Archive for the ‘Gut Health’ Category

The Endocannabinoid System and the Important Role It Plays in Human Health

https://articles.mercola.com/sites/articles/archive/2019/02/10/endocannabinoid-system-role-in-human-health.aspx?

Published on Feb 5, 2019

Natural health expert and Mercola.com founder Dr. Joseph Mercola interviews Carl Germano, a board-certified nutritionist and phytocannabiniods expert, on how the endocannabinoid system influences human health.
February 10, 2019
By Dr. Mercola

STORY AT-A-GLANCE

  • Cannabinoid receptors in the human body were discovered in the 1990s, which in turn led to the realization that we make compounds in our body — endogenous cannabinoids — that influence these receptors
  • Endocannabinoid deficiency has been identified in people who have migraines, fibromyalgia, irritable bowel syndrome, inflammatory and neurological conditions and a variety of treatment-resistant conditions
  • While CBD has gained the most attention, CBD alone cannot fully support your body’s endocannabinoid system (ECS). You need the other phytocannabinoids and terpenes as well
  • Hemp has been outlawed in the U.S. since 1938. The latest Farm Bill, signed into law at the end of 2018, makes it legal again; hemp oil with full-spectrum phytocannabinoids may benefit a wide range of health problems
  • There’s an intimate relationship between your ECS and your omega-3 status. Omega-3 fats make your cannabinoid receptors more active, and are used as backbone structures to produce cannabinoids in your body

Hemp has been outlawed in the U.S. since 1938. Thankfully, the latest Farm Bill signed into law at the end of 2018 makes it legal. In this interview, board-certified clinical nutritionist and expert on phytocannabinoids, Carl Germano, discusses the exciting implications of this change.

Now, there’s a difference between cannabidiol (CBD) products made from hemp and those made from marijuana. While many mistakenly believe hemp and marijuana are interchangeable, they’re actually two different plants.

“Both are considered Cannabis sativa by genus and species, but that’s where the similarity ends,” Germano explains. “Hemp has been cultivated for many reasons for the past few thousand years — food, clothing, fiber and fuel. The plant itself contains naturally occurring active compounds called phytocannabinoids, of which CBD is just one of them.

Marijuana, on the other hand, has been cultivated for its primary phytocannabinoid, tetrahydrocannabinol (THC). While it has recreational value at small levels, it does have medicinal value.

Nevertheless, many decades ago, hemp got dumped into the definition of marijuana. Hemp was unjustly placed into the Controlled Substances Act (CSA), which kind of hampered its access, its ability to have U.S. farmers grow it, or to have even medical or academic institutions study it.

We’ve been in the Dark Ages for decades. Thanks to Israel and Europe, who’ve championed all the research, we’ve [discovered] the cannabinoid system in the body called the Endocannabinoid System (ECS).

Trump did sign a Farm Bill that finally deregulates hemp. It takes it out of the CSA … It gives the rights of farmers to grow it. It will open up the doors for academic and medical institutions to study it. It will give consumers access to [what is] probably the most important botanical we have on this planet.”

Why Whole Hemp May Be Better Than Isolated CBD

The hemp plant contains over 100 different phytocannabinoids, of which CBD is one. And while hemp has now been taken off the CSA, CBD is still under the jurisdiction of the U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA), which is responsible for the labeling of supplements and enforcing the Dietary Supplement Health and Education Act (DSHEA).

“With the passage of the Dietary Supplement Health and Education Act (DSHEA), you have several things against CBD. First, CBD was not in commerce prior to 1994, so it could not be grandfathered as a dietary supplement, yet hemp oil has been in commerce prior to 1994, so we’re OK there.

Secondly, DSHEA states that if you want to submit a new dietary ingredient application, you can do so and petition the FDA for an ingredient to be classified as a dietary supplement.

Well, if you were to do that today, you would get rejected immediately because the other part of DSHEA states that if Big Pharma takes a natural ingredient and makes a drug that gets approved, it’s hands-off to the dietary supplement industry.

GW Pharmaceuticals has two drugs using isolated purified CBD in it. Therefore, we’ve got several strikes against putting CBD on the front panel, calling it a dietary supplement, and I say, why bother? Because the story is much bigger than CBD, both clinically, scientifically and legally.”

Hemp oil is a food that happens to have CBD in it. But while CBD may not be legally advertised on the label, CBD-containing hemp products can be labeled as having phytocannabinoids — the class of compounds to which CBD belongs. While CBD has gained the most attention, CBD alone cannot fully support your body’s endocannabinoid system (ECS). You need the other phytocannabinoids and terpenes, which are very complementary to the phytocannabinoids, as well.

“Those of us in botanical medicine understand that the sum of all the parts of the plant is greater than any one single ingredient,”Germano says. “Let’s face it. There’s more than one ginsenoside in ginseng. There’s more than one curcuminoid in curcumin. There’s more than one isobutylamide in Echinacea. There’s more than one ginkgolide in ginkgo.

Well, there’s more than just one phytocannabinoid in hemp. Back in 2011, Dr. Ethan Russo in the British Journal of Pharmacology1 … wrote about the entourage effect of all the phytocannabinoids and terpenes needing to be present to give rise to full clinical, meaningful benefit …

While CBD may be the most dominant phytocannabinoid in hemp, the others are there in minor in number, but they are not minor in the body as they all participate in nourishing, supporting the ECS, which is the bigger story.”

Understanding Your ECS

While the discovery of the ECS is fairly recent, genetically it dates back over 600 million years.2Cannabinoid receptors in the human body were discovered in the 1990s, which in turn led to the realization that we make compounds in our body — endogenous cannabinoids — that influence these receptors.

It was also discovered that the ECS orchestrates communication between other bodily systems, such as your respiratory, digestive, immune and cardiovascular systems. The ECS does this via receptors found in every organ, including your skin.

“Your ECS is like the conductor of the orchestra. The orchestra are our organ systems. We cannot be healthy, we cannot be well if our ECS does not function well,” Germano says.

“Your body produces cannabinoids similar structurally to the cannabinoids found in cannabis. Your body feeds off of them. If you don’t produce enough to feed every single receptor, various conditions and various illnesses will ensue.”

Two Types of Endocannabinoid Receptors Have Been Identified

There are two primary ECS receptors: cannabinoid receptor type 1 (CB1) and cannabinoid receptor type 2 (CB2). While CB1 is typically thought of as being primarily in the brain and CB2 primarily in the immune system, both types of receptors are in fact found throughout your body.

One of the two cannabinoids your body produces is called anandamide — a nod to the word “ananda,” the Sanskrit word for “bliss,” as it attaches to the same CB1 receptors that THC attaches to. The other, 2-arachidonoylglycerol (2-AG), is found throughout your body.

“The ECS has been the subject of many scholarly textbooks … Quite frankly, this is something that should be taught from high school to college to medical school. Unfortunately, because of the stigma attached to cannabinoids … less than 13 percent [of medical schools in the U.S.] are teaching the ECS.

I say, ‘Are you insane? This is like saying that for the next 70 years we will not teach the cardiovascular system, as if it never existed.’ We now have to dismantle this medical travesty … The whole thing is about education. This is critical and crucial to our health and well-being.

We have to dismantle the stigma, and we have to start educating ourselves to understand that the ECS is probably one of the most important medical discoveries in quite some time. Understanding the enormity of this system and what it does and what it influences throughout the entire human body.”

Low Endocannabinoid Levels Result in Ill Health

With age, our bodies tend to become less efficient in creating the compounds needed for optimal health, and this holds true for anandamide and 2-AG as well. According to Germano, these two cannabinoids can actually be used as biological markers for certain illnesses and conditions.

Endocannabinoid deficiency has been identified in people who have migraines, fibromyalgia, irritable bowel syndrome, inflammatory and neurological conditions and a variety of treatment-resistant conditions. Germano also cites a paper3 in Translational Psychiatry, which found low anandamide levels are a statistically positive indicator for stress-induced anxiety.

They’ve also discovered there’s an intimate relationship between your ECS and your omega-3 status.4As it turns out, omega-3 fats make your cannabinoid receptors more active, and are used as backbone structures to produce cannabinoids in your body.

“What do we see in people who have low omega-3 status? We see the same things we see in people who are endocannabinoid deficient: pain, inflammation, stress, anxiety, depression and so on. It is a perfect marriage between omega-3s and phytocannabinoids, which act like a multivitamin for the ECS.

