LSD “helps alcoholics to give up drinking”, BBC News has today reported.
This unusual claim is based on a review examining research into the powerful hallucinogenic and its potential to treat alcoholism. The review analysed the results of six medical trials performed between 1966 and 1971, a time when LSD was still used for the treatment of some psychiatric conditions. Although it seems unthinkable now, the drug was prescribed to some patients until evidence began to suggest that it could cause long-term harm, leading it to be withdrawn.
Although the review suggested that LSD could help dependent people to stop drinking, the limitations of the quality, methods and age of the research gathered mean that the researchers cannot support using the drug to treat alcohol misuse or dependency. Since the research was conducted, social and medical perceptions of drug harms have changed considerably, and it is highly unlikely the benefits - if any - would outweigh the risks, particularly as there are now many options for helping people with alcohol problems.
LSD is a class A drug that is illegal to possess or sell. The effects of taking LSD are highly unpredictable, and while some individuals may experience enjoyable hallucinations it carries high risk of considerable personal and psychological harm, both at the time of taking the drug and in the longer-term.
Where did the story come from?
This study was carried out by researchers from the Norwegian University of Science and Technology (NTNU and Harvard Medical School. It was funded by the Research Council of Norway and published in the peer-reviewed Journal of Psychopharmacology.
The Daily Mail gives slightly overinflated coverage of this story, which doesn’t take into account the review’s numerous and significant limitations. BBC News does make it clear that the review looked at trials from the 1960s and 1970s.
What kind of research was this?
LSD (lysergic acid diethylamide was first created in a lab in the 1930s, and in the decades that followed there was great interest in whether the psychedelic chemical could have medical uses. As the drug significantly alters how people think and perceive their surroundings, there was some speculation that it could open patients’ minds to psychotherapy.
This speculation centred on whether the substance could help people with severe mental health problems, although it was also considered as a potential treatment for more minor conditions, such as anxiety and phobias. Given its perceived benefits, LSD was administered to psychiatric patients for several years; but as it became associated with recreational use and negative effects for patients, it was withdrawn from medical use.
According to the authors of this new research, numerous clinical investigators have claimed that treating alcoholics with individual doses of LSD in combination with psychosocial interventions may help prevent further alcohol misuse. They suggested this could work by allowing patients to understand better their behavioural patterns and therefore become motivated to build and maintain a sober lifestyle.
This was a systematic review and meta-analysis, which aimed to combine the results of all relevant trials that have used LSD (lysergic acid diethylamide to treat alcoholism. A systematic review of randomised controlled trials (RCTs is the best way of reviewing the available evidence on the health effects of a particular intervention. Systematic reviews are, however, often inherently limited by the different methods of the individual trials that they combine, including the populations they studied, how the intervention is given (such as frequency, dose and duration and outcomes measured.
What did the research involve?
The researchers searched PubMed and PsycINFO databases to identify any published trials that included key terms relating to LSD, alcohol and dependence. They included any RCTs of LSD treatment for alcoholism. In RCTs, an intervention such as LSD-use is compared with a “control treatment”, such as standard treatment or no specific treatment. The researchers described that the control treatments in eligible trials could involve any type of other treatment, including using “low doses” of LSD (up to 50 micrograms, which was lower than the intervention doses . Two reviewers analysed the studies and extracted data.
Primary outcomes of interest were alcohol misuse, which was defined as “alcohol use or consequences of alcohol use, as systematically measured by interview or self-report at the first reported follow-up”. Secondary outcomes of interest were alcohol misuse in the short-term (approximately three months , medium-term (approximately six months and longer-term (approximately 12 months . They also looked at reports of abstinence and adverse events. Where possible, they pooled the results of individual studies. If any trials had included people with psychiatric conditions such as schizophrenia or psychosis, the researchers excluded these from their analyses.
The researchers identified six eligible trials, all of which were dated between 1966 and 1971. Five trials were conducted in the USA and one in Canada. The trials included 536 individuals (general age range 30s-50s; all male except two females , of whom 61% were randomly assigned to receive “full-dose” LSD and 39% a control treatment or no intervention. The trials all gave a single oral dose of LSD as the intervention, with doses ranging between 210 and 800 micrograms (average 500 . Control conditions included “low-dose” LSD (25 or 50 micrograms , amphetamines, ephedrine sulphate (a stimulant drug or no drug treatment. All participants were said to be seeking treatment for alcoholism and had been admitted to alcohol-focused treatment programmes before being recruited to the trials.
The researchers said that the individual trials varied in their preparation for the LSD treatment session, with most studies providing only brief participant information, with often little or no description of the possible effects of LSD. During treatment, the most common procedure was described to be “simple observation with brief reassurance by clinical staff”. In only three studies did the treatment groups also receive clinical interviews, psychotherapy or active guidance. After the experimental drug session, only one study included multiple review sessions that reviewed the experiences during the drug session. The other five studies provided either only one brief review session or no review session at all.
All of the trials defined their methods for assessing the effects of the drug on alcohol use, but these varied between trials (such as using rating scales on alcohol use, assessing abstinence or using social adjustment rating scales .
What were the basic results?
Five trials gave “categorical” data (for example, whether a patient was improved or unimproved , and in these five trials 59% of those taking LSD (185 of 315 and 38% of controls (73 of 191 had improvements in their alcohol use at first follow-up. The pooled results of all six trials demonstrated increased odds of improvement in alcohol misuse, with LSD treatment compared to control ( odds ratio 1.96, 95% confidence interval 1.36 to 2.84 . This, they calculated, meant six people would need to be treated with LSD for one person to gain benefit at the time of first follow-up.
When the researchers divided the trials up into those assessing short-term (two to three months , medium-term (six months and longer-term effects (12 months , significant improvements were only seen at short- and medium-term follow-up.
