Public 'misled' by drug claims

By Michelle Roberts Health reporter, BBC News
 

Doctors and patients are being misled about the effectiveness of some drugs because negative trial results are not published, experts have warned.

Writing in the British Medical Journal, they say that pharmaceutical companies should be forced to publish all data, not just positive findings.

The German team give the example of the antidepressant reboxetine, saying publications have failed to show the drug in a true light.

Pfizer maintains its drug is effective. Reboxetine (Edronax), made by Pfizer, is used in many European countries, including the UK.  But its rejection by US drug regulators raised doubts about its effectiveness, and led some to hunt for missing data.

This is not the first time a large drug company has come under fire about its published drug trial data.

Trial information Pharmaceutical giant GlaxoSmithKline (GSK) was criticised for failing to raise the alarm on the risk of suicidal behaviour associated with its antidepressant Seroxat.
GSK rejected claims that it improperly withheld drug trial information.

The research authors

But GSK has also been forced to defend itself over allegations about hiding negative data regarding another of its drugs, Avandia, which is used to treat diabetes.

Now researchers from The German Institute for Quality and Efficiency in Health Care say there is unpublished trial data for Pfizer's antidepressant reboxetine that should be made public because it could change views about the drug.

Dr Beate Wieseler and colleagues carried out their own assessment of reboxetine, looking at the results of 13 trials, including eight previously unpublished trials from the manufacturer Pfizer.

They found the drug was no better than a placebo in terms of remission and response rates. And its benefit was inferior when compared with other similar antidepressants.

Furthermore, a higher rate of patients had side effects with reboxetine than with placebo. And more stopped taking the drug because of side effects compared with those taking a placebo or a different antidepressant.

Biased picture The researchers said there has been a publication bias and this had overestimated the benefit of reboxetine and underestimated potential harm. And, they said, it was a widespread problem that applied to many of the drugs in use today.

"Our findings underline the urgent need for mandatory publication of trial data," they say in the BMJ.
They warn that the lack of all information means policy makers are unable to make informed decisions.
In the US, it is already a requirement that all data - both positive and negative - is published. The UK is also striving to achieve this.

The UK's regulator, the MHRA, said: "There is a European initiative to provide public access to the results of clinical trials. The currently planned timeline is that this information could become available in late 2011/early 2012."

A spokeswoman for Pfizer said: "In the UK, Pfizer's reboxetine is licensed for the acute treatment of depressive illness/major depression and for maintaining the clinical improvement in patients initially responding to treatment.
"This medicine presents an effective treatment option to clinicians for the use in patients suffering from these conditions.
"Pfizer discloses the results of its clinical trials to regulatory authorities all around the world. These regulatory authorities carefully balance the risks and benefits of each medication, and reflect all important safety and efficacy information in the approved product labelling.
"Pfizer will review the meta-analysis relating to reboxetine published in the British Medical Journal on 13th October 2010 in detail and will provide further comment after completing the review."
Others lay at least some of the blame with the medical journals that publish drug trial data.
In response, the BMJ has promised to devote an entire issue to the topic next year.
BMJ Editors Dr Fiona Godlee and Dr Elizabeth Loder said: "It is time to demonstrate a shared commitment to set the record straight."

Beauty Parlor Stroke

A grieving widower in the UK is warning women to beware of hair salon stroke, caused by their heads being bent back while being washed. Malcolm Crabb is convinced his wife died of stroke because her head was bent back at the beauty salon while they were washing her hair. His wife Pamela was 51.

He said "I think there should be warnings in hairdressers about it."

Mrs. Crabb had a stroke in September 2000. The stroke hit soon after her appointment. Her speech became slurred and her hands claw-like. She was taken to hospital where tests revealed she had had a stroke. Mrs. Crabb died last week after having a second stroke.

According to the Stroke Association (UK), no real research has been carried out to show a link between beauty salons (hair washing) and strokes. However, the association says there are many cases reported in medical journals. They would like to see research done into this.

According to experts, when you push a person's head back into a sink his/her neck over-extends. According to neurologists Dr. David Bateman, Cumberland, UK, the neck can be stretched so that it kinks for a long time - as in hair-washing at a salon - the arteries get stretched and can tear if you are unlucky. As the bleeding between layers of tissue continues you can get clots building up, this eventually leads to a stroke.