But it doesn’t stop there. Look at bones … the reason we give post-menopausal women estrogen is because it influences the cells that build up bone, osteoblasts, and the cells that break down bone, osteoclasts. What does this have to do with the ECS?

We now know that if you stimulate the CB1 receptors, you start to stimulate the brain-to-bone communication by slowing down the brain from releasing bone-breaking compounds, like norepinephrine. Then when you stimulate the CB2 receptors, it increases osteoblasts, the bone makers, and decreases osteoclasts, the bone breakers.”

Top conditions associated with low cannabinoid levels include:
  • Pain, inflammation and inflammatory conditions
  • Stress, anxiety and insomnia
  • Ocular health
  • Bone health
  • Neurological conditions

“These are all conditions that can be suitably treated with phytocannabinoids,” Germano says. “These are conditions that we see in people who are endocannabinoid-deficient.”

Running Dramatically Boosts Anandamide Level

While runner’s high is typically attributed to the release of endorphins, running also dramatically increases anandamide in the body, and anandamide not only targets the CB1 receptor, but it also influences opioid and endorphin receptors. Not surprisingly then, the higher an individual’s anandamide level, the better they report feeling.

“That makes sense, because anandamide hits the receptors in the brain that are involved in reward and mood,” Germano says. “We also understand that the cannabinoids we produce are quite promiscuous.

They certainly touch the CB1 and CB2 receptors, but they [affect] other receptors as well, [such as] the 5-hydroxytryptamine (5-HT3) receptors, peroxisome proliferator-activated receptors (PPAR), gamma-aminobutyric acid (GABA) receptors, and receptors that control inflammation, pain, reward, anxiety and things of that nature.”

A paper5 published in PLOS ONE also details how various nutrients (such as omega-3 fats), drugs, exercise, chiropractic care, massage and acupuncture influence the function of your ECS.

Your Endocannabinoid System — A Key Player in Inflammation

Curcumin, boswellia, fish oil and quercetin are all well-recognized anti-inflammatory nutrients, but none can compare to what cannabinoids can do, Germano says, especially when the full spectrum is used.

As noted in a 2014 paper6 in Current Opinions in Clinical Nutrition and Metabolic Care, the ECS is an emerging key player in inflammation, because it’s intertwined with all of the inflammatory pathways, including the eicosanoid ones that omega-3 fish oils influence.

Germano also cites other research showing that targeting the ECS can ease both inflammatory and neuropathic pain, and describe how cannabinoids act as analgesics. According to Germano:

“You cannot contend with any inflammatory condition unless you’re supporting the ECS. They can be used interchangeably; phytocannabinoids along with curcumin and boswellia and fish oils would be remarkable, as they are complementary to each other by doing different things.

Again, we must address the ECS in any inflammatory condition, whether it be irritable bowel syndrome or injuries — even inflammation in the brain, which is one of the hallmarks of all neurological diseases. In 2003, the United States government got issued a patent on the neuroprotective effects of cannabinoids.

At that time, while the government has been telling us that phytocannabinoids are like lysergic acid diethylamide (LSD) and heroin — [meaning they] have no medical value — they go out and get a patent on the medical value.

But that was followed up, and there are many papers that talk all about the anti-inflammatory effects in the brain and in the nervous system, of these cannabinoids … There is nothing else like supporting the ECS with phytocannabinoids.”

Your Endocannabinoid System Also Plays a Key Role in Your Gut Health

You’re probably familiar with the fact that there’s a strong connection between not only your brain and your gut, but also your immune system. The importance of this triad in health and disease prevention cannot be overstated. Your gut not only is your largest immune organ, it’s also your second brain, containing hundreds of millions of neurons.

“We now understand how the gut is involved with communicating with the brain and the immune system, because it has brain cells and immune cells in it,” Germano says. In the middle of this trio is your ECS. It is actually the orchestrator of this tri-directional communication. According to Germano, researchers have also discovered the ECS controls:

  • Motility in the gut
  • Intestinal inflammation
  • Abdominal pain
  • Gut permeability
  • Tolerance to antigens

The ECS also reduces the activity of the stress pathways, including the hypothalamic-pituitary-adrenal (HPA) pathways. Anandamide, specifically, participates in the immunological response in the gut. What’s more, there’s also communication occurring between your endocannabinoid system and your gut microbiome (the bacteria in your gut).

Clinical Applications for Hemp Products

Again, a full-spectrum oil is actually far preferable to product in which CBD has been isolated. Germano cites a 2015 Israeli paper, which compared full-spectrum oil against isolated CBD, and found the full-spectrum oil was in fact clinically superior.

As for dosing, most of the literature demonstrates efficacy of CBD in the several hundred milligram range — but that is for “single magic bullet” isolated CBD. Preclinical studies and any clinicians are reporting that efficacy can be achieved with much lower doses when using a ful spectrum oil — some in the 10 to 25mg CBD range.

“Since CBD is the most dominant cannabinoid in hemp, when you extract oil from hemp, you do have much, much higher levels of CBD naturally in the oil as compared to the rest of the phytocannabinoid family. Providing 10 to 25 mg of CBD is the sweet spot for most conditions in the trade — especially when used with other synergistic ingredients …

People are responding quite remarkably, which [suggests] you don’t need a lot to jump-start the body’s ECS. Quite frankly, when we look at the bell-shaped curve with the isolates, the higher the dose, sometimes you decrease the effectiveness … When you use a full-spectrum oil and you’re getting the other important phytocannabinoid and terpene components, this is superior, and I’ll tell you why.

People have been focusing on CBD, which is the wrong message. It’s the myopic message. Think about it, CBD does not attach to the CB1 or CB2 receptors. If anything, CBD supports the CB1 receptors by preventing the breakdown of anandamide in our bodies and anandamide hits the CB1 receptor.

What about the CB2 receptor that controls inflammatory cycling, pain signaling, insulin sensitivity and bone building? CBD does nothing for that, so we need something of a CB2 agonist. A perfect partner to CBD would be another phytocannabinoid called beta caryophyllene. Luckily, the family of other phytocannabinoids in a full-spectrum oil contains other phytocannabinoids that complement to what CBD is not doing as well.

We must get off this single magic bullet bandwagon. We must appreciate the full gamut of all these phytocannabinoids as a whole, and that they complement each other, because CBD is not the answer to support the ECS as a whole.”

As with most things, too much can backfire. While CBD cannot kill you, using CBD isolate in too high amounts can reduce its effectiveness. Such problems are far less likely when using a full-spectrum oil.

“I don’t foresee anybody really overdosing on the standard dosages that we’re recommending,” Germano says. “Nor when we look at the data that’s been published, up to 1,500 mg of CBD chronically administered over time show that it was well-tolerated, minimal to no adverse reactions on physiological function, psychological functioning and other parameters in the body, including blood pressure. So, CBD is quite well-tolerated in humans.”

Hemp Oil for Sleep

Aside from inflammation and pain, another area where a full-spectrum hemp oil can be beneficial is to improve sleep and treat insomnia. Germano recommends using a full-spectrum oil in a dose that provides 25 mg of CBD.

“CBD at that range does a number of things. No. 1, it reduces excitability in the brain. It can reduce glutamate toxicity and any excitatory conditioning. Secondly, CBD is involved in various neurotransmitters that are involved with a normal sleep cycle.

While it has a calming effect and helps to establish a normal sleep cycle, it’s not necessarily a sedative. You can use it with melatonin. You can use it with lavender. You can use it with chamomile and passionflower, what have you. I would do that towards the latter part of the day, at least an hour or two before bedtime. Lower doses of CBD are more stimulating, so to speak, and more upregulating.”

How the New Law Can Improve Quality of Hemp Products

In the past, prior to the signing of the new Farm Bill, the leaf, flower and bud of the hemp plant could not be used in the production of CBD-rich hemp oil. The oil had to be pulled from the stalk and stem of the plant only — the less concentrated part. With the new law, all parts of the plant can be used, which will make processing easier and more economical, as the cannabinoids are more concentrated in the leaves, flowers and buds.

The law also makes it legal to grow hemp in in every state, so if you wanted to, you could grow it in your backyard. This is something I’m definitely considering, as you can easily juice the whole plant or add it to smoothies.

