Free Republic

Public Health (from a German Propaganda pamphlet authored by Walter Tießle). "In preserving health, National Socialism is following fundamentally new ways of thinking. In the past, one understood health care as caring for those who were ill. Enormous means were used. And in certain circles, the ill were the model of humanity, at the center of all action and thought. No one made the effort to find the roots of illness, or to consider: "How could we stop illness at its start, or at least limit it as much as possible?" The means used by National Socialism must, of course,...

I cracked up – for the first time - on June 4, 1988, three weeks short of completing my Masters degree in Psychology. Some would say I had a nervous breakdown. The psych ward doctors said it was major depression. I say that I saw just how evil my sin is in the eyes of God and it scared the hell out of me. I cracked up, broke down, and de-pressed. I cobbled together some mad reality and blew a fuse. I despaired, decompensated, detached, and derailed. I lost my mind, never to be the same again. Thanks be to...

N.Korea's Kim has 'serious' pancreas disorder: report 57 mins ago TOKYO (AFP) – North Korean leader Kim Jong-Il is suffering from a "serious disorder" of the pancreas, a Japanese television network reported Friday, quoting a South Korean intelligence official. The 67-year-old's condition has been the focus of much speculation since he reportedly suffered a stroke last August. The TBS network reported that Kim has been resting and is being treated at his villa in the southeasten area of Wonsan by a team specialists.

Real 'Lucy in the Sky with Diamonds' gravely ill June 12, 2009, 9:22 AM EST LONDON (AP) -- They were childhood chums. Then they drifted apart, lost touch completely, and only renewed their friendship decades later, when illness struck. Not so unusual, really. Except she is Lucy Vodden — the girl who was the inspiration for the Beatles' 1967 psychedelic classic "Lucy in the Sky With Diamonds" — and he is Julian Lennon, the musician son of John Lennon. They are linked together by something that happened more than 40 years ago when Julian brought home a drawing from school...

My daughter, who posts as Ellendra, has had continuing health problems. Dizziness and brain fog started in October 2008 and continues to get worse. She's seen a neurologist, who had eegs, an ekg, and an mri done, which showed nothing. A throid test came back very high, so she's now on meds for that, but there's been no improvement yet. We suspect Lyme Disease, but tests so far have come back mostly negative. She's now seeing an integrative medicine specialist in another state, and we're waiting for results of about 20 different tests. Meanwhile, she keeps getting worse. Sometimes, her...

A 13-year-old boy from Sleepy Eye and his parents are ignoring the advice of cancer specialists that the teenager undergo chemotherapy and radiation. Daniel Hauser has Hodgkin's lymphoma, considered by doctors to be one of the most curable forms of cancer. Danny, as he is known, and his parents have turned to natural therapies, such as herbs and vitamins, instead. They're scheduled to be in court Friday to defend their decision. Brown County Attorney James Olson has filed a petition accusing Daniel's parents, Colleen and Anthony Hauser, of child neglect and endangerment. Olson is asking a judge to order the...

7. Electric People According to British paranormalist Hilary Evans, some people are ‘upright human [electric] eels, capable of generating charges strong enough to knock out streetlights and electronic equipment.” Cases of electric people date back to 1786, the most famous of which is that of 14 year old Angelique Cottin, whose presence caused compass needles to gyrate wildly. To further investigate this phenomenon, Evans founded SLIDE, the Street Lamp Interference Data Exchange. Wikipedia article on this unusual phenomenon

It's been a dream for a decade: a single daily pill combining aspirin, cholesterol medicine and blood pressure drugs — everything people need to prevent heart attacks and strokes in a cheap, generic form. Skeptics said five medicines rolled into a single pill would mean five times more side effects. Some people would get drugs they don't need, while others would get too little. One-size-fits-all would turn out to fit very few, they warned. Now the first big test of the "polypill" has proved them wrong. The experimental combo pill was as effective as nearly all of its components taken...

This is an actual sweepstakes and, if you are the grand prize winner, we will fly you and a companion to New York where you will receive a free colonoscopy. You will also be given three nights' accommodation in a suite at the luxurious Loews Regency Hotel, which will include the night before you are "awarded" the colonoscopy. What should you expect if you are the lucky winner? The hardest part is the preparation the night before when you drink a laxative. This laxative is well known for declaring itself at the very moment you have called a relative or...

