As Civilization Breaks Down while Authorities Repudiate Constitutional Rights to Self Defense and Police Are Only Cleanup Crews— Enter the Cane

re: self defense

Civilization is the situation where we can live with minimal concern for being harmed or having property stolen. We no longer live in a civilized society but halfway down the road to anarchy.

See It’s Getting Dangerous for Photographers in California for background.

Mobility devices such as cane

It’s not safe to walk the streets any more, or even be in some areas outdoor, like parks. What does a woman or elderly person or just about anyone do, given the awesome legal jeopardy that comes even with any use of a gun, even when you do everything by the rules?

The only practical solution that cannot be prohibited from you using it is a cane. A few weeks of training, and even granny can fend off a thug. And for many elderly, it’s of utility each and every day.

Anon writes:

Its best value is probably as a deterrent, assuming the criminal (a) knows the cane could be used as a weapon, (b) thinks you know how to use it as a weapon, and (c) makes a decision from a distance to leave you be. But obviously, all bets are off if someone walks towards you with a gun drawn.

I’m 67.5 years old, and I don’t have the reflexes to keep up with a 20 year old thug. If it ends up being close quarters and he grabs one end of the cane, I wouldn’t have the strength to wrench it back from him. Also, as you start approaching age 70, there is also the risk of sudden movements triggering a heart attack, unless you practice with the cane for 30 minutes every day. Now, that’s a thought – possibly combine exercise with the cane.

All said and done, it’s probably worth getting one, though. It won’t help if someone is out to mug you, but it could be a useful weapon to defend against some drug addict who decides to attack you. You could get the Rolls Royce version of a cane for $200-300, and that would last a lifetime!

This is one defensive weapon I probably will get.  At some point, I’ll likely need one anyway, so having one now simply means I get more utility out of it.

WIND: a visible defense mechanism is indeed the best deterrent, but you do have to train to use it effectively. A cane is also an exercise tool, and thus great for travel anywhere and everywhere.

According to a 65 year old friend, who knows such things and carries a cane, hardened criminals will cross the street and avoid you if you are carrying a defensive cane and show any confidence—they know what they are dealing with—it's a thing. An ordinary criminal might not know though, but after a blow in self defense, they'll remember it.

A cane does not require a lot of strength, just fluid motion. Addition of "sharks teeth" or similar hugely increases impact pressure. Get a "DOJO cane" for practice as it will get dropped a lot and banged up while you master the skillset over a few weeks.

https://canemasters.com/the-cane-tips-blog-and-chronicles

A really top end defensive cane with the rare ultra high grade wood (clear hickory heartwood) with all the trimmings can run over $500. But that is only for those who want function and art in one. Even the $45 Dojo cane gets the job done. A good cane will last a lifetime if high quality to start (eg oak or hickory). A good oak or hickory cane can easily destroy a typical metal cane and can withstand a crowbar swung with heavy force. Don’t buy a junk cane and expect anything but a failure.

Exercise is indeed a thing with a cane:
https://canemasters.com/the-crx-training-resistance-system
https://canemasters.com/cane-and-fitness-systems

Mobility canes

Unsettled Science, by Nina Teichholz

re: ethics in medicine
re: follow the money

Every doctor ought to be reading Nina Teicholz’s substack Unsettled Science. Good luck with that*.

Nina is also the author of The Big Fat Surprise: Why Butter, Meat, and Cheese Belong in a Healthy Diet @AMAZON and numerous other investigative journalism pieces.

For example...

* As a professional group doctors are among the least qualified people on the planet to opine on nutrition and healthy living, having had nil training on nutrition and no competence at improving baseline health.

It’s National Diabetes Month, and U.S. Plans Will Lead to…More Diabetes

2022-11-14

President Biden recently issued a proclamation for National Diabetes Month, which follows upon his historic White House Conference last month, on Hunger, Nutrition & Health. He is right to focus on the crushing load of diabetes, which costs $1 billion dollars a day to treat and afflicts more than 37 million Americans, including nearly one third of people aged 65 years-plus. And our children: the number of young people under age 20 with type 2 diabetes grew by an astonishing 95% from 2001 to 2017. These trends have all been moving fast in the wrong direction, ever since the first Diabetes Awareness Month, back in 1975. Awareness is nice, but clearly it hasn’t brought results. And tragically, the current administration’s proposals are based on precisely zero hard science.

.... To be clear: We should aim to make insulin not just more affordable, but obsolete. That may sound crazy, but reversal of diabetes is now known to be possible, for people with type 2 (type 1 occurs when the body can no longer produce insulin, a condition that cannot be cured). People with type 2 can dramatically reduce or eliminate the need for insulin and swivel their condition into reverse within a matter of weeks—mainly by cutting back on foods that spike blood sugar. Multiple clinical trials, including one with 5-year results, have demonstrated this breakthrough treatment and shown it to be safe. Thus, type 2 diabetes, long considered the unstoppable slow-train to death, has a new gear: reverse. This is undoubtedly headline news, yet not a single person involved in the research or practice of diabetes reversal was invited to talk at the White House conference.

...We can only conclude that according to the most rigorous available data, the USDA diet will not make a dent in the diabetes epidemic. In fact, given what is now known about how type 2 diabetes can be put into remission—by reducing sugars and starches—the US guidelines, with six servings of grain (including 3 refined grains) and 10% of calories as sugar, will almost inevitably worsen this condition.

These are the guidelines that allow donuts and OJ for breakfast in school meals, followed by pizza and Nachos for lunch. Need we say more?

...

WIND: follow the money (and trail of destruction and death)— Big Medicine has a superb business model: make people sicker and sicker, for an increasing supply of customers for every illness imaginable.

Cheerios a Health Food, Says Leader of White House Conference on Nutrition

2022-11-20

...

What kind of dystopian world has nutrition “science” entered into whereby a university, a peer-reviewed journal, and one of the field’s most influential leaders legitimize advice telling the public to eat more Lucky Charms and fewer eggs? Simply eyeballing these recommendations should be enough to know this diet is a get-sick, diabetes diet, a high-carb, sugar-laden, candy-coated highway to ill-health.

...Each of these assumptions is contradicted by substantial data to the contrary. Just take the subject of dietary cholesterol, for example. The science on this topic was systematically reviewed by the American Heart Association in 2013, and the U.S. Dietary Guidelines expert committees in 20151 and 20202. All these reviews found no link between cholesterol in the diet and cholesterol in the blood. It turns out that restricting eggs and shellfish is ineffective, since the body simply adjusts its own cholesterol production to keep a steady amount available for the body’s many essential functions. Ranking “egg whites” higher than a whole egg, as the Food Compass does, is therefore not supported by the evidence. Outdated hypotheses die hard, we know, but the dean of a nutrition school should be up-to-speed on the latest science. 

...

WIND: follow the money. Nutritional science is an oxymoron in practice, as is medical science. Both are radical takeovers of science by money-making interests destroying health for profit.

How the Medical System Really Works, in one short video (FDA reality)

re: follow the money

Spot-on.

All you need to know about the FDA and its processes.

Lipids: A Different Perspective, Part Three (Cholesterol, Heart Disease, Atherosclerosis, statin)

re: cholesterol
re: statin

Crackpot debunked assumptions about cholesterol and statins and atherosclerosis are still the standard of care (abuse) in modern medicine. One of many runaway trains that enable Modern Wealthcare*.

* The repudiation of health and transfer of wealth from patients to “care” givers, while destroying any chance at better health via terrible advice, always treating symptoms and rarely causes, and never a cure. There is nil “health” in healthcare, a bitter pill of a word in its misleading suggestiveness.

The Arrow #100, Cholesterol, Cholesterol, Cholesterol…

2022-12-01
TG = triglycerides, CVD = cardiovascular disease, CAD = coronary artery disease

I get emails all the time from people wondering about this or that cholesterol level. Here’s an example:

Could I suggest you write about your views about the advanced cholesterol tests like apoB, apoA, Lp(a), LDL-P, HDL-P... don't know if I remembered all of them.