Mr. Crabb said, when talking about his wife's first stoke "When she got up she wasn't speaking like she normally would. She felt awful and I didn't know what the matter was. Her speech then became slurred and her hands became like claws."

When he took her to hospital he said they asked whether she had had her hair done.

Mr. Crabb said "After that it all fell into place and we connected the stroke with the way she had her hair washed."

After her first stroke she became increasingly intolerant to cold weather. The couple eventually moved permanently to southern Spain.

An article 8 years ago in the Lancet writes about a woman who had her hair washed for five minutes at a salon and developed a stroke as a result of it. The doctors said that salons should place a cushion so as not to over-extend the neck.

Recent Barbaric Experiments in Medicine

The following scientific experiments are considered sick, unethical or just plain sadistic by today's standards:

• 1939 ‘Monster Study,’ which involved berating and ridiculing children.
• World War II Porton Down Experiments, during which military servicemen were exposed to toxic nerve agents.
• Program F, which involved saturating public drinking water supplies in Newburgh, New York with high levels of fluoride for 12 years.
• 1971 Stanford Prison Experiment, a “mock” study of volunteer prisoners and inmates carried out in the basement of Stanford University that caused lasting psychological trauma to many study participants.
• Milgram Experiment, which studied the effects of authority on human behavior.
• 1950s to 1970s Holmesburg Dermatological Experiments, which involved injecting Holmesburg prison inmates with cancer-causing chemicals like dioxin.
• 1950s – 1960s Project MKULTRA, which involved the CIA giving LSD and other mind-altering drugs to uninformed test subjects.
• 1960s Willowbrook Hepatitis Experiment, during which researcher Saul Krugman infected mentally disabled children with hepatitis B so he could develop vaccine for it.
• 1970s – 1980s Aversion Project, which involved inhuman experiments like electroshock therapy, castration and forced sex-change operations among those suspected of being homosexual in South Africa’s military.
• 1932 Tuskegee Experiment, which involved 400 black men from Alabama with syphilis. Researchers did not inform them they had the disease (which allowed them to spread it to others), despite symptoms, and did not offer them treatment (even though it could have been treated with the development of penicillin in 1947).

An additional study, called the U.S. Public Health Service Sexually Transmitted Disease Inoculation Study of 1946-1948, involved intentionally infecting Guatemalans with syphilis, gonorrhea or chancres. The U.S. government just apologized for the study in October 2010.
The majority of these experiments happened years ago.

BENEFITS OF SATURATED FATS – traditional societies

Japanese in Okinawa
The people of Okinawa, an island in Southern Japan, are well known for their longevity and excellent health – to the extent that books have been written about the Okinawa diet. The main cooking oil used by the people of Okinawa is pork lard.
The Japanese, in general, are also known for their good health and long lives. This is often attributed to a low fat diet, but it is not true. Although the Japanese eat few dairy fats, the notion that their diet is low in fat is a myth; rather, it contains moderate amounts of eggs, pork, chicken, beef, organ meat, fish (fatty fish like tuna and salmon) and seafood. These are all foods relatively high in saturated fats and cholesterol.
The French
Well known for their love of good food, the French also have low rates of heart disease and other degenerative diseases compared with, say, the Americans. The French diet contains lots of saturated fats in the form of butter, cheese, cream. eggs, meats and liver, including pates.
Apart from using butter generously in their cooking, some French cuisine also feature goose fat!
in France the death rate from heart disease is 145 per 100,000, compared with 315 of every 100,000 middle-aged men who die of heart attacks in the US each year. In the Gascony region, where goose and duck liver form a staple of the diet, this death rate from heart disease is only 80 per 100,000.
The relatively good health of the French, called The French Paradox, is often attributed to them drinking wine. This could well be a reason.
But when one accepts the view that there are many health benefits of saturated sats, then the good health enjoyed by the French begin to make more sense.

Other Mediterranean groups
In general, people of the Mediterranean countries consume quite large amounts of saturated fats – and enjoy good health.
One explanation often cited is olive oil but, in fact, many of these people take far more saturated fats than olive oil. On the Greek island of Crete, for example, fat makes up about 70 percent of the total diet!
Again, while Olive oil is beneficial, these people are also enjoying the health benefits of saturated fats.