Al Qaeda terrorists have been left fearing the Black Death plague after it wiped out at least 40 insurgents at an Algerian training camp, it was reported today. The horror disease, which killed 25 million people in medieval Europe, is understood to have been found in a militant’s body dumped at a roadside. Terror group AQLIM (al Qaeda in the Land of the Islamic Maghreb) was forced to turn its shelter in the Yakouren forests into mass graves and flee, it has been claimed. Now al Qaeda chiefs are said to fear the plague has been passed into other cells...

KABUL, Afghanistan, Dec. 31, 2008 – Doctors and medics with the provincial reconstruction team in Afghanistan’s Zabul province are teaching medical providers to purify water and reduce waterborne illnesses. Air Force Capt. (Dr.) Bill Errico of the provincial reconstruction team in Afghanistan’s Zabul province, shows Iraqi doctors how to use a water purification machine. The PRT medical team donated water purification systems to hospitals throughout the province. U.S. Air Force photo by Airman 1st Class Mary Costello  (Click photo for screen-resolution image);high-resolution image available. PRT members taught five medical providers in Shajoy district how to operate, clean and sustain a...

Researchers have found out what made the 1918 flu pandemic so deadly -- a group of three genes that lets the virus invade the lungs and cause pneumonia. They mixed samples of the 1918 influenza strain with modern seasonal flu viruses to find the three genes and said their study might help in the development of new flu drugs. The discovery, published in Tuesday's issue of the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, could also point to mutations that might turn ordinary flu into a dangerous pandemic strain. Yoshihiro Kawaoka of the University of Wisconsin and colleagues at the...

Mayo Clinic cardiologist Apoor Gami, M.D., the lead researcher on the study, presented his findings at the American Heart Association's Scientific Sessions 2008 in New Orleans. "Nighttime low oxygen saturation in the blood is an important complication of obstructive sleep apnea," according to Virend Somers, M.D., Ph.D., the study's principal investigator. "Our data showed that an average nighttime oxygen saturation of the blood of 93 percent and lowest nighttime saturation of 78 percent strongly predicted SCD, independent of other well-established risk factors, such as high cholesterol. These findings implicate OSA, a relatively common condition, as a novel risk factor for...

I feel sort of cheated - like discovering that your spouse has been sneaking out the back door with a pack of Pall Malls. It doesn't fit the character type either. McCain, yes. The guy was a two-pack-a-day smoker for 25 years and looks like a man desperately in need of a fix. But Obama? Mr. Coolunderfire? I guess part of it is the way we characterize smokers and smoking in this day and age. What was once accepted, if not encouraged - the Flintstones did a commercial for Winstons in the old black-and-white days of television - is now...

OBAMA INTERVIEW: LETS TALK ABOUT GRANDMOTHER'S HEALTH Wed Oct 22 2008 18:09:23 ET CBS EARLY SHOW co-anchor Harry Smith conducted an exclusive interview with Sen. Barack Obama earlier today in Richmond, Va. Among other topics, the senator told Smith why it’s so important for him to take a break from his campaign to see his grandmother. “My grandmother's the last one left,” Obama told Smith. The senator added, “She has really been the rock of the family, the foundation of the family.” Obama didn’t get to his mother before she died. “Yeah, got there too late,” he says. “You know,...

Once upon a time, on a farm in Virginia, there was a little red hen who scratched about the barnyard until she uncovered quite a few grains of wheat. She called all of her neighbors together and said, 'If we plant this wheat, we shall have bread to eat. Who will help me plant it?' 'Not I,' said the cow. 'Not I,' said the duck. 'Not I,' said the pig. 'Not I,' said the goose. 'Then I will do it by myself,' said the little red hen, and so she did. --- Read on to identify these lazy animals ...