If i'm not wrong it was a study called Interheart that found that relation apoA/apoB was the more predictive marker.

My view is that they don’t really matter. I know that sounds like madness, but I really don’t. I’ve spent hundreds of hours reading the lipid literature, and I’m just not convinced lipids having anything to do with heart disease. Eskimos supposedly have 29 words describing snow. I don’t know if that’s true or not, but I’ve heard it countless times. Lipidologists are the same. They keep slicing and dicing the various lipids into more and more subfractions in an effort to find something that confirms their notion that lipids cause heart disease.

...If you haven’t read Malcolm’s book The Clot Thickens @AMAZON, click the link and get it right now. Don’t even read on first and get it later, or you might forget. It’s a wonderful book everyone concerned about heart disease and health in general should read. And, like Malcolm himself, it’s both brilliant and funny.

...

Weakness Is the New Smoking

While holed up in Fayetteville I read a new study that I loved. Problem is, I love it because it tells me what I want to hear. Which is that strength, measured as handgrip strength, is a proxy for actual biological age.

...

WIND: the cholesterol hypothesis is increasingly obvious as a crackpot theory, but of course embraced by the modern medical establishment. The original intellectual crook Ancel Keys should take his place in history as a scoundrel.

Lipids: A Different Perspective, Part Three (Cholesterol, Heart Disease, Atherosclerosis, statin)

re: cholesterol
re: statin

See also: LIPIDS. A DIFFERENT PERSPECTIVE, Part Two

Crackpot theories about cholesterol and statins and atherosclerosis are still the standard of care (abuse) in modern medicine. One of many runaway trains that enable Modern Wealthcare*.

Here is a perspective that any objective MD capable of critical thinking would have difficulty disagreeing with. Not that most MDs have critical thinking skills, sad but true.

* The repudiation of health and transfer of wealth from patients to “care” givers, while destroying any chance at better health via terrible advice, always treating symptoms and rarely causes, and never a cure. There is nil “health” in healthcare, a bitter pill of a word in its misleading suggestiveness.

LIPIDS. A DIFFERENT PERSPECTIVE, Part Three

2022-11, by BY DR. BAYNE FRENCH, MD DC. Excerpts, emphasis added.
TG = triglycerides, CVD = cardiovascular disease, CAD = coronary artery disease

...As Abramson et al (BMJ. 2013) reported, for the majority of people for which statins are prescribed (specifically for "primary prevention," people who DO NOT have heart disease), the benefit is lacking, while side effects and risks are significant.

Very often, the "36% reduction" in heart attacks attributable to statin treatment is mentioned with little understanding of what that means. It is a statistical figure referring to relative risk reduction. The actual reduction in heart attacks was 1% (3% down to 2%). This is absolute risk reduction. The benefit of statin medication for relatively healthy people without known heart disease is just not there. A group of independent researchers reviewed vast data (Cochrane Database Systematic Reviews) and found the evidence limited that statins help prevent a first heart attack, and “caution” should be taken in prescribing them for this reason (75% of statin prescriptions are written for low-risk patients).

An independent (no industry funding) group of doctors and scientists formed a group whose foundation is a concept called NNT (number needed to treat). It is a way of looking at the real benefit and risk of treatment. Their work on statins (and other interventions) can be found at www.thennt.com. It is not favorable in regards to statin use.

Experimental verification is itself also a rather imperfect tool. I think it is essential to understand that every time someone uses science or research, he is not talking about the work of some omnipotent beings with access to revealed truths but of fallible people working in a currently accepted paradigm and socialized into a scientific family and job structure. Bernie knows that well-intentioned "experts" make mistakes all the time. And that initially well-intentioned research can easily be swayed by funding, grants, and the promise of career advancement.

Summary

• Educate yourselves. Rely not on standard advice on lipids. Break the thrall of conventional wisdom.
• Understand that much of the research done on lipids has been drug industry-funded. The cookie-cutter recommendations on lipids are the antithesis of individualized medicine...
• Carbs and especially sugar trigger the liver to make more fat and chol in a process called lipogenesis... High carb and especially high sugar diets drive the production of TG, lower HDL, increase the number of LDL particles, and reduce the size of LDL particles (Parks et al. Proc Nutr Soc. 2002; Krauss et al. J Nutr. 2001).
• Reliance on LDL as a prognostic marker for CVD is misguided and outdated. Prado et al (J Clin Lipidol. 2011), among many others, showed that heart disease risk is much better determined by LDL-P (LDL particle number) and LDL size. Advanced lipoprotein testing is necessary to determine these values. If this is not possible, the most useful part of the standard lipid panel is the TG/HDL ratio. It really should be under 3.
• Reduce inflammation. Hansson et al (NEJM. 2005) is responsible for a study some authorities consider pivotal in our understanding of the mechanisms behind inflammation, not cholesterol, as the root cause of atherosclerosis.

...

WIND: today’s Big Pharma and industrial medicine is 99.99% follow the money based on anti-science and “pull” in getting dubious to dangerous but highly profitable con games approved by the FDA.

Statins in Persons at Low Risk of Cardiovascular Disease

... The USPSTF found that statins have a 0.46% absolute benefit (NNT = 217) for nonfatal heart attacks.4 This NNT is probably artificially improved (lowered) by the predominance of events that occurred in high-risk individuals. In trials, however, 30% to 40% fewer heart attacks occurred in statin groups compared with placebo groups, suggesting that the benefit is reliable and can therefore be accepted as the best available estimate. Nonfatal strokes occurred in 0.32% fewer patients taking statins (NNT = 313), with the same caveats.4

...

Benefits

• No statistically significant mortality benefit
• 1 in 217 avoided a nonfatal heart attack (myocardial infarction)
• 1 in 313 avoided a nonfatal stroke
  

Harms

• 1 in 21 experienced pain from muscle damage
• 1 in 204 developed diabetes mellitus

WIND: an absolute benefit of 0.46% with needing to treat 217 people for one “success” is laughably inappropriate. This is the crackpot unethical medicine that is practiced today, at huge cost in money and physiological damage from side effects to the other 216 of 217 people. Diabetes is no laughing matter, nor is muscle damage (which in rare cases can destroy the kidneys). And that’s assuming the numbers are credible, which they are not. And even if credible, they are not statistically significant—could be random chance—crackpot medicine.

‘Negative Efficacy’ Should Have Stopped COVID Vaccine Recommendations in Their Tracks

re: COVID
re: ethics in medicine
re: The Epoch Times

Fourth Jab yet?

The Epoch Times: ‘Negative Efficacy’ Should Have Stopped COVID Vaccine Recommendations in Their Tracks

2022-11-28, by Dr. Sean Lin and Mingjia Jacky Guan. Emphasis added.

Recently, various health agencies around the world have approved and are actively pushing for another COVID booster shot, meant to enhance the vaccine efficacy against a COVD-19 infection.

However, many studies have found that the boosters do not make a significant  difference in protection, especially in terms of protection against reinfection. In fact, the latest data shows vaccine efficacy against the coronavirus tends to even drop into the negatives after just a few months.

... When a vaccine’s efficacy drops into the negatives, it means that vaccination actually elevates the risks of hospitalization and severe diseases rather than reducing the risks. In simple terms, it does more harm than good when the efficacy is negative.

... COVID-19 vaccination campaigns should’ve been suspended as soon as the Omicron variant began to dominate over Delta...

...Another potential mechanism that leads to the significant decline of vaccine efficacy is that repeated vaccination also damages people’s immunity via immune imprinting, a phenomenon in which an initial exposure to a virus–such as the original strain of SARS-CoV-2, by infection or vaccination–limits a person’s future immune response against variants...

...

WIND: “vaccine” insanity continues, for a simple reason: follow the money.

Science is dead. And modern medicine is corrupt beyond belief in pushing (like a street thug) “vaccination” that would not be approved at 50% efficacy and goes below zero to negative efficacy. A double potential harm.

Only children and idiots could ever again trust the medical industrial complex, which includes those doctors you are supposed to consult and give your trust too. I am sorry for the occassional doctors that are trustworthy, because they are unfairly slimed by the same filth that oozes from their environment.

