Data from the European Prospective Investigation into Cancer and Nutrition (EPIC) study showed that for every 200 grams (about two servings) of total fruits and vegetables eaten per day, the incidence of cancer was reduced by 3%.

The study, published in the Journal of the National Cancer Institute, is the largest ever conducted to date on diet and cancer. It included 142,605 men and 335,873 women. The participants were followed for an average of about nine years, during which time over 30,000 cases of cancer were diagnosed.

Headlines See Cup Half Empty

Doctors, led by Paolo Boffetta, M.D., at the Mount Sinai Medical Center, New York, reviewed more than eight years of data, between 1992 and 2000.

“The bottom line here is that, yes, we did find a protective effect of fruit and vegetable intake against cancer, but it is a smaller connection than previously thought,” Boffetta said in a press release issued by Mount Sinai.

Health Benefits of Fruits & Vegetables

The World Health Organization (WHO) issued a recommendation in 1990 suggesting that five servings of fruit and vegetables per day helped prevent cancer and other diseases.

“Worldwide, low intake of fruits and vegetables is estimated to cause about 19% of gastrointestinal cancer, about 31% of ischemic heart disease and 11% stroke,” the WHO says on its website.

In an editorial accompanying the EPIC study, Dr. Walter Willett, M.D., from the Harvard School of Public Health noted that a considerable body of science supports a link between lycopene in tomato products and a reduced risk of prostate cancer.

Dr. Willet pointed out that the EPIC study, like almost all studies on diet and cancer miss the fact that cancer studies need to include a much longer time period, including childhood due to the long exposure time required to develop cancer.

“Multiple lines of evidence indicate that ionizing radiation and some other risk factors for cancer can operate primarily in childhood and early adult life; thus, antioxidants or other protective constituents of fruits and vegetables may need to be present at that time to be effective,” reports Dr. Willet.

“Like the European Prospective Investigation into Cancer and Nutrition (EPIC), almost all studies of diet and cancer would have missed such effects because they started decades later in life,” he added.

The key take home message is that for every two servings of fruit and vegetables you eat, you reduce your risk of cancer by 3%, so eat more fruits and vegetables.

Source:
Journal of the National Cancer Institute
Published online ahead of print, doi:10.1093/jnci/djq072
“Fruit and Vegetable Intake and Overall Cancer Risk in the European Prospective Investigation Into Cancer and Nutrition (EPIC)”
Authors: P. Boffetta, E. Couto, J. Wichmann, P. Ferrari, et al.

Editorial:
Journal of the National Cancer Institute
10.1093/jnci/djq098
“Fruits, Vegetables, and Cancer Prevention: Turmoil in the Produce Section”
Authors: W.C. Willett

Inadequate levels of vitamin D may be causing about 37,000 premature deaths in Canada and costing the country billions of dollars, according to a new review.

New research, published March 29, 2010, in Molecular Nutrition & Food Research, reports that increasing the mean serum level of Vitamin D in the average Canadian could reduce the death rate by 16% and save the country 6.9% of its health care costs, or about $14.4 billion annually.

“The results of this study strongly suggest that the personal and economic burden of disease in Canada could be significantly reduced if the mean serum 25(OH)D level was increased from its current level of 67 nmol/L to the optimal level of 105nmol/L,” wrote the researchers.

“These results should increase interest by individuals, researchers, organizations, and agencies in Canada in assessing the health benefits of higher vitamin D production and intake and modifying practices and recommendations accordingly,” they added.

The study was funded by the Vitamin D Society (Canada), the UV Foundation (US), the Sunlight Research Forum (The Netherlands), Bio-Tech-Pharmacal (US), Dairy Farmers, Yoplait, and IADSA.

Vitamin D Benefits

Vitamin D deficiency in adults is reported to precipitate or exacerbate osteopenia, osteoporosis, muscle weakness, fractures, common cancers, autoimmune diseases, infectious diseases and cardiovascular diseases. There is also some evidence that the vitamin may reduce the incidence of several types of cancer and type-1 diabetes.

