California Assembly Bill 354 became law in September of 2010. The new law simply added a whooping cough booster shot to the list of vaccinations recommended for school entry. In spite of strongly worded school announcements and public health advisories giving the impression that this particular shot is absolutely mandatory, as of this writing, the right of parents to refuse this or any other vaccine in California has been preserved.

According to the language in the new law, the California legislature will continue to “provide exemptions from immunization for medical reasons or because of personal beliefs.” But why would a parent want to exempt their child in the first place?

First, some background. The new bill was enacted following a declared epidemic of whooping cough (pertussis) in the state of California in 2010. The most recent epidemic of whooping cough was declared in 2005. The immediate course of action promoted by state and federal public health authorities was more booster shots against pertussis. Many public health authorities incorrectly blamed the epidemic on parents who opt out of vaccinating their kids, apparently forgetting that the percentage of children receiving the vaccine has steadily increased for decades.

“Pertussis, an acute, infectious cough illness, remains endemic in the United States despite routine childhood pertussis vaccination for more than half a century and high coverage levels in children for more than a decade,” the Centers for Disease Control (CDC) reported ten years ago. The CDC now reports that the number of babies under six months old who contract pertussis has continued to dramatically increase in the United States in the intervening years.

“In California, pertussis rates are about the same in counties with high childhood vaccination rates and low ones. And the C.D.C. reports that pertussis immunization rates have been stable or increasing since 1992,” according to the New York Times in August 2010.

If more babies, kids, and adults than ever before are getting vaccinated against whooping cough, why are we seeing epidemics every few years? And why do fully vaccinated children and adults keep getting the whooping cough?

One explanation given is that vaccine effectiveness wanes over time. This is the rationale for additional shots and boosters periodically being added to the list of recommended vaccines, as well as recommendations to vaccinate and revaccinate older and older populations.

Another explanation is that we are seeing outbreaks of a different pertussis bacteria called parapertussis, with symptoms that are nearly identical. Parapertussis is reportedly on the rise and is often mistaken for whooping cough, but no one knows to what extent. Lab tests are expensive, and most whooping cough cases are not laboratory confirmed.

Even settling on a common definition of pertussis infection has been problematic for public health authorities. An expert committee with the World Health Organization proposed a definition that “required 21 days of paroxysmal cough plus laboratory confirmation of pertussis in the subject or household contact,” according to the journal Pediatrics in December 1999. “There are 2 problems with this definition,” wrote the authors. “The first is that a substantial number of B pertussis infections in unvaccinated children are mild and would not meet the case definition. The second is that all pertussis vaccines tend to modify duration and severity of disease rather than completely preventing illness.”

So, a substantial number of pertussis infections in unvaccinated children are mild? What else do we know about whooping cough infections in unvaccinated children? A study of a large number of unvaccinated children with laboratory-confirmed pertussis was published in Pediatrics in December 1997. “The age distribution of our patients with a peak in preschool children is typical for a primarily unvaccinated population. In contrast, widespread immunization results in a relative increase of cases in infants, adolescents, and adults,” wrote the authors.

Widespread use of the pertussis vaccination is reportedly changing the natural age at which whooping cough infections occur in our society. This coincides with CDC reports that adults increasingly suffer whooping cough infections, even as babies today are being infected at a younger age, an age during which they are most vulnerable.

Contrary to most media accounts and public health announcements, the pertussis vaccine is incapable of preventing the spread of whooping cough. The CDC admits this fact on its website, “The whole-cell vaccine for pertussis is protective only against clinical disease, not against infection. Therefore, even young, recently vaccinated children may serve as reservoirs and potential transmitters of infection.”

The newer, acellular pertussis vaccines are even less effective than the older whole-cell vaccine referred to above, which had to be replaced because a substantial number of children were experiencing serious adverse neurological reactions to it.

Does giving the shot to babies prevent the spread of pertussis infection in that population? Apparently the answer is no. “In fact, childhood disease predates the age at which children extensively socialize with each other and [pertussis infection] appears to commonly have as its source an adult, non or mildly symptomatic carrier,” according to the Journal of Clinical Investigation in December 2005.

How about adverse reactions to the newer acellular pertussis vaccines? The CDC tells us that one in 14,000 children receiving the acellular pertussis vaccine will suffer a seizure, one in every 1,000 will have nonstop crying for three hours or more, and one child in 16,000 will spike a fever of more than 105 degrees. Let’s see, about 4 million babies are born each year, and each baby is recommended to receive pertussis injections at 2 months, 4 months, and 6 months of age—that’s three pertussis shots in the first six months of life. Using the CDC’s numbers, the pertussis shot is expected to cause 857 babies per year to have a seizure, about 12,000 to cry nonstop for three hours or more, and 750 to develop a high fever greater than 105 degrees.

How about giving the shot to the rest of the population, does that protect babies? “It is unknown whether immunizing adolescents and adults against pertussis will reduce the risk of transmission to infants,” according to the makers of Adacel, a pertussis booster vaccine.