The Jews
The Jews, when they lived in Yemen, ate plenty of saturated fats from eggs, meat and butter. Yet they had low rates of heart disease and diabetes.
Modern Jews in Israel consume margarine and vegetable cooking oils – plus plenty of sugar. And they suffer high rates of heart disease and cancer.

Indians in North and South India
Originally, Indians in the North consumed plenty of meat and they cooked with ghee or clarified butter, which is high in saturated fats. Indians in the South were more vegetarian and fish eaters, and they cooked with coconut oil, which is also high in saturated fats.
Both groups originally had low rates of heart disease. Then the South Indians began to use less coconut oil and more margarine / vegetable cooking oils. And they developed a much higher rate of heart disease compared with North Indians who took a lot more saturated fats.
Now, the North Indians are also beginning to switch from ghee to margarine – and the heart disease rate is starting to increase.
Other societies
Other societies that enjoy the health benefits of saturated fats include:

• Swiss, Austrians and Greeks, who live as long as the Japanese but take much more fatty diets.
  
  
• The people of Soviet Georgia – where a study found that those who eat the most fatty meat lived the longest.
  
  
• The Eskimos who, because of their harsh environment, eat mainly meat and lard. They, too, have low rates of heart disease and “clean” arteries that are not clogged up with saturated fats.
  
  
• The Masai, an African tribe whose diet consists primary of meat, blood and milk.

The benefits of saturated fats

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

The much-maligned saturated fats—which Americans are trying to avoid—are not the cause of our modern diseases. In fact, they play many important roles in the body chemistry:

1. Saturated fatty acids constitute at least 50% of the cell membranes. They are what gives our cells necessary stiffness and integrity.
   
    
2. They play a vital role in the health of our bones. For calcium to be effectively incorporated into the skeletal structure, at least 50% of the dietary fats should be saturated.
   
    
3. They lower Lp(a), a substance in the blood that indicates proneness to heart disease. They protect the liver from alcohol and other toxins, such as Tylenol.
   
    
4. They enhance the immune system.
   
    
5. They are needed for the proper utilization of essential fatty acids.
   Elongated omega-3 fatty acids are better retained in the tissues when the diet is rich in saturated fats.
    
6. Saturated 18-carbon stearic acid and 16-carbon palmitic acid are the preferred foods for the heart, which is why the fat around the heart muscle is highly saturated. The heart draws on this reserve of fat in times of stress.
   
    
7. Short- and medium-chain saturated fatty acids have important antimicrobial properties. They protect us against harmful microorganisms in the digestive tract.

The scientific evidence, honestly evaluated, does not support the assertion that "artery-clogging" saturated fats cause heart disease. Actually, evaluation of the fat in artery clogs reveals that only about 26% is saturated. The rest is unsaturated, of which more than half is polyunsaturated.

Go to the site and read more.

Call to 'suspend' diabetes drug

By Nick Triggle Health reporter, BBC News
 

A widely-used diabetes drug should be pulled from the market, European regulators say.

Avandia is used to control blood sugar levels in type 2 diabetes patients.  It was licensed 10 years ago and more than 100,000 patients in the UK use it despite on-going concerns linking it to heart problems.

After reviewing safety data, the European Medicines Agency said the benefits no longer outweighed the risks and it should be suspended.

The drug - generic name rosiglitazone - is also used in combination with other drugs under the names Avandamet and Avaglim.

Contrast A spokeswoman for the regulator said: "Patients who are currently taking these medicines should make an appointment with their doctor to discuss suitable alternative treatments.
"Patients are advised not to stop their treatment without speaking to their doctor."

But the recommendation in Europe contrasts with the US where regulators have decided only to introduce tougher restrictions over its use - a verdict which they confirmed at the same time as the EMA announcement.

Avandia was originally licensed with warnings about the risks for patients with heart failure.
These were later expanded to include other heart problems after further research into its use.
The advice by an expert panel of advisers, who looked at the issue amid mounting concerns, will now be passed to the European Commission.
It may be several months before they make a final ruling, although it is unusual for them to ignore advice from the regulator.
Dr Ellen Strahlman, chief medical officer at GlaxoSmithKline, the manufacturer, said: "Our primary concern continues to be patients with type 2 diabetes and we are making every effort to ensure that physicians in Europe and the US have all the information they need to help them understand how these regulatory decisions affect them and their patients."
GSK said it still believes the drug was an "important treatment" for diabetes patients.
Peter Walsh, head of the patient group Action Against Medical Accidents, said: "Medical experts have been warning for months about the dangers of this drug, which have been well documented.
"It should not take this long to come to a decision when there is evidence that people's lives may be at risk.
"We need a review of how medicines are regulated in the UK and Europe as a whole. We fear that pharmaceutical companies have far more influence than they should have."
Simon O'Neill, of Diabetes UK, agreed action in such cases should be taken more quickly.
But he added: "Patient safety is paramount, so we welcome that a decision has been made about Avandia."