A tense standoff has developed in waters off Somalia over an Iranian merchant ship laden with a mysterious cargo that was hijacked by pirates. Somali pirates suffered skin burns, lost hair and fell gravely ill “within days” of boarding the MV Iran Deyanat. Some of them died. Andrew Mwangura, the director of the East African Seafarers’ Assistance Programme, told the Sunday Times: “We don’t know exactly how many, but the information that I am getting is that some of them had died. There is something very wrong about that ship.” ....

Don't Mention the Kim Jong Il's Illness! By Moon Sung Hwee, from Jagang in 2006 [2008-09-24 18:10 ] Read in Korean Despite strong regulation by the North Korean authorities, rumors about Kim Jong Il’s illness spread quickly through the students who took part in the parade at the September 9 commemorative events for the founding of the North Korean regime. A source from North Hamkyung Province reported on Tuesday that “The story that the General (Kim Jong Il) had fallen down spread fast and widely among the college students who participated in the parade. They said that the General got...

Rabbi Yossie Raichik, who as director of Chabad’s Children of Chernobyl project oversaw the rescue of thousands of children from the dangers of radioactive fallout, succumbed Sunday to complications from a lung infection. He was 55. Raichik’s passing came as a shock to the tens of thousands of friends and admirers worldwide who took to reciting Psalms in the past week as the rabbi awaited a lung transplant at Tel Aviv’s Ichilov Hospital. The son of Rabbi Shmuel Dovid and Leah Raichik – who were sent to Los Angeles as emissaries of the Sixth Lubavitcher Rebbe, Rabbi Yosef Yitzchak Schneersohn,...

There was a FReeper named "Jaysun" back in 2007 and early in 2008, who announced in February of this year that he had contracted some kind of cancer, and that the prognosis was NOT good. He received an outpouring of sympathy in that thread, from me also, who had "talked" to him in personal "FR mail" over some subject of other. His FR profile showed him posed with his new infant daughter. So it was ever so much more touching and hard to bear to hear and read him talking about not being long for this world. He made a...

Sen. Edward Kennedy had two seizures over the weekend, not one as originally reported, his father-in-law told WBZ Monday. Kennedy was taken first to Cape Cod Hospital Saturday morning after having a seizure and was later transferred to Massachusetts General Hospital for further examination. During the helicopter ride to Mass. General, Edmund Reggie said Kennedy had a second seizure. "He had a seizure in the helicopter. You think that would be bad, but it's good the doctors said... By flailing his arms and moving his arms and legs and head, it showed he was not a stroke victim." Kennedy's spokeswoman...

Prayers couldn't save man from himself Tuesday, April 1, 2008 9:55 PM By Randy Ludlow THE COLUMBUS DISPATCH Ultimately, the prayers of others could not save Marc Kidby from himself. On Feb. 8, Ohio University's Baker Center was evacuated as he threatened to jump from a fifth-floor ledge inside the student union. A group of students prayed for his safety, writing inspirational notes that a campus police lieutenant read to him. Their prayers were answered. After four hours, Kidby left the ledge. On Feb. 18, he prepared to jump from the sixth floor of the Athens city parking garage. Police...

Researchers from the UN University found out which business can bring a lot of profit to an investor. It is a construction business, although it does not go about the construction of large shopping malls or grocery stores. It goes about the construction of toilets. Every dollar invested in this business can bring the staggering 900-percent profit. For example, if an entrepreneur builds a 100-dollar bathroom, he or she may have the return of $900 in a certain period of time. Experts studied statistics on the issue and conducted their own research before they came to such a surprising conclusion....

Sick Passengers Lead To Emergency Landing At FLL FORT LAUDERDALE (CBS4) ― A flight from the Dominican Republic to Canada made an emergency landing at the Fort Lauderdale-Hollywood International Airport after eight passengers complained of being sick. Airport spokesman Greg Meyer says Air Transat flight 477 was quarantined on the runway after it landed late Tuesday until officials from the Centers for Disease Control determined the sick passengers weren't suffering from any airborne illness.

In the US, most deaths are attributable to chronic afflictions, such as heart disease and cancer. Typically the medical community has attributed these diseases to accumulated damage, such as plaque formation in arteries or mutations in genes controlling cellular replication. This view is changing. Scientists are now beginning to recognize that many of these chronic illnesses are due to microbial infections. A recent report in the American Journal of Psychiatry suggests that schizophrenia, a mental illness leading to errors in perception, is associated with the pathogen, Toxoplasma gondii. "Our findings reveal the strongest association we've seen yet between infection with...