Three trials reported on abstinence rates but only found a benefit of LSD at short-term follow-up.
In total the trials reported eight adverse reactions at the time of taking the drug. These included becoming agitated, acting “bizarrely” and having a seizure.
How did the researchers interpret the results?
The researchers concluded that “a single dose of LSD, in the context of various alcoholism treatment programmes, is associated with a decrease in alcohol misuse”.
Conclusion
Fifty years ago, researchers and doctors considered LSD to be a possible treatment for patients with mental health problems, until evidence showed that it could cause long-term psychological problems in some people. This review of six previous trials cannot be considered to provide evidence that LSD could be beneficial for people with alcohol problems. This is in no small part due to the questionable methods of the reviewed trials, the most recent of which was carried out 41 years ago.
Although LSD may have been considered suitable for testing in a trial at a time when its recreational use was quite common, it is highly unlikely that it would be considered now, given how considerably social and medical perceptions of drug harms have changed since then. This is notable by the attitudes displayed in the previous trials, which reportedly gave the participants very little information ahead of their LSD treatment session: most studies provided only brief participant information with often little or no description of the possible effects and risks of taking LSD. This would be considered unethical and unacceptable in trials today.
There was also very little follow-up of patients to see the long-term effects of taking LSD. Only one study included multiple review sessions assessing the individual’s experiences of taking the drug; the other five studies provided either only one brief review session or no review session at all. Therefore, how individuals are affected by taking LSD – regardless of its effects on their subsequent alcohol use - are unknown. At the time of taking the drug, there were eight reports of participants being agitated, acting “bizarrely”, having a seizure or having other “unspecified” adverse reactions.
LSD is a class A drug that is illegal to possess or sell. The effects of taking LSD are highly unpredictable, and while some individuals may experience “pleasant” hallucinations, the individual is putting themselves, and potentially others, at high risk of considerable personal and psychological harm, both at the time of taking the drug and in the long term.
Given the potential danger, it seems unlikely that LSD would be considered for future testing in people with alcohol dependence. It’s particularly important to note that we now have a range of medicines and psychological interventions for treating alcoholism that weren’t available at the time of this previous research.
Links To The Headlines
LSD 'helps alcoholics to give up drinking'. BBC News, March 9 2012
LSD could treat alcoholism because 'trips' make you reassess addiction. The Daily Telegraph, March 9 2012
Can LSD cure alcoholism? Trials show 59 per cent of problem drinkers improve after a single dose of powerful hallucinogen. Daily Mail, March 9 2012
Links To Science
Krebs TS, Johansen PO. Lysergic acid diethylamide (LSD for alcoholism: meta-analysis of randomized controlled trials. Journal of Psychopharmacology. Published online March 8 2012
A team of researchers at Duke University has determined the structure of a key molecule that can carry chemotherapy and anti-viral drugs into cells, which could help to create more effective drugs with fewer effects to healthy tissue.
"Knowing the structure and properties of the transporter molecule may be the key to changing the way that some chemotherapies, for example, could work in the body to prevent tumor growth," said senior author
Seok-Yong Lee, PhD, assistant professor of biochemistry at Duke.
The article was published in
Nature online on March 11.
The transporter molecule, called a concentrative nucleoside transporter, works by moving nucleosides, the building blocks of DNA and RNA, from the outside to the inside of cells. It also transports nucleoside-like chemo drugs through cell membranes.
Once inside the cells, the nucleoside-like drugs are modified into nucleotides that are incorporated into DNA in ways that prevent tumor cells from dividing and functioning.
"We discovered the structure of the transporter molecule, and now we believe it is possible to improve nucleoside drugs to be better recognized by a particular form of the transporter molecule that resides in certain types of tissue," Lee said. "Now we know the transporter molecule has three forms, which recognize different drugs and reside in different tissues."
The team determined the chemical and physical principles a transporter molecule uses to recognize the nucleosides, "so if you can improve the interactions between the transporter and the drug, you won't need as much of the drug to get it into the tumor cells efficiently," Lee said. "Knowing the shape of the transporters will let scientists design drugs that are recognized well by this transporter."
Because the drugs enter healthy cells as well as tumor cells, giving a lower dose of drug that targets tumor tissue would be the best scenario, said Lee, who is also a member of the
Duke Ion Channel Research Unit. "Healthy cells don't divide as often as tumor cells, so lowering the amount of drug given overall would be an effective approach to killing tumors while protecting patients."
The researchers studied transporter molecules from
Vibrio cholera
, a comma-shaped bacterium. The bacterial transporter serves as a good model system for studying human transporters because they share similar amino acid sequences. They found that both the human and bacterial transporter use a sodium gradient to import nucleosides and drugs into the cells.
The next step will be to try to understand which features of the transporter confer the ability to recognize certain chemo drugs and ultimately to design drugs that can easily enter the cells.
This work won a prize for Dr. Lee, the National Institute of General Medical Sciences Award, which he will receive at the Biophysical Society meeting in February.
The work was funded by the McKnight Endowment Fund for Neuroscience, the Alfred P. Sloan Foundation, the Klingenstein Fund, the Mallinckrodt Foundation, the Basil O'Connor Starter Scholar Research Award from the March of Dimes Foundation, and the NIH Director's New Innovator Award, in addition to start-up funds from the Duke University Medical Center.
Other authors include Zachary Lee Johnson and Cheom-Gil Cheong also of the Department of Biochemistry and the Ion Channel Research Unit.
“Stem cells beat kidney rejection,” says BBC News. The broadcaster says that an injection of stem cells given alongside a kidney transplant could remove the need for a lifetime of treatment to suppress the immune system.