Let’s review what we know about whooping cough and the vaccine. Death from a bout of whooping cough is rare, and a well-nourished child typically comes through whooping cough just fine and ends up with lifetime immunity. Infants are the population most at risk of death from pertussis infection, and the infants that died in California in 2010 were too young to receive the vaccine. The pertussis vaccine does not prevent infection, but only modifies the symptoms. The vaccine is not capable of preventing transmission of pertussis infection to others, and previously vaccinated adults and adolescents are the primary source of the spread of pertussis. Many people who are fully vaccinated get full-blown cases of whooping cough. Outbreaks are on the rise even as vaccination coverage has climbed and remained high. Finally, widespread vaccination against pertussis has resulted in infants contracting whooping cough at a younger age, and increased the ages at which adolescents and adults are becoming infected. To call whooping cough a “vaccine-preventable disease” is grossly inaccurate, based on sixty years of real-world outcomes.

“The definition of insanity is doing the same thing over and over again and expecting different results,” said Albert Einstein. Far be it for me to suggest that our public health leaders are insane on the whooping cough issue. I’m just saying that doing more of the same thing we’ve been doing for more than sixty years and expecting the results to suddenly match the wishful thinking of our health leaders is ludicrous and entirely disconnected from evidence-based public health policy.

In California we parents retain the right to refuse vaccines for our children, and parents are to be commended for educating before vaccinating. Interestingly, there seems to be an inverse relationship between parents’ education level and vaccination, according to the American Journal of Public Health in February 2007. In other words, parents with the highest levels of education consent to the fewest vaccines for their children.

The American Medical Association and the American Academy of Pediatrics are working hard to force a one-size-fits-all vaccine schedule on all children in the United States. Both organizations believe that parents should not have the right to refuse any vaccine whatsoever, and they are working actively in states across the country to try and take away our medical freedom to do so.

I join Barbara Loe Fisher of the National Vaccine Information Center in saying “Show us the science and give us a choice. No forced vaccination. Not in America.”

Will it ever be safe to eat salad greens again? From where I stood in the produce section of the supermarket I could see the headlines screaming from the news rack by the checkout counter. CONTAMINATED PRODUCE. PEOPLE SICK. I glanced suspiciously at the onions on my left. Were they tainted? I leaned over and cautiously sniffed the spinach. Had rogue pigs gotten loose and run rampant through the patch, spreading E. coli in every direction just moments before the greens were picked, packed and shipped?

The poor U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA) has certainly been overwhelmed with problems of food and drug safety lately. Perhaps we are asking too much of those erstwhile commissioners to keep track of both our food and our drugs. After all, how can we expect them to effectively police the vegetable farms of America when they are already up to their ears writing black-box warning labels for already approved drugs that are unaccountably killing and disabling people? There just isn’t enough time at the end of the day to think about food beyond grabbing a quick hormone-tainted, antibiotic-laden hamburger with GMO fries and a diet soda on the way home to get a few hours of sleep.

One problem is that medical schools do not really equip doctors to understand the profound importance of food and nutrition. That is because funding for medical schools comes mainly from the pharmaceutical companies. These powerful economic behemoths prefer that no one finds out too much about adequate diets, healthy lifestyles and living with the body in balance and structural alignment because it could ruin them financially.

Medical practitioners do, however, emerge from medical school enthusiastically poised to scribble prescriptions for dangerous drugs all day long. That is why we need to free up more time for the FDA research doctors to improvise fast-track approval for the newest and scariest drugs and bizarre vaccines.

Each new drug requires much creativity and imagination to invent a new disease to go with it, not to mention planning the jillion-dollar marketing schemes to make sure people beg their doctor to prescribe that new pharmaceutical as soon as it comes down the pike. The average person has no idea how much time all of this takes, what with flying back and forth to drug company conferences at five-star hotels in exotic locations around the globe, each one with mandatory rounds of golf and lavish four-course banquet dinners followed  by much drinking and flirting with voluptuous, scantily clad cocktail waitresses.

Back in the day when the only drug question on the table was whether aspirin should be taken on an empty stomach or with meals, it probably made sense that the responsibilities of keeping watch over food and drugs should be combined, but things are quite different today.

Many people, even many working inside the FDA, mistakenly believe that the essence of a food or nutrient is no different than the essence of a drug. In an effort to provide food for thought and help FDA researchers digest the difference between the two, I hereby provide the following definition of food as articulated by the online American Heritage Dictionary: “Material, usually of plant or animal origin, that contains or consists of essential body nutrients, such as carbohydrates, fats, proteins, vitamins, or minerals, and is ingested and assimilated by an organism to produce energy, stimulate growth, and maintain life.”

From the same dictionary we learn the definition of a drug: “A substance used in the diagnosis, treatment, or prevention of a disease or as a component of a medication. A chemical substance, such as a narcotic or hallucinogen, that affects the central nervous system, causing changes in behavior and often addiction.”

Obviously, there are stark and fundamental differences between food and drugs. In recognition of the fact that eating nutritious foods in proper proportions can often eliminate the need for any drugs whatsoever, a conflict of interest clearly exists within the hallowed halls of the FDA. I believe it is high time to effectively split up the FDA into two separate agencies.