The science supporting the muscle function of vitamin D, as well as the vitamin’s role in immune health, is sufficiently robust to have merited a positive opinion from the European Food Safety Authority’s (EFSA) Panel on Dietetic Products, Nutrition and Allergies (NDA).

Despite the recent surge in research supporting the wide range of benefits of Vitamin D, many people across the world are still not getting enough vitamin D.

Recommended Daily Intake of Vitamin D

The Institute of Medicine (IOM) is conducting a review of the available vitamin D science and is due to deliver its findings this summer. Many expect the IOM to recommend RDIs much above the current levels of 400IU. Oprah has been telling her viewers the RDI should be 2000IU or more.

The IOM may also revise upper safe levels (USLs) with some saying 10,000IU per day reflects the most recent science.

Dr. Hansen says adults should be taking 5000-10,000IU Vitamin D3 daily and they should get their blood tested to make sure they are getting enough to raise their serum 25(OH)Vitamin D level to 100nmol/L.

Source: Molecular Nutrition & Food Research
Published online ahead of print, doi: 10.1002/mnfr.200900420
“An estimate of the economic burden and premature deaths due to vitamin D deficiency in Canada”
Authors: W.B. Grant, G.K. Schwalfenberg, S.J. Genuis, S.J. Whiting

Lawsuit: Disclose PCB Levels in Fish Oil

Quoted from CBSNews.com http://www.cbsnews.com/stories/2010/03/02/health/main6259938.shtml

Group Finds Amount of Contaminant Varies Greatly Among Popular Supplement Brands; Vague Claims on Labels Seen as Deceptive

March 2, 2010
NEW YORK, (CBS) A lawsuit brought by environmentalists in California claims popular brands of fish oil dietary supplements contain unsafe and illegal levels of the carcinogenic chemicals known as polychlorinated biphenyls, or PCBs.

The lawsuit, filed in California Superior Court in San Francisco, targets eight supplement manufacturers or distributors - CVS Pharmacy, Rite Aid, General Nutrition Corp., Solgar, Twinlab, Now Health, Omega Protein and Pharmavite - for alleged violations of California’s Proposition 65, which requires that consumers be warned about chemical exposures.

The plaintiffs are two citizen environmentalists and the Mateel Environmental Justice Foundation. Their initial testing found that levels of PCBs in supplements in popular fish oil products varied wildly, from about 12 nanograms per recommended dose in the best performer to more than 850 nanograms in the worst performer - a factor of 70.

By Ken Millstone

[Article continues at original source: CBS News]

To learn about the Health Effects of PCBs from the EPA.gov website, click here.

Synthetic hormone replacement therapy, already linked to increased risk of breast cancer, heart disease stroke, and dementia, nearly doubles a woman’s risk of dying from lung cancer.

This new research, published September 18, 2009, found that there were 83% more deaths in the group using Premarin plus Progestin hormone therapy than the group using the placebo. (Lancet. 2009 Sep 18. Epub ahead of print)

“This is a new, lethal side effect of Estrogen plus Progestin use,” said Dr. Rowan Chlebowski lead author of the study, from the Los Angeles Biomedical Research Institute at Harbor-UCLA Medical Center.

This latest bad news about standard hormone therapy comes on the heels of a study published in February 2009, in the New England Journal of Medicine, that found that women who take Estrogen-Progestin combination hormone therapy for more than five years suffer a doubling of their risk of getting breast cancer and the risk doubles again every year they continue to take the drugs.

In 2004, researchers found that Estrogen-Progestin drugs not only did not prevent Alzheimer’s as was previously thougt, but actually increased the risk of dementia and mental decline by 47%. Thirty-five million Americans now have dementia.