“Growing it for yourself would be wonderful,” Germano says. “It is a weed. It has a short period of harvest. It grows very rapidly — July, August and September. Yes, the whole plant can be used rather than just extracting the oils from it. All the phytocannabinoids and lipids are found in the oils, but the leaf can be juiced and put into smoothies as well …

In terms of growing and processing it, it’s a rather easy plant to grow, because it is a weed. When we talk about the raw plant, a lot of these cannabinoids are in their acidic form. CBD is in CBDA, cannabidiol acid, form. To convert it to its useable form, the acid has to be decarboxylated.

So, while you may benefit from a lot of the phytocannabinoids [in the raw plant], it’s going to be reliant on your body’s ability to process it from the acidic forms that are in there. Exposure to heat, light, moisture and air will decarboxylate a lot of them as well. The more you process it yourself, the more useable some of those phytocannabinoids will be.

[To process it], you can take the leaf, flower and bud. You can blend it and store it in the refrigerator. Over a day or two of exposure to heat, air, light and moisture, it’ll decarboxylate to some extent and you’ll benefit more from that. How much do you get? Appreciable amounts of CBD may be difficult with just juicing alone …

I don’t want to misquote myself and say the wrong thing, but probably an ounce or two [of raw plant] would do the trick as a healthy plant beverage. Again, you don’t need a lot to jump-start your body’s ECS. It’s not a numbers game. Small doses, you would definitely respond to.”

How to Identify a High-Quality Hemp Product

If you’re not growing your own, attributes to look for when shopping for a hemp product include:

Organic Kosher-certified
Non-GMO Verified pesticide and herbicide free
Full-spectrum phytocannabinoids Grown from certified seeds and not hybrids with marijuana

“I look for companies that are doing the right thing also. That is, they don’t mention CBD on the front panel or quantify it in the Supplement Fact box. Responsible companies talk about phytocannabinoids,” Germano says.

“They talk about hemp oil. They talk about nourishing the endocannabinoid system. This is a superior story to just CBD. Those are the more reputable companies that are telling the right story, [and not just talking about] isolated CBD.”

More Information About Endocannabinoid System

Germano has written a book about the endocannabinoid system called, “Road to Ananda: The Simple Guide to the Endocannabinoid System, Phytocannabinoids and Hemp,” (www.roadtoananda.com) which is due out shortly. I am very proud to have written the forward to this book as it is a great resource. Definitely pick up a copy if you want to learn more about this fascinating topic.

“I’m ecstatic to announce that the person who wrote the introduction to the book is Raphael Mechoulam, the father of cannabinoid research and who was involved in the discovery of the endocannabinoid system.

He is well-known in the scholarly circles. There are certainly plenty of scholarly work out there, but we need to get this message, this story, which is enormous, out to the layman and practitioner out there who is really unaware still,” Germano says.

“I’ve been in this industry for over 35 years. I’m a clinical nutritionist by trade. I have not seen any natural compounds this clinically relevant since the inception of this industry. I can tell you that targeting the endocannabinoid system, supporting it, will dominate medicine and nutrition of the next couple of decades.

There are also topical applications for phytocannabinoids, because, again, our skin is one of our largest organs. It also has five to 10 times more cannabinoids in it than we have in our brain. The CB1 and CB2 receptors are there as well.

There are three targeted areas for topical applications. One, obviously, is pain and inflammation, because the CB2 receptors are there that control that. That is something that will blow away any of these compounds in the marketplace today for topical pain relief.

Then we know that certain cannabinoids strangle the sebaceous gland for acne. Certain cannabinoids also influence age spot development and antiaging. [There are] some very interesting things going on in the topical application area.

When we look at the global picture of what is the subcutaneous endocannabinoid system doing, it’s helping to maintain normal cell proliferation, differentiation and immune competence. Oncologists are going to be interested in that aspect.”

_________________

**Comment**

If you are a Lyme/MSIDS patient you should see yourself ALL over this article.  We struggle with pain, inflammation, gut issues (motility, permeability, antigen tolerance, pain/inflammation), neurological issues, & insomnia.  Many experience ocular & bone issues as well.  It will be interesting to observe the topical applications of this since so many have pain.

It’s quite amazing that our government has gotten away with pigeon-holing this wonderful plant into the same category as heroin and marijuana for decades.  Hopefully, we will see pricing begin to fall as currently, cost is high.

The article, and indeed everything I’ve read, stresses that full-spectrum CBD is crucial.

For more:  https://madisonarealymesupportgroup.com/2019/02/09/webinar-cbd-craze-health-or-hype/

My entire family has found CBD oil to help with both sleep and pain.  I give the brand we’ve had success with here:  https://madisonarealymesupportgroup.com/2019/01/16/ldn-cbd/  (I am not affiliated with ANY companies).  It is potent.  The company has other strengths as well.

Category:

Activism, Eye Issues, Gut Health, Hemp Oil, Herbs, Inflammation, Pain Management, research, Sleep, Supplements, Treatment

Lyme & Herxheimer Reactions – Dr. Rawls

https://rawlsmd.com/health-articles/lyme-herxheimer-reactions-your-guide-to-feeling-good-again?

lyme-disease-and-herxiemer-reactions

Lyme + Herxheimer Reactions: Your Guide To Feeling Good Again

by Carin Gorrell & Dr. Bill Rawls
Updated 1/21/19

It’s one of life’s cruel jokes: You discover a new therapy for Lyme disease and are really optimistic about your odds of finally feeling better. Then, within a day or two of starting the regimen, your symptoms take a turn for the worse—intense fatigue washes over you, and you feel like you did during your last fight with the flu. Could it be the dreaded Herxheimer Reaction you keep hearing about from fellow Lyme sufferers?

Unfortunately, answering that question is no easy feat. So we asked Dr. Bill Rawls, author of the bestselling book Unlocking Lyme, to help explain Herx Reactions and the best ways to differentiate them from other possible issues. Keep reading for his advice, plus steps you can take now to feel better—without derailing your recovery.

Herxheimer Reactions, Defined

Herxing was first observed in syphilis patients by dermatologists Adolf Jarisch and Karl Herxheimer in the late 1800s and early 1900s, who noticed that sufferers receiving treatment often got worse before they got better. The phenomenon was dubbed the Jarisch-Herxheimer Reaction, and has since been shortened to Herxheimer Reaction or simply, herxing.

“The classic explanation of a Herxheimer Reaction in Lyme sufferers is that when Borrelia bacteria are killed off by an antibiotic or herbal therapy, parts of dead bacteria called endotoxins are shed,” explains Dr. Rawls. “These endotoxins then circulate throughout the body and cause an intense whole-body inflammatory reaction. And that makes the war against microbes that’s already going on inside your body worse.”

In general, Herx Reactions are more common and more intense with conventional antibiotic use than with use of herbs, says Dr. Rawls. “With herbs, the bacterial die‐off is more gradual and the immune response is less intense.”

Either way, the intensification of your symptoms can be disconcerting, and if you’re treating Lyme, the odds are good you’ll experience herxing: While there’s no clinical research on the prevalence of herxing, anecdotally it seems the majority of Lyme sufferers experience it at some point. And that’s actually good news: “It’s often a sign that the therapy is working,” says Dr. Rawls.

How To Tell If It’s Herxing—Or Something Else

Herx Reactions can feel like a red herring, for a few reasons.

For starters, symptoms vary from person to person, says Dr. Rawls, and they’re easy to confuse with other health concerns that are also highly likely in chronic Lyme sufferers, including a disease flare-up, adverse reaction to a new Lyme treatment, or food sensitivity (digestive issues are highly common in Lyme sufferers). What’s more, the timing of any of these issues can also overlap, making it difficult to track your symptoms to their source.

For help clearing up the confusion and determining what’s to blame for your symptoms, check out these helpful identifying characteristics from Dr. Rawls:

HERX REACTION

Symptoms: Intensified fatigue, muscle pain, and flu‐like symptoms such as headache, nausea, GI distress. You may also experience symptoms not listed here; Herx Reactions are highly variable between individuals.

Onset: Symptoms intensify in tandem with starting a new therapy.

Telltale signs: Symptoms may gradually improve with continuation of therapy, and worsen again when you increase the dosage or add a new therapy.