The drug part of the agency we will call the Drug and Disease Administration, or the DDA. Medical doctors can head up this one because they have been formally trained to see every aspect of the human experience as a medical condition requiring prescription drugs for treatment, a second drug to treat the side effects of the first one, and so on and on.

The food agency will be called the Food and Natural Healing Administration, or the FNHA. Wellness doctors and nutrition experts can run this one because of their propensity for viewing human health challenges as the result of nutritional, emotional, structural and lifestyle imbalances. By dividing up the FDA house in this way, everyone will be working on projects they like and know best, and everyone will be happy.

Don’t get me wrong though, there will still be ample opportunity for collaboration between the two distinct, new agencies. For example, it makes no clinical sense to stick with the outmoded practice of only comparing drug effects to placebo effects. (As a side note, remember back in the good old days when they were using actual placebos in the drug trials, instead of doctored up pills that produce side effects similar to the unpleasantness caused by the actual drugs being tested? But I digress.)

The time has come for us to move well beyond simple drug/placebo testing. If it is health we are looking for, let us perform high quality scientific research that compares health outcomes among a) drugs, b) placebos, and c) restoring health on the cellular level using nutrition, exercise and healing energy restoration. With two separate agencies steadfastly representing the best ideas in their respective fields, it will finally be possible to level the playing field and understand which protocols get the best results.

When the research starts pouring in and the data tallied, many folks will be amazed at the results that can be achieved by the foodies and natural healers. Wild claims that hundreds of billions of dollars can be saved each year, not to mention saving hundreds of thousands of lives as well, can finally be scrutinized in a strictly scientific fashion and just may be proven correct.

If that is the case, drug companies will no doubt find they need to hire more spin doctors to massage, manipulate and mangle the data before they can profitably market their drugs. Not to worry, the pharmaceutical industry has proven enormously resilient when forced to spin catastrophic news, superseded only by its skill at spreading fear in the public mind about conditions, diseases and disorders, many of which are as rare as winning lottery tickets.

Yes, things will definitely be different once we have a pro-food agency that doesn’t push drugs. Before long, producers of high quality organic fruits, vegetables, nutrition supplements and herbs may find they have ample scientific evidence to go head to head in the marketplace against anti-cancer drug therapies that don’t do any good anyway but cost as much as buying a new house. No longer will there be armed FDA storm troopers raiding producers of natural products and shutting them down because they had the audacity to cite published scientific literature indicating measurable health benefits available to users of their products.

We might even discover that children whose parents just say no to more than 50 vaccinations before they even show up for their first day in school are actually healthier than those who get stuck as if they were human pincushions. At any rate, for the first time in history (I am not making this up) the health of vaccinated children will finally be compared to that of unvaccinated children. Armed with this information, people will finally have a chance to analyze scientifically verifiable results for themselves, allowing them to make truly informed choices about the health of their own children.

I know what you are thinking, who in the heck has the money to pay for another federal agency in Washington, D.C.? No problem. The FDA’s funding pretty much all flows from the deep pockets of Big Pharma already. No need to mess with that revenue stream. In fact, once we remove food from the crowded plate of the new Drug and Disease Administration, drugs will begin flying out of the drug pipelines faster than you can say, “Stock split on Wall Street!”

Ah, but what about funding for the new Food and Natural Healing Administration? The solution to that is simple also, but requires a bit of political will. We need to tap into the very source of sickness, the undisputed king of chronic illness in North America: television advertising. Look at it this way, the public owns the public airwaves and the broadband spectrum. We have a legitimate right to charge higher rent for the privilege of brainwashing us.

I realize that the drug companies are the ones with the largest advertising outlays, so that industry will be the one most affected by this modest new tax. I’m not too worried about it though, if you take just a moment to look at Big Pharma’s wild and unimaginable profit margins you will notice they can easily afford it. Besides, you may recall that some of the most profitable blockbuster drugs in history were discovered and developed at American universities using taxpayer money. Once the real work was done, the patents were simply handed over to drug makers to go and make another killing. Here’s a chance for the boys from down on the pharma to show some gratitude and pay back a few billions in kind.

But time is of the essence. For the public’s protection we need to separate food and nutrition issues from the pharmaceutical cartel’s stranglehold as soon as possible. For starters, the farmers of this country urgently need a government agency to help them figure out how to wash the produce before it goes on the trucks. Not to mention the urgent need to get the drug executives out of the debate on vitamin safety before natural foods and vitamins become criminalized and I get arrested for felony possession of a slab of raw milk cheddar cheese on my sandwich and a bottle of vitamin C crystals in my briefcase.

A whooping cough epidemic was declared in California on June 24, 2010. Every three to five years whooping cough, or pertussis, cases spike upward. The most recent epidemic of whooping cough in California was declared in 2005.

Just as regularly as whooping cough outbreaks come around, reports appear in the media blaming the outbreak on parents who choose to not vaccinate their children. What is whooping cough? Are the unvaccinated causing the epidemic? What do public health authorities recommend we do to protect our babies? What options do we have?