U.N. Keeps Quiet on Suspect Boxes From North Korea By BENNY AVNI Staff Reporter of the Sun February 1, 2008 UNITED NATIONS — U.N. officials failed to inform New York or federal authorities about an illness suffered by two employees who had handled boxes shipped here from North Korea — boxes that might have been contaminated — U.N. sources said. The U.N. contractors suffered headaches and nausea and felt sick enough to report the incident and seek treatment. The U.N. security authorities were concerned enough to deploy their own hazardous-material team but failed to seal the site where the incident...

Texas Children's inoculating parents in an effort to halt spread of illness With whooping cough at its highest levels since the 1950s, Texas Children's Hospital has launched a program to protect babies from the life-threatening infection by immunizing family members. Hospital officials announced Thursday they have begun administering the "cocoon strategy" — booster shots for parents who often unknowingly spread the infection — at Houston's Ben Taub General Hospital. "With this program, we can prevent whooping cough in our most vulnerable population — infants less than 6 months," said Dr. Carol Baker, executive director of Texas Children's Center for Vaccine...

As has been reported elsewhere today, Fred Thompson's mother is gravely ill right now. Our prayers ought to be with Sen. Thompson, his mother, his wife, and their family. This must be a very difficult time for them. All of this political stuff is of only secondary importance right now. That said, here is what I would do, politically, if I were Thompson: I would just lay low. Just wait. See what happens in Louisiana's caucuses tomorrow. See what happens in Florida next week. See who drops out of the race at some point. And then consider reviving my campaign,...

Before President Bush left Washington for the Mideast, he signed into law the first major federal gun control measure in more than 13 years. If the new law had been in effect last April, it might have prevented the Virginia Tech shooter, Seung-Hui Cho, from buying a weapon at a gun store.

Roundworms may infect close to a quarter of inner city black children, tapeworms are the leading cause of seizures among U.S. Hispanics and other parasitic diseases associated with poor countries are also affecting Americans, a U.S. expert said on Tuesday. Recent studies show many of the poorest Americans living in the United States carry some of the same parasitic infections that affect the poor in Africa, Asia, and Latin America, said Dr. Peter Hotez, a tropical disease expert at George Washington University and editor-in-chief of the Public Library of Science journal PLoS Neglected Tropical Diseases. Writing in the journal, Hotez...

McLean, VA - Senator Fred Thompson issued the following statement regarding today's scientific breakthrough in adult cell research: "There is exciting news for patients today. In yet another breakthrough for adult cell research, scientists have made normal human skin cells take on the relevant properties of embryonic stem cells. That is in addition to 73 breakthroughs for adult and cord blood research to date. There are still no embryonic stem cell breakthroughs. "For all who are concerned for patients and their families, the effective, ethical, and compassionate answer is to put our money where the breakthroughs are happening -- in...

I’ve said it all along: The Democrats’ massive S-CHIP expansion is a Trojan Horse for Hillarycare. Now, we get it straight from the horse’s mouth. A Hill source sends an audio clip of former Iowa Dem. Governor Tom Vilsack at Drake University on Nov. 16 describing how S-CHIP will help achieve those universal entitlement ends: Click here for audio. Transcript: “I think there is going to be a commitment to universal coverage. I don’t think it’s necessarily going to be a sector by sector process. I think you either need to go in whole hog or not. We tried to...

Burlington, Ia. — Republican Fred Thompson told potential supporters on Sunday that he’s running for president as a champion of ideals held by all Americans: a strong national defense, adherence to the rule of law and a market economy. “And immigration laws that actually work,” Thompson said at the outset. “That’s not just a Republican idea, I don’t think.” Speaking at Big Muddy’s restaurant in Burlington, the former Tennessee senator said he would be able to secure the votes of independents in a general election. Thompson criticized what he called Democrats’ insistence on infusing government into everything. “Would you trust...