LYME FLARE-UP

Symptoms: Intensification of fatigue, arthritis (joint pain, swelling, and stiffness), flu-like feelings, GI distress, recurrence of your usual Lyme symptoms

Onset: Symptoms are often precipitated by any type of extra stress to your system (including emotional stress, poor diet, toxin exposure, physical stress, lack of sleep, or a new tick bite). Symptoms are not related to starting a new therapy, though the two may coincide if you experienced stress just before starting the therapy.

Telltale signs: Your best clue is timing: A Lyme relapse typically occurs while taking a stable dose of treatment and in reaction to some type of stress, so look for recent lifestyle changes (i.e., diet changes, travel, sleep deprivation, relationships trouble).

ADVERSE TREATMENT REACTION

Symptoms: An allergic-like reaction (hives, itching, skin rash, runny nose, watery eyes, wheezing). This is common in people with chronic Lyme disease, whose entire immune system is in disarray and more easily activated.

Onset: Symptoms develop within about an hour of taking a new medication or herb

Telltale signs: Your symptoms get better when you take an allergy remedy such as an antihistamine. *See your doctor as soon as possible if you experience signs or symptoms of a drug allergy. Call 911 if you experience signs of a severe reaction or suspect an anaphylaxis after taking a medication.

FOOD SENSITIVITY

Symptoms: Fatigue, joint pain, muscle pain, general achiness, brain fog, irritability

Onset: Symptoms occur within hours to a couple of days after an offending food is consumed.

Telltale signs: Your symptoms get better when you eliminate the food(s) from your diet. Doctors can order testing for food sensitivity and heavy metal toxicity, however the best determinant of food sensitivities is an elimination diet.

If these guidelines don’t describe your experience with herxing exactly, take heart. In the beginning, you may go back and forth between knowing whether what you’re experiencing is Herx Reaction or something else, but with time, you will become better at distinguishing herxing and riding it out.

It’s Herxing. When Will It End?

If you’ve determined (or strongly suspect) that you’re herxing, your next question is likely: How long will it last?

Unfortunately, there’s no cut-and-dry answer — everyone’s experience is individual, says Dr. Rawls. Some may feel better after a few days or a few weeks; others may experience herxing for as long as two to three months (though symptoms tend to wax and wane throughout that time).

The good news is, there’s a lot you can do to help ease a Herx Reaction and move beyond the symptoms more quickly. The quickest solution would be to discontinue your Lyme treatment. But that’s not necessarily the best solution, says Dr. Rawls.

“Fundamental advice with herx is to continue therapy at whatever dose you can tolerate. Sometimes you will have to reduce the dose to stay comfortable, but you can increase again later” says Dr. Rawls. “If your symptoms improve over days to a couple of weeks, that suggests confirmation that it’s a herx.And as your symptoms improve, you can gradually increase the dose until the desired therapeutic dose is reached.”

If your symptoms do not improve, it may be an indication that the therapy is not working. In this case, Dr. Rawls suggests either increasing the dose or adding other herbs or other therapy. If symptoms gradually start getting better, then you know you’re on the right track.

That said, if your symptoms are debilitating, back off on your treatment dosage or even stop altogether, advises Dr. Rawls. Then, once your symptoms are tolerable, you can gradually increase your dosage again.

Smart Ways to Ease Herxing

The number one way to find relief from herxing is to address the underlying cause for needing Lyme treatment in the first place: chronic immune dysfunction.

“An impaired immune system is what makes people vulnerable to chronic Lyme,” explains Dr. Rawls. “Restore your immune function, and not only will your body be better at battling Lyme microbes, it’ll be stronger at withstanding the side effects of treatment and overcoming herxing as well.”

To begin, work your way through what Dr. Rawls calls System Disruptors, factors that can contribute to inflammation and intensify either a Herx reaction or a Lyme relapse. These include poor nutrition, emotional stress, environmental toxins like air pollutants and mold, physical stress, and excessive exposure to radiation from modern sources like computers, cell phones, and microwave towers.

Once you’ve begun to take the pressure off of your immune system by decreasing your exposure to these disruptors, your body will be better equipped to handle both microbes and the endotoxins they create as they begin to die off. The result: You start to feel better.

From here, there are a number of additional lifestyle habits you can adopt to help alleviate a Herxheimer Reaction—all of which also contribute to restoring immune function and thus contribute to Lyme recovery, says Dr. Rawls. Here, his recommendations:

1. Hydrate with fresh ginger tea.

A lot of liquids in general is a good idea, but fresh ginger tea in particular has potent systemic anti-inflammatory properties for reducing Herxheimer symptoms.

2. Add some natural therapies to your regimen.

Some good ones to try:

  • Turmeric and Boswellia They’re excellent for reducing systemic inflammation associated with Herxheimer reactions, and it’s hard to take too much of either. Dr. Rawls recommends 175 mg of turmeric and 75 mg of Boswellia, twice a day for each.
  • Marine source omega-3 fatty acids They offer anti-inflammatory support, especially for high-fat tissues such as the brain. Both fish oil and krill oil reduce inflammation, but krill is better absorbed and also contains the antioxidant astaxanthin, which provides extra anti-inflammatory support. The suggested dose for krill oil is 500 mg, 1-3 times daily.
  • Red Root This herb is very good for stimulating clearing dead cellular debris from the lymphatic system. It also supports a healthy liver and spleen, optimal immune function, and swollen lymph nodes.
  • Chlorella Consistently taking this freshwater algae does wonders for healing an irritated stomach and restoring digestive function. It’s also great for detoxing and healing in general. The typical maintenance dose is 5 to 7.5g total a day. For additional support, we suggest 10g total a day. Chlorella can be taken any time of day. For best results, take with food. (Avoid products that also contain spirulina, a blue-green algae that potentially contains toxins.)
  • Adaptogenic herbs. These help reduce herxing and moderate the effects of stress. Some to try: Chinese skullcap (450 mg, twice a day), Cordyceps(450 mg, twice a day), Reishi mushroom (175 mg, twice a day), and Rehmannia (50 mg, twice a day).

3. Take enzymes.

There are a variety that will work to help break down immune complexes and reduce inflammation. Bromelain (from pineapple) is a good choice; the dose is 500-1000 mg, one to two times daily. It’s sometimes found in combination supplements for joint health. In general, it’s best to take enzymes on an empty stomach so they are absorbed directly.

4. Apply heat.

Heat can be very soothing during Herx reactions. A far infrared (FIR) sauna and/or a hot bath are excellent for removing toxins from the body. Adding Epsom salts to your bath can also help soothe muscles and joints.

5. Get outside and breathe fresh air.

Forests and beaches or shores alongside open water are especially beneficial. Take your shoes off and walk barefoot: called “grounding,” it’s a good practice for reducing inflammation in the body.

6. Relax.

Decreasing stress is key to normalizing the body’s adrenaline/cortisol response. Some ideas:

  • Meditate
  • Get a massage, or try abhyanga (the Ayurvedic practice of self-massage)
  • Practice Qigong or yoga
  • Try acupuncture or energy healing

7. Sleep.

Make 7-8 hours of shuteye a nightly goal.

8. Say “no” more often.

Only agree to doing what’s necessary, and let the rest go until you are back on your feet.

9. Avoid coffee and green and black tea.

They tend to dry and irritate the stomach lining.

10. Eat steamed cabbage.

It’s great for soothing an inflamed stomach.

11. Use lavender essential oil.

Research suggests it may be beneficial for easing insomnia, anxiety, stress, and postoperative pain. Apply it to the bottom of your feet before bed to help with sleep.

12. Laugh lots.

It raises your immune system and just makes you feel good.

Thoughts on Herx Prevention

There’s a decent chance that if you increase the dosage of your current treatment or introduce a new one to your Lyme regimen, the herxing may return. It’s not entirely avoidable, says Dr. Rawls, but there are steps you can take to help fend off and reduce symptoms.

A few days before you change up your therapy, Dr. Rawls recommends adding some turmeric and krill or fish oil to your daily routine; these help support a healthy immune response. He also suggests using calming essential oils such as lavender and frankincense to reduce your stress response.

And in general, the most successful approach to feeling your best is to focus on restoring healthy immune function. Do that, and you’ll rebound faster from herxing and most other maladies that may come your way.

