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Non-Toxic Pesticides Round Up

Blog Of The Week

Thursday, June 28, 2012

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We asked our Healthy Child Network what they do to get rid of pests in their homes. Here are some great advice they sent us! Remember to go to their blogs to read the full articles.

Lori from Groovy Green Livin’ educates us about 3 Mosquito Repelling Plants:

Pot of basil

Basil is a known mosquito repellent (it’s also known to repel flies). Planting fresh basil around your outdoor eating areas is a simple way to repel those pesky mosquitoes. If there’s no time to grow your own pick up fresh basil at your local farmers market or supermarket and place it in a vase on the table. If mosquitoes are circling your head and buzzing in your ear while you are trying to catch some z’s place a vase of basil on your night table to keep the mosquito and the buzzing away.

Catnip

Catnip is a natural mosquito repellent. “Catnip” is the common name for a perennial herb of the mint family. It is native to Europe and is an import to the United States and other countries. The catnip plant is now a widespread weed in North America. In August 2010, entomologists at Iowa State University reported to the American Chemical Society that catnip is ten times more effective than DEET.

To grow your own catnip you’ll need a perennial herb called Nepeta cataria, which can be found at a nursery or by purchasing the seeds online. Line your yard with catnip to ward off mosquitoes. Another option is to place catnip oil directly on your skin. Note of caution to cat owners-cats might find you irresistible.

Citronella

Citronella has been a known mosquito repellent for quite some time. You can find citronella scented candles, bracelets, buckets and sprays. The scent from the citronella plant itself is your best bet in keeping the mosquitoes away since that provides the strongest protection. Citronella’s strong smell tends to mask your scent, making it harder for mosquitoes to find you.

According to eartheasy, Citronella is a perennial ‘clumping’ grass which grows to a height of 5 – 6 feet. It can be grown directly in the ground in climate zones where frost does not occur. If grown in the garden or near the patio, it should be planted in the ‘background’, behind small decorative flowers and shrubs. In northern climate zones citronella can be grown in a large pot or planter, ideally with casters, so it can be rolled indoors during winter.

Hilary from Accidentally Green teaches us a lot of home prevention methods in Make Your Own Insect Repellent:

1. Cut the leaves and stems of catmint and rosemary, then place in a container and cover with a cup of boiling water. Steep for an hour, cool and use the herbal tea as a repellent spray.
2. Crush parsley and mix with apple cider vinegar. Rub the mixture on your skin.
3. Place a handful of fresh basil leaves into a glass measuring cup. Pour 1/2 cup of boiling water over the basil. Let the leaves steep for two to four hours. Squeeze the basil leaves to get out as much of the liquid as possible. Pour the infused liquid into a spray bottle. Add 1/2 cup of vodka to the squirt bottle. Shake gently to mix the contents and apply this all-natural insect repellent by spraying it on your skin. (While this mixture is safe, especially compared to DEET brands, be sure to keep out of the reach of children.)

The great news? Not only does this keep mosquitoes away, but ticks are repelled by basil, too.

Kristina of The Greening of Westford shows us a simple way to get rid of fruit flies in Fruit Flies Be Gone:

How do I deal with the fruit flies? Fruit flies are pretty easy to deal with without using any sort of pesticides. All you need – a small glass, apple cider vinegar and some plastic wrap. Don’t use your good, expensive apple cider vinegar (ACV) with The Mother; cheap store brand works great.

1. Fill the glass with about an inch or so of ACV
2. Place some plastic wrap over the top and poke some holes.
3. Sit it by your fruit bowl.The fruit flies, attracted to the ACV, crawl in through the holes then can’t get out.
4. You’ll need to change the vinegar every few days. It loses its effectiveness.

I used to use a piece of paper wrapped into a cone shape stuck in a jar for years. It worked, but it’s a pain when you have to change the vinegar. I find this method much easier.

