(Part 3) Top products from r/Health

Just a few points:

1. they are "patentable", every innovative pharmaceutical or biotech product is.
   
2. oncology business is already pretty big, they don't want to destroy or shake too much this booming market. That's why development is pursued to treat and not to cure.
   
3. the majority of people expect to have magic pills for everything when actually everyone should be more or less capable to be their own doctor, meaning to have common sens when it comes to being healthy.
   
   You should read "the truth about drug companies"

First, let me say, I cannot really provide a solution for you, but I can share what has worked for me. I have not been as overweight as you but I have at times in my life been significantly overweight (not in mass but in % body fat) and as I am becoming older, I had found it increasingly difficult to control. My point is, you need to try things to see what works for you. Keep a daily journal of how you feel (energy, attention, brain function, etc) so you can do some experiments on yourself.

What has worked for me is adopting (what appears to be the latest fad) the paleo/evolutionary fitness model for diet and exercise. I eat little or no processed foods (e.g. read Pollan, and other rules of thumb...if it doesn't spoil, don't eat it, never shop in the inside area of the supermarket, if it comes out of a box, don't eat it, etc.). I don't drink soda, juice, or anything with sugars (just unsweetened coffee or tea, water). I eat a lot of meat, eggs, fish (no worries on fat content...my favorite lunch is a sandwich from the local deli called the Three Little Pigs, without the bread, it is smoked ham, pork bbq, and bacon). I eat some dairy, primarily full fat and fermented, like Fage Total plain yogurt (with a little fresh fruit and shredded raw coconut). I eat all my favorite vegetables slathered in full fat butter (from the farm if I can get it). This may sound like a low-carb, Atkins type diet, but it isn't. That isn't to say going low carb won't help you lose fat quickly. Nevertheless, it isn't the main point. The main point is to eat as our ancestors did some 10,000 or more years ago, as evolution has not caught up with our recent use of grains in our diet and certainly not processed foods. Another thing I do is intermittently fast. At first somewhat forced, but now just because I am not hungry. I can typically eat dinner (say around 5pm) and not eat again until around lunch the next day.

As far as exercise, I avoid long aerobic activities unless in pursuit of yard work, handling the kids, or sport (like tennis). No treadmills, distance running, or biking. I do walk or ride a bike for transportation, but I am not getting winded. I do lift weights, usually once a week, using only large muscle groups and free weights, and very intensely. It takes about 20 minutes, but given its intensity it is brutal...but over quickly. I introduce a bit of randomness into the exercise frequency and variety of exercises (e.g. maybe twice in one week, maybe I will do a bunch of pull-ups one night or push ups). Sprints are intermingled with this, sometimes just as part of playing with the dog. Again, the point is to expose the body to stresses in an irregular but intense pattern, as perhaps were encountered by our ancestors.

The result is that I am probably a month away (after approximately 9 months total) from having washboard abs, I have great energy levels, stamina and focus. I no longer wake up with aching joints. I don't get low energy levels after eating (unless I really stuff myself). Keep in mind, I am in my 40s. I was 210 and very soft and pear shaped when I started, now I am 185 and back to a youthful V shape.
The only negatives I can speak to is a diminished ability to find quick and convenient food sources and missing bread, pasta and a pizza once and a while. I really don't miss sweets, but I don't think I was that hooked on them in the first place.

Finally, let me give the sources that drove me in this direction. Take a look and see if you are interested in trying it. As I said, I can't say that it will work for you, but it has worked for me.

Websites:

Art Devany http://www.arthurdevany.com/ Evolutionary Fitness

Keith Norris http://theorytopractice.wordpress.com/

Mark Sisson http://www.marksdailyapple.com/

Richard Nikoley http://freetheanimal.com/

Seth Roberts http://blog.sethroberts.net/ (more about self-experimentation and the value of fermented foods)

Weston A. Price Foundation http://www.westonaprice.org/

Books:

Gary Taubes, Good Calories, Bad Calories

Little, McGuff Body by Science

Weston A. Price, Nutrition and Physical Degeneration

Mark Sisson The Primal Blueprint

This is fascinating, but it's been known for at least a decade that the brain definitely remains plastic through adulthood. This is nothing new. See The Brain That Changes Itself.