The news is based on research detailing the outcomes of eight experimental kidney transplants where the organ came from a living donor. In addition to having their kidney removed, the donor also donated blood stem cells, which can develop into any type of blood cell, including immune system cells. After the recipient patient had received chemotherapy and radiotherapy to suppress their own immune system, the donor kidney and stem cells were transplanted. The aim was to help prevent the organ from being rejected by altering the recipient’s immune system to match that of the donor kidney. Five of the eight patients were able to have their immunosuppressant drugs reduced within one year. Furthermore, there was no evidence that the donor’s transplanted immune cells had started to attack the recipient’s healthy tissue, a possible complication of this type of treatment.
Although this is only early-stage research, the results of this small case series are promising and could have implications for the future of organ transplants, particularly in those cases where the donor and recipient are not an immunological match to each other.
Where did the story come from?
The study was carried out by researchers from Comprehensive Transplant Center, Northwestern Memorial Hospital, Chicago and other institutions in the US. Funding was provided by the US National Institute of Health; the Department of the Army, Office of Army Research; the National Foundation to Support Cell Transplant Research; the WM Keck Foundation; and the American Society of Transplant Surgeons Collaborative Scientist Award. The study was published in the peer-reviewed journal Science Translational Medicine.
The BBC News website provides good coverage of this research.
What kind of research was this?
This was a case series reporting on the results of eight patients receiving kidney transplants alongside haematopoietic stem cells (HSCs – cells that can develop into any type of blood cell . These were taken from “mismatched” donors (either related or unrelated to the recipient . If they are “mismatched”, the donor and recipient do not share the same human leukocyte antigens (HLAs , which are proteins located on the surface of immune cells and other cells in the body. The immune system recognises “foreign” HLAs and will attack cells that carry them, potentially leading to rejection. If donor cells carry the same HLAs there is less chance that the host’s immune cells would recognise the transplant tissue as foreign. This is why the ideal situation is to find a suitable HLA-matched donor for individuals awaiting a transplant, although this is often not possible.
The research investigates a theory known as “chimerism” (named after a mythical creature made up of parts of different animals , where the transplant recipient has both their own immune cells and those that come from the donor. The hope is that this will prevent the body from rejecting the transplant. However, there is a chance that this could increase the risk of what is known as graft versus host disease (GVHD , which is where the donor’s immune cells instead attack the healthy tissue of the host. HSC transplant also carries a risk of what is known as “engraftment syndrome”, which is characterised by a fever, skin rash and other symptoms.
What did the research involve?
This case series reported the outcomes of eight adults (age range 29-56 years who were receiving a kidney transplant from a living, unmatched donor. A special technique was used to retrieve relevant cells from the donor’s blood, including both HSCs and “graft facilitating cells” (FCs – which are a type of immune cell derived from HSCs .
Prior to transplant of the donor kidney and HSCs/FCs, the recipients were first treated with chemotherapy and radiotherapy to suppress their own immune system and reduce the chance of rejection. After the transplant they received continued treatment with two drugs to suppress their immune system and reduce the chance that their bodies would reject the transplant. They were discharged from hospital two days after the transplant and managed as outpatients.
The researchers monitored the patients to look at how the procedure was tolerated and whether GVHD or engraftment syndrome occurred.
What were the basic results?
By one month after transplant the level of chimerism in the recipients’ blood (where they demonstrated cell lines coming from both their own stem cells and the donor’s stem cells was reported to vary between 6 and 100%.
One patient developed a viral blood infection and blood clot in one of their kidney arteries two months after transplant. Two patients demonstrated only slight chimerism and were maintained on low-dose immunosuppressive treatment. However, five patients demonstrated “durable chimerism” and were able to be weaned from immunosuppressive treatment by one year. None of the recipients developed GVHD or engraftment syndrome.
How did the researchers interpret the results?
The researchers conclude that transplant of HSCs is a “safe, practical, and reproducible means of inducing durable chimerism”. It also appeared to be tolerated with no signs of GVHD or engraftment syndrome.
If confirmed in larger studies, the researchers say that this approach to transplantation could free some patients from the need for immunosuppressive treatment within one year of transplantation.
Conclusion
This research reported on the cases of eight patients who were receiving a kidney from an unmatched living donor. Alongside the kidney transplant, to the recipients were also given a transplant of the donor’s haematopoietic stem cells, which have the ability to transform into a range of blood cell types. The aim was that slightly altering the recipient’s immune system to produce cells that “matched” those of the donor kidney would help prevent the organ from being rejected. Five of the eight patients were able to have their immunosuppressant drugs reduced within one year. Furthermore, no patients developed a serious condition called graft versus host disease (where the donor’s transplanted immune cells start to attack the recipient’s healthy tissue , and no patients developed another complication of HSC transplant, known as engraftment syndrome, which includes fever, skin rash and other symptoms.
Importantly, this is only early-stage research, reporting the results of treatment in only eight people. Further follow-up in these patients will be needed, in addition to study in much wider groups of patients. However, the results are promising and could have implications for the future of kidney transplant and the transplant of other organs, particularly in people for whom it has not been possible to find a suitable matched donor.
Analysis by Bazian
Links To The Headlines
Stem cells beat kidney rejection. BBC news, March 9 2012
Breakthrough in kidney transplant 'could cut waiting list'. The Daily Telegraph, March 9 2012
Links To Science
Krebs TS Johansen PO. Lysergic acid diethylamide (LSD for alcoholism: meta-analysis of randomized controlled trials. Journal of Psychopharmacology, published online before print March 8 2012
By
JONATHAN D. ROCKOFF and
JOANN S. LUBLINFederal prosecutors in Washington, D.C., have rejected a roughly $1 billion proposed settlement to resolve allegations that
Johnson & Johnson promoted the antipsychotic drug Risperdal for unapproved uses, according to people familiar with the matter.J&J and the federal prosecutors in Philadelphia who had reached the tentative deal now must go back to the drawing board, because the officials in Washington are seeking a larger settlement, the people said.