Not only that, the risk of vaccine side effects has yet to be properly addressed, so corrupt and disingenous is the system we call “health care”. The only thing healthy about most health care is the extraction of wealth from the populace for the benefit of the few.

Colonoscopy: Not Worth the Risk for Some of Us?

re: colonoscopy

I am “due” for a colonoscopy as 7 years have passed.

I am reluctant, as I consider my body overall very healthy, I dislike the anesthetic effects (I had bad dreams for 3-4 weeks once though maybe current knockout drugs do better I still fear brain effects), swallowing antifreeze (polyethylene glycol) seems very unwise, and most of all: recent studies call the value of colonoscopy into question (barring individual circumstances).

A cousin died of colon cancer in mid-50's but that cousin was hardly a poster child for health. No other family history of colon cancer in siblings or parents or grandparents. Why should I bother, here in my late 50's?

The “prudent” move is to get the colonoscopy. Or is it? They are hardly risk free, in fact the risks are very significant.

And as a huge money-maker for Big Medicine, I’ve grown increasingly skeptical of the medical justification (follow the money)—there is no credible objective advice out there in the general medical community.

The Epoch Times: The Truth About Colonoscopies, Part 1

2022-11-21, by Sherri Tenpenny

...While a colonoscopy is a good and important procedure for diagnostic purposes, it may be time to remove its standing as the “gold standard” of colon cancer screening.

The Epoch Times: The Truth About Colonoscopies, Part 2

2022-11-21, by Sherri Tenpenny

...Given that 15,000,000 colonoscopies are performed each year in the US alone, the study points out:

• Exam only, no biopsy/polypectomy: Up to 15,000 persons per year (1/1000) can have a serious complication – colon perforation, persistent pain/burning, persistent diarrhea, etc.
• Exam with biopsy/polypectomy: Up to 105,000 persons per year (7/1000) can have a serious complication
  - 75,000 persons per year (5/1000) may experience extended bleeding that may result in hospitalization, surgery and/or need for blood transfusion.
  - 15,000 persons per year (1/1000) may have a perforated colon. Small perforations are less likely to cause immediate peritoneal irritation and the diagnosis can be delayed for as long as 30 days, leading to poor prognosis.

A person can even die from a colonoscopy. The reported death rate after colonoscopy is around 0.09%. That sounds like a tiny number, but when applied to 15,000,000 exams per year, up to 13,500 person per year can die as a result of a colonoscopy!

...

If these were the odds for an airplane ride, I’d never get on an airplane.

The Epoch Times: The Truth About Colonoscopies, Part 3

2022-11-21, by Sherri Tenpenny

...Recall, an ideal screening test should be safe, readily available, convenient, inexpensive and have a high sensitivity. I think several stool and blood tests discussed in this substack that are much better for screening than an expensive, marginally safe colonoscopy which, in my opinion, should only be used to confirm a diagnosis and should NOT to be used for routine screening.

The Epoch Times: The Truth About Colonoscopies, Part 4

2022-11-21, by Sherri Tenpenny

...Throughout this 4-part series, I have shown that routine colonoscopies are not all they’re cracked up to be. There are several other, non-invasive screening options and many foods and supplements that should be your cornerstone to overall colon health.

While a colonoscopy is a good and important procedure for diagnostic purposes, it may be time to remove its standing as the “gold standard” of colon cancer screening.

It’s Autumn, Here’s How to Dry Apples, Persimmons, Pears and other Fruit, Kale, Beef Jerky, etc etc

re: persimmon

It’s autumn, and maybe you or your neighbors/friends have your own fruit tree(s) and/or a readily available supply at the local farmer’s market or similar.

Excalibur Food Dehydrator 9-Tray

My persimmon tree is about 1/20 harvested, and that means about 100 pounds so far, only about a ton to go. I cannot possibly use all this bounty, but I preserve some at least since I hate to see it just drop and rot.

How to Make Dried Persimmons

Whether it is persimmons, apples, pears, oranges, kale, beef jerky, or squirrel, it’s fast and easy to preserve food that will last up to a year (the more dry the finished product, the longer it will last).

Dehydrating Food is Fast and Easy—Here’s How and What to Use  for Drying Fruit, Making Beef Jerky, etc

How to Make Healthy Beef Jerky or Bison Jerky

I recommend pacing yourself on dried fruit due to its high fructose content*, but it’s hard to resist these dried persimmons, so do as I say, not as I sometimes do!

The $271 Excalibur 9-tray @AMAZON is the dryer to get—I have two of them and they have given me over 20 years of reliable service:

Excalibur Food Dehydrator 9-Tray Electric with 26-hour Timer, Automatic Shut Off and Temperature Settings @AMAZON

* Fructose is especially good at driving fat storage, a mechanism designed by nature for the coming winter.

Dried persimmons, ready for storage and eating

f1.8 @ 1/120 sec, ISO 40; 2021-12-22 11:09:14
iPhone 7 Plus + iPhone 7 Plus 4.0 mm f/1.8 @ 28mm equiv (4mm) ENV: altitude 496 ft / 151 m

[low-res image for bot]

Below, grass-fed beef peppered and about to be dried.

Jerky meat on trays in food dehydrator

Lipids: A Different Perspective, Part Twp (Cholesterol, Heart Disease, Atherosclerosis, statin)

re: cholesterol
re: statin

See also: LIPIDS. A DIFFERENT PERSPECTIVE, Part Three

Crackpot theories about cholesterol and statins and atherosclerosis are still the standard of care (abuse) in modern medicine. One of many runaway trains that enable Modern Wealthcare*.

Here is a perspective that any objective MD capable of critical thinking would have difficulty disagreeing with. Not that most MDs have critical thinking skills, sad but true.

* The repudiation of health and transfer of wealth from patients to “care” givers, while destroying any chance at better health via terrible advice, always treating symptoms and rarely causes, and never a cure. There is nil “health” in healthcare, a bitter pill of a word in its misleading suggestiveness.

LIPIDS. A DIFFERENT PERSPECTIVE, Part Two

2022-10, by BY DR. BAYNE FRENCH, MD DC. Excerpts, emphasis added.
TG = triglycerides, CVD = cardiovascular disease, CAD = coronary artery disease

It’s a long and sordid tale... The formation of atherosclerosis, like dementia, cancer, diabetes, and numerous other diseases, is an accumulation of metabolic dysfunction. A vastly complicated interplay of environment (our behaviors, diet, level of conditioning, toxin exposure, stress management, sleep quality, etc. x hundreds) with our genetics...

...Understand that your LDL is not a directly measured test but rather a value determined using non-individualized math. HUGE decisions are based on the result of this calculation (like who takes Lipitor for the rest of their lives), all hinging on the assumption that LDL actually matters. Many feel it does not...

...We need to ask ourselves just what in the hell are we trying to do with lab testing anyway! We’re trying to determine if there’s an increased risk of CVD. I dispute that LDL is good at predicting who’s at risk. It is apparent to me that TG, and especially the TG/HDL ratio is a much better marker. Checking lipids in a fasting state does NOT represent how most people spend their time. We are usually in a fed state, unfortunately. So maybe “random” testing of lipids is more suggestive of the usual state of affairs.

...The components of a standard cholesterol panel include total cholesterol, HDL (good chol), LDL (bad chol), triglycerides, and total chol/HDL ratio. This "panel" has been available for many decades. There is tremendous dogma surrounding this lab test. Many still view it as the end-all-be-all for determining heart attack risk. I think it sucks. I've never found it helpful in lowering an individual's risk of heart disease. Most of my patients that have a heart attack are already on cholesterol-lowering medications...

...The ratio of TG/HDL, my favorite, was first proposed by Dr. Gaziano et al... reported that the ratio of triglyceride and HDL cholesterol was the “most powerful” independent predictor of coronary artery disease (CAD, or heart disease). It is, frankly, the only ratio I care about. Specifically, a ratio >4 was a powerful predictor of CAD. For example, a ratio of 4 would be TG of 200 and HDL of 50. Dr. da Luz and others (Clinics. Aug 2008) performed another study showing that the TG/HDL ratio was most strongly associated with the extent of CAD, which means how advanced and widespread heart disease (severity of artery narrowing, and how many arteries in the heart were involved).