Why do people think that local food is better for the environment? Haven't we moved past this?

> Just look at the cultures in which it is most prevalent, e.g. Israel. Yuck

According to the WHO: Of all men who have been genitally mutilated by what is called 'circumcision':

• 0.8% are Jews
  
• 12.8% are Americans non-{Jews,Muslims}
  
• 68.8% are Muslims
  
  Nevertheless, the Jewish influence in the medical fields and entertainment industries in the U.S. are part of the reason genital mutilation is so rampant there[0][1][2][3]. Of course, the Victorian Christians got the ball rolling on genital mutilation in the U.S., because they wanted to curb masturbation.

Check out this book before going into any cleanse. It's loaded with information regarding what exactly is going on inside your body during a cleanse. It also includes a 3 week cleanse that allows one solid meal and two blended meals, allowing you to continue to hit the gym and go on with normal life. Highly recommended.


http://www.amazon.com/gp/aw/d/0062201662/ref=redir_mdp_mobile/182-7828804-4311439?ref_=cm_sw_r_an_am_ap_am_us

Read these books: The Field, The Holographic Universe and Hands of Light.

As for you, please provide citation for your side of things.

I'm not a doctor, so I'm not disagreeing with you, but my little booklet about AS says that sacroilitis revealed by STIR MRI has both sensitivity and specificity of 90%. It's also from 2009.

I just recall my rheumatologist that glanced at my MRI evaulation for no more than 5 seconds (before asking me about anything else), and said "It's Bechterew's. 100% certain." :-)

By the way, I paid full price (no insurance involved) for my MRI, but it was not a contrast MRI.

No becuase as the book "Listening to Prosac"

http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/0140266712?ie=UTF8&tag=reddit0e-20

pointed out way back in the 90's the antidepressants actually work whereas there has been no study showing psychotherapy actually effects a positive outcome overall.

Thus most insurance plans dropped or made psychotherapy prohibitively expensive in insurance plans.

http://www.amazon.com/Coconut-Oil-Sunscreen-Amazing-Book-ebook/dp/B01D8KGZT8/ref=asap_bc?ie=UTF8

Whose son was a noted conservationist, author, and general bird-watcher. Ironically, under his chair of Monsanto, they produced hundreds of thousands of tonnes of DDT.

Fuck.

FTFY

This book is for you

Moderate drinking has been shown to extend life.

It is not recommended that you begin drinking a moderate amount, due to the risks of alcoholism.

Citation.

Yes, before work or school would not be the appropriate time to medicate.

You may find this following book helpful The Mindbody Prescription: Healing the Body, Healing the Pain. It is certainly different but Howard Stern raves about it having cured his 20+ years of back pain.

I used hyperbole and satire on purpose. At some point I realized I cant even convince people in person, with sources. They WANT to believe the pills will work as it gives them a sense of hope and security. On the surface it appears to be cognitive dissonance, but in reality I have come to believe ignorance is bliss. It is too much a leap of the imagination to even entertain the idea that consumers and their doctors have been mislead for the sake of obedient workers and corporate profits. On a side note, Prozac LITERALLY turns people into zombies, that is not hyperbole.

But fuck it, I can try again. Lucky for the lazy, 2 of 4 sources are videos.

Article 1) The Strange Powers of the Placebo Effect (video)

Article 2) Initial Severity and Antidepressant Benefits: A Meta-Analysis of Data Submitted to the Food and Drug Administration


>Conclusion: Drug–placebo differences in antidepressant efficacy increase as a function of baseline severity, but are relatively small even for severely depressed patients. The relationship between initial severity and antidepressant efficacy is attributable to decreased responsiveness to placebo among very severely depressed patients, rather than to increased responsiveness to medication.
Ergo: Antidepressants are no more effective than placebo except in the most statistically extreme cases. In those cases, drugs do not perform better but placebo performs worse.