Since 2004, federal prosecutors have been investigating Risperdal marketing by J&J's Janssen Pharmaceutical unit. Under federal law, firms can market a drug only for uses approved by the U.S. Food and Drug Administration, though doctors may prescribe drugs however they see fit.
Seeking to put the probe to rest, J&J and federal prosecutors in Philadelphia had reached a tentative settlement about two months ago, according to people familiar with the matter. But prosecutors at the Justice Department, who must sign off on any deal, rejected it within the past two weeks, the people said.
A spokeswoman for J&J referred to a Feb. 23 securities filing that described as "ongoing" the company's discussions with state and federal prosecutors to resolve civil claims stemming from investigations into the off-label promotion of Risperdal and another schizophrenia treatment, Invega.
The securities filing said J&J and federal prosecutors had reached an "agreement in principle" for the company to resolve potential criminal charges stemming from Risperdal marketing by pleading to a misdemeanor violation of the federal Food, Drug and Cosmetic Act.
A spokeswoman for the U.S. Attorney's Office in Philadelphia said it doesn't "confirm or deny investigations." A Justice Department spokesman declined to comment.
The Justice Department prosecutors are seeking a settlement of around $1.4 billion, the sum that
Eli Lilly & Co . agreed to in 2009 to resolve allegations it had improperly promoted its antipsychotic drug Zyprexa, according to one of the people familiar with the matter. Yet J&J officials have resisted paying that amount.An outright rejection of a deal is unusual, according to Shelley Slade, a former Justice Department health-care fraud lawyer who now represents whistleblowers suing drug makers. Ordinarily, prosecutors in a U.S. Attorney's Office work with counterparts in Washington, D.C., to find mutually agreeable terms, Ms. Slade said.
"It's not unusual for there to be disagreements along the way, but for things to get so far down the road where there is what I would say is a handshake deal" is "highly unusual," said Ms. Slade, who isn't involved in the Risperdal case.
Risperdal is a pill approved for treating schizophrenia and bipolar disorder. It had been one of J&J's top-selling drugs, generating more than $2.2 billion in U.S. sales in 2007, before its U.S. patent expired.
In January, J&J agreed to pay $158 million to settle a lawsuit alleging that company marketing caused Texas's Medicaid program to overpay for Risperdal.
Write to Jonathan D. Rockoff at
jonathan.rockoff@wsj.com and Joann S. Lublin at
joann.lublin@wsj.com
Four days later, Bandit collapsed on the floor.
He was soon experiencing bloody diarrhea, and by the time Higginbotham and her mother got him to his veterinarian, his organs were shutting down. His liver showed that he had eaten something toxic. Certain that Bandit's inexplicable illness had already become too severe, the veterinarian suggested putting him down, and Higginbotham's mother and son agreed.
But she refused, and after nearly $4,000 in medical bills and three weeks of intensive nursing that included in-home I.V. care, Bandit recovered. The vet could not conclusively link the chicken jerky to the illness, but Higginbotham said he thought it could be the cause.
Bandit's puppyish spark has come back, but Higginbotham remains anxious, feeling an overwhelming sense of helplessness over what she might be feeding her dog. At the opposite corner of the country, in Eastern Florida, Danielle Kinard-Friedman's story did not end as well. Two weeks ago, Millie, her 18-month-old yellow Labrador, began vomiting bile after weeks of growing progressively more lethargic.
When Millie wouldn't eat anything, Kinard-Friedman took her to a vet. Blood tests revealed that Millie was experiencing kidney failure, and so she spent a week in an emergency pet clinic receiving intensive treatment that eventually proved futile. She was put down this past Sunday.
It was Millie's vet who asked Kinard-Friedman if she had been feeding her dog chicken jerky treats. She had. In fact, she had just started buying the treats -- under a different brand-name from Bandit's -- two months prior.
The vet then asked a more alarming question: Was the chicken from China? She had no idea, but she checked the label as soon as she got home. It was. When Higginbotham checked her treats, she found the same thing. Their vets could not prove anything, but both suspected the treats had sickened the dogs.
Higginbotham and Kinard-Friedman have now joined thousands of pet owners speaking out on the Internet and asking the government to force a recall of chicken jerky dog treats made from Chinese chicken. Concerns over the issue first arose in 2007, when the U.S. Food and Drug Administration began receiving reports of sickened dogs, all with the apparent common denominator of chicken jerky treats from China.
Since then, the FDA has performed hundreds of tests on chicken jerky samples and has not yet found any contaminant to explain the illnesses.
Regardless, the movement has continued to gain significant momentum. In the past month, it even got the attention of Ohio's Sen. Sherrod Brown and Rep. Dennis Kucinich after Ohio resident Candace Thaxton contacted them about two of her dogs who fell ill.
Until a cause is uncovered, owners and lawmakers say they will continue requesting that the FDA make the issue a priority, while the 15 companies implicated by consumers see no empirical evidence to justify recalling their products.
Congressmen and FDA sink their teeth in
On February 7, Brown brought the issue to the Senate floor, saying he had urged the Food and Drug Administration to accelerate its investigation into these chicken jerky treats -- found under multiple brand names but all sourced from China -- that appeared to be sickening dogs across the country. Two weeks later, the senator held a press conference and issued a news release again urging the FDA to act swiftly.
Back on Nov. 18, 2011, the FDA cautioned consumers that chicken jerky dog treats from China may be associated with a rising number of dog illnesses. This followed earlier warnings of the same issue in September 2007 and December 2008. After a drop in 2009 and 2010, reports of dog illnesses have spiked once again.