...notable finding of this massive study is that the majority of patients hospitalized with heart disease had excellent LDL

...

WIND: early this year, my experience with a cardiologist was so revolting in its lies and uselessness that I will never see that cardiologist again. Here was a guy that-I mean this literally—thorougly abuses his patients by offering absolutely no insight into anything, dispensing lifelong asking no questions about lifestyle, diet, history, activities, etc, etc. IMO, such doctors should be hounded out of the profession as the ignorant health-deniers they are.

The cholesterol hypothesis has become one of many zombie dumpster fires of cunning misinformation fueling Big Pharma and Wealthcare (commonly known as healthcare).

It’s not just about the costs of taking a often dangerous and wholly ineffective statin. It’s about the failure to address dozens of other life-ruining conditions all stemming from metabolic disfunctions and nutrient deficiencies, which in turn stem from atrociously bad advice from the medical profession or simply a failure to address health.

The modern medical profession is condemming hundreds of millions of people to a life of suffering, via absent and/or bad advice and by failing to improve health. Follow the money—it is a feedback loop of treating diseases with “bandaids” and thus encouraging those very diseases—an incredibly powerful business model proven-out now for at least 50 years, with healthcare now consuming vast portions of the nations GDP even as people become sicker and sicker.

Trusting your doctor on cholesterol and statins and heart disease is for children and idiots. They are certifiably incompetent on the subject, making no intellectual effort whatsoever, taking a paint-by-numbers approach based on decades-old and discredited bullshit hypotheses (many, morphing constantly) because the entire field has never had any predictive power whatsoever. Now take your statin and shut up.

I have yet to find (as a patient) a doctor who manifests the slightest trace of objectivity on the subject. Well... that’s not quite right: my solo-practice MD internist finally came around to my point (after some years) that my spike to very high cholesterol was the consequence of my Long COVID (or whatever it is)—the body naturally raising cholesterol when it is battling a problem. Which many doctors are not even aware of.

Half of what a doctor learns in school is out of date by the time the doctor is interning. And half of what is learned interning is already wrong or dogmatic, and out of date a few years later. How many harried doctors have the time to stay up to date? Virtually none. How many doctors working as employees have any incentive to stay up to date vs paint-by-numbers guideliness assembly line “next patient please”, where each patient gets 30 minutes a year to cover a dozen different health problems? Cholesterol is only one of hundreds of areas that these principles apply.

The future is crowdsourcing better health. No single doctor can do it on his/her own; that’s impossible.

Lipids: A Different Perspective (Cholesterol, Heart Disease, Atherosclerosis, statin)

re: cholesterol
re: statin

See also: LIPIDS. A DIFFERENT PERSPECTIVE, Part Three

Crackpot theories about cholesterol and statins and atherosclerosis are still the standard of care (abuse) in modern medicine. One of many runaway trains that enable Modern Wealthcare*.

Here is a perspective that any objective MD capable of critical thinking would have difficulty disagreeing with. Not that most MDs have critical thinking skills, sad but true.

* The repudiation of health and transfer of wealth from patients to “care” givers, while destroying any chance at better health via terrible advice, always treating symptoms and rarely causes, and never a cure. There is nil “health” in healthcare, a bitter pill of a word in its misleading suggestiveness.

LIPIDS. A DIFFERENT PERSPECTIVE, Part Two

2022-10, by BY DR. BAYNE FRENCH, MD DC. Excerpts, emphasis added.
TG = triglycerides, CVD = cardiovascular disease, CAD = coronary artery disease

It’s a long and sordid tale... The formation of atherosclerosis, like dementia, cancer, diabetes, and numerous other diseases, is an accumulation of metabolic dysfunction. A vastly complicated interplay of environment (our behaviors, diet, level of conditioning, toxin exposure, stress management, sleep quality, etc. x hundreds) with our genetics...

...Understand that your LDL is not a directly measured test but rather a value determined using non-individualized math. HUGE decisions are based on the result of this calculation (like who takes Lipitor for the rest of their lives), all hinging on the assumption that LDL actually matters. Many feel it does not...

...We need to ask ourselves just what in the hell are we trying to do with lab testing anyway! We’re trying to determine if there’s an increased risk of CVD. I dispute that LDL is good at predicting who’s at risk. It is apparent to me that TG, and especially the TG/HDL ratio is a much better marker. Checking lipids in a fasting state does NOT represent how most people spend their time. We are usually in a fed state, unfortunately. So maybe “random” testing of lipids is more suggestive of the usual state of affairs.

...The components of a standard cholesterol panel include total cholesterol, HDL (good chol), LDL (bad chol), triglycerides, and total chol/HDL ratio. This "panel" has been available for many decades. There is tremendous dogma surrounding this lab test. Many still view it as the end-all-be-all for determining heart attack risk. I think it sucks. I've never found it helpful in lowering an individual's risk of heart disease. Most of my patients that have a heart attack are already on cholesterol-lowering medications...

...The ratio of TG/HDL, my favorite, was first proposed by Dr. Gaziano et al... reported that the ratio of triglyceride and HDL cholesterol was the “most powerful” independent predictor of coronary artery disease (CAD, or heart disease). It is, frankly, the only ratio I care about. Specifically, a ratio >4 was a powerful predictor of CAD. For example, a ratio of 4 would be TG of 200 and HDL of 50. Dr. da Luz and others (Clinics. Aug 2008) performed another study showing that the TG/HDL ratio was most strongly associated with the extent of CAD, which means how advanced and widespread heart disease (severity of artery narrowing, and how many arteries in the heart were involved).

...notable finding of this massive study is that the majority of patients hospitalized with heart disease had excellent LDL

...

WIND: early this year, my experience with a cardiologist was so revolting in its lies and uselessness that I will never see that cardiologist again. Here was a guy that-I mean this literally—thorougly abuses his patients by offering absolutely no insight into anything, dispensing lifelong asking no questions about lifestyle, diet, history, activities, etc, etc. IMO, such doctors should be hounded out of the profession as the ignorant health-deniers they are.

The cholesterol hypothesis has become one of many zombie dumpster fires of cunning misinformation fueling Big Pharma and Wealthcare (commonly known as healthcare).

It’s not just about the costs of taking a often dangerous and wholly ineffective statin. It’s about the failure to address dozens of other life-ruining conditions all stemming from metabolic disfunctions and nutrient deficiencies, which in turn stem from atrociously bad advice from the medical profession or simply a failure to address health.

The modern medical profession is condemming hundreds of millions of people to a life of suffering, via absent and/or bad advice and by failing to improve health. Follow the money—it is a feedback loop of treating diseases with “bandaids” and thus encouraging those very diseases—an incredibly powerful business model proven-out now for at least 50 years, with healthcare now consuming vast portions of the nations GDP even as people become sicker and sicker.

Trusting your doctor on cholesterol and statins and heart disease is for children and idiots. They are certifiably incompetent on the subject, making no intellectual effort whatsoever, taking a paint-by-numbers approach based on decades-old and discredited bullshit hypotheses (many, morphing constantly) because the entire field has never had any predictive power whatsoever. Now take your statin and shut up.

I have yet to find (as a patient) a doctor who manifests the slightest trace of objectivity on the subject. Well... that’s not quite right: my solo-practice MD internist finally came around to my point (after some years) that my spike to very high cholesterol was the consequence of my Long COVID (or whatever it is)—the body naturally raising cholesterol when it is battling a problem. Which many doctors are not even aware of.

Half of what a doctor learns in school is out of date by the time the doctor is interning. And half of what is learned interning is already wrong or dogmatic, and out of date a few years later. How many harried doctors have the time to stay up to date? Virtually none. How many doctors working as employees have any incentive to stay up to date vs paint-by-numbers guideliness assembly line “next patient please”, where each patient gets 30 minutes a year to cover a dozen different health problems? Cholesterol is only one of hundreds of areas that these principles apply.

