Focus on Alternative and Complementary TherapiesVolume 16, Issue 1 p. 28-30 How solid is the evidence-base of mainstream medicine? One point of view Damien Downing, Damien Downing New Medicine Group, The London Medical Centre, UKSearch for more papers by this author Damien Downing, Damien Downing New Medicine Group, The London Medical Centre, UKSearch for more papers by this author First published: 15 February 2011 https://doi.org/10.1111/j.2042-7166.2010.01061.xRead the full textAboutPDF ToolsRequest permissionExport citationAdd to favoritesTrack citation ShareShare Give accessShare full text accessShare full-text accessPlease review our Terms and Conditions of Use and check box below to share full-text version of article.I have read and accept the Wiley Online Library Terms and Conditions of UseShareable LinkUse the link below to share a full-text version of this article with your friends and colleagues. Learn more.Copy URL Share a linkShare onFacebookTwitterLinkedInRedditWechat Volume16, Issue1March 2011Pages 28-30 RelatedInformation
(2004). The British Society for Ecological Medicine. Journal of Nutritional & Environmental Medicine: Vol. 14, No. 4, pp. 289-289.
(2004). Dr K. K. Eaton, 1936–2002. Journal of Nutritional & Environmental Medicine: Vol. 14, No. 2, pp. 75-78.
It is a fact of life in the current scienti c world that publicity, hype, and spin are more important in spreading information—and disinformation—about nutritional medicine than peer-reviewed scienti c studies. The recent publicity over vitamin C is an obvious instance of this; a paper from the University of Pennsylvania Center for Cancer Pharmacology was the subject of a press release that presented it as new data that may have shown a damaging effect of vitamin C, even though any number of other studies have shown the opposite. When the principal author, Ian A. Blair, was nally contacted by telephone (the press release was issued while he was out of the USA on holiday), he apparently said ‘Absolutely for God’s sake don’t say vitamin C causes cancer’. This did not stop the media from reporting exactly that, with the result that many patients world-wide have been stopping or reducing their vitamin C intake, with possible detrimental effects on health. As has been pointed out repeatedly, if the study had shown a positive effect from vitamin C, or any other nutrient, experience tells us that it would not have been ‘hyped up’ in this manner. Which is also exactly what did not happen with a crucial review article on vitamin D in the American Journal of Clinical Nutrition in 1999 [1]. This paper, by Dr Reinhold Vieth in Toronto, laid out strong arguments that we are all de cient in vitamin D, because we have grossly misjudged the necessary intake for adults and the amount needed to cause toxicity. Since then Dr Veith has continued to accumulate evidence of this, his central thesis, and for the further rami cations of it. In this issue he brings the argument up to date [2] and discusses the implications, not just for bone health, but for a number of other diseases as well. Ironically, this comes at a time when the US Environmental Protection Agency is advising that ultraviolet light, and therefore sunlight, is so dangerous that we should ‘protect ourselves against ultraviolet light whenever we can see our shadow’. Following this advice is likely to lead to an increase in vitamin D de ciency diseases, and is effectively discriminatory against the many individuals with darker skin types who now live in higher latitudes. As a physician who has seen two cases of rickets this year, I nd this of great concern. Whether sunlight is the direct and principal cause of skin cancers and other skin damage is a separate debate, which we cannot cover here, but the evidence is mounting that following current guidelines on sun protection will have detrimental effects on other areas of health. There are several important, only recently understood, and not yet widely appreciated, points to be made about vitamin D:
(2000). Hypothyroidism: Treating the Patient not the Laboratory. Journal of Nutritional & Environmental Medicine: Vol. 10, No. 2, pp. 101-103.
Nutritional and environmental medicine—the study of the internal and external human milieus—takes on steadily greater importance as the detritus of our civilization accumulates, and our sins return to haunt us. Previously, we have discussed the concept of the nutrion-toxicity interface; this is emerging as the major medical battlefield of our times. Taken together, the editorials and papers that have appeared—many of them in this journal—on aspects of this topic amount to a developing body of work that maps out the history and pathology of this most genuine of twentieth century diseases.
There have been several reports in recent years on the treatment and management of allergy issued by the Royal College of Physicians (RCP) and the British Society for Allergy and Environmental Medicine with the British Society for Nutritional Medicine (BSAEM/BSNM). The nature and aims of the latest reports, the RCP's Good Allergy Practice and the BSAEM/BSNM's Effective Allergy Practice, are compared and contrasted. It is concluded that in denying that controversy exists in the field, the RCP's most recent report reveals itself as partisan and thus fails to meet the basic standards of a scientific document.
The Central Asian states of Turkmenistan, Uzbekistan and Kazakhstan, formerly members of the Soviet Union, are all near to, or form a coast of, the Aral Sea. Intensive over-usage of water plus intensive pesticide and defoliant usage has created an ecological disaster of immense proportions in the area. Twenty-five years ago this was the fourth largest inland sea in the world. Its volume has now decreased by 75%, and its salinity has tripled. But the effects on the sea itself pale in comparison with the ecological and human impact on the whole of Central Asia. The documented health consequences include high rates of cancer, stillbirth and genetic abnormalities, impaired immune function, chronic gastritis and cardiovascular disease.