Vaccines = Infertility In Humans

Would you feel comfortable being injected with a vaccine that contains a substance that has been strongly linked to infertility?  Well, if you take the Fluarix swine flu vaccine manufactured by GlaxoSmithKline or any of the other swine flu vaccines that contain Polysorbate 80 that is exactly what you will be doing.  If you are considering getting the swine flu vaccine, or any other vaccine for that matter, perhaps you should educate yourself about EXACTLY what is in these vaccines before you allow them to be injected into your body.

Perhaps you think that linking the swine flu vaccine with infertility is quite a stretch.  Well, let's take this one step at a time.

#1) Polysorbate 80 is in the Fluarix swine flu vaccine manufactured by GlaxoSmithKline according to the CDC.  This is confirmed by the CDC in the document below..... 

http://www.cdc.gov/vaccines/pubs/pinkbook/downloads/appendices/B/excipient-table-2.pdf

#2) A medical study done in Slovakia injected newborn female rats with Tween 80 (Polysorbate 80).  These newborn female rats were injected with Polysorbate 80 at days 4 to 7 after birth.  The researchers found that Polysorbate 80 accelerated the maturation of the female rats, damaged the vagina and womb lining, caused significant hormonal changes, severe ovary deformities and ultimately rendered the young female rats infertile.

In fact, Dee Nicholson, the National Communications Director for Freedom in Canadian Health Care is not shy about saying that Polysorbate 80 is "linked to infertility in mice".

#3) In the package insert for Fluarix, GlaxoSmithKline specifically mentions that they cannot guarantee that their flu vaccine will not damage your fertility: "FLUARIX has not been evaluated for carcinogenic or mutagenic potential, or for impairment of fertility."  Thanks to foolishly passed laws by the U.S. government, you will not be able to sue anyone if it does leave you infertile.

#4) GlaxoSmithKline is not alone in using Polysorbate 80.  It is being reported that Novartis is using the adjuvant MF59 in its swine flu vaccine. The MF59 adjuvant contains Tween80 (Polysorbate 80) and squalene among other things.

#5) On the World Intellectual Property Organization, a patent application for a "fertility impairing vaccine".  The University of Georgia Research Foundation is listed as the patent applicant.  

In the description section of the patent application, Tween 80 (Polysorbate 80) is listed as a preferred ingredient:

"In a preferred embodiment the vaccine comprises oil, preferably a biodegradable oil such as squalene oil, in an amount of about 2.5% to about 15%, preferably about 8% to about 12%. In preparing the vaccine it is advantageous to combine a concentrated oily adjuvant composition with an aqueous solution of the antigen, pZP glycoprotein. Typically, the vaccine is prepared using an adjuvant concentrate which contains lecithin (about 5% to about 15 % wt/vol, preferably about 12% wt/vol) and STDCM (preferably about 25 mg/mL to about 50 mg/mL) in squalene oil. The term % wt/vol means grams per 100 mL of liquid. The aqueous solution containing the isolated pZP glycoprotein is typically a phosphate-buffered saline (PBS) solution, and additionally preferably contains Tween 80 (about 0.2% vol/vol to about 0.8% vol/vol, preferably about 0.4% vol/vol)."

#6) The United Nations is actively seeking ways to limit and control population growth around the globe.  An incredibly shocking U.N. population division policy brief from March 2009 asked this very disturbing question: 

What would it take to accelerate fertility decline in the least developed countries?

You can read this almost unbelievable document here:

http://www.un.org/esa/population/publications/UNPD_policybriefs/UNPD_policy_brief1.pdf

The reality is that for the super wealthy global elite and the majority of the social engineers at the United Nations, population control is a major obsession.  If you doubt this fact, just read this article:

http://signsofthelastdays.com/archives/the-radical-population-control-and-eugenics-agenda-of-the-global-elite

The truth is that the more people learn about what is in these vaccines, the less likely they are to take them.  It is important to do your own research before letting anyone inject anything into your body.  Those who blindly trust the government or world health authorities are likely the ones to end up being extremely disappointed in the end.