The future is crowdsourcing better health. No single doctor can do it on his/her own; that’s impossible.

The Arrow #90: Statins Have Never Shown Improvement in All-Cause Mortality except...

re: Alzheimer’s disease

IMO, within 15 years, statins will be shown to be one of the greatest medical farces in history.

Statins and Longevity

2022-09-22, by Michael Eades MD. Emphasis added.

...As they almost always do, her doctor flipped at the score and knee-jerked to the statin prescription. No thinking involved. And no real knowledge or understanding of the multi-hundreds of millions of dollars spent on statin trials that amounted to squat.

As I've repeatedly written, none of the so-called gold standard, randomized-controlled studies of statins have shown any improvement in all-cause mortality except in one small group of subjects. That small group is men under 65 who have had a heart attack. Not supposed risk factors for a heart attack, but an actual heart attack.

All other groups show no improvement. That means men under 65 who haven't had a heart attack, men over 65 irrespective of whether or not they've had a heart attack, and women of any age. People who fall into these groups--which encompass most of the population--don't derive any decrease in all-cause mortality by taking statins.

...All-cause mortality means just what it says: death from any cause. If some drug or other treatment therapy decreases all-cause mortality, it means that those taking the drug or receiving the therapy, as a group, live longer than those not taking the drug or undergoing the therapy. That is a good thing and it means the drug or therapy prolongs life.

An increase in all-cause mortality means just the opposite. People die sooner.

A number of studies have shown that those subjects taking statins have slightly, but statistically significant (whatever that means), reduced incidence of both fatal and non-fatal heart attacks. 

At first glance, one might think that is a good thing. After all, heart disease is the number one killer of people living in Western societies, so it stands to reason that anything that would reduce the rate of death from heart disease would decrease all-cause mortality.

But, other than in that one small group, it doesn't work that way. All-cause mortality is the same in those taking statins and those not taking statins.

Which can mean only one thing. Statins must be causing as many deaths as they prevent. People taking statins trade one risk of dying sooner for another.

What risk? Well, for one, those on statins develop diabetes at significantly higher rates than those not taking the drugs. Diabetes is also a major killer of those in Western society. Some data indicate the rate of cancer is higher. Statins themselves are not totally benign drugs, which is why those who take them must go in frequently for lab testing to ensure that liver function and other issues have not gone awry.

If you want more information on all this, you can take a look at a couple of blog posts I wrote on the subject. There are long discussions in the comments to these posts that are worthwhile reading as well. Especially this one from the Statin Madness post by a doc with all the merit badges and my response along with additional info from another commenter. I never got a response back from Dr. Pokrywka.

Also, you should read this article from the business press published shortly after all the big dollar statin trials had been completed. It is excellent and isn't clotted with medicalese. This is my favorite article about statins for the general reader.

Why, you might ask, does someone writing for the business press know all this while doctors who are taking care of patients apparently don't?

...Because of the requirement for almost perfect grades and high MCAT scores, medical school selects for people who study hard and test well... one must be able to memorize and regurgitate. ... Critical thinking is discouraged.

...When doctors get out and get into practice, they get their info not from lecturers, but from drug company reps...

...most doctors don't know how to read a study critically...Most don't know the difference between an observational study and a randomized-controlled trial. (Actually, they probably do if they stopped and thought about it, but most don't stop to think.)...

Doctors also learn at medical meetings, many of which are underwritten by various pharmaceutical companies...

Physicians in practice know they won't get in trouble if they follow the guidelines established by whatever specialty group they're a member of. Couple that with the fact that they don't particularly indulge in a lot of critical thinking and/or study reading, and you should understand why most of them have their pens at the ready and dutifully write statin prescriptions for the slightest elevation of cholesterol...

Why else would my friend's doctor want to put a female on a statin with a total cholesterol of 231. Especially in the face of an HDL of 72 and triglycerides of 74. It's insane. Statins don't confer any improvement in all-cause mortality in women. Period. But if in the unlikely event my friend had a heart attack, the doc would be safe from a malpractice suit because the guidelines were followed. It doesn't matter that the literature shows that elevated cholesterol is associated with greater longevity in older females. The guidelines were written by drug pushers.

Same with the second case. The doctor of an 81 year old male with an elevated calcium score--that is probably all stable plaque, otherwise he would have had a problem already--wants to put him on a statin. As I've written ad infinitum there is no evidence statins will help anyone in this age group live any longer. It would simply be replacing one risk factor for another.

...

WIND: the cholesterol hypothesis has become one of many zombie dumpster fires of cunning misinformation fueling Big Pharma.

Trusting your doctor is for children and idiots. Trust in a doctor can only come from years of good advice not contaminated by the physician’s employer, medical board, insurance company, etc. In other words, there are zero* doctors not influenced at least a little, and I would say that 99% of doctors have no interest in expressing truly independent thought, or at least rate it a lower priority than their income/job.

* Zero is of course not zero, for the literal-minded.

Latest Findings: Use of Medical Contrast Media on Patients Significantly Increases Risk of Dementia

re: Alzheimer’s disease

I started getting uncomfortable about 'contrast' 10-15 years ago, eg gadolinium and other stuff that has no business going through my body and kidneys. My first experience made me feel pretty weird, and not in a healthy way.

Doctors poo-pooed my concern (out of ignorance), but I never again allowed a contrast agent after the first usage about 20 years ago. I am now doubly glad about that decision. Would I allow it today? Only if there were some deadly issue that needed to be delineated clearly.

The Epoch Times: Latest Findings: Use of Medical Contrast Media on Patients Significantly Increases Risk of Dementia

2022-11-11

A new study conducted by National Health Research Institutes (NHRI) and Taichung Veterans General Hospital found that the contrast medium (CM) used on patients during radiological examinations may significantly increase the risk of vascular dementia.

Doctors use contrast media to increase the visibility of organs, blood vessels, and tissues when performing computed tomography or magnetic resonance imaging scans on patients.

It has been found that some contrast media can cause renal failure, acute kidney injury, and death because the contrast medium can cause toxicity to the renal tubular epithelial cells directly, leading to renal dysfunction or even necrosis (death of tissue), and microvascular problems in the kidney indirectly.

Chih-Cheng Hsu, deputy director of the Institute of Population Health Science of the NHRI, said that since some contrast media have been proven to damage the kidneys. The brain and kidneys are covered with many blood vessels, so it was speculated that contrast medium might also affect the brain and cause dementia.

Dementia is further divided into common Alzheimer’s disease (AD) and vascular dementia (VD). The worldwide incidence rate of VD has grown rapidly in recent years, and the age group is getting younger, which has attracted the attention of the public and the medical industry.

...Although the incidence rate is not high, the risk of dementia for those who have used a contrast medium within 10 years is 2.09 times higher than for those who have not. And the incidence of vascular dementia is four times higher. People with diabetes and depression are generally considered to be at high risk of dementia.

The so-called vascular dementia is rapid damage to the brain caused by reduced blood flow to the brain.

In addition, the report shows that intra-arterial injection (into an artery) of the contrast medium easily allows the contrast medium to enter the blood circulation of the brain, which may affect the brain, then the risk of dementia caused by arterial injection is greater than that of intravenous injection. These research results were published in the international journal Biomedicines in mid-August.

...

He emphasized that the identification of tumors, kidney stones, and the placement of cardiovascular stents requires the help of a contrast medium. The aim of this study is not to prevent the public from checking with contrast medium but to use it only when necessary.

...
After the press conference, Taiwan’s NHRI mentioned that the study still has some limitations. The results of the study only confirm that the use of contrast medium is highly “correlated” with an increased risk of dementia, but further research is needed to show whether it has a “cause and effect relationship” because data on the patients’ dietary habits and the dose of contrast medium used at the time are absent.

WIND: correlation is not causation, but a doubling of risk over a huge cohort gets my attention.

Scientists Say Alzheimer’s Is an Autoimmune Disease, Not Result of Amyloid Plaques

re: Alzheimer’s disease

Makes a lot more sense than the existing lame explanations, which explain nothing but effect, lacking any causal credibility.