BIRMINGHAM, Ala. - For lovers of boiled peanuts, there's some good news from the health front. A new study by a group of Huntsville researchers found that boiled peanuts bring out up to four times more chemicals that help protect against disease than raw, dry or oil-roasted nuts. Lloyd Walker, chair of Alabama A&M University's Department of Food and Animal Sciences who co-authored the study, said these phytochemicals have antioxidant qualities that protect cells against the risk of degenerative diseases, including cancers, diabetes and heart disease. "Boiling is a better method of preparing peanuts in order to preserve these phytochemicals,"...

Obesity is more dangerous than smoking and will dramatically shorten the lives of millions, a landmark study has found. While smoking reduces life by an average of ten years, the research says being seriously overweight can cut life expectancy by as much as 13 years. The Foresight report, written by 250 leading scientists, says Britain's obesity crisis is so severe that it would take at least 30 years to reverse. If current trends continue, by 2050 about 60 per cent of men, 50 per cent of women and 25 per cent of children in the UK will be clinically obese...

Whatever you made of the Chancellor’s various sleights of hand on Tuesday, lurking beneath his Budget plans was one inescapable fact. The hungry maw of the NHS is swallowing more and more resources, at the expense of virtually everything else. The defence budget is at its lowest since 1930, despite our dwindling troops being dotted across three continents. Prison overcrowding is at such record levels that Jack Straw will have to release even more inmates early in a few weeks’ time. But the health service marches relentlessly on, having hoovered up two thirds of the increase in public spending in...

As America gets fatter, policymakers are seeking creative approaches to legislating health. They may have entered the school cafeteria -- and now they're eyeing your neighborhood. Amid worries of an obesity epidemic and its related illnesses, including high blood pressure, diabetes and heart disease, Los Angeles officials, among others around the country, are proposing to limit new fast-food restaurants -- a tactic that could be called health zoning. The City Council will be asked this fall to consider an up to two-year moratorium on new fast-food restaurants in South L.A., a part of the city where fast food is at...

Even though the year is far from over and is likely to have its fair share of hypocrisy, Mrs. Clinton’s comment on the need to compromise to achieve political and social progress has to outclass any other current or future entrant for the Hypocrite of the Year award. This woman, who refused to change a comma or a word of her thousand-page-plus healthcare reform bill and, as a result of her intractable stubbornness, sent the bill down to defeat along with the Democratic Congress and almost her husband’s presidency, is daring to show herself now as the apostle of compromise....

Patients who refuse to change their unhealthy lifestyles should not be treated by the NHS, the Conservatives said today. In a bid to ease spiralling levels of obesity and other health concerns, a Tory panel said certain treatments should be denied to patients who refuse to co-operate with health professionals and live healthier lifestyles. And those who do manage to improve their general health by losing weight and quitting smoking, for example, would receive "Health Miles" cards. Points earned could then be used to pay for health-related products such as gym membership and fresh vegetables. The aim is a shift...

Cardiac patients will soon be able to 'grow their own' heart valves and have them transplanted within weeks of seeing a doctor. The groundbreaking treatment, developed by British surgeons, will create heart tissue from stem cells from the patient's body. The technique offers hope to millions who suffer heart disease. Scientists said the valves would not be rejected after a transplant because the tissue will have come from the patient and be genetically identical. In April, a team led by heart surgeon Sir Magdi Yacoub of Harefield Hospital, in West London, revealed that they had used bone marrow stem cells...

Mystery DR Congo fever kills 60 More than 60 people have died because of a fever epidemic in the centre of the Democratic Republic of the Congo, health officials say. Many of the victims are people who have been in contact with the deceased, including medical staff, and who lack equipment to deal with the illness. The latest victim was a nurse at a local hospital. She died on Thursday after taking care of infected patients. Health officials say the medical staff had no masks and this put them at risk. Speaking from Kananga, the capital of the West Kasai...

AN EPIDEMIC of obesity could have serious consequences for America's economy and its ability to defend itself, according to a leading politician. Self-confessed "recovering foodaholic" Mike Huckabee, a Republican Party presidential candidate, told a group of governors from the American South that the increasing numbers of people who were either over-weight or obese meant more and more people were having to take time off work for health reasons. And Mr Huckabee, who lost 110lb - nearly 8st - several years ago when he was governor of Arkansas, said he was concerned by reports that nearly two-thirds of American military personnel...