Aspirin Gives Strokes

NSAID Use Associated With Future Stroke in Healthy Population

 

September 8, 2010 (Stockholm, Sweden) — Short-term use of nonsteroidal anti-inflammatory drugs (NSAIDs) was associated with an increased risk of stroke in a Danish population study including only healthy individuals.
Presenting the study at last week's European Society of Cardiology (ESC) 2010 Congress, Dr Gunnar Gislason (Gentofte University Hospital, Hellerup, Denmark) said the results could have "massive public-health implications."

"First we found an increased risk of MI with NSAIDs. Now we are finding the same thing for stroke. This is very serious, as these drugs are very widely used, with many available over the counter," Gislason told heartwire . "We need to get the message out to healthcare authorities that these drugs need to be regulated more carefully."

Cochair of the session at which the study was presented, Dr Robert Califf (Duke Clinical Research Institute, Durham, NC), agreed that the results raised a major public-health issue, especially in the US, where many NSAIDs were available without a prescription.

For the current study, Gislason and colleagues examined the risk of stroke and NSAID use in healthy individuals living in Denmark. He explained to heartwire that information on each individual in the Danish population is kept in various national registries. His team started with the whole population of Denmark aged over 10 years. To select just the healthy individuals, they excluded anyone admitted to the hospital within the past five years or those prescribed chronic medications for more than two years. This left a population of around half a million, who were included in the study. By linking to prescribing registries, the researchers found that 45% of these healthy individuals had received at least one prescription for an NSAID between 1997 and 2005. They then used stroke data from further hospitalization and death registries and estimated the risk of fatal and nonfatal stroke associated with the use of NSAIDs by Cox proportional-hazard models and case-crossover analyses.

Results showed that NSAID use was associated with an increased risk of stroke. This increased risk ranged from about 30% with ibuprofen and naproxen to 86% with diclofenac.

Risk of Stroke With Various Nsaids

NSAID	HR (95% CI) for risk of stroke
Ibuprofen	1.28 (1.14–1.44)
Diclofenac	1.86 (1.58–2.19)
Rofecoxib	1.61 (1.14–2.29)
Celecoxib	1.69 (1.11–2.26)
Naproxen	1.35 (1.01–1.79)

Gislason noted that there was also a dose-relationship found, with the increased risk of stroke reaching 90% (HR 1.90) with doses of ibuprofen over 200 mg and 100% (HR 2.0) with diclofenac doses over 100 mg. He pointed out that the results were particularly striking, given that this study was conducted in healthy individuals.
He conceded that his results could have some confounding but noted that the data were controlled for age, gender, and socioeconomic status and the patient population did not include those with chronic diseases. "We also have to think about the degree of confounding needed to nullify risk. It would have to increase risk four- to fivefold, which is very unlikely," he commented.

He said he did not find the results that surprising in view of the accumulating evidence of increased MI risk with these drugs, adding that the mechanism was probably the same. There have been several hypotheses about the mechanism linking NSAIDs with cardiovascular events, including increased thrombotic effect on platelets, the endothelium, and/or atherosclerotic plaques; increasing blood pressure; and effect on the kidneys and salt retention.

Gislason told heartwire that there is reluctance among the medical profession to limit the prescribing of these drugs. "The problem is that we don't have randomized trials, and it is very hard to change the habits of doctors. They have been using these drugs for decades without thinking about cardiovascular side effects."
He also stressed that the public needs to be protected by not allowing NSAIDs to be bought without a prescription. He has had some success in this regard in Denmark at least, where diclofenac became available over the counter recently, but after some of the MI data came out, Gislason's group campaigned the health authorities, and it has now become a prescription-only drug again. But he noted that many more NSAIDs are available over the counter in the US.

He believes the harmful effects of these agents are relevant to huge numbers of people. "If half the population takes these drugs, even on an occasional basis, then this could be responsible for a 50% to 100% increase in stroke risk. It is an enormous effect."