Dr. Rawls is a physician who overcame Lyme disease through natural herbal therapy. You can learn more about Lyme disease and recovery in Dr. Rawls’ best-selling book, Unlocking Lyme. You can also learn about Dr. Rawls’ personal journey in overcoming Lyme disease and fibromyalgia in his popular blog post, My Chronic Lyme Journey.

_________________

**Comment**

For those of you just starting treatment:  https://madisonarealymesupportgroup.com/2015/12/06/tips-for-newbies/

More on Herxing:  https://madisonarealymesupportgroup.com/2015/08/15/herxheimer-die-off-reaction-explained/

https://www.lymedisease.org/lymesci-herxing/

https://madisonarealymesupportgroup.com/2017/06/28/jarisch-herxheimer-a-review/

Enzymes:  https://madisonarealymesupportgroup.com/2016/04/22/systemic-enzymes/

https://madisonarealymesupportgroup.com/2018/03/05/how-proteolytic-enzymes-may-help-lyme-msids/

https://madisonarealymesupportgroup.com/2018/10/24/herbs-habits-to-revive-your-gut/

MSM – another detoxifier, gut support, & inflammation & pain reducer:  https://madisonarealymesupportgroup.com/2018/03/02/dmso-msm-for-lyme-msids/

One of the hardest things to understand about this complex disease(es) is that you feel a whole lot worse before you feel better and this can take considerable time.  Managing the herx is a challenging job.  Many find sauna’s to be of great help.

 

 

Category:

Activism, Detoxing, diet and nutrition, Gut Health, Inflammation, Lyme, Supplements, Treatment

Vaccines Likely Infected With Retroviruses & Linked to Chronic Disease

https://articles.mercola.com/sites/articles/archive/2018/12/09/retrovirus.aspx?

Plague: One Scientist’s Intrepid Search for the Truth About Human Retroviruses and Chronic Disease

 Approx 3 Min

Written by Dr. Joseph Mercola

December 09, 2018

Story at-a-glance

  • A retrovirus is a virus that contains RNA encoded genes rather than DNA. Using reverse transcriptase, the retrovirus is able to transform the single-stranded RNA into a double-stranded DNA
  • When the retrovirus infects a host, it integrates its DNA into the DNA of the host cell, which allows the retrovirus to replicate itself and spread through the host
  • One example of a transmissible retrovirus is the HIV virus, which can cascade into the clinical symptoms of acquired immunodeficiency syndrome (AIDS)
  • A retrovirus family known as xenotropic murine leukemia virus-related viruses (XMRV) may play a causal role in chronic fatigue syndrome, chronic myalgic encephalopathy (ME) and other diseases, including autism
  • Some retroviruses, including XMRV (but not HIV as far as we know), infect your germ cells, which means they are transmitted to your offspring

Judy Mikovits, Ph.D., a virologist, researcher and founding research director of the Whittemore Peterson Institute — which researches and treats chronic fatigue syndrome (CFS) in Reno, Nevada — got embroiled in controversy when, in 2009, she was the senior author on a paper which reported that a retrovirus known as xenotropic murine leukemia virus-related virus (XMRV) may play a causal role in CFS and other diseases, including autism.

Her book, “Plague: One Scientist’s Intrepid Search for the Truth About Human Retroviruses and Chronic Fatigue Syndrome (ME/CFS), Autism and Other Diseases,” details her research and personal trials that arose as a consequence of her work.

“Kent Heckenlively essentially wrote it,” Mikovits says, “because I write like a scientist. We wrote it using the genre of flashback. He taped hours and hours of me telling the story as he asked me questions — because he’s trained as an attorney — and then he turned that into this suspense-thriller. Interestingly enough, it almost has to read like fiction because of the lawyers it took to … make sure we weren’t sued.”

What Are Retroviruses?

Before we go further, let’s review what a retrovirus is. A retrovirus is a ribonucleic acid (RNA) virus — in other words, a virus that contains RNA encoded genes rather than deoxyribonucleic acid (DNA). Using reverse transcriptase, the retrovirus is able to transform the single-stranded RNA into a double-stranded DNA.

When the retrovirus infects a host, it integrates its DNA into the DNA of the host cell, which allows the retrovirus to replicate itself and spread through the host. As more and more cells are infected, you become increasingly sicker. Mikovits explains:

“Humans have a DNA genome. Our blueprint is DNA. Retroviruses have an RNA genome, but they also are unique in the RNA family of viruses, where their RNA genome is reverse-transcribed. That is, written backwards by an enzyme unique to retroviruses called reverse transcriptase. That enzyme writes the RNA into DNA.

Then they have another enzyme called integrase. Integrase is like a pair of scissors that cuts open your DNA and then inserts the retrovirus, which is only about 8,000 base pairs, a very, very, very small virus, 50 to 100 nanometers on an electron micrograph. That piece of DNA — called a provirus — is now in the DNA of your cells forever. Every time your cells replicate, you make more viruses.”

Now, this DNA insertion has been ongoing throughout human history. According to Mikovits, about 10 percent of the human genome is retroviral in origin. These are called human endogenous retroviruses. These, however, differ in that they’ve been crippled in part by our DNA methylation machinery (which modulates genes expression and the human immune system — so that they can no longer make complete viruses and therefore cannot infect others.

However, when you’re infected with a retrovirus such as human T-lymphotropic virus (HTLV-1), HIV HBRV or Borellia as in chronic Lyme disease and develop DNA methylation and immune dysfunction, these endogenous retroviruses begin to be expressed, and this is yet another really important finding.

HIV — One Example of a Transmissible Retrovirus

One example of a transmissible retrovirus is the HIV virus, which can cascade into the clinical symptoms of acquired immunodeficiency syndrome (AIDS). HIV was discovered in 1982, and as mentioned above, was part of Mikovits’ early research work. Her book includes the history of that important discovery.

When Mikovits first began studying retroviruses, HIV/AIDS was completely unknown, but they suspected a retrovirus was at play because of how retroviruses affect the human immune system and lead to acquired immune deficiencies and cancers.

“You don’t just one day get this virus and you’re sick. In fact, we now know millions of people have HIV and will never develop AIDS. We talk about that in the book, because the book ultimately is one of hope that we fix HIV.

I can honestly tell you in 1999, when I was running the lab of antiviral drug mechanisms, I did not ever expect we would solve that problem. Now, AIDS patients on antiretroviral therapy are probably healthier and develop fewer cancers … than most of the rest of society.”

Some retroviruses, including XMRV (but not HIV), also infect your germ cells, which means they not only cause continuous infection in your body but also transfer to your offspring.

“XMRV, the xenotropic murine (mouse) leukemia retrovirus, is the mouse-related retroviruses that cause cancer and lots of neurological diseases. Those affect the stem cells, the egg, the sperm — every cell in your body. That was one of the big ‘Oh, my Gods,’ about our discovery,” Mikovits says.

When it comes to treatment, the key is to keep the virus silent, because when they’re not, each time your cells divide you’re making more retroviruses. For this, antiretroviral treatments are used, some of which will be discussed later in this article.

From AIDS to ME/CFS

After 9/11, Mikovits started working with a woman whose daughter was severely ill with chronic fatigue syndrome. “Basically, that was the first time I ever saw the disease called ME/CFS,” she says.

“This person was looking at a herpes virus known as human herpesvirus 6 (HHV-6). This is a virus prominent in people with Kaposi sarcoma, [which] became associated with HIV and AIDS. Dr. Patrick Moore and Dr. Yuan Chang [discovered] that Kaposi sarcoma was actually caused by a herpes virus — then known as Kaposi sarcoma herpes virus; now, it’s HHV-8.

Because the immune system is crippled, you wake up the sleeping herpes viruses. People with autism, ME/CFS and cancers have a lot of chronic active infections, so we often see the Epstein-Barr virus (EBV) associated with outbreaks of ME/CFS …

This woman introduced me to Dr. Dan Peterson and Annette Whittemore in Incline Village, Nevada, where he had been studying outbreaks of ME/CFS for probably 25 years. He said he had a bank of samples. We went up there. I met all the patients.

I interviewed them in great length and developed a hypothesis, which had actually been shown before by Elaine Defreitas, Ph.D., another scientist many years earlier …

Defreitas had isolated retroviruses from patients with ME/CFS. A doctor … named Sidney Grossberg had also isolated retroviruses from at least one patient with ME/CFS. So, the retroviral hypothesis wasn’t new. Everything about it fit …

One of the most severely injured patients at that time was Whittemore’s daughter, Andrea. That summer (2006), I went up there … and started studying it … I used the systems biology approach, because there’s a lot of heterogeneity.