The Epoch Times: Scientists Say Alzheimer’s Is an Autoimmune Disease, Not Result of Amyloid Plaques

2022-11-16

According to statistics from the World Health Organization (WHO), there are about 50 million dementia patients in the world, with 10 million new cases every year; it means that about one person is diagnosed every three seconds...

Recently, Canadian scientists published a post saying that the amyloid beta found in the brains of Alzheimer’s patients is actually a substance released by the body’s immune response. They further speculate that Alzheimer’s is an autoimmune disease centered on the brain.

Autoimmune diseases refer to diseases caused by the body’s own immune system attacking the body. For instance, inflammations like arthritis and neuritis are autoimmune diseases.

...The study looked at amyloid beta as a molecule normally found in the brain, that is, part of the brain’s immune system, rather than an abnormal protein.

Amyloid beta is a product of an integrated immune response that occurs in the brain when there is trauma or the presence of bacteria in it. The researchers also emphasized that stimulating events such as infection, trauma, ischemia, air pollution, and depression can trigger the body’s immune response, causing the secretion of amyloid beta.

...

As neurons disintegrate after necrosis, the necrotic neuronal breakdown products diffuse to adjacent neurons, eliciting the further release of amyloid beta—everything keeps collapsing like dominoes and develops into a chronic self-perpetuating autoimmune cycle that eventually leads to Alzheimer’s disease.

The study also emphasizes that it is the necrotic neuronal breakdown products that elicit the release of amyloid beta and that the natural process of neuronal apoptosis does not significantly promote the release of this substance.

Other Evidence

In addition to having neurotoxic properties, amyloid beta was considered in this study as an antimicrobial peptide secreted by the human body. The researchers believe that when the human body is stimulated, it will mount an immune response and secrete amyloid beta to fight external challenges, as in vitro experiments have shown that amyloid beta also has antiviral and antibacterial functions, which also happen to be the basic properties of antimicrobial peptides secreted by the human body.

In experiments, amyloid beta was shown to be effective against the herpes simplex virus, as well as being able to kill and break down a variety of bacteria, including E. coli, S. aureus, S. marcescens, and K. pneumonia. The researchers believe that these experimental results support the view that Alzheimer’s is an autoimmune disease.

...

However, some scientists have also proposed related treatment methods based on the communication pathway of the microbiota-gut-brain axis. For example, by enhancing the activity of specific gastrointestinal microbiota, the body can produce neuroactive tryptophan metabolites to intervene and treat neurodegenerative diseases such as Alzheimer’s disease. 

WIND: auto-immune disease can be caused by a virus (eg Epstein-Bar virus or COVID-19 and many others), or the chemical-laden toxic food that most most people eat, including so many grain-based products, and so on. It would make a lot of sense that Alzheimer’s is driven by diet primarily, given its epidemic and catastrophic levels.

Excitotoxins: Direct and Indirect Cellular Effects of Aspartame on the Brain

re: excitotoxins

I’ve written before about excitotoxins, which are chemicals that convert to neurotransmitters and cause nerves to kill themselves by firing excessively*. When enough neurons have died, you “unexpectedly” get various neurodegenerative diseases, a mystery to medical science even today.

Doesn’t seem like much of a mystery to me: feed the body with garbage processed foods, PUFAs, MSG, aspartame, and other excitotoxin≠s along with many nutrient deficiencies, particularly magnesium deficiency (a global public health crisis and Mg is critical to cellular health), and the inputs guarantee hundreds of millions of degraded lives.

If you suffer from low blood sugar (eg diabetes), heat stress (eg intense exercise or similar), old age, concussion and many other factors, then your blood brain barrier (BBB) which normally can keep most toxins out of the brain out gets leaky and lets in considerably more of the toxins than a young brain in perfect health would. But some always gets through no matter what. Point is, any of those stressors put critical neurons at risk.

* Examples include MSG (monosodium glutamate), and aspartame (aspartic acid). Food purveyors are not required to disclose such poisons when they occur in chemically processed substances often referred to by other names. This is why you see “natural flavors”, instead of MSG; if it was straight MSG it would have to be disclosed. What you don’t know does hurt you!

Excitotoxins: Direct and Indirect Cellular Effects of Aspartame on the Brain

May 2008, European Journal of Clinical Nutrition

The use of the artificial sweetener, aspartame, has long been contemplated and studied by various researchers, and people are concerned about its negative effects. Aspartame is composed of phenylalanine (50%), aspartic acid (40%) and methanol (10%). Phenylalanine plays an important role in neurotransmitter regulation, whereas aspartic acid is also thought to play a role as an excitatory neurotransmitter in the central nervous system.

Glutamate, asparagines and glutamine are formed from their precursor, aspartic acid. Methanol, which forms 10% of the broken down product, is converted in the body to formate, which can either be excreted or can give rise to formaldehyde, diketopiperazine (a carcinogen) and a number of other highly toxic derivatives.

Previously, it has been reported that consumption of aspartame could cause neurological and behavioural disturbances in sensitive individuals. Headaches, insomnia and seizures are also some of the neurological effects that have been encountered, and these may be accredited to changes in regional brain concentrations of catecholamines, which include norepinephrine, epinephrine and dopamine.

The aim of this study was to discuss the direct and indirect cellular effects of aspartame on the brain, and we propose that excessive aspartame ingestion might be involved in the pathogenesis of certain mental disorders (DSM-IV-TR 2000) and also in compromised learning and emotional functioning.

...

WIND: do not expect the FDA to prohibit the favorite ingredients (poisons) of food manufacturers. The FDA works for them, not for you!

If only 1% of the population is affected, then out of a billion people, you get 10 million people with problems.

Food manufacturers have engineered “food” to be maximally appealing, and that means dozens of chemicals along with flavor enhancers eg MSG disguised as “natural flavors” (very unnatural), and a dozen other dirty-trick names for it.

Then you have the aspartame-flavored soft drinks, which the world drinks by the billions of cans.

Toxin in ===> disease out.

Simple advice: no soft drinks of any kind, no processed or prepared foods, no seed oils, no factory-farmed anything. Eat whole unprocessed foods, preferably organic.

Mercedes Sprinter: Whistling Sound From Turbo Turns Out to Be...

re: Mercedes Sprinter

I drive some very rough roads so, perhaps this will not happen to most owners...

My Mercedes Sprinter had been making a whistling sound from the turbo area for about a year. I had no luck in figuring it out until just recently, when changing the oil. I even mentioned it to the dealer, who just shrugged and no mechanical inspection found it.

What I found is that the turbo inlet tube in the engine compartment (top right near front grill area) had popped up and out of the socket into which it fits. It was sitting slightly ajar on top of the hole into which it should be inserted, allowing air to bypass the inlet in the grill area, and to enter directly into the main tube leading to the turbo.

The whistling noise disappeared once I fitted the front inlet piece into the tube.

I don’t know where the filter is for incoming air, but I hope it is after this juncture, otherwise dirty/dusty air would have been directly entering the turbo, doing who knows what to the turbo internals.

Lesson learned: familiarize yourself with the engine compartment. Look for stuff like this turbo tube popping out/up, rat pee and poop and/or damage/chewing, anything that looks different from the last look-see.

UPDATE on Mercedes Sprinter: Will Not Go, Normal idle in P but RPMs drop in D or R with Engine Lugging Nastily at 400-500 RPM — ***POSSIBLE FIX***

re: Mercedes Sprinter Issues and Breakdowns: Sprinter Will Not Go, RPMs Drop Very Low (Normal idle, put into D or R, RPMs drop, Engine Lugs
re: UPDATE on Mercedes Sprinter Issues and Breakdowns: Sprinter Will Not Move, RPMs Drop Very Low
re: 2017 Mercedes Sprinter: Is it Going to KILL ME by Failing to Move at a Crucial Time?
re: Mercedes Sprinter

Read the first link above in particular to understand the issue.

In brief, at altitudes ~6000 ft and above (perhaps lower), it can take up to 10 minutes before the Mercedes Sprinter will go anywhere, even with the accelerator floored.