April of Frugally Green Mom shares Green Ways to Keep Pests At Bay:

Living in Florida, we have more than our fair share of bugs to deal with! I’m not fond of bugs, but I also want to limit my family’s exposure to DEET. Fortunately, there are a lot of options out there to help keep bugs at bay!

Mosquitos:

1. Remove standing water from your yard.
2. When grilling, throw sage or rosemary on the coals to keep the mosquitos away.
3. Add 2 tsp of vanilla extract to a water-filled spray bottle.
4. Fill a spray bottle with equal parts of water and witch hazel, then add 10 drops of essential oil. You can add more or less essential oil at your discretion. Best bets are citronella, lemon grass, lavendar or eucalyptus—mosquitos hate these scents!

Got ants problems? Take a look at the all natural ants deterrent from Trina at O’Boy Organic:

• Get a small spray bottle and fill it with soapy water. When you see the ants just give them a good spray.
• Don’t throw those cucumber peels in the compost just yet, set them out where you are having issues with the ants, placing either the peels or slices on a small towel or directly on the counter. Ants have a natural aversion to cucumbers so once they come near, hopefully they will turn around and go home.
• Got fresh Mint or Mint tea bags? Leave them around where you see those ants, it also works as a natural deterrent
• Now if you can find where these little suckers are coming from then mix cayenne pepper, citrus oil, lemon juice, cinnamon or coffee grounds in a small container. Soak some cooking string in the mixture then lay in the path of where they are coming from.
• Mix one liter of water to 1 teaspoon of borax and a cup of sugar. Soak cotton balls in the mixture and then place them in a small container such as a used yogurt container with lid. Make small holes in the lid so the ants can get through, they will take bait back to the others where it will eventually kill the colony. IMPORTANT: Use indoors only and keep away from pets and children.

Read more: http://www.healthychild.org/blog/comments/0622812_non-toxic_pesticides_round_up/#ixzz1zDbOEaRe

Tony Budden of 'Hemporium SA' - The Global Benefits of HEMP

High and Dry: Why Genetic Engineering is Not Solving Agriculture's Drought Problem in a Thirsty World | Union of Concerned Scientists

High and Dry: Why Genetic Engineering is Not Solving Agriculture's Drought Problem in a Thirsty World | Union of Concerned Scientists

High and Dry is the third in a series of reports highlighting genetic engineering’s limitations and demonstrating the importance of increasing public investment in more effective—but often neglected—agricultural technologies. The first two reports in the series are Failure to Yield and No Sure Fix.

Droughts can be devastating to farmers and to the people who depend on the food those farmers produce. The historic Texas drought of 2011 caused a record $5.2 billion in agricultural losses, making it the most costly drought on record.

While extreme droughts capture the most attention, mild and moderate droughts are more common and collectively cause extensive damage. Climate scientists expect the frequency and severity of such droughts to increase as the global climate heats up.

Furthermore, agriculture accounts for the lion's share of water extracted from rivers and wells, setting up conflicts between food production and other uses. Other important organisms, such as fish, also compete with humans for fresh water. So there is a vital need for crop improvements that will increase drought tolerance and water use efficiency (WUE).

Biotechnology companies such as Monsanto have held out the promise that genetic engineering can accomplish these goals, creating new crop varieties that can thrive under drought conditions and reduce water demand even under normal conditions. High and Dry offers an analysis of the prospects for delivering on that promise.

Extent and severity of drought conditions in the U.S. on August 30, 2011. The darker areas are regions of severe to exceptional drought where cspB corn would likely be of little use. (Click on map for larger version with legend.)

A Small Bang for Big Bucks

Though the mid-2000's saw a surge in field trials for crop varieties with engineered drought tolerance traits, as of 2012 only one such variety—Monsanto's DroughtGard, containing the engineered genecspB—had been approved by the USDA.

The results so far paint a less than spectacular picture of DroughtGard's effectiveness: USDA analysis of data supplied by Monsanto show that DroughtGard produces only modest results, and only under moderate drought conditions at that. The report estimates that cspB corn would increase the overall productivity of the U.S. corn crop by only about one percent. And DroughtGard does not improve water use efficiency.