The November 2011 FDA notice warned dog owners who purchased chicken jerky to monitor their pets for decreased appetite, decreased activity, vomiting, diarrhea (including bloody , increased urination or increased water consumption. If any of those symptoms worsen or last more than 24 hours, owners should bring their dog to a vet, the notice said. Blood tests could indicate kidney failure, while urine tests might indicate Fanconi Syndrome, a disorder that results in nutrients normally absorbed into the bloodstream instead being released through urine.
On Wednesday, an FDA spokesperson confirmed to Food Safety News that the agency has recently received more than 600 reports from dog owners who say their pets have fallen ill because of jerky products made from Chinese chicken.
Since the issue first arose in September 2007, the FDA has run numerous chemical and microbial tests on Chinese chicken jerky samples in search of a contaminant. Though the agency said it could not conclude anything from the test results, the details remained under wraps until March 1, when an FDA document describing tests dating back to 2007 was sent to Kucinich's office. According to a Kucinich aid, the congressman "took them to task" at a briefing in order to get the information.
The one-page document outlines 241 tests for potential contaminants and 130 tests with pending results, none of which conclusively link the jerky to contaminants at dangerous levels. The 2012 tests with results still pending, however, are searching for heavy metals.
The Kucinich aid and many pet owners said they hope those latest tests might finally link the treats to a toxic substance and resolve the mystery of their pets' problems. The FDA has stated repeatedly that it will continue to actively investigate the issue.
According to the FDA, at least one Australian chicken jerky manufacturer has issued a recall of its products made from Chinese chicken, calling the move a precautionary measure.
The manufacturer may be mindful of March 2007, when hundreds of pet illnesses linked to melamine-contaminated Chinese ingredients prompted the recall of thousands of pet food products in the U.S., Europe and South Africa. In the U.S., the FDA received thousands of reports of dogs and cats dying from kidney failure, but confirmed very few cases.
More consumers come forward, but pet food industry says they're not to blame
A month ago, the private Facebook group called "Animal Parents Against Pet Treats Made in China!" had roughly 100 members. Today, the number has exploded to more than 2,500. One petition demanding the ban of jerky treats from China has acquired more than 3,000 signatures.
Susan Rhodes created another petition on March 3. She has asked the FDA to recall the jerky treats after she found that her dog, Ginger, had suffered permanent kidney damage and was losing weight at an alarming rate. Rhodes said she had been feeding the treats to Ginger for the past two years. Days after creating the petition, she has racked up more than 300 signatures from dog owners reporting similar diagnoses. Media coverage and word of mouth have brought a tidal wave of attention to the manufacturers of these treats. Some of the snowballing coverage, however, might lead some pet owners to incorrectly blame other health problems on the treats, said Kurt Gallagher, spokesperson for the Pet Food Institute, an industry education and public relations resource.
"Pet food companies want to make safe, nutritious products. It's their top priority," Gallagher told Food Safety News. "When everyone's talking about something like this, I think there's heightened awareness and sensitivity for pet owners looking for it."
Gallagher recommended pet owners take any sick pets to a vet to get a clinical opinion before diagnosing any issues themselves. If the vet considers pointing a finger at a certain food, the owners should contact the food manufacturer. Food companies should be tracking their complaints and looking for patterns and problems within their food supply, he said.
Pet owners have been quick to amass lists of jerky manufacturers sourcing their chicken from China. Rhodes' petition, for example, names 15 such companies.
A spokesperson for a dog treat company at the center of the furor reiterated that the FDA's testing has not found any contaminants and so his company has no reason to believe their product has sickened dogs. The company has a comprehensive food safety system at their Chinese facilities, he said, including quality control inspectors who monitor for safety.
He added that his company appreciated hearing from concerned customers, and emphasized that anecdotal evidence, however pervasive, does not prove causation.
"Obviously, we take food safety very seriously," he said. "Millions of dogs enjoy our products without ever getting sick."
Multiple pet owners have told Food Safety News that the spokesperson's company has backed away from its original intention to offer customers small monetary settlements for harm their jerky might have caused pets. According to sources, once the complaints reached a certain volume, spokespeople for the company told customers that providing any settlements would be an admission of guilt.
Made in "America"?
Blogger Mollie Morrissette has been following the chicken jerky developments for more than a year on her website, Poisoned Pets. She said that the issue has reached a sort of tipping point in the last month, with more and more pet owners speaking up about sick dogs.
"I get letters every day from broken-hearted pet parents -- people who had to put down their beloved family dog or five month-old puppy," she said. "They all fed their dogs chicken jerky."
One issue frustrating pet owners, Morrissette said, is that many of these dog treat packages boast that they are made in the U.S., though the fine print on the package often reveals that the chicken actually comes from China, where a cultural preference for dark meat makes for cheap white meat.
These "country of origin" claims are made possible by laws that say that once an ingredient is "substantially" altered in a given country, the resulting food can be considered a product of that country. These alterations can include cooking, mixing or otherwise reprocessing the ingredients in some way.
Just as oranges from Brazil can be turned into Canadian orange juice, chicken jerky from China can be reprocessed and repackaged in the U.S. to become a U.S. product. This can trick consumers into a false sense of security about the safety of their pet's food, Morrissette said.
Higginbotham said that the brand of jerky she bought for Bandit claimed to be "Proudly manufactured by an American company." Kinard-Friedman believed the same thing about the jerky she fed to Millie.
Morrissette said that pet owners feel helpless as they wait for some sort of justice on behalf of their pet, and she criticized the FDA for what she saw as a lack of urgency in investigating the illnesses.
"A lot of these pet parents are just wringing their hands, hoping the FDA will find some sort of answer," she said. "If this was [potentially contaminated] baby formula, we would have had the answer when it started five years ago. It would all get pulled off the shelves out of caution as soon as anyone suspected it might be contaminated."