Cold exacerbates the issue, but it happens at altitude even when relatively warm eg 50°F or so. It can be extremely dangerous (as in death or serious injury), let alone annoying.

Here is a video taken in October 2022. It shows the same issue as all previous years. This was prior to the mitigation discussed below.

Mitigation that seems to work — Cetane/winterizer and/or BG 245

On a recent 6-week trip, I spent most time at an altitude of 8400 feet. I encountered the “no go” lug-then-stall-and-die problem regularly. Lowest temperatures did not go below 28°F, but the problem happened even after nights well above freezing.

Moving on later in the trip, I spent time at 8000 to 12000 feet in the White Mountains with temperatures down to 20°F or so parked overnight (and as low as 8°F and not above 16°F on one day). I had no issues at all. Indeed, the van/engine was eager to pull away and go immediately upon startup, with no hesitation, no lugging, etc. Engine idle was ideal, and smooth.

The difference? About 100 miles before getting up into the White Mountains, I added:

• To my 48 gallon fuel tank upon fillup, I added Power Service diesel fuel Cetane Boost and winterizer/antigel @AMAZON, specified to treat 100 gallons, eg 2X the suggested ratio for winterizing.
• One quart of BG 245 premium fuel system cleaner @AMAZON.

My hypothesis is that one (possibly both) of these additives was responsible for eliminating the stall/lugging/no-go issue. While this was only one trip, each and every day for 5 days at altitude and cold I had an eager engine right upon startup, with no lugging and no stalling. That defies all prior 5 years of experience as well as the previous 4-5 weeks.

I can think of no other factor that could explain the perfect operation.

My guess woud be that the Cetane booster/winterizer alone did the trick, since I rarely add the BG 245 stuff except on a low tank (maximal concentration/minimum dilution for most effect), and this time I had a full 48 gallon tank, diluting the BG 245 substantially. And since I regularly use BG 245 to clean up crud, I discount the idea that it was responsible. Yet I cannot rule out that it contributed or was even the primary benefactor—I will have to experiment to find out.

Since the past 5 years of stall issues occured sometimes at even relatively warm temperatures (Charles H reports up to 80°F), I dismiss fuel gelling from cold temperatiures as a factor. I’m guessing it is the Cetane boost at work (+8 when treated at 2X the specified ratio?). But I cannot rule out the BG 245 being involved.

Next trip to altitude (cold or not), I will try just the Cetane Booster to see if behavior is good. At over $50/quart for the BG 245, I hope it is the Cetane Booster (about $12).

Quick note on the BG 245

BG 245 premium fuel system cleaner @AMAZON works in my view. The trick I use is to add it only when down to ~6 gallons of fuel so as to have a high concentration in the mix. Even better if you are handy (I’m not) is to add it directly into the fuel filter, start the engine briefly (10 seconds or so), then shut it off and soak overnight (dump the rest into the fuel tank). That should help dissolve away any nasty deposits.

Oil changes

Sprinters get a lot of money put into them. Higher operating costs for frequent oil changes with top-grade oil are massively cheaper than the problems you can run into. If you want to use the garbage-grade oil Mercedes puts into your Sprinter (NOACK 25%, nil zinc to protect the timing chain, very poor ability to handle soot, etc, just horrible stuff not even rated for a diesel engine), be my guest, but the chickens will come home to roost doing so.

Recommendation: change oil every 4000-5000 miles for normal operation, every 3000 miles if the engine is idled a lot. And avoid idling unless absolutely necessary.

How Poly Unsaturated Oils and Lineolic Fatty Acid Wrecks Your Health (PUFAs)

re: COVID
re: ethics in medicine
re: The Epoch Times

Pay attention here—short long term health consequences. I’ve covered PUFAs before.

Big food is poisoining you and your family, delivering your disease-ridden body to Big Pharma for “healthcare”.

See also: The Bitter Truth About Seed Oils, Inflammation, and Disease—The Genius Life with Max Lugavere

The Epoch Times: How This Common Fatty Acid Wrecks Your Health

2022-10-24 by Joseph Mercola. Emphasis added.

Linoleic acid (LA) is the primary contributor to nearly all chronic diseases.

You hear a lot about essential fatty acids, but did you know certain ones can damage your metabolism and set you up for obesity, heart disease and worse?

STORY AT-A-GLANCE

• Linoleic acid (LA) makes up the bulk — about 60% to 80% — of omega-6 and is the primary contributor to nearly all chronic diseases. While considered an essential fat, when consumed in excessive amounts, LA acts as a metabolic poison
• Polyunsaturated fats such as LA are highly susceptible to oxidation, which means the fat breaks down into harmful subcomponents. OXLAMS (oxidated LA metabolites) are what cause the damage
• Over the last 150 years, the LA in the human diet has increased from about 2 to 3 grams a day to 30 or 40 grams. LA used to make up 1% to 3% of the energy in the human diet and now it makes up 15% to 20%
• The omega-3 to omega-6 ratio is also very important, but simply increasing the amount of omega-3 that you eat is ill advised. You really need to minimize your omega-6 to prevent damage
• At a molecular level, excess LA consumption damages your metabolism and impedes your body’s ability to generate energy in your mitochondria

In this interview, Tucker Goodrich and I discuss what will be the topic of my next book, namely linoleic acid (LA), which I believe is likely the leading contributing cause of virtually all chronic diseases we’ve encountered over the last century. Unfortunately, this is a topic that most clinicians and health care practitioners who focus on natural medicine have only a superficial understanding of.

...
Avoiding Omega-6 Fats Is Key for Good Health

While considered an essential fat, when consumed in excessive amounts, which over 99% of people do, LA (an omega-6 polyunsaturated fat or PUFA) acts as a metabolic poison.

Most clinicians who value nutritional interventions to optimize health understand that vegetable oils, which are loaded with omega-6 PUFA, are something to be avoided. What most fail to appreciate is that even if you eliminate the vegetable oils and avoid them like the plague, you may still be missing the mark.

Chances are you’re still getting too much of this dangerous fat from supposedly healthy food sources such as olive oil and chicken (which are fed LA-rich grains).

...

WIND: obesity, diabetes, cardiac disease, even sunburn, which I can attest to personallly (no longer happens to me!).

COVID-19 probably killed many people because of BAD DIET, especially linoleic acid, which is highly toxic when released into the bloodstream.

Do not eat seed oils in any form

This means most foods you will find in the grocery store, restaurant food, snack bars, “health bars”, fast food, salad dressing, etc.

Do not eat processed foods

Eat whole unprocessed foods.

If a food has more than1 ingredient (or a few all of which are original foods), you’re good. If it has chemicals, additives, etc, do not eat it.

Do not eat factory-farmed meat

Grass-fed only. Most meats sold today are fed corn and soy, producing high levels of Omega 6 and linoleic acids in the meat.

‘Speed of Science’ — A Scandal Beyond Your Wildest Nightmare

re: COVID
re: ethics in medicine
re: The Epoch Times

Look at all the needle-pocked suckers with their triple and quadruple Jabs getting COVID, and getting COVID again, and again.

The Epoch Times: ‘Speed of Science’ — A Scandal Beyond Your Wildest Nightmare

2022-10-24 by Joseph Mercola. Emphasis added.

It was never about science or protecting others.

It was never about data or science; it was about following the top-down script they had from the beginning. And this recent admission by a Pfizer executive proves it would be called out as fraudulent in any other industry. So how have they managed to pull the wool over so many people’s eyes?

STORY AT-A-GLANCE

• The premise behind COVID shot mandates and vaccine passports was that by taking the shot, you would protect others, as it would prevent infection and spread of COVID-19
• In early October 2022, during a COVID hearing in the European Parliament, Dutch member Rob Roos questioned Pfizer’s president of international developed markets, Janine Small, about whether Pfizer had in fact tested and confirmed that their mRNA jab would prevent transmission prior to its rollout
• Small admitted that Pfizer never tested whether their jab would prevent transmission because they had to “move at the speed of science to understand what is happening in the market … and we had to do everything at risk”
• We’ve known for well over two years that the shots were never tested for transmission interruption. In October 2020, Peter Doshi, associate editor of The BMJ, highlighted that trials were not designed to reveal whether the vaccines would prevent transmission. Yet everyone in government and media insisted they would do just that
• It was never about science or protecting others. It was always about following a predetermined narrative that sought to get experimental mRNA technology into as many people as possible
  

...