The evidence suggests that alternatives to GE—classical breeding, improved farming practices, or crops naturally more drought-tolerant than corn, such as sorghum and millet—can produce better results, often at lower cost. If we neglect these alternatives because of exaggerated expectations about the benefits of GE, we risk leaving farmers and the public high and dry when it comes to ensuring that we will have enough food and clean freshwater to meet everyone's needs.

Why Drought Tolerance Is So Challenging

There are several reasons why a GE magic bullet for drought tolerance may prove elusive. Drought tolerance is a complex trait that can involve many different genes, corresponding to different ways the plant can respond to drought; genetic engineering can manipulate only a few genes at a time. And in the real world, droughts vary widely in severity and duration, affecting the crop at different stages of its growth, so any engineered gene will be more successful under some drought conditions than others.

Genes that improve drought tolerance may have other effects on crop growth, some of which may be undesirable—a phenomenon known as pleiotropy. This has been commonly observed with many otherwise promising drought tolerance genes, and is likely a reflection of the interconnectedness of drought response with many other aspects of plant growth.

Molecular biologists try to reduce the negative effects of pleiotropy by ensuring that the engineered genes only become active under drought conditions, but if droughts are prolonged, the harmful effects may be hard to avoid.

Market Uncertainties

If Monsanto's cspB corn can meet these challenges, it will still face market hurdles. For starters, DroughtGard will have to compete in the marketplace with drought-tolerant varieties produced through less expensive breeding methods.

Another challenge for cspB corn is that farmers buy their seeds well before they plant. Because drought is not reliably predictable, many farmers may not want to pay the higher price of engineered drought tolerance just in case drought occurs. This may largely restrict planting of cspB corn mainly to areas where moderate drought is frequent, such as the western regions of the U.S. Corn Belt.

Other factors important for marketing seed include the overall quality of the corn varieties that the cspB is placed in and how these compare to competitors varieties.

Recommendations

Given the status of R&D on GE drought tolerance and water use efficiency and challenging questions about its prospects, UCS recommends that:

Congress and the USDA should substantially increase support for public crop-breeding programs to improve drought tolerance.

Congress and the USDA should use conservation programs funded under the federal Farm Bill to expand the use of available methods for improving drought tolerance and WUE.

The USDA and public universities should increase research devoted to finding better ways to store and conserve soil water, groundwater, and surface water, and better farming methods to withstand drought.

In particular, organic and similar methods that improve soil fertility simultaneously improve the capacity of soil to store water for crop use during drought, while mulches can reduce soil temperature and reduce evaporation. These methods should be encouraged through incentives.  

Public and private research institutions should devote more funding and effort to improve crops that are important in drought-prone regions in the Southern Hemisphere.

Researchers at the USDA and public universities should carefully monitor the efficacy and possible undesirable effects of cspB corn. Such monitoring is important because this variety is the first GE commercial drought-tolerant crop, and the resulting information would enhance our understanding of GE drought tolerance.

The USDA and public universities should expand their research on using plant breeding to improve water use efficiency—a vital concern that has not attracted major efforts from the biotechnology industry.

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GMOs (genetically modified food) How safe is your food?

How GMO foods alter organ function and pose a very real health threat to humans - YouTube

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=T-IJikX1144&feature=player_embedded

A MUST SEE!!

Awareness and action called for!!

Your health and the ultimate well being of our children are at risk - this MUST change!!

NO to GMO s!!!

The Grand Botanical Chess Game

The Grand Botanical Chess Game

April 19, 2012
From Puerto Rican social ecologist Carmelo Ruiz-Marrero

All over the world, debates on the future of food and agriculture are dominated by one supreme subject: the seed. Its importance cannot possibly be overstated. Seed is, after all, the beginning of the human food chain. In the words of University of Wisconsin professor Jack R. Kloppenburg: “As both food and means of production, seed sits at a critical nexus where contemporary struggles over the technical, social and environmental conditions of production and consumption converge and are made manifest.”

