five. The problem is so huge that the reintroduction of DDT is considered as a proven way of reducing deaths. Magic sugar pills and water drops will do nothing. Many of the poorest in Kenya cannot afford real anti-malaria medicine, but offering them insane nonsense as a substitute will not help anyone.

Ironically, the WHO has issued a press release today on cheap ways of reducing child and adult mortality due to malaria. Their trials, conducted in Kenya, of using cheap mosquito nets soaked in insecticide have reduced child deaths by 44% over two years. It says that issuing these nets be the 'immediate priority' to governments with a malaria problem. No mention of homeopathy. These results were arrived at by careful trials and observation. Science. We now know that nets work. A lifesaving net costs $5. A bottle of useless homeopathic crap costs $4.50. Both are large amounts for a poor Kenyan, but is their life really worth the 50c saving?

I am sure we are going to hear the usual homeopath bleat that this is just a campaign by Big Pharma to discredit unpatentable homeopathic remedies. Are we to add to the conspiracy Big Net manufacturers too?

It amazes me that to add to all the list of ills and injustices that our rich nations impose on the poor of the world, we have to add the widespread export of our bourgeois and lethal healing fantasies. To make a strong point: if we can introduce laws that allow the arrest of sex tourists on their return to the UK, can we not charge people who travel to Africa to indulge their dangerous healing delusions?