Whooping cough is a respiratory disease caused by toxins of the Bordetella pertussis bacteria. A strong immune response is typical, especially in the young, with production of large amounts of thick, sticky mucus that can block the breathing passageways of children and babies, making it difficult to breathe. The hallmark wrenching cough ends with the characteristic whooping sound as the child struggles to breathe, and this is often followed by vomiting.

Babies typically show the classic whooping cough symptoms, while in older children and adults the symptoms are not always so clear. “Pertussis affects an estimated 600,000 adults every year, aged 20 to 64 years, and can result in weeks of coughing, cracked ribs from severe coughing spells, pneumonia, and other complications,” states the Centers for Disease Control (CDC) on its website.[i] More commonly, the symptoms resemble a bad cold.

Death from pertussis is rare today. Virtually all pertussis-related deaths occur in young people, with infants less than six months old accounting for 90 percent of deaths, according to CDC statistics. There were ten infant deaths in California attributed to whooping cough during this outbreak, all the babies were less than three months old.

Surprisingly, and contrary to most media accounts, the pertussis vaccine is incapable of preventing the spread of whooping cough. The CDC admits this often omitted fact on its website, “The whole-cell vaccine for pertussis is protective only against clinical disease, not against infection. Therefore, even young, recently vaccinated children may serve as reservoirs and potential transmitters of infection.”[ii]

(The article refers to the old DPT whole-cell pertussis vaccine, which actually “worked” better than the newer acellular DTaP vaccines. The DPT vaccine had to be replaced because it was associated with “high fever, collapse/shock, convulsions, brain inflammation and permanent brain damage,” in many children, according to Barbara Loe Fisher of the National Vaccine Information Center.)[iii]

“It is unknown whether immunizing adolescents and adults against pertussis will reduce the risk of transmission to infants,” says the disclaimer in tiny print on advertisements for Adacel, one of the DTaP booster shots.[iv]

“In fact, childhood disease predates the age at which children extensively socialize with each other and [pertussis infection] appears to commonly have as its source an adult, non or mildly symptomatic carrier,” according to the December, 2005 Journal of Clinical Investigation.[v]

“The incidence and prevalence of pertussis in adults have increased in recent years. It has been shown that previously immunized adults and adolescents are the main sources of transmission of Bordetella pertussis,” said the Chest Journal in its May, 1999 issue.[vi]

At least one reporter got it right in the current outbreak. Tera Parker-Hope had this to say in her August 17, 2010 New York Times article entitled, Vaccination Is Steady, but Pertussis Is Surging. “The rise in pertussis doesn’t seem to be related to parents’ refusing to have their children vaccinated for fear of potential side effects. In California, pertussis rates are about the same in counties with high childhood vaccination rates and low ones. And the C.D.C. reports that pertussis immunization rates have been stable or increasing since 1992.”[vii]

The CDC tells us that reported cases of whooping cough have been on the rise since the early 1980s, despite ever increasing vaccination coverage. The number of babies less than six months old contracting pertussis continues increasing dramatically, even as the percentage of babies receiving the three-shot series at two, four and six months old has increased.

“Pertussis, an acute, infectious cough illness, remains endemic in the United States despite routine childhood pertussis vaccination for more than half a century and high coverage levels in children for more than a decade.”[viii] This statement from the CDC was made ten years ago, so we are now talking about two decades of high rates of vaccination. Vaccine compliance for pertussis remains very high today, with 84 percent of children having completed the series of four shots by age three.[ix]

Whooping cough infections routinely are seen in people who have received some or all of the pertussis vaccines and boosters. Why? One explanation given is waning vaccine effectiveness over time, which is why additional shots and booster shots keep being added to the list, as well as recommendations to vaccinate and revaccinate older populations.

Another explanation not widely discussed in the popular press is the possibility we are experiencing an outbreak of a different pertussis bacteria infection altogether, with nearly identical symptoms, called parapertussis. No vaccine has ever been created using the parapertussis bacteria. Parapertussis is reportedly on the rise and is often mistaken for whooping cough, but no one knows to what extent. Lab tests are expensive, and most whooping cough cases are not laboratory confirmed.

The science of how whooping cough is transmitted is anything but vague; vaccinated or not, people with an infection can infect others by direct contact. Despite our clear scientific understanding of this fact, health authorities continue pitching the blame game with accusations that the unvaccinated are causing recurring pertussis outbreaks. Might it benefit everyone more if health authorities instead tried to expose the myth that vaccination alone can protect babies under three months of age?

In the midst of an officially declared whooping cough epidemic, one might expect a massive public outreach program featuring instructions on how to protect babies from pertussis infection for real. The key is to avoid close contact between the baby and anyone suffering a pertussis infection. Close contact means touching and holding, as opposed to just being in the same room. Even so, preventing close contact is not easy, since the symptoms of pertussis infection for adolescents and adults may be no different than a lingering cold with a bad cough.