Current debates on seed center around its appropriation and privatization through intellectual property laws and treaties, and around the growing power of corporations like Monsanto and Syngenta, which are bent on creating virtual monopolies over all seed germplasm. As we’ll see, attempts to take over the seed are not new at all.

Throughout all of human history, nations and empires have always had their agricultural programs. And in order to be viable, these programs have always depended on the acquisition of seed varieties from all over the world. As far back as 2,800 BC, Chinese emperor Shen Nung sent plant collectors to distant regions in search of specimens of agricultural or medicinal value, and already by the XVI century there were botanical gardens in France, England, Switzerland, the Netherlands, and present day Germany and Italy. Apart from their aesthetic function, these gardens were established to receive and systematize seed and plant samples of great economic value for the colonial empires.

According to Dartmouth University professor Michael Dorsey, botanical gardens “and their associated networks, including botanists and herborists moved species- to the Old World as well as in between the nascent colonies…

“The king of Spain, and other European monarchs, retained botanists and pharmacists to identify, collect, formulate and identify plant medicines for the royal family. The desire to expand personal pharmacopoeias legitimized financing for early exploration projects, especially those to the New World. According to Schultes and Reis, the King of Spain sent his personal physician to live with the Aztecs and study their medicines, less than fifty years after Columbus’ first voyages. Indeed it was rare that any ship to or from the New World- or anywhere outside of Europe in the Age of Exploration- did not have a person knowledgeable about plants and potentially capable of exploiting their medicinal properties.”

That’s how the banana, originally from Southeast Asia, ended up in Africa and the Caribbean. Cocoa, a native of Brazil, traveled in the opposite direction, towards the fields of Africa and Southeast Asia. Coffee is from Ethiopia, and nowadays its production is extremely important for the economies of Latin America, the Caribbean and Asia’s southeast. Cotton hails from Peru and Mexico, and the colonizers brought it to Africa and India, and in both places it is a crop of the highest economic importance for small farmers. Pineapple and rubber are both from Brazil and both were taken to Africa and Asia. Sugar cane, a crop associated with slavery and obscene profits for plantation owners in the Caribbean, came from Southeast Asia. Canadian theorist and visionary Pat Mooney, who won the 1985 Right Livelihood Prize for his historical and social research on seed, described this global movement of seed as an imperial botanical chess game.

Christopher Columbus returned from this first voyage to the Americas with corn seeds, something never before seen in Europe. It can be said that the seeds brought by the European colonizers from the Americas were a bigger treasure than the mountains of gold and silver that they took. After all, minerals and precious stones can only be taken once, but a seed gives birth to a plant that then produces seed, one season after another. This appropriated germplasm provided the basis for the great chemical, pharmaceutical, textile, lumber, food and biotechnology industries of today.

The arrival of corn and potato had a profound impact on Europe. Both provide more calories per hectare than any other crop planted in Europe. The ruling classes used these crops to feed their impoverished peasants and the growing industrial proletariat that lived in the urban slums. It has been said, perhaps as something of an exaggeration, that without the potato Germany’s industrialization would not have been possible, but “new crops from the Americas certainly played an important role in feeding a European population that nearly doubled between 1750 and 1850″, according to Kloppenburg.

The European colonial empires developed their respective seed acquisition programs, which they jealously guarded. The Dutch, for example, cut down all nutmeg and clove trees in the Molucca (Maluku) islands, except in three isles where they had their plantations, of course with considerable military protection. The French made the export of indigo seed from the Caribbean island of Antigua a capital offense. And Germany’s Kaiser ordered the collection of seeds from the country’s colonies in Africa and the Pacific, and to store the specimens he established a modern agricultural station in Gatersleben, which went on to become one of the world’s premiere seed deposits.