We know AIDS patients who have HIV and will never get AIDS … I interviewed patients in Peterson’s office all summer and took blood, urine, saliva and all kinds of samples to isolate that virus, which is what you need to do to show it’s associated with a disease.”

The Discovery of Infectious Retroviruses

Eventually, she brought together several of her former and current colleagues who were world experts in HIV sequencing to look at ME/CFS. Among them was the world’s leading electron microscopist, Kunio Nagashima, who has done the electron micrographs of every family of human retroviruses discovered: the human beta retrovirus, human delta virus, lenti-virus (such as HIV) and gamma retroviruses.

Working in collaboration with the Cleveland Clinic, Mikovits and her team isolated the virus and spent the better part of 2008 and 2009 putting a paper together, proving the XMRV retrovirus was infectious and transmissible and not just another crippled human endogenous retrovirus.

“To our horror, we learned these [retroviruses] could be aerosolized. This was in 2011 … That was really the first nail in my coffin. Pun intended, because the national academy member, John Coffin, Ph.D. — who had told Frank Ruscetti, ‘There is no such thing as human retroviruses. Don’t study them’ — then made a fortune out of HIV and did everything he could to destroy me and the patients,” Mikovits says.

“Prior to publication in 2009, we wrote a patent on the detection of these retroviruses, these pieces and parts as contaminants of the cell cultures, of the cell lines from which we make vaccines. After they destroyed my reputation and career and forced the retraction of our paper from [the journal] Science, Coffin turned around and wrote a patent on the detection of these viruses in contaminating cell linings and contaminating biologicals in our labs.”

This PDF includes emails, letters and supporting documentation showing how the retraction of Mikovits’ Science paper was forced, after which Coffin filed his own patent for a detection method of the contaminants in cell lines used for vaccines and other biologicals. There’s also documentation detailing the scientific fraud Mikovits asserts in this interview.

Infectious Retroviruses May Contaminate Blood Supply and Vaccines

In her book, she also details how infectious retroviruses are still likely infecting many biological solutions used clinically today, such as vaccines and other therapies. To say that this is a concern would be an understatement. Children’s Health Defense discusses this, and more, in “Looking Back, Looking Forward: Cancer and Vaccines.”1 Mikovits explains:

“That was really at the heart of the big ‘Oh, my God.’ The worst I learned in this whole experience is how corrupt scientific journals are. In fact, Ruscetti now calls Science, that prestigious journal, ‘The National Inquirer,’ because they literally engineered the whole thing to destroy MEC/FS patients and any association this virus [XMRV] had with these diseases …

All of the studies showed that the control population was between 3.75 and 6.8 percent infected. When you do a study and there’s evidence of infection in 6 percent of the human population, that’s 25 million Americans. To put that in context, at the height of HIV/AIDS in 1995, it was 1 million Americans. It would crush our health care system if they had to pay for what they caused.”

The result of Mikovits’ findings was nothing short of personal devastation. Not only was her paper retracted by Science, she was even arrested for “stealing” her own lab notes. Charges were ultimately dropped, but the damage to her reputation was a done deal.

“Basically, our paper came out on October 8, 2009. It was literally like ‘the shot heard around the world.’ I was on the road every single day. Everywhere I went doctors were like, ‘She’s got it. She’s got it. She’s got it,’ and not just with MEC/FS but also with cancer, leukemia, lymphoma, with prostate cancer.

When you start looking at the inflammatory events in the acquired immune deficiencies, with autoimmune disease, with Lou Gehrig’s disease, the problem became this [retro]virus. Well, there’s no single virus. There’s no HIV. There’s a whole family of HIVs. There’s an HIV 1. There’s an HIV 2. There’s a strain A, B, C and D.

Why do we do influenza vaccines for this strain de jour or every year? [Because] there are strains of viruses. There are families of viruses … The second that we published this paper, we started working to get a diagnostic test for the blood supply to show it wasn’t contaminated, which, in fact, it was.

Later that year, the last talk I ever gave was on a science paper that came out September 22, 2011 … That talk was basically a debate for the evidence that there are human retroviruses of the XMRV family that aren’t VP62 (the infectious molecular clone, not the natural isolates of our paper).

We could show in the original paper that there was evidence of murine leukemia viruses, gamma retroviruses that were infectious and transmissible, just as we had said.

Coffin was on the other end of that debate. He said it was all a recombination event. He published a paper in 2013 saying, ‘When we worked with mouse cells, they expressed a lot of pieces and parts of retroviruses. This just happened to happen in the laboratory.’

[Hence, he claimed] that’s what we had isolated. [Coffin claimed] that what we were looking at were just contaminants in the laboratory. ‘It’s all a lab contaminant,’ [Coffin said], ‘You can all go home. You’re safe.'”

Massive Public Health Concerns Swept Under the Rug

As one might expect, Mikovits’ research caused massive concern in the professional community, because here was a newly identified, infectious and transmissible retrovirus that no one was screening for, and it was potentially contaminating 10 percent of the human blood supply. But rather than face the problem head on, it was rapidly swept under the proverbial rug.

“My mom was watching Good Morning America one morning. Across the bottom of the ticker tape said, ‘XMRV all a hoax’ … It was horrible. We started to realize our fake news and fake science.”

Today, the blood supply is unlikely to be contaminated, thanks to a decontamination procedure developed by a California-based company called Cerus and which Mikovits proved to inactivate XMRV, rendering it noninfectious.

Other biologicals, including vaccines, however, may not be routinely decontaminated using this process, in large part because they’re not required to do so, and drug companies are not liable for vaccine-induced harm. What’s more, decontaminating the vaccine may render it ineffective.

“It won’t work. It will no longer be a vaccine … The Cerus method cleans up Ebola. It cleans up Zika. It cleans up essentially any RNA viruses, including HIV and all three human retroviruses. The Cerus system is extremely valuable to cleaning up the blood supply.

But they cannot clean up the vaccines for another reason. If they do, they prove Andy Wakefield right. They prove me right. They prove they’ve got 25 million Americans, who they have to support for the rest of their lives and pay damages [to] …”

The Price of Making an Unpopular Scientific Discovery

On a personal level, Mikovits has taken an enormous personal hit. September 29, 2011, she was fired from the Whittemore Peterson Institute for insolence and insubordination, and was driven into bankruptcy after being falsely arrested for stealing her own lab notes. (She never was and to this day is not in possession of her notebooks or any of the two offices full of her work done in her entire career.)

She explains her firing saying that Whittemore had been selling a diagnostic test and the director of their for-profit commercial laboratory was using federal grant funds to do that work (with full knowledge and under the direction of Annette and Harvey Whittemore), which is misappropriation of federal funds. Mikovits became aware of this in August that year, and wrote him off the grant.

“The Whittemores basically fired me immediately in an attempt … to get this scientist, Vince Lombardi, Ph.D. … to recreate the work while I was out of town and say I was a lunatic — that he’d been doing the work all along, and he hadn’t misappropriated any of the funds.

They fired me on September 29 and immediately locked down the entire university to me or my staff … The insolence and insubordination was I had refused a direct order to misappropriate federal funds, basically. I wasn’t ever going to do that. The insolence I’m trying to learn not to do, because it probably would have gone a lot better for me if I didn’t say ‘F-you,’ at the same time …

It was September 22, 2011, when I gave my last talk. They had three weeks to get a Science paper out there that would destroy my reputation in the ME/CFS community … Ruscetti had to sign that paper, or he and Sandy Ruscetti would be fired … [and] lose their entire retirement, which is 75 years.

That was one of the few times I sobbed. I was sitting in my bed screaming …It was 6 o’clock in the morning. They were on the East Coast and they needed to get this paper published fast by Science.

I called the Ruscettis and said, “Frank, they agreed to change the language. They agreed to change the title. They agreed it wasn’t an association study … [they say] we didn’t have a diagnostic test. Either way, the Whittemores are going to kill me because they’re selling the diagnostic test.’