These results have been partly published in Circulation: Cardiovascular Quality and Outcomes earlier this year [1]. Gislason told heart wire that the novelty of the results presented at the ESC meeting was that "we had further analyzed our data regarding specific stroke and looked at the risk of ischemic stroke, and we confirmed that the risk of ischemic stroke was substantially elevated." He added: "We are in the process of analyzing these data related to time to risk and the effect of duration of treatment on stroke risk."

 

Vitamin D Deficiency May Contribute to Musculoskeletal Pain

Musculoskeletal pain, or pain that affects the bones and muscles in the body, is a common complaint among all segments of the population. Still, despite the high incidence and potential consequences of such pain, precise diagnosis and effective treatment are not always easily attained.

What's more, extremely low levels of vitamin D (known as hypovitaminosis D) may be partly responsible for causing some musculoskeletal pain that goes undetected, which can often lead to more severe consequences, including softening of the bones.

In order to determine the prevalence of hypovitaminosis D in patients suffering from musculoskeletal pain, researchers examined 150 patients (ages 10-65) with musculoskeletal pain who had no known health conditions that would decrease the production or absorption of vitamin D, or otherwise account for their pain.

The study found that 55 percent of individuals younger than age 55 had exceptionally high rates of vitamin D deficiency, while 28 percent of patients had severely deficient vitamin D levels. The deficiencies were similar for both men and women.

The moral of the story? Don't underestimate the role that vitamins and nutrition play in maintaining health and well being.

For more information on the benefits of vitamins, visit www.chiroweb.com/find/archives/nutrition/vitamins.

Reference:
Plotnikoff GA, Quigley JM. Prevalence of severe hypovitaminosis D in patients with persistent, nonspecific musculoskeletal pain. Mayo Clinic Proceedings 2003;78, pp1463-70.

Scottish warning over vitamin D levels

Sunlight on the skin helps generate vitamin D

 

New leaflets are to be handed out urging people to make sure they get enough vitamin D.

Doctors are concerned people in Scotland are not getting enough of the vitamin from sunlight and are not topping up their levels with a healthy diet.

There is increasing evidence that a lack of vitamin D could be linked to cancer and multiple sclerosis.
Doctors are also concerned about a rise in the bone disease rickets.
Rickets is a rare condition which causes the softening and weakening of bones in children.

Pregnant and breastfeeding women are particularly at risk of vitamin D deficiency, along with children under five, the elderly, the housebound and people with darker skin.
About 10 to 15 minutes a day of sunshine is considered safe.

But in Scotland the sun is only strong enough to provide vitamin D between April and September.

If the body's reserves of vitamin D run out during the winter, they need to be topped up from oily fish, eggs, meat or a supplement.


Health Secretary Nicola Sturgeon said: "We know that in Scotland the winter sun is not strong enough to provide the minimum vitamin D needed for health - especially for those with darker skin.

"A significant proportion of the UK population has low vitamin D levels. This leaflet aims to ensure that those at risk are aware of the implications of vitamin D deficiency and know what they can do to prevent it."
She added: "Vitamin D is key to maintaining healthy bones. Young children have a high risk of deficiency and we are seeing an increase in reported cases of rickets in Scotland.
"These conditions are easily prevented by improving diet and taking a supplement if you are at risk.
"Recent research suggests that vitamin D deficiency may also contribute to a range of other medical conditions. The Scottish government are keen to continue to monitor this evidence."

The health secretary is due to speak at the Shine on Scotland conference on Tuesday, which will bring together academics from across the world to consider the possible links between vitamin D deficiency and various health problems.
The event is taking place after schoolboy Ryan McLaughlin took a petition to the Scottish Parliament which called on ministers to produce new guidelines on vitamin D supplements for children and pregnant women, along with an awareness campaign about the issue.

Ryan took up the cause after watching his mother Kirsten suffering from MS.

He said: "It's amazing that I only launched Shine on Scotland early last year and so much has happened since.
"The petition lodged at the Scottish Parliament got great support and I'm really grateful to the Scottish government for being prepared to look at this issue.
"I hope the summit is a great success and that something positive can be done for people with MS and to prevent future generations from developing it."

Dr. Green says:  For people eating plenty of good, healthy red meat, this isn't a problem.  Saturated Fats and Protein are what fed our ancestors for thousands of years and it's just as good for us today.  It's only nonsense of the food pyramid and vegetarianism that causes this and many other problems.  Meat is full of vitamins and nutrients.  It is what we were designed to eat.