Today the seed is no less important than in previous centuries. “Commercial seeds, the first link in the agroindustrial food chain, are the starting place for crop-based feedstocks that will be used to produce not just food, feed and fibre, but also energy, high-value chemical and consumer products (e.g., plastics, pharmaceuticals)”, informs the ETC Group, a research and advocacy organization founded by Mooney. “Major seed/pesticide enterprises are already hopping on the bioeconomy bandwagon. Monsanto, Dow and Dupont are among those partnering with companies to develop new technology platforms to manufacture bio-based agroindustrial products.”

According to the ETC Group, ten corporations control 74% of all commercial seed sales worldwide, a $27.4 billion business. Only three of them- Monsanto, Dupont and Syngenta- have over half the global seed business. Monsanto alone has a 27% market share, plus 80% of the genetically engineered seed market.

But times are changing. Today there are new social actors and a critical consciousness that was not widespread even twenty years ago. In the Social Fora, Occupy and indignados movements, in the practice of food sovereignty, agroecological projects and within newly formed organizations, alternative visions are being brewed, and collective actions are being launched to protect farm seeds from those who would appropriate and privatize them.

We quote from a document of the Seed Campaign of the Latin American Coordinating Committee (CLOC) of Via Campesina:

“We affirm that the seed is so much more than a productive resource, that they are simultaneously the foundation and product of cultures and societies throughout history. Seeds incorporate values, affections, visions and ways of living that tie them to the realm of the sacred. Without them the peoples’ livelihood and sovereignty are impossible… Therefore, seeds and the knowledge associated to them are a fundamental and irreplaceable part of people’s food sovereignty. Seeds are not a heritage of humanity, but rather our heritage, of the peasant and indigenous peoples, who created, diversified and protected them through time and put them at the service of humanity… Seeds cannot be appropriated. They must in every moment maintain their character of collective heritage… The campaign, therefore, opposes intellectual property and any form of appropriation of life.”

Now the great empires are not alone in the table. The diverse peoples and social movements of the world, armed with centuries of experience, intend to change the grand botanical chess game in a decisive way.

Carmelo Ruiz-Marrero is a Puerto Rican author, investigative journalist, environmental educator, a Research Associate of the Institute for Social Ecology, and director of the Puerto Rico Project on Biosafety (http://bioseguridad.blogspot.com/search/label/en). He has a MA in Social Ecology from Goddard College and is also a fellow of the Oakland Institute and a senior fellow of the Environmental Leadership Program. His Twitter feed is: carmeloruiz.

SOURCES:

• CLOC/Vía Campesina. “Reunión de la Campaña de Semillas” Ecuador, July 22-24 2010. Subido el 16 de agosto 2010. http://viacampesina.org/sp/index.php?option=com_content&view=article&id=1051:reunion-campana-semillas-cloc-via-campesina&catid=15:noticias-de-las-regiones&Itemid=29
• Dorsey, Michael. “Shams, Shamans and the Commercialization of Biodiversity”. Published in “Redesigning Life?”, Brian Tokar, editor. Zed Books, 2001.
• ETC Group. “Who will control the green economy?” December 15 2011. http://www.etcgroup.org/en/node/5296.
• Kloppenburg, Jack. “First the Seed: The Political Economy of Plant Biotechnology”. University of Wisconsin Press. Second edition, 2004.

Our Children and the Need for the Precautionay Principle

The Precautionary Principle

More and more documented data has become available to substantiate our need to use the Precautionary Principle. I wish to thank and acknowledge the contributions made by:

APP Advocate Precautionary Principle ~ and most certainly encourage you to avail yourself of this excellent resource. ( http://appprecautionaryprinciple.wordpress.com/author/appprecautionary/)

APP Advocate Precautionary Principle, an approach characterized by minimizing or eliminating potential hazards at the onset of an activity rather than accepting a level of harm.

Valid Concerns

Environmental exposures play a key role in human growth and development. Toxic chemicals in products and in our homes, work places and communities can interfere with healthy brain development in the fetus, infants and children, potentially resulting in life-long problems with learning and behavior .