So Frank [Ruscetti] signed the paper. They didn’t change the wording. [What they did] is pure fraud. Here, the head of the National Heart, Lung, and Blood Institute published pure fraud in the journal Science, just as two years later, Ian Lipkin published pure fraud. It is fake news. It is so corrupt, everything about it.

It’s not [the researchers]. It’s the top of the line. It’s Dr. Tony Fauci. We’re only allowed to make incremental advances. When you make a discovery of this nature, it changes all of everything. This is misogyny … This is a bunch of little boys … fighting over who gets credit, while the world dies, while you kill an entire continent.

That’s why I do shows like this. Because we’re going to teach doctors. When doctors understand the science — and they’re coming around a lot — because the science is there. Nothing about our paper, except the sequence of the virus, has ever been wrong. We knew that in the beginning.”

Individuals Infected With Retroviruses Should Avoid Vaccinations

According to Mikovits, retroviruses such as XMRV affect entire families, as it can be transmitted to your offspring. Many of these families also have children with autism, which Mikovits believes may be connected to the retrovirus. The question is, what can you do if you’re infected? For starters, Mikovits recommends avoiding vaccinations.

“Until 2011, not inconsequentially, we didn’t vaccinate AIDS patients the same way. It’s in the book. You don’t vaccinate the immune-compromised … By definition, you have an immune system that doesn’t work. Why would you vaccinate them? Why would you vaccinate somebody under 3 years old, who has an immune and detox systems that don’t work?

This was the key of the RNaseL story (a genetic susceptibility not to degrade RNA viruses), of the Thompson fraudulent paper [Editor’s note: This refers to William Thompson, Ph.D., a former senior scientist at the CDC’s National Center for Immunizations and Respiratory Diseases, who confessed he conspired to cover up links found between the MMR vaccine and autism].

All they had to do was wait for black boys to be 3 years old, and they would have been able to degrade the RNA virus. That’s criminal. That’s beyond comprehension …

The pearl of wisdom is this DNA methylation. Keep the violent virus silent … DNA methylation has to silence them. You can’t inject them in a vaccine. We’re injecting millions of pieces in parts of retroviruses in every vaccine, by definition (and admission).

I am working on an ongoing cancer lawsuit that says vaccines cause childhood cancer, a lymphoma. By these same mechanisms, you’ve destroyed the DNA methylation machinery’s ability [to silence the virus]. You’ve simply overwhelmed the substrate. You’ve overwhelmed the ability to methylate.

Every time those viruses integrate, you have a better chance at insertional mutagenesis. Don’t expose anybody to human (or animal) retroviruses. Use antiretroviral therapy, which are natural products … There are lots of natural products. We published on them. Those are actually therapy for these kids.

[A 100-year-old drug called Suramin] was one of the first antiretroviral therapies for HIV … [It] worked best against the murine leukemia virus-related viruses, against the mouse retroviruses, the gamma retroviruses …

[Dr. Robert] Naviaux [professor of medicine, pediatrics and pathology at University of California San Diego School of Medicine] did a small clinical trial.2 These kids got their life back.3 They started talking again. What did Bayer do? They stopped the trial and took the drug away from everyone. Now, you can’t get it …

We could help millions of people get over [autism]. But when you show cure, you know cause. That’s it. I would be right … Millions of people would get their lives back, and it’s all about money.”

XMRV Is a Significant Threat

As mentioned, there are several different retroviruses, which are part of four viral families (delta, lenti, beta and gamma). Aside from HIV and XMRV, there’s the human T-cell leukemia lymphoma virus (HTLV-1) family. There are five or six HTLV viruses, but HTLV-1 is the only one known to cause severe disease.

Human beta retrovirus is another virus associated with primary biliary cirrhosis. Many patients with MEC/FS also have family members with primary biliary cirrhosis. As for which one might be the most significant threat, Mikovits believes XMRV is among the most pressing, because while HIV is well-contained at present, XMRV is not, and it appears to play a significant role in diseases of methylation.

Disturbingly, they’re now using murine leukemia viruses as vectors for gene therapy and a novel cancer therapy called chimeric antigen receptor (CAR) T-cell therapy. In other words, they’re causing cancer and other retroviral illnesses.

“The same thing with Gardasil … We’re causing these diseases and we know it because we’re using these [retroviruses] as vectors. We don’t need infectious viruses. That’s one thing that’s really important to know. You don’t need infectious viruses if you’re injecting the provirus, or the pieces and parts. You inject it, past your immunity, past your gut, past RNA cell, past everything. You bypass the immune system. They don’t need to be infectious.

All you need is an envelope to cause that prostate cancer. That’s a paper that was published 2013. In most of our studies, all we detected was the envelope. The envelope alone causes vasculitis … Another strain of XMRV gamma retrovirus from mice was identified by Gary Owens … associated with cardiovascular disease. This is just a nightmare that we’ve unleashed in our environment.”

Retroviruses and ME/CFS

According to Mikovits, 6 to 8 percent of the general population are infected with infectious and transmissible XMRV-retroviruses, and in the chronic fatigue population, that prevalence shoots up to about 30 to 40 percent. As with HIV, antiretroviral therapies can be very helpful in the treatment of ME/CFS, including low-dose naltrexone.

“You have to silence the other pathogens, so taking care of mycoplasma, taking care of mold, absolutely supporting the gut microbiome [will help],“ Mikovits says. “We learned with AIDS and cancer patients that if they don’t have the diversity in the microbiome, just like in autism, just like in MEC/FS, it’s because the retrovirus is causing leaky gut …

The nonspecific inflammation [is] the retroviruses. If you keep the gut healthy, you can heal. The primary is the diversity in the microbiome, or you can’t respond to the drugs. There’s a lot of hope. That’s what we end the show with. There are therapies. We could fix this tomorrow. That’s why I do it.”

To learn more, be sure to pick up a copy of “Plague: One Scientist’s Intrepid Search for the Truth About Human Retroviruses and Chronic Fatigue Syndrome (ME/CFS), Autism and Other Diseases,” which reads more like a fictional thriller than a nonfictional book about the science of disease.

________________

For More:  https://madisonarealymesupportgroup.com/2017/10/15/vaccines-and-retroviruses-a-whistleblower-reveals-what-the-government-is-hiding/

https://madisonarealymesupportgroup.com/2018/03/01/vaccines-could-contribute-to-disease-epidemics-due-to-retrovirus-contamination/

https://madisonarealymesupportgroup.com/2018/06/23/the-role-of-retroviruses-in-chronic-illness-a-clinicians-perspective/

They should make Mikovits’s book into a movie.  It’s beyond belief.

 

 

Category:

Activism, Gut Health, Inflammation, vaccines, Viruses

Naturally Recovering Autism, Lyme Disease, & Coinfections

 58 Min

November, 2018

Naturally Recovering Autism (18) Lyme Disease and its Co-infections

With Karen Thomas and Dr. Jodie A. Dashore:  https://naturallyrecoveringautism.com/about/

Want to hear Thomas’ weekly radio show?  Go here and sign up:  https://naturallyrecoveringautism.com/weekly-radio-show/

 

Category:

Autism, Bartonella, Detoxing, diet and nutrition, Gut Health, Lyme, Supplements, Treatment

Herbs & Habits To Revive Your Gut

https://rawlsmd.com/health-articles/herbs-habits-need-revive-gut-health?

The Herbs & Habits You Need to Revive Your Gut Health

by Dr. Bill Rawls
Posted 10/19/18

“Stop eating gluten.” “Give up dairy.” “Cut out caffeine.”

Diet-related advice is always the first thing you hear when it comes to overcoming any sort of gut issue. That’s true whether you’re trying to avoid the abdominal pain or bouts of constipation or diarrhea that can come with a chronic illness like Lyme disease or fibromyalgia, or sidestep triggers for GI conditions like leaky gut syndrome or irritable bowel syndrome (IBS).

It’s good guidance, of course, but it’s not always easy – and it’s not always enough.

Fortunately, there are other effective tools you can use to help cope with digestive issues. The following four steps are additional, diet-free ways to hack common sources of GI distress. Put them into action and not only will you ease symptoms, you’ll also help prevent future ones. And as an added bonus, when you improve your gut health, you also enhance immune function and support your recovery from chronic illness.

Keep reading to learn four key habits to revive your gut health.