Owners say they won't back down until they have an answer
Candace Thaxton, the woman who spurred Senator Brown and Congressman Kucinich into action, has more than one dog motivating her to uncover that answer.
In November 2011, when her 10-year-old pug, Chansey, started urinating unusually often and refusing to eat, Thaxton assumed they were just signs that the dog was getting old.
Chansey's health quickly deteriorated. At a vet appointment, Thaxton learned that the dog's kidneys had shut down and she would need intensive medical treatment to recover, if it was possible at all. Thinking their dog had naturally reached end of her life, the Thaxtons chose to have her put down.
Within weeks, the family had adopted a mixed-breed "pixie" puppy named Penny, who earned a pristine bill of health at her first vet appointment.
Right around Christmas Day, Thaxton ran out of the treats that came with Penny when she was adopted, so she started feeding her Chansey's leftover treats: chicken jerky. Chansey had never eaten jerky until weeks before she grew sick. She died with her first bag half-finished.
In the weeks that followed, Penny started urinating more than usual. After New Year's Day, Thaxton saw a news story online about the FDA's warning for chicken jerky made from China. She checked her bag of treats, which said it was from South Carolina.
Then she noticed the text over the barcode: "Made In China."
Thaxton stopped feeding her the treats, but Penny started vomiting. When the vet saw her, she showed all the same symptoms as Chansey.
"Her kidneys were worse than Chansey's," Thaxton said. Penny went on 24-hour surveillance at an emergency pet clinic. She recovered a week later, but Thaxton was just getting started.
"Candace went to bat," Morrissette said. "She's the driving force behind all of this, all the publicity."
Thaxton filed two complaints with the treat manufacturer -- one for Chansey, one for Penny. It looked like she was going to at least get a settlement amount to cover part of her $3,000 vet bill, but the company eventually rescinded as more complaints began to pour in, Thaxton said.
Even before the settlement talks broke down, Thaxton's story had run on two local news channels. When she was ultimately refused payment, Thaxton promised the company she would take the issue national within the week.
"By Friday night, Congressman Kucinich had written a letter to the FDA. By Monday, I had a press conference with Senator Brown," she said. "We've had two more conferences since then. I talked to Inside Edition. I told them I was going to be the one who pushed. I'm not stopping now."
Like Thaxton, other pet owners seem determined to keep the pressure on FDA to find answers and hold any guilty party responsible. For many, a sense of uncertainty, frustration, and even guilt, lingers.
"Pets are part of your family. When they die, you lose a family member," Higginbotham said. "I'm dealing with a lot of guilt over this. I'm the one who feeds my dog and is supposed to make sure he's safe and healthy. How do I do that if I can't even trust his food?"
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Photo captions, from top to bottom:
- Bandit, Maria Higginbotham's dog
- Ginger, Susan Rhodes' dog
- Sarge, Ray Parker's dog. Sarge, a seven year-old chow-corgi mix, fell ill soon after eating a single chicken jerky dog treat, Parker said. After nearly two weeks of clinical treatment, including intensive critical care, Sarge was put down.
- Chansey, Candace Thaxton's dog
via
TVR:
In case they didn’t cover it in your weekly programming, the biggest debt write-down in human history occured on 3.9.12.
SDA Announces a Credit Event Has Occurred
No need to worry, the ISDA, IMF, ECB, US Fed, Euro Zone Leaders and every other Frankenstein group have everything under control. Don’t worry that they changed their minds more times than your wife changes shoes before coming to this “solution.” This time they’re sure. Sure this is going to be a huge benefit to the Greek people. Sure the triggering of CDS’ in no threat to financial institutions and sure overall payouts will be around the $3.2B in net outstanding CDS contracts linked to Greece. And sure the exact level of payouts will be determined on March 19. I am sure not one of these sureties is accurate.
The biggest debt writedown in history, will be followed-up with additional bailout funds being given to the money masters, I mean the poor people of Greece. It’s for the children. IMF head, Christine Lagarde wants to contribute $36.4B from the IMF to the $169B upcoming bailout. Ms. Lagarde says this will be needed to avoid a disorderly default that could be destabilizing. I guess skyrocketing suicide rates and pleas from Greek parents to give their children up for adoption is considered stable. Their oppression reeks of their greed and disgrace.
The restructuring will shave $138B off Greece’s $487B debt. Non-elected Minister Lucas Papademos called the deal a “historic success”. He continued, “For the first time, Greece is not adding debt but taking debt off the backs of its citizens.” You’ll have to forgive Papademon, like his friends, he often confuses the words debt and money. I’m sure he meant that they would be taking money off the backs of its citizens. Forget about the upcoming madness with Spain, Portugal, France and finally the US. Do you really think the “net” 3.2B CDS Greek exposure is the true liability? I’ll help you with the answer. If they sold a couple hundred billion in fictitious insurance and immediately took the proceeds and levered them, say a 100x and dumped it on themselves, proclaiming, “It’s raining!”, do you think they will be able to cover the insurance claims now? I guess we’ll find out if chopping off the head of a zombie bank can really kill them.
Institutions Will Not Enter the Gold Market in Force
Worth their weight in paper – It is my belief that financial institutions will not play a large role in this gold bull market until it is too late. I want to clarify that I am not referring to central banks or Sovereign Wealth Funds that are already some of the biggest players in this bull market, especially those in the East, like China. Rather, I am referring to the investment banks, securities firms, mutual fund and insurance companies.
Comments like those made by Warren Buffet in this year’s annual letter to Berkshire Hathaway shareholders are indicative of the feelings of many money managers and executives in the financial sector. Warren stated gold is an asset that is “forever unproductive” and that “it [gold] will never produce anything.” The common belief is that gold is not an investment, but a speculation. This is because money managers don’t understand gold or how to value it. More on how to value gold later.