An estimated 12 million American children (nearly 17%) have one or more learning, developmental, or behavioral disability, (LDD) and these numbers appear to be increasing. LDD includes children and adults diagnosed with learning disabilities, intellectual and developmental disabilities, ADHD, autism, and other conditions involving brain development. Intellectual disability alone affects 1.4 million children, and one in 110 children is diagnosed with autism each year.

The connection between toxic environmental exposures and neurodevelopment is an emerging area of concern. Scientists have learned that the developing brain is much more susceptible to harm from toxic substances than the adult brain. For their size and weight, children consume more food, drink more fluids, and breathe more air than adults. Those with disabilities often spend more time on the floor and put more things in their mouths, exposing them to chemicals that accumulate in household dust or are in products.

Many aspects of learning and development are genetically influenced, but for the vast majority of LDDs there is no evidence that genetic factors are the predominant or only cause. The National Academy of Sciences (NAS) estimates that 25% of developmental and neurological deficits in children are due to the interplay between chemicals and genetic factors, and that 3% are caused by exposure to chemicals alone. Exposures to environmental toxins such as lead, mercury, PCBs, toluene, and other solvents have all been proven to cause permanent developmental disabilities.

There is an urgent need to reform the way our country regulates chemicals. The vast majority of chemicals are used in products without being tested first for health impacts. Not only is it important to test and prevent exposures to neurotoxins, it is also critical to evaluate chemicals that interfere with the hormonal system.

Pediatric Precautionary Health

In a policy paper from the American Academy of Pediatrics it is explained that there are risks of different pesticides to children, and the AAP argues that the government should intervene to keep dangerous chemicals off the market. Writes Dr. Jerome Paulson, part of the AAP’s Council on Environmental Health.”Children are not little adults,” Paulson, of Children’s National Medical Center in Washington, D.C., told Reuters Health. “Their bodies are different and their behaviors are different. That means that their exposures to chemicals in the environment are different, and the way their bodies (break down) those chemicals are different.” Kids may be especially vulnerable to chemicals during important periods in development, when their brains and bodies are changing quickly,” Dr. Paulson added.

Last spring, the at the National Cancer Institute President’s Cancer Panel, a group of expert physicians, public health and policy experts, released a report entitled Reducing Environmental Cancer Risk which stridently warned that the scientific and regulatory communities in this country were underestimating the number of environmentally-induced cancers caused by industrial and commercial chemicals. Of the 80,000 chemicals now in industrial use in the US only about 200 have been studied for carcinogenicity. Few studies relate in any way to humans, and none to fetuses, infants, and children, the highest risk populations. Because few have been peer reviewed and many have been performed under conditions where potential conflicts of interest exist, there is much controversy over the accuracy and relevance of the data.

Studies have shown that all newborn infants’ cord bloods appear to contain measurable levels of many industrial chemicals previously taken in by their mothers. Some countries, and groups like the EU, have espoused the “precautionary principle,” requiring manufacturers and industries to show that new chemicals they want to use are generally harmless before they incorporate them into products or spill them out into the environment. But, just as it took the US 50-100 years to ban lead in house paint, it is taking many decades for our commerce-driven society to respond to warning signs that we might be poisoning ourselves in the relentless pursuit of profit.

We should be concerned that environmental toxins may be causing the increased incidence of asthma, autism, ADHD, and other developmental dysfunctions that seem to be rising more rapidly than can be explained on the basis of infectious diseases, behavioral changes, or parenting patterns. These chemicals enter our bodies through our skin, our lungs, and our gastrointestinal tract. We then pass them on to our children and they, too, build up levels because the chemicals cannot be metabolized or excreted.

Article Source: appprecautionary « APP Advocate Precautionary Principle ~ http://appprecautionaryprinciple.wordpress.com/author/appprecautionary/

Image Credit: www.wired.com/images_blogs/ wiredscience/2011/..

There’s a lot more to the pineal gland than meets the eye

Anatomy of the inside of the brain,
the pineal and pituitary glands, optic nerve, ventricles
(with cerebrospinal fluid shown in blue), and other parts of the brain.