Smokers have already been banned from New York bars and restaurants, and soon they could be prohibited from lighting up in cars carrying minors, an idea giving added fuel to critics who say the city has become a nanny state. A City Council member of Queens who is chairman of the council's Environmental Protection Committee, James Gennaro, said he is planning to introduce the smoking bill next week. "I am just seeking every opportunity I can to denormalize smoking and to try to put it out of the reach of kids," Mr. Gennaro said. "I've lost family members to lung...

A grandfather died after a blister caused by tight new shoes led to blood poisoning and massive organ failure. Peter Catterall, 60, was given dressings by a district nurse and told the sore on his toe should heal by itself. But just over a week later, the retired electrician suffered two heart attacks. [snip] But according to his youngest daughter, Sara, 21, the sore continued to weep, and when she went to see him a week later on July 1 he confessed: "This toe is killing me." Miss Catterall said yesterday: "I am no nurse, but I immediately knew he...

Left-handers more at risk of mental illness By Laura Clout Last Updated: 1:49am BST 31/07/2007 Left-handed people may have an increased risk of developing schizophrenia, scientists have found. An international group of scientists, led by a team at Oxford University, have identified a gene that seems to increase the chance of being left-handed. The researchers said that the same gene - called LRRTM1 - may slightly increase the risk of developing the brain disorder. Schizophrenia is a highly complex condition that results in impaired perception and thought, it affects around one in every 100 people. Although little is known about...

As the latest installment in Michael Moore's attempt to give rich white liberals a reason to sneer at poor white centrists, the big and cranky one has decided to take on the United States system of health care. This would be all well and good had Moore given the general public the slightest inkling of a reason to believe him in his previous films. You know, interviews where the time changes back and forth on the wall clock, statements by military personnel spliced out of context, outright false claims - all the stuff that makes for award-winning indictments of the...

/begin my excerpt Kim Jong-il, a Total Package of Diseases [2007-07-23] Dr. K, a chief specialist at PLA Hospital in Shenyang, China, is the only Chinese national and ethnic Korean who was able to visit Pyongyang during the period when Kim's heart operation is said to have been performed. His grand uncle was one of the three medical doctors who were with Kim Il-sung at (Red Army's) 88th Brigade in Vyaskoye, Khabarovsk, fighting against Japanese. Due to this connection, he is said to have done some of medical treatments for "Kim Il-sung's pseudo-Dynasty." After his Pyongyang visit, he told...

In the interest of your fetish with the poorly named "Fairness Doctrine," I have decided to spend a little "equal time" giving the party of FDR some friendly advice. Free of charge. First and foremost, if you want to get into more power (after all, that’s the goal of every politician, right?), try standing for something. For the last thirty years, I have only heard of what you are opposed to. Opposing your opponent is no longer enough to convince voters what you plan to do with the power bestowed upon you by the "consent of the governed." You have...

The Humane Society of the U.S. has, for years, been trying to frighten people away from consuming meat, milk and eggs -- but its recent testimony before a congressional committee reached a new low when the HSUS president, Wayne Pacelle, made the unsupported claim that pigs could be harboring the infamous and deadly British ‘mad cow” disease. Swine veterinarians quickly pointed out that “mad cow,” or bovine spongiform encephalopathy, has never occurred naturally in swine. At the height of the British “mad cow” epidemic, both swine and cattle were exposed to the tissues from thousands of infected cattle and the...

HAVANA - Michael Moore's new documentary film "SiCKO" has given Cuba's free health system its best publicity since Fidel Castro's 1959 revolution, a Cuban doctor who hosted the filmmaker's visit said on Monday. Moore took eight Americans sickened after volunteering for the September 11, 2001, rescue efforts for free treatment in Cuba in March in order to extol the Communist state's universal care in his film, which attacks the U.S. health system for being driven by profits and leaving millions uninsured. "SiCKO" has stirred heated debate in the United States since opening in June due to its scathing indictment of...