And just what does whooping cough look like in the unvaccinated? The journal Pediatrics in December, 1997 published a study of a large number of unvaccinated children with laboratory-confirmed pertussis. The researchers wrote, “The age distribution of our patients with a peak in preschool children is typical for a primarily unvaccinated population. In contrast, widespread immunization results in a relative increase of cases in infants, adolescents, and adults.”[x]

Widespread use of the pertussis vaccination is apparently changing the natural age at which whooping cough infections occur in the population. This coincides with the CDC’s reports that adults increasingly suffer whooping cough, even as babies are now being infected at a younger age when they are most vulnerable.[xi][xii]

This phenomenon has also been observed with other childhood infectious diseases for which mass vaccination has been undertaken, such as measles. The desired reduction in the incidence of infection has been accompanied by an undesirable shift in measles infection to much younger and much older populations, for whom infection is far more dangerous.[xiii]

So let’s review the facts. Death from a bout of whooping cough is rare; a well-nourished child typically comes through just fine and ends up with lifetime immunity. Infants are the population most at risk of death from pertussis infection, and they are too young to receive the vaccine. The pertussis vaccine does not protect against infection with pertussis, it can only protect against the clinical manifestations of whooping cough. Many people who are fully vaccinated get full-blown cases of whooping cough. Outbreaks are on the rise even as vaccination coverage has remained high. Previously vaccinated adults and adolescents are the primary source of the spread of pertussis. Widespread vaccination against pertussis has resulted in infants contracting whooping cough at a younger age, just as it has increased the age of infection for adolescents and adults.

The available evidence begs the question about the big picture of public health policy: “Is there any verifiable scientific basis that supports continued mass vaccination against pertussis?”

Author and clinician Archie Kalokerinos, MD has remarked that the historic importance of vaccines in public health is significantly overblown in the minds of public health officials and the entire medical community, “Up to 90 percent of the total decline in the death rate of children between 1860–1965 because of whooping cough, scarlet fever, diphtheria, and measles occurred before the introduction of immunizations and antibiotics.”[xiv]

Many parents who are choosing to not vaccinate their children have thoroughly researched the issue and are exercising their right to choose what is best for their child. Reporters and public health officials who haven’t done their homework will probably continue to make scientifically unsupported claims about vaccination and blame outbreaks on parents of unvaccinated kids. The vaccine controversy will likely be around for awhile, which is why it is so important to protect parents’ right to choose.

[ii] http://www.cdc.gov/ncidod/eid/vol6no5/srugo.htm (accessed August 19, 2010)

[iii] http://vaccineawakening.blogspot.com/ (accessed August 13, 2010)

[iv] http://www.adacelvaccine.com/support/brochure/adacelpatientbrochure.pdf (accessed August 13, 2010)

[v] J Clin Invest. 2005;115(12):3594–3601. doi:10.1172/JCI24609.

[vi] CHEST May 1999 vol. 115 no. 5 1254-1258. doi: 10.1378/chest.115.5.1254

[vii] http://well.blogs.nytimes.com/2010/08/16/vaccination-is-steady-but-pertussis-is-surging/ (accessed August 19, 2010)

[viii] http://www.cdc.gov/mmwr/pdf/rr/rr5503.pdf (accessed August 19, 2010)

[ix] http://www.cdc.gov/media/pressrel/2009/r090827.htm (accessed August 19, 2010)

[x] Pediatrics December 1997 Vol. 100 No. 6 p. e10. 10.1542/peds.100.6.e10

[xi] http://www.cdc.gov/mmwr/pdf/rr/rr5517.pdf (accessed August 19, 2010)

[xii] http://www.cdc.gov/features/pertussis/ (accessed August 13, 2010)

[xiii] Hospital Practice 1980 Jul;15(7):49-57. The ‘new’ epidemiology of measles and rubella, JD Cherry

[xiv] http://www.whale.to/vaccines/decline1.html (accessed August 19, 2010)

“Get over yourself,” my friend the microbe expert said offhandedly, surprised I didn’t know this already. “We humans are only 10 percent human cells and the rest teeming, thriving microorganisms along for the ride.”

She pulled out a 2004 report from the American Academy of Microbiology and read to me, “Microbes enable efficient digestion in our guts, synthesize essential nutrients, and maintain benign or even beneficial relationships with the body’s organs. The presence of these organisms influences our physical and mental health.”

I had to sit down immediately. That is, “we” had to sit down, my microbes and I. Why had I never understood or even heard about this before? What is the significance that so many more cells are microbial than human? Who or what controls the 90 percent of me that is not me? When the word finally gets out, won’t it revolutionize the entire world of healthcare?

At the very least, I realized, it is high time to rewrite The Germ Theory.

Of course, there always have been a few “bugs” in the Germ Theory of Disease that kept the theory from becoming a principle of medical science. First off, if germs really did cause disease, none of us would be left standing here to discuss the theory’s finer points. Obviously there is something else at work here, perhaps our ability to maintain resistance and develop immunity.