There’s a lot more to the pineal gland than meets the eye

The pineal gland is the one organ that you should be paying a lot more attention to, especially if you care about your health – and sleep. And yet, the pineal gland is one of the most enigmatic and least known of all the endocrine glands of the human body. Hopefully that will change soon as mankind begins to realize its importance.

It is small, actually one of the smallest organs in the body, and yet make no mistake, the pineal gland is one of the most influential and important organs in your body. I’m just surprised why the medical community always downplays the significance of the pineal gland and assumes it only produces melatonin, when there is a lot more that it does.

In size, it is no larger than 1cm across, and is located deep inside the brain, practically in the middle of the head. Has it occurred to you why the pineal gland would be seemingly accorded such protection? You may still hear doctors today dismissing the pineal gland as a “throwaway of evolution,” but far from that, the pineal gland is HIGHLY important in sleep, overall health, growth, and psychic or sixth sense development.

Many eminent scientists thousands of years ago have already speculated as to the function of the pineal gland. Galen the Greek philosopher (130-210 AD) believed the pineal gland was an important part in the channeling of “psychic pneuma” in the brain “ventricles.”

During medieval times, Qusta ibn Luqa (864-923) wrote that “people who want to remember look upwards because this raises the worm-like particle, opens the passage, and enables the retrieval of memories from the posterior ventricle. People who want to think, on the other hand, look down because this lowers the particle, closes the passage, and protects the spirit in the middle ventricle from being disturbed by memories stored in the posterior ventricle.”

The French scientist Rene Descartes (1596-1650) described the pineal gland as “the seat of the soul.” In the New Age movement, the pineal is regarded as the “third eye” that grants man the ability to have spiritual insight and heightened sixth sense ability – Something which I’m inclined to believe.

I would also urge you to question the rationale behind the fluoridation of public drinking water, even though, fluoride has absolutely minimal role in preventing cavities or osteoporosis. In fact, fluoride is a highly toxic substance that crystallizes within the pineal gland and calcifies it, rendering it virtually incapacitated. And osteoporosis cases have been on the rise for the past several decades. Is there a relation between fluoride and rising insomnia cases, especially in the West, where all the water has been heavily fluoridated?

That’s why doctors can see the pineal gland in X-ray scans easily, because all that fluoride in our drinking water has turned our pineal glands into virtual fossils. In case you didn’t know, fossils are the remains organic tissue that got replaced with a mineral, and hardened (turned into stone).

Fluoride was heavily used in concentration camps because it dulls the thinking, senses, and whatever psychic abilities humans have, rendering them more easily controllable. Conspiracy theories aside, you don’t have to be a rocket scientist to conclude that fluoridated water is one of the causes of rising insomnia cases and (other health woes) in many societies around the world (where the water is fluoridated).

Article Source: Sleep Enough

An Added Word

Attention, Focus, Lighting and the Pineal Gland

Rose Marie Raccioppi

The pineal gland is indeed related to creativity and focus. Fluorescent lighting has an adverse effect on the pineal gland. It is for this very reason that I do not have any such lighting in my home nor in my office. A child's ability to sustain focus and attention on the printed page is adversely compromised under the duress of fluorescent lighting. Yes, I have learned to take all into consideration when working with a child to develop reading mastery (http://www.apogeelearning.com). Through the use of APOGEE Cognitive Kinesiology, the stress experienced from fluorescent lighting is shown to lower the energy flow in particular meridian pathways. APOGEE Cognitive Kinesiology is a process that allows the student to understand the integrative action of the mind-body energy system. The extent of the effect on particular pathways ultimately determines how attention, focus, and perception will be influenced. For some, extended length of time under fluorescent lighting, results in headache, restlessness and fatigue. In assessing behavior, one need take into consideration those environmental and systemic factors that can enhance or compromise physical, mental and creative endeavors.

And so Fluoride... what is is... and why NOT... Fluoride Deception { Mike Adams Natural News.TV } - YouTube - http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VTXS1nozFnQ&feature=g-upl&context=G2aa5487AUAAAAAAAAAA