In 2002, the results of the Women’s Health Initiative, reported that Premarin plus synthetic Progesterone increased a women’s risk of breast cancer by 26%, her risk of a heart attack by 29%, her risk of stroke by 41% and her risk of blood clots by 113%.

Collectively, these findings should end the debate as to whether or not the risks of these drugs are worth the benefits.

Why Don’t Doctors or the FDA send out Recall Notices?

Despite previous warnings – increased risks of heart attacks, stroke, invasive breast cancer, pulmonary emboli, blood clots, gall bladder disease and dementia – millions of postmenopausal women still use the combined hormone therapy to fight the symptoms of menoupause.

Dr. Chlebowski says that 25 to 30 million hormone prescriptions are written every year that are probably responsible for half of the 40,000 breast cancers discovered in women every year.

Perhaps women are not seeing the headlines or hearing the news. Perhaps their doctors should be required to send them a RECALL NOTICE, rather than continue to refill their prescriptions.

Great News! Grape Seed Extract (GSE) that Dr. Hansen told you to take for your blood vessels, skin and joints is also killing cancer.

A new study published January 1, 2009, by researchers from the University of Kentucky School of Medicine, found that GSE kills 76% of leukemia cancer cells in a test tube within 24 hours without harming healthy white blood cells that were also placed in the test tubes (Clinical Cancer Research. 2009 Jan 1;15(1):140-9).

Grape seed extract contains powerful polyphenols such as proanthocyanidins, which have been found to kill several different types of cancer including skin, breast, colon, lung, stomach, and prostate cancers.

had also been previously reported to induce cancer cell death by apoptosis (cell suicide) in human leukemia cells, but the mechanism by which it works had not yet been explored.

In a healthy person, cancer cell suicide (apoptosis) is a frequent occurrence and a healthy part of life. Your body fights cancer everyday.

Once a cell recognizes it is flawed it activates enzymes that destroy its own membranes and dies. Grape Seed extract appears to activate this programed cell death of cancer cells.

Potent Anti-Cancer Agent Without Harming Healthy Cells

In the laboratory the study’s lead author, Dr. Xianglin Shi, Ph.D., professor in the Graduate Center for Toxicology at the University of Kentucky, combined leukemia cells with grape seed extract in different doses and found a marked increase in apoptosis in these cells.

The researchers found that GSE strongly activates a protein known as JNK. researchers said “represents the early insult, which leads to Cip1/p21 up-regulation and caspase activation and apoptosis.” The researchers also discovered that the extract does not harm normal cells.

“These results could have implications for the incorporation of agents such as grape seed extract into prevention or treatment of hematological malignancies and possibly other cancers,” said Dr. Shi.

“What everyone seeks is an agent that has an effect on cancer cells but leaves normal cells alone, and this shows that grape seed extract fits into this category,” he said.

New Hope for Leukemia

GSE achieved similar anti-cancer effects in U937 (acute myeloid leukemia) and HL-60 (acute promyelocytic leukemia) cells, suggesting that the effects are not cell type-specific, the researchers said.

This is great news because cancers of the blood - leukemia, lymphoma and myeloma - account for an estimated 118,310 new cancer cases and almost 54,000 deaths annually, ranking these cancers as the fourth leading cause of cancer incidence and death in the U.S.

“This is very promising research, but it is too early to say this is chemo-protective” says Dr. Shi. He believes that the research is not far enough along to suggest that people should eat grapes, grape seeds, or grape skin in excess to stave off cancer.

Dr. Hansen’s Rx: Eat more grapes with seeds in them and take GSE Ultra 110 every day!

What do I think? I think Nature is amazing. Nature is wiser than man. Grape seed extract is a power natural anti-cancer agent and it kills cancer cells without harming healthy cells.

Unlike toxic chemotherapy, grape seed extract is safe. No one has ever lost their hair from taking grape seed extract. So I say eat more grapes with seeds in them and take GSE Ultra 110 every day to protect your blood vessels, skin, joints and your immune system.

For more information about Grape Seed Extract, click here.