Louis Pasteur himself found it necessary to falsify his records and fudge the results of major experiments he carried out just to make the Germ Theory work, according to historian Gerald Geison in a New York Times article in 1995. Geison was one of the first scholars to study Pasteur’s personal notes following the Pasteur family’s long delayed release of the research. I imagine this new view of Pasteur describing the fundamental fraud and deception in which he engaged did not go over too well with the French people, who have erected beautiful statues in his image and named venerable public institutions after him.

Pasteur worked hard to garner credit for developing the Germ Theory during his lifetime, even though scientists had already been kicking the idea around for a hundred years or so before he showed up. As an old man though, Pasteur reportedly dropped the entire theory and sided with his contemporary, Claude Bernard. Bernard was the doctor who once gathered a group of colleagues around himself and quaffed down a glass of water teeming with cholera proclaiming, “The terrain is everything; the germ is nothing!” By this act Bernard staked his health on his belief that a “germ” requires the right kind of “soil,” namely diseased tissue, to mount an infection resulting in illness.

Many Germ Theory enthusiasts find the idea intolerable that Pasteur might have abandoned his pet germ theory in old age and sided with Bernard. They dismiss his 180-degree change of heart as the incoherent ravings of a dying man. Many of us believe Pasteur was very sound of mind at the time and we give him credit for publicly changing his mind when he concluded the evidence supported a different story.

At the very least though, the Germ Theory rescued us from the Evil Spirits Theory, which was the dominant theory of disease before blame was passed to germs. This is now regarded as a giant step forward for science. That is because the cures for casting out evil spirits required using harsh treatments that ended up killing significant numbers of patients needlessly. I am told this in no way resembles modern medicine’s incessant war against microbes, whose harsh treatments end up killing staggering numbers of patients unintentionally.

Considering that microorganisms help us digest our food, create vital nutrients for us and protect us from opportunistic infections, is it any wonder that antibiotics and vaccines are linked to so many terrible health disorders, complications and chronic diseases since their effect is to kill, kill, kill?

If microbes could talk, they would make public service announcements crying, “Poison to one is poison to all!” If the human body was ruled by democracy, the microbes in our bodies would no doubt hold an election, and the majority would vote to prevent pharmaceutical attack wherever and whenever possible.

Which brings us back to the task at hand, the rewriting of the Germ Theory of Disease. Since germs are such a big part of who we are, it follows that our good health depends on the good health of our resident microbes. We need a new manifesto to induce everyone to make our microbes feel at home, happy, safe and healthy. In short, we need to make peace with our microbes, love our microbes, and ask our microbes what they want for dinner.

We shall call the new dominant theory the Germ Theory of Life. The transition period will require that all of us reach deep down inside and exercise patience, understanding, and practice extra patience with misguided germ haters and killers. Medical practitioners will be facing enormous challenges and difficulties at first, because they have been trained to reflexively declare war on every germ in sight, plus all the ones they can’t see. But people in the health field tend to have a good heart and they will naturally excel in the new system once they make the transition to being germ lovers. Indeed, many individuals have already seen the writing on the wall and have taken up the new Love Your Germs! banner with gusto.

But the Big Pharma Drug Cartel is based on killing and suppression and will not stand down easily. Big Pharma is the greatest and most powerful economic force in the entire history of mankind. In order to justify perpetual germ warfare and the promotion of germ genocide, the Prescription Drug Cartel needs the Germ Theory intact. Big Pharma clings to the germ theory as tenaciously as the Catholic Church once clung to the Earth Is The Center Of The Universe Theory. Many heads will roll before the transition to loving our germs is complete.

Nevertheless, in the big picture of history, as scientific progress lurches forward down the road like a drunken sailor, theories come and theories go. The old Germ Theory of Disease has always proclaimed “Death to the bugs!” The new Germ Theory of Life says we need to nurture our bugs and raise the healthiest bugs we possibly can. The new theory accounts for the fact that we humans are part of the stream of nature and our health ultimately depends on the health of our environment. When you come right down to it, each one of us is our own environment.

Not surprisingly, the practices needed to ensure the health of our microbes are identical to the practices for ensuring the health of our human cells. These are the usual suspects for creating wellness: Eat well, think well, exercise well, rest well, love well and be well.

The greatest thing about the new Germ Theory of Life is that we do not need prescriptions, physicians or anyone’s permission to choose a lifestyle that creates good health. One caveat though, since making healthy choices and practicing a healthy lifestyle is neither dangerous nor outrageously profitable or expensive, do not expect your medical insurance to pay for it.

The pharmaceutical companies have done it again, they have proven the depth of their genuine concern for the health of our entire citizenry. They are so concerned, they are “pre-concerned.” And what does this mean? It means that scientists working for the pharmaceutical companies believe they have discovered a key concept about our health. Hundreds of millions of us – probably every last one – have been walking around thinking we were doing pretty good health-wise, but actually we are all in the early stages of chronic pre-sickness. That’s right, it turns out that the human condition is really just a temporary pre-condition of debilitating disease.

Now, before this worrisome news triggers any pre-anxiety attacks or pre-depression mood swings, please hold on, because help is on the way. But first let’s review the pre-facts.