Gold doesn’t pay a dividend and doesn’t generate easy transaction or administrative costs. Many investment managers I work with don’t even consider gold an asset. The whole system is built so that each component works together – they facilitate deals, offer services and issue and sell paper for profit. It’s a symbiotic relationship between all groups that will not be broken. Gold is not part of their business model. It is for this reason that I believe institutions will not be large players in the gold market and will ultimately be severely impacted by the dollar collapse. The coming currency collapse will destroy the entire financial system. They are a ship of fools sailing off a cliff.
The Manipulation of Markets Will Only Increase Until They Don’t
We have reached the point where manipulation (aka policies by governments and government sponsored entities need to continuously increase to keep the debt-based monetary system from collapsing. Similar to the fictitious interest rates in the US Bond Markets, the gold and silver manipulations must continue until the last. No matter how you choose to store savings, you should understand the manipulations will continue until they cannot any longer. If you can understand how this will end, you will not only be able to handle the short-term volatility, but will see it as a gift.
Like a thief in the night, the financial system’s ship of fools will find their gold has been removed and they’ve thrown their silver away.
How to Value Gold
I believe James Turk has the best way to value gold. Keep in mind using this formula assumes that 5,000 years of history is not wrong and in fact gold is still money. I tend to put more faith in 5,000 years of human behavior than digits on my computer. James determines “fair value” by dividing Central Bank Foreign Exchange Reserves by Central Bank Gold Reserves. Using this calculation, the “fair value” of gold is over $11,000/oz and rising. How high’s the water Mama? $1,700 and rising.
Gold Oil Ratio (GOR
Last week I mentioned that the price of oil was dropping versus gold, as I would expect in either a hyperinflationary or hyperdeflationary depression that coincides with a financial collapse. In 2005, the GOR was 6.6 barrels of oil/oz of gold. Today, the price of oil has dropped to about 16 barrels/oz. That means I can buy almost 2 ? times the amount of oil for the same amount of gold. The historical norm is between 15-20 barrels/oz – so we are around the historical average now. I know about peak oil and peak everything theories. Whether peak oil is true or not, it’s going to feel like peak oil if your savings is in USDs.
Rising Taxes
With budget deficits running completely out of control, new and existing taxes are going to be levied on the public. We have new taxes for ObamaCare and the potential for the Bush tax cuts to expire in 2013. All told, 41 separate tax provisions are set to expire this year, ranging from personal to estate taxes. In addition, there has been a 2013 proposal that could reduce the tax benefit of employee deferrals into a qualified retirement plan for certain high income individuals. We’re talking 401Ks and the like. The proposal would tax deferrals at a rate that is the difference between the employee’s tax rate for ordinary income and 28%. It is unclear whether this proposal will gain traction, but what is clear is the direction of future taxation to support ever growing debts.
No matter how high existing taxes go or how many new taxes are implemented; there is no way to cover the shortfalls. John Williams of SGS noted that even if the US were to tax 100% of all wages and corporate profits, they could still not cover the bill. Unfortunately, this won’t stop them from trying. The whole debate about who should pay what, is a perfect example of how the conversation is being directed. We are following their script without ever questioning why. How in the world are we ever going to pay them what they demand if they keep taking it out at a faster rate? Catherine Austin Fitts put it best by saying, “A negative economy is like having a hole in the milk bucket; it’s time we fixed the hole and filled up the bucket!” I’m not just talking about a little waste. I’m referring to the outright theft by those with access and power.
There’s a Hole in the Bucket
There are many holes in the bucket. A few examples include:
1 Federal housing programs like the FHA and HUD – Time Magazine exposed a scandal at the FHA where real estate speculators used the program to make huge profits at the expense of the poor. Builders pocket millions of profits from mortgage loans that far exceeded the cost of construction. These programs allow the government to write bank checks to those involved in the contracts. In the 1980’s it was disclosed that senior HUD staff used their positions for personal gain and when they left their positions they used inside contacts to win subsidies and new contracts. In 1981 Sam Pierce became Secretary of HUD under Ronald Reagan. After leaving his office, the US Office of the Independent Counsel and US Congress investigated mismanagement and abuse stemming from political favoritism. Through the 1990s many of Pierce’s closest aides were charged and convicted of felonies for inappropriate expenditures, but Pierce himself was not charged. HUD provides about $8B a year to public housing authorities (PHAs .
In 2006, The Miami Herald ran a series exposing the following examples of fraud and corruption:
• The PHA gave developers and nonprofit groups with political connections millions of dollars to build affordable housing, but they ended up building shoddy houses or no houses at all.
• HUD gave the PHA $35 million to tear down dilapidated public housing and replace it with new affordable housing. Six years later, half the money was gone and only three houses had been built.
• Instead of selling new houses to low-income buyers, the PHA allowed developers to make sales to wealthy investors who then “flipped” them for a profit.
2 Medicare and Medicaid – Theft in these two federal health programs range well into the 100’s of billions annually. Malcolm Sparrow of Harvard University, a top specialist in health care fraud thinks it’s likely that between $200-500B/year is lost to fraud (theft between these two programs.
3 Food Stamps – $1.7B/year lost to fraud
4 School Lunches – $1.4B/year lost to fraud
5 Supplemental Social Security – $4.6B/year lost to fraud
6 Unemployment Insurance – $4B/year lost to fraud
7 Temporary Assistance for Needy Families – $1.7B/year lost to fraud
And if we wanted to get belligerent, we could mention the Wachovia money laundering scam using funds from the Mexican (CIA drug cartel. To be fair to Wachovia, they were fined 1/3rd of a cent for each dollar laundered.