1. Nourish Your Gut Lining

In a healthy gut, the cells in the intestinal mucosa – which line your intestines and create a barrier to troublemakers like pathogens – fit neatly together like puzzle pieces. But over time, gut disruptors like toxins and gluten can inflame, irritate, and compromise the intestinal mucosa, allowing them to sneak across the gut-blood barrier and triggering symptoms like abdominal pain, gas, bloating, diarrhea, constipation, nausea, or indigestion (all classic signs of leaky gut).

Here are some things to try to nourish and restore your gut health:

  • Take herbs with mucilage, a demulcent that acts like the mucous barrier in your gut. These can help serve as barrier to foreign substances until you’re able to rebuild your mucosa. My favorite mucilage-containing herb is slippery elm.
  • Try carminatives. These are natural substances that lessen intestinal spasms and reduce gas. Cardamom and fennel are two excellent options to ease these troubling symptoms.
  • Drink ginger tea. It’s great for soothing the stomach, plus it offers antiviral and other antimicrobial properties if you’re fighting pathogens.
  • Avoid anti-inflammatory drugs and alcohol. This includes over-the-counter medications like ibuprofen (Advil) and naproxen (Aleve) as well as numerous prescription drugs. Both medications and alcohol contribute to ulcer formation in the stomach.

2. Enhance Sluggish Digestion

If your gut is dysfunctional and inflamed, odds are you’re producing less of the digestive enzymes and stomach acids you need to properly digest a meal. As a result, your liver gets congested, and food moves through the digestive process at an increasingly slower pace.

While you’re working to help restore your gut health, the following tips can help support digestive function until it’s back up to speed.

  • Take digestive enzymes. Supplementing with an assortment of enzymes (such as protease, amylase, alpha-galactosidase, lipase, and others) can help your body digest protein, fat, and carbs until it’s able to restore normal enzyme levels. It also promotes nutrient assimilation and conversion and excretion of waste.
  • Support normal liver and gallbladder function. To encourage healthy bile flow, take 400 mg of milk thistle daily. It contains silymarin, which is a powerful antioxidant and promoter of liver health. Additionally, the herbs andrographis and artichoke extract provide similar properties.
  • Sip apple cider vinegar (ACV). When taken with meals, ACV can help increase acidity in the stomach to support digestion, after which the acetic acid in vinegar is neutralized in the small intestine to acetate and absorbed into the bloodstream. Acetate can help dissolve calcium oxalate crystals in tissues that can contribute to kidney stone formation. Take 2 tablespoons of ACV in 6 ounces of water with a drizzle of honey with each meal. Note: If burning or discomfort occurs, use of ACV should be discontinued until gut healing is more advanced.
  • Normalize bowel function. Vitamins A, B, and C and minerals like zinc and magnesium help your body produce digestive enzymes, ease gut inflammation, and aid in the growth of beneficial bacteria. Note that excess vitamin C can be converted into oxalate, so don’t take more than 2,000 mg a day, and if it bothers you, nix it altogether.
  • Add omega-3 essential fatty acids to your diet. Found in krill oil, fish oil, flax oil, and borage oil, these beneficial oils reduce inflammation in the gut and encourage normal bowel movements.

3. Restore Bacterial Balance in the Gut

For significant intestinal dysfunction, antimicrobial supplements may be necessary to help facilitate the growth of beneficial bacteria and deter the growth of symptom-inducing microbes. Herbs with antimicrobial properties offer the advantage of inhibiting the growth of pathogenic organisms without adversely affecting normal bacterial flora. The good news is that once your gut health is reestablished, normal microbiome balance can generally be maintained with diet alone.

Here are some ways to restore bacterial balance in the gut:

  • Use herbs to reduce the pathogenic organisms. Gut-friendly herbs, including berberine, andrographis, cat’s claw, sarsaparilla, and garlic, support the growth of friendly, normal flora and suppress the growth of pathogenic bacteria. Coverage includes common pathogenic bacteria, yeast, and protozoa. These herbs can be used alone or in combination for a synergistic effect against problematic microbes.
  • Stock up on ginger. You’ll notice ginger is recommended for many aspects of gut health. Not only does it have the ability to soothe the lining of the stomach, but it offers activity against many common gut pathogens.
  • Eat prebiotic foods. Prebiotics like inulin and fructo-oligosaccharides are fibers that provide nourishment for favorable bacteria. These substances are found naturally in onions, garlic, chicory, and Jerusalem artichoke.
  • Increase your intake of fermented foods. Daily consumption of yogurt or other fermented foods is important for seeding the intestinal tract with favorable bacteria, but concentrations of bacteria in yogurt are often not adequate if significant dysbiosis, an imbalance in the gut bacteria, is present. Probiotics may provide additional support.
  • Consider probiotics. Evidence of probiotics’ benefits for various health concerns is marginal at best, but they have been shown to help folks with IBS. It’s really trial and error, however: Because every person’s gut microbiome is different, some people gain benefit from a probiotic and others do not. The best probiotic to consider for IBS is one that contains both lactobacillus and bifidobacteria species.

4. Manage Your Stress

Stubborn and overwhelming stress is often a primary driving force behind digestive dysfunction. That’s because chronic stress tells your body to stay ready to fight or flee, which in turn puts digestion on hold – it’s simply not a necessary function when you’re in survival mode.

This inhibits the movement of food from your stomach through your intestinal tract. Stress also halts the flow of bile in the liver and gallbladder, which normally aids in the digestion of fats and acts as the vehicle for carrying neutralized toxins out of the body.

As you can see, putting stress back in the box is essential for allowing the gastrointestinal tract to perform its job. Try the following tips for reining in stress and supporting normal digestion.

  • Take stress-modulating herbs. Herbs such as ashwagandha, Chinese tree bark, and l-theanine help maintain normal adrenal function, so your body is better able to handle stress. (The adrenal glands are responsible for allocating resources in the body and preparing the body for stress, including the secretion of stress hormones like adrenaline and cortisol.)
  • Practice gentle exercise and stretching. Mild forms of exercise such as yoga, qigong, and walking encourage relaxation and enhance digestion. In fact, research published in the journal Psychology, Health & Medicine found that walking twice a week helped IBS sufferers experience a decrease in overall GI symptoms and well as feelings of anxiety.
  • Prioritize sleep. If you’re not getting enough sleep, stress will remain your constant companion. Reach for herbs that promote healthy sleep, such as passion flower and motherwort. Bonus: Motherwort also helps reduce intestinal spasms.
  • Drink a mug of chamomile tea. Research suggests that sipping a cup of chamomile tea can help bring on both relaxation and sleep. It’s also excellent for calming the intestinal tract.

If you’re interested in trying an herbal approach to restoring gut health, I encourage you to learn more about my holistic gut health protocol. It includes many of the herbs I recommend above and used myself to overcome my own gut dysfunction, all in one easy-to-follow and comprehensive program.

Finally, remember that no matter where you’re at with gut health, patience and persistence pay off. With time and effort, digestive function will return to normal. You may always have to watch what you eat, but making smart lifestyle choices a central part of your everyday life will go a long way toward sustaining recovery.

Dr. Rawls is a physician who overcame Lyme disease through natural herbal therapy. You can learn more about Lyme disease in Dr. Rawls’ new best selling book, Unlocking Lyme.

You can also learn about Dr. Rawls’ personal journey in overcoming Lyme disease and fibromyalgia in his popular blog post, My Chronic Lyme Journey.

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For more:

https://madisonarealymesupportgroup.com/2018/01/03/the-invisible-universe-of-the-human-microbiome-msm/  Recitas, author of “The Plan,” calls MSM the wonder supplement for your gut. It can alleviate allergy symptoms, helps with detoxification, eliminates free radicals, and improves cell permeability. She states that with given time, MSM will start to actually repair damage caused by leaky gut – a common problem with Lyme/MSIDS patients. It can also help the body’s ability to absorb nutrients from food. Many Lyme patients struggle with paralysis of the gut where the muscles of the stomach and intestines stop being efficient. MSM helps this muscle tone as well.

https://madisonarealymesupportgroup.com/2018/09/15/prebiotics-probiotics-do-they-really-work-for-gut-health/

https://madisonarealymesupportgroup.com/2018/08/10/the-facts-about-candida-overgrowth-how-to-overcome-it/

 

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Activism, diet and nutrition, Gut Health, Herbs, Supplements, Treatment