Article 3) Anatomy of an Epidemic: Magic Bullets, Psychiatric Drugs, and the Astonishing Rise of Mental Illness in America by Robert Whitaker

Article 4) RSA Animate - Changing Education Paradigms by Sir Ken Robinson (video)

IF you think I am a crazy loon, click article 4 first, and just watch.

I suggest everyone considering the possibility that their doctors opinion is bought and paid for. Said doctor may not realize they are a pawn and may honestly believe they are helping you. Also understand there is little law requiring they stay up to date on modern studies after they receive their certification. You may be receiving information which has long since been disproven, yet the drug companies have no reason to spread such information.

A conspiracy theory explains an event as being the result of an alleged plot by a covert group or organization or, more broadly, the idea that important political, social or economic events are the products of secret plots that are largely unknown to the general public. Just because you're paranoid, doesn't mean they're not following you.

Your alternative option is to believe there is no conspiracy. Because they clearly know what they are talking about, and I am a kook/crank. If you cannot even hypothetically enter into a though experiment on the subject and temporary accept my premise for the sake of a socratic dialog, I have wasted my time for the system has already won and you are no longer a free thinker.

tldr: I give up, satire is the only way to push peoples buttons enough to even get them to look into the issue. Even then no one on pills cares enough.

I would like to recommend this book, for anyone who has suicidal thoughts or know some one who tried to commit suicide. It has given me an insight in what a person with suicidal thoughts goes through. It also shines a light on how someone who seems perfectly normal suddenly tries to commit suicide.

http://www.amazon.com/Waking-Up-Alive-Richard-Heckler/dp/0345400356

EDIT: SUICIDE IS NOT AN SELFISH ACT!!

Every other modern industrialized country in the world has had universal healthcare for many years. They all spend half (or less) than the United States on their healthcare -- whether measured as a percent of their country's GDP or measured as a percent of average income. Measurement of quality of healthcare and health is much more subjective, but nearly all studies indicate that the U.S. falls behind these other countries in this area also. Nobody is forced to go bankrupt because of medical situations in these countries. Nobody has to worry how to get medical care for their loved ones who are kicked off of policies after getting sick. There is virtually no organized effort in any of these countries to move toward a system such as we have in the U.S. because they know our system is sick and broken and will never achieve what they have achieved. Their systems were designed and developed by intelligent forward-thinking people. Their various systems work much better than our money-driven, corporations-first system works. For some real information on the subject, please read:

The Healing of America by T.R. Reid

Money-Driven Medicine by Maggie Mahar

*UPDATE - IT IS NOT EBOLA!! - LOCAL PAPER, The StarPhoenix, REPORTS:

"Update: A suspected case of ebola in Saskatchewan has tested negative. The World Health Organization tweeted the results Tuesday morning. "#Canada #Ebola suspect tests NEGATIVE for Ebola, Marburg, Lassa, CCHF, RVF @WHO @pahowho at Winnipeg BSL4 lab," tweeted Gregory Härtl, WHO's head of public relations.

"Lab results from Winnipeg will be officially confirmed by Canada," he also wrote."

Had the patient had Ebola Zaire, as first believed, this could have been a major cluster fuck. Had an Ebola Zaire patient been on an airplane with a group of people then it would be necessary to both isolate and quarantine them.

Early on the patient was incorrectly believed to have the Zaire strain of Ebola, a hemorrhagic disease. The body bleeds out and then turns to a bag of liquid virus. The fatality rate for Ebola Zaire is 9 of 10, there is no known cure and no known effective treatment. It spreads via contact and via aerosol (cough, breathing). Few hospitals have been able to contain Ebola Zaire; lots of nurses and doctors have died trying. Luckily the patient does NOT have Ebola Zaire.

Just finished reading "Virus Hunter" by C. J. Peters and this incident at first read like one of the potential disaster scenarios Peters' describes.