Having healthy clinical signs and passing all the diagnostic tests with flying colors means nothing at all anymore. In the old days the EKGs, CBCs, EEGs, MRIs, and PSATs were trusted indicators of an individual’s health condition, but no longer. This does not mean doctors will henceforth cease ordering all those expensive tests, it just means the results will be duly noted and duly ignored.

The first signs of the coming wave of pre-sickness emerged years ago with a smattering of diagnoses being charted for “pre-hypertension.” With pre-hypertension, the heart sounds good, the cardio tests are good and everything else about the person’s health seems to be fine. Fine, that is, unless you have been specially trained to spot the subtle signs of pre-hypertension, such as patients having a pulse or owning a pair of shoes.

A related, but also widely overlooked pre-sickness that affects virtually the entire population of the U.S. is pre-high-cholesterol. If you have “good” cholesterol numbers, don’t be fooled. If your current MD tells you your blood test results are “normal,” you need to switch to a doctor who knows what’s what. Normal means only one thing: pre-abnormal. You’ll need to take action steps right away before real and pseudo-scientifically verifiable problems actually occur.

Little by little, drug scientists have begun to realize the enormous pre-problem we have on our hands, and that’s when the painstaking journey to find answers began. Numerous week-long conferences continue to be held at five-star hotels in the Bahamas with preeminent expert panels, endless rounds of golf, late night discussions in the spa over cocktails, and gourmet banquets featuring entertainment by scantily-clad hot females.

But now, thanks to all of the hard work and sacrifices of Big Pharma and its doctors, scientists, and government regulatory hand puppets, the solution is finally at hand. We can all stop worrying about our previously unrealized potential health problems and get on with normal life.

The answer is so simple, we wonder why it took so long to discover it. In order to keep the “pre” in pre-hypertension, pre-high-cholesterol and pre-depression, all that is needed is – are you ready for this? – drugs! All it takes is one pill each day for the rest of your life for each pre-ailment you might one day possibly be at risk of maybe having. And don’t worry, these drugs are all approved by the FDA.

Are you surprised that drug-company-funded scientists would be able to come up with such a refreshingly ingenious and original idea? Not me, I have come to expect nothing less from the laboratories of our fine drug houses.

The amazing part about all of this is that the drugs needed to treat all these scary pre-problems have been right under our noses the whole time. This means we won’t have to wait for years while the FDA wastes precious time mulling over silly drug side effects and safety issues.

The very same drugs that we’ve been using to treat actual hypertension reportedly will work just as well for pre-hypertension. Likewise, pre-high-cholesterol can be treated with the same drugs as actual high cholesterol, pre-depression can be treated with real depression anti-depressants, and so on. Pre-headache, pre-heartburn, pre-constipation, pre-attention deficit disorder; the list of pre-problems stretches on seemingly forever.

I wonder if the drug companies have yet realized they are sitting on a veritable goldmine? Once people can be made aware of the entire panoply of pre-problems that are possible, all the new pre-prescriptions will be flying off the pharmacy shelves. Then, at the point when pre-sickness begins tapering off and actual problems begin showing up, the only thing doctors need to do is tweak the dosage using the same meds. Brilliant.

National health leaders are concluding that the massive pre-maladies facing our society are so daunting and so extensive that it will require massive pre-sickness education. Qualified doctors will soon begin receiving pre-disease training at special pre-schools. Once doctors have been carefully pre-trained to pre-diagnose pre-diseases, they can properly prescribe pre-medications. Of course, they will also need to know when to refer out for pre-surgery.

I guess the only question left is, who is going to pre-pay for all of this? Just kidding, we already know the answer to that one.

Now blessed by the Food and Drug Administration (FDA) as a treatment for migraines, botulinum toxin is approved for doctors to administer to migraine sufferers who have 15 or more days of headache per month. The multiple injections are given into the neck muscles and must be repeated each 12 weeks.

Not everyone believes the shots of toxin are a good idea however, including the American Academy of Neurology, which in 2008 concluded that despite the popularity of using botulinum toxin for headache treatment, it is ineffective for migraine headaches and unlikely to help tension headaches either.

The black box warning (the most serious warning) required by the FDA for botulinum toxin is a wee bit alarming, because it says the toxin can spread from the injection site and cause swallowing and breathing difficulties that are life-threatening. Other side effects? The most commonly cited reactions are neck pain and – you guessed it – headache.

Chronic headache sufferers may be surprised to learn that there is help available that requires neither a prescription nor any warning that using it may kill you. This is a substance that can minimize or eliminate headaches for the majority of people, and the only side effect is loose stools or diarrhea (but only if too much is taken at once). Not only that, the same substance can significantly reduce pain from fibromyalgia, lower blood pressure, reduce multiple sclerosis relapses, reduce anxiety and depression, relax and repair heart muscle, lower the risk of cognitive decline, and promote tooth and bone health all at the same time.

If this were a drug it would probably be one of the most widely prescribed and profitable drugs of all time. Luckily for us, it is not a drug, it is completely nontoxic, widely available, and inexpensive. It is the mineral magnesium.