As noted by Roos, the entire premise behind COVID shot mandates and vaccine passports was that by taking the shot, you would protect others, as it would prevent infection and spread of COVID-19. Small replied:

“No. We had to really move at the speed of science to understand what is happening in the market … and we had to do everything at risk.”2

This means the COVID passport was based on a big lie. The only purpose of the COVID passport: forcing people to get vaccinated. I find this shocking — even criminal. — Rob Roos, MEP

As noted by Roos, “This means the COVID passport was based on a big lie. The only purpose of the COVID passport: forcing people to get vaccinated.” Roos added that he found this deception “shocking — even criminal.”3

...

Vaccine Makers Continue to Spread Lies

Despite Small’s unequivocally clear admission that Pfizer has not tested its COVID shot to ascertain whether it prevents transmission, Pfizer’s CEO still does not shy away from insinuating as much. Here’s what he tweeted out October 12, 2022.15 He’s not saying the shot has been confirmed to prevent COVID, but he insinuates that it does by saying the FDA authorized it for the prevention of COVID. This is also known as lying by omission.

...

The primary questions that still remain unanswered are: Why was this script created? What are its intended consequences? And, who created it? As mentioned earlier, the evidence suggests harm is an intended outcome — harm to our economy, our social order, our health, our life span and reproductive capacity.

WIND: by getting the Jab: you did NOT protect others, and most of you did NOT even protect yourselves—there is a solid chance that you increased your risk of getting COVID.

Blood Pressure Meds: Suicide-Inducing Quality of Life Disaster?

re: COVID
re: ethics in medicine
re: The Epoch Times

Recently, Scott Adams (author of Dilbert) went public, stating that his quality of life was so bad that he would consider suicide if it did not improve within one year. Constant muscle pains for months, no energy, just a horrible day, day after day. He had thought it might be Long COVID. It wasn’t.

The cause? A Big Pharma medication for high blood pressure. For blood pressure that wasn’t even high but very marginally borderline. He seems clueless about how insignificant his “issue” was.

Scott stopped the beta blocker, and within 24 hours, months of agony went away, and did not return.

How many Americans are damaged/injured by their feckless doctors prescribing one (or many) dangerous meds according to guidelines, for a dubious if not outright crackpot medical hypothesis for which research does not hold up under scrutiny? Like the steadily decreasing guidelines for “high” blood pressure, which varies hugely over the course of the day (or with coffee!) and for which doctors do one or two measurements before dispensing the “rat poison” the guidelines suggest.

OTOH, given the garbage that most people eat (and fail to change) and the lack of exercise, maybe for some (many), a BP med is the only form of compliance that a doctor can handle. But such people are just adding problems onto problems, rather than fixing the core issues first.

I am NOT saying that no-one should use a BP med. Some people for whatever reason can have dangerously high BP. But high BP things can be episodical. For example, my BP ran something like 190/160 for 6-8 weeks after my concussion (no doctor even bothered to check it, another case of doctor ignorance). And fighting Long COVID, when I had a downcycle, it would rise to the 150/90 range from the 118/68 range. Thing is, a doctor will put you on a lifetime regimen for episodical things—precisely what my (former) cardiologist tried to do, based on one visit and even when I explained that my body was under special and extraordinary duress, particularly so at that time. It doesn’t even register with those assholes.

How many medical doctors follow up properly, let alone perform competent risk assessment? Probably 1% of doctors do both of these, and 5% do one of them. It’s obvious if you spend one visit with any doctor working for a corporation—poisons  (“medication”) is dispensed like Halloween candy. It’s appalling beyond belief. And all the risk and heartache and damage is yours to bear—no liability whatsoever.

Talk to your doctor? Who but a child or idiot thinks that is a good idea when doctors are not free to practice medicine, but must instead mindlessly prescribe by numbers to cover their ass? And to NOT discuss the dangerous and unpleasant side effects of so many meds. Buyer beware—choose your doctor with exceptional care, which means NOT in a corporate entity. There is simple NO CHANCE you will get objective advice from such organizations.

Statins Double Diabetes Rates, and Might Even Triple the Risk

re: COVID
re: ethics in medicine
re: The Epoch Times

If you screw around with one of the most fundamental and necessary systems in the body (cholesterol levels), you can wreak havoc everywhere.

There is zero credible evidence that statins offer net benefit, and the downsides are legion. And the “science” behind statins is both corrupt beyond redemption, and incompetent beyond belief.

The Epoch Times: Statins Double Diabetes Rates

2022-10-29 by Joseph Mercola. Emphasis added.

Cholesterol lowering medications have a long history of side effects and adverse events. Research finds your risk of diabetes may double, or even triple, with long-term use. Lower your risk of cardiovascular events without using medications.

STORY AT-A-GLANCE

• While past research has indicated statins increase your risk of diabetes, data demonstrate they double your risk of Type 2 diabetes, and when taken for more than two years may even triple your risk
• Statins work by blocking a liver enzyme your body uses to make cholesterol; blocking this enzyme triggers a depletion of CoQ10 and vitamin K2, both necessary for heart health and the prevention of some cancers. Your body makes cholesterol as it is necessary for the production of hormones and cell walls, and to produce substances to digest food
• While the relative risk reduction of a cardiovascular event with statin medications is between 20% and 25%, the absolute risk, or the actual difference in rates of coronary death is 2.3%
• Additional risks associated with statin medications include neurodegenerative diseases, musculoskeletal disorders, cataracts and heart disease; consider using natural approaches to improve your cardiovascular health

Statins are a type of medication prescribed to lower cholesterol levels. They work by blocking an enzyme in the liver your body uses to make cholesterol. Although vilified for many years as causing heart attacks and stroke, your body makes cholesterol as it is needed to produce hormones, build cell membranes and produce substances used to digest food.

...

Statins Trigger High Number of Side Effects

Statin medications deplete your body of coenzyme Q10 (CoQ10), which may account for some of the devastating long-term results. It was strongly suggested the FDA add a black box warning to statin medications to advise patients and physicians about this, but in 2014 the FDA decided against it.

The reduction in CoQ10 may be responsible for an increased risk of acute heart failure and atherosclerosis, as reported in a 2015 scientific investigation. The study addressed physiological mechanisms in the reduction of CoQ10, including the inhibition of the synthesis of vitamin K2 necessary to protect against arterial calcification.

A reduction in vitamin K2 may contribute to osteoporosis, heart disease,34< brain disease and inappropriate calcification. Statins have also been associated with an increased risk of neurodegenerative diseases, cataracts, cancer., and musculoskeletal disorders.

In one study, a research team evaluated the use of statins in patients with terminal illnesses who had a high likelihood of dying within one year. They found those who stopped taking statins had a mean survival of 39 more days than those who continued to take statins — 229 days without statins and 190 days with statins.

Although the FDA calls liver complications rare, one physician’s search of MedWatch, the FDA’s Adverse Event Reporting Program, found 5,405 individuals reporting hepatitis or liver function abnormalities associated with just two statin medications between 2006 and 2013.

...

WIND: trust your doctor.... to be incompetent at risk assessment. For that matter, few doctors ever consider relative risk vs absolute, which is critical and basic to the analysis... yet they’ll quote you total bullshit (relative risk) all without any mention of side effect. And for that matter, few doctors are even competent to read medical studies. Doing so requires critical reasoning skills, which are stunted in most doctors.

The cholesterol hypothesis belongs on the trash heap of crackpot ideas, yet it is the basis for poisoning tens of millions with statins. Which is exactly what you’ll get along with scare tactics if you trust a doctor working for a corporation or similar—paint-by-numbers “care” that is really abuse, where the doctor is not allowed to even think.