The hole gets bigger yet. We’ve got to pay for their military. And I mean “their” military. The American people are not asking to drop more bombs, they are being told. It’s a complicated agenda that we wouldn’t understand, so they have to choose for us. It’s for our own good of course. If it wasn’t already clear, they like to give you a second serving. In June 2011, The White House told Congress and America why it didn’t need their approval for military action in Libya. It was because it wasn’t a war – they should just say it’s because “we say so”.
General Smedley Butler, two-time recipient of the Congressional Medal of Honor put it best: “War is just a racket. A racket is best described, I believe, as something that is not what it seems to the majority of people. Only a small inside group knows what it is about. It is conducted for the benefit of the very few at the expense of the masses.”
The US taxpayer is funding global military operations in a big way. We have over 700 military bases in 130 different countries. The reported military budget for the US is $700B/year. More than the top 14 countries (excluding the US combined. Including off-the-books war costs, the annual US military spending is estimated to be about $1.25T. To add insult to injury, Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld publicly stated on September 10, 2001 that “According to some estimates we cannot track $2.3 trillion in transactions.”
There’s a hole in the bucket and it’s getting bigger. It’s a massive gaping hole of fraud and abuse, waste of hard-earned tax dollars, corporate exploitation, criminal-predatory lending and governmental tyranny. Deceit masked in thousand page bills. There’s a hole in the bucket and we need to fix it.
Market Thoughts
Walking a Tightrope
Think of the market as a man walking on a tightrope with each arm tied to a team of horses. On one arm are the natural forces of deflation, on the other are the unholy forces of central bank intervention. The horses pull harder with each passing day, making it ever more difficult for the man to balance himself. As he wobbles with volatility, the crowd wonders which team of horses will succumb. Some betting on hyperinflation, others on hyperdeflation. All seeming to understand the man must fall eventually. Given the collapse in inevitable, CBs will ensure it’s not a deflationary collapse. They’ve already stated this and back-stopping banking deposits alone will require full-speed printing (FDIC is broke too . Collapse due to a deflationary spiral is a certainty, while printing is more profitable for those in control and postpones the day of reckoning the longest, if they can just keep their team of horses in equilibrium with the
deflationary horses. In the meantime, holding a portion of your portfolio in cash is a prudent option. Of course the amount you hold in cash depends on your situation. I am extremely bearish on the U$D and still hold over 20% in cash. I accept the 10% annual hit from inflation – it is the cost of protecting my PMs and it may allow me to take advantage of buying opportunities should the man, I mean market, wobble violently.
Unlimited Dollar Swaps
On the interventionist team, the US Fed is supplying an unlimited amount of dollars to the world via the dollar swap agreements. On Nov. 30, 2011, the world’s G6 central banks (the Federal Reserve, the Bank of England, the Bank of Japan, the European Central Bank [ECB], the Swiss National Bank, and the Bank of Canada announced “coordinated actions to enhance their capacity to provide liquidity support to the global financial system”. Under this agreement, The US Fed will offer unlimited amounts of US dollars to other central banks at the US dollar overnight index swap rate (OIS plus 50 basis points (about 1% . These freshly printed dollars are being lent to the CBs respective banks, so that withdrawals and debt payments can be met. These swaps are, and will continue to be offered with no limitation until at least Feb 1, 2013.
Near-Term Market Movements
The US trade gap for December widened to a record $52.5B. More importantly, we have the Greek CDS’ and incredible debt financing to deal with this month. You know what we need to solve this nagging issue of insolvency? More credit! Or debt, or money, or whatever they call that digital and paper shit they are so good at creating. The “pushers” will probably make you
ask nicely, but not too worry, the doctor’s here and he’s got his syringe ready. The new injection will have its desired affect – junky affect. I’m expecting a continued downward movement in the world’s stock markets through the end of March and into early April. Any attempts at rallying will be met with new fears over the expanding debt tsunami. It’ll be plenty choppy – the risk is on the downside. I wouldn’t be caught shorting stocks, but I consider any allocation risky. PMs and commodities will move much higher beginning in April. $2000 gold and $50 silver by July.
God Bless,
~David Freedom
Click for the supplemental editorial audio.
Once a juicer, always a juicer?
That may indeed be the case as Jose Canseco's attempt to play in the Mexican Baseball League ended on Wednesday after league officials said the former star admitted to taking a banned substance without a prescription.
League president Plinio Escalante
told ESPN Deportes that the banned substance was testosterone and that Canseco refused to take a drug test.
The 47-year-old former slugger had been trying out with the Quintana Roo Tigers, publicly stating that it was his goal
to again play in the major leagues one day. The Mexican League is Triple-A level ball, but teams do not share any affiliation with MLB franchises.
Still, it was better than the independent league ball that Canseco had been playing in.
As has been his custom, Canseco took to his Twitter account and defended himself with a flurry of stream-of-consciousness tweets:
"How can I test positive when I never took any test don't believe everything the media tells you.the truth always comes out I am not using any illegal substanced,"
he wrote from @josecanseco. "All I am on is prescription medication for low testosterone .legal and very important for my health."
Whether it's explaining why
he sent his twin brother to box for him or
professing his love for Lady Gaga, Canseco's uninhibited tweets have always been a particularly sad piece of theater. He has become the ultimate outsider in a sport that he turned upside down with the revelatory publication of "Juiced" back in 2005.
[Rewind:
Jose Canseco demands $2,000 for blog interview]
That Canseco would be injecting testosterone into his aging body as he continues his delusional "dream" to play big-league baseball would be no surprise if true, of course.
It would also be no surprise if Canseco's claims that years of steroid use have driven his testosterone to low levels that would necessitate these injections.
Either way, it's against baseball's rules to take unauthorized testosterone for any reason if you want to play the game. Canseco made this sad world for himself, but it'll always be impossible for him to acknowledge that.
Spring training has started, so don't miss a beat ...
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