You probably have not heard much about the many miraculous benefits of magnesium, but this is largely due to the apparent unwritten rule among the FDA and pharmaceutical companies: If something cannot be patented, there can be no massive profits, and without profits there is no reason to study a substance, much less produce and promote it. And in those cases where a completely natural and vital nutrient works exceptionally well and competes with drug products, stories seem to circulate periodically in the media about how ingesting a lot of the nutrient is not only useless, but probably dangerous.

Magnesium is the miracle mineral that does so much and costs so little. The U.S. Department of Agriculture (USDA) reports that the majority of adults in the U.S. are deficient in magnesium. And the USDA scientists’ calculations are made using official required daily allowance figures considered ridiculously low by nutrition-conscious clinical doctors, so the actual problem far exceeds the USDA estimates.

“Even a mild deficiency of magnesium can cause increased sensitivity to noise, nervousness, irritability, mental depression, confusion, twitching, trembling, apprehension, and insomnia,” writes Dr. Mark Sircus, author of the book, Magnesium – The Ultimate Heart Medicine.

No wonder some clinicians describe ADHD symptoms as virtually identical to the symptoms of chronic magnesium deficiency. The symptoms of movement disorders such as Parkinson’s disease are also linked to magnesium deficiency, because magnesium is vital to the production of dopamine.

Foods that provide magnesium include leafy green vegetables, avocados, nuts such as almonds, cashews, pecans and walnuts, whole grains, legumes, figs and dates. Unfortunately, unless the foods are grown organically, they will contain little magnesium. Standard industrial farming techniques use the standard NPK fertilizers, composed primarily of nitrogen, phosphorous and potassium, which may make the plant look healthy, but lack the vital nutrients needed for good health. Organically grown produce is grown in topsoil constantly replenished with compost that supplies micronutrients such as magnesium.

“However, if you are suffering from the following symptoms you may need supplemental magnesium: muscle twitches, tics, or spasms; “Charlie horse” (the muscle spasm that occurs when you stretch your legs); insomnia or restless sleep; stress; back pain; headaches, cluster headaches, migraines; stiff and aching muscles; bones and joints that need continued chiropractic treatment; weakness; hypoglycemia; diabetes; nervousness; hyperactivity; high blood pressure; osteoporosis; PMS; constipation; angina; kidney stones; aging; depression; heart attack; irregular heartbeat; attention deficit disorder; aggressive behavior; chronic fatigue syndrome; stroke; anxiety; confusion, muscle weakness; hiccups; seizures; high-strung; exhaustion from exercise,” writes Carolyn Dean, M.D., N.D. in her book, The Miracle of Magnesium.

Imagine the stack of prescriptions for drugs that would be needed to treat each of the above symptoms, each drug with its own long and impressive list of side effects, some of which require additional drugs to alleviate the adverse reactions, not to mention the hefty expense.

Obviously, many of the health disorders listed above have complicating factors in addition to magnesium deficiency, and every individual is unique with a unique health history and genetic predisposition. But considering that magnesium is responsible for the correct metabolic function of over 350 enzymes in the body, until magnesium levels are brought up to par, it is difficult to know just what the other factors may be.

It is terribly easy to become magnesium deficient. Mental stress, menstruation, a diet high in processed foods, high salt intake, as well as intake of alcohol, caffeine, tobacco, and many prescription drugs all tend to increase the loss of magnesium through the urine.

The official required daily allowance of magnesium gives the absolute minimum necessary amount, currently set at 300 milligrams per day for women and 400 milligrams per day for men. Magnesium citrate and magnesium malate are considered the formations of the mineral best tolerated and absorbed. Since the body easily rids itself of excess magnesium, it is safe to start supplementing with the required daily allowance and increase the dosage each day to “tolerance,” or the level that causes the bowels to be loose.

However, for many people who are severely depleted of magnesium, the oral tolerance dosage is insufficient to build up magnesium to healthy levels. Luckily, magnesium is easily absorbed through the skin, or transdermally.

“There are many advantages to transdermal magnesium therapy, since the gastrointestinal tract is avoided altogether and there is no laxative effect. Next to intravenous magnesium administration, transdermal therapy provides a greater amount of magnesium to be absorbed than even the best tolerated oral supplements, and can restore intracellular concentrations in a matter of weeks rather than the months required for oral supplementation,” according to the Weston A. Price Foundation on its website.

Many people have used Epsom salts without realizing they were soaking in magnesium sulfate or engaging in transdermal therapy. Magnesium sulfate provides temporary relief from a wide variety of problems, but there is another formulation of magnesium that is more effective and longer lasting because it is more deeply absorbed into cells, magnesium chloride powder. Magnesium chloride can also be spread directly on the skin in the form known as “magnesium oil,” which is not oil at all, but a supersaturated concentration of magnesium chloride and water that feels slippery like oil.

Magnesium supplements and Epsom salts are widely available at local health food stores, but magnesium chloride is not and so must be ordered through sources on the Internet. Ultimately, you may have to go to a bit of trouble locating and then getting sufficient quantities of magnesium into your body’s cells, but doing so has the potential of vastly improving your health right now and saving you from a surprisingly wide range of health troubles as you age.