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For older news: july-august / may-june / march-april
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Vaccine Pioneer Admits Adding Cancer Causing Virus To Vaccine
16/3/13
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Milk Doesn't Do Your Body Good
12/3/13
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Latest Harlan Campaign Report
9/3/13
Vivisection might not be at the forefront of activism these days, but that doesn't mean any fewer animals are being squirted, prodded, injected, creamed, caged or otherwise tortured - or that some humans aren't still kickin' up a fuss about it.
Save the Harlan Beagles campaign held a demonstration on Saturday (9th) in Brighton. The campaign targets Harlan Laboratories, a set-up sinister to the core: Harlan is one of the world's leading suppliers of animals to labs for the purpose of animal testing. The UK branch has a diversity of inmates including marmosets, beagles, cats, rabbits, guinea pigs, rats, mice, gerbils, and hamsters. Also available are hybrid, mutant, and transgenic animals. A quick google demonstrates the crazy world of lab-animal mutants – Harlan's online catalogue has more modified mice ('research models') than you can shake a stick at. Take the poor wee sod that is the 'athymic nude' – these bald fellas were 'derived from a nucleus colony from the National Institutes of Health' and is referred to as an 'immunodeficient model'. Sounds like a recipe for a long, healthy and natural life.
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Bradley Manning: Profile in Courage Above and Beyond the Call of Duty
2/3/13
He's one of America's best. He risked great personal harm. He did so to expose vital truths. He's a true American hero. He deserves praise, not prosecution. In February 2012, Movement of the Icelandic Parliament (MIP) members nominated him for the Nobel Peace Prize. They felt compelled to recognize his important contribution to world peace. They called nominating him a "great honor." They're indebted for what he did. He deserves Washington's Presidential Medal of Freedom.
It's awarded "for especially meritorious contributions to (1) the security or national interests of the United States, or (2) world peace, or (3) cultural or other significant public or private endeavors."
War criminals often get it. Peacemakers are spurned.
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Why is Bee Decline Not a National Emergency?
20/2/13
I'm beginning to wonder just what in the world bees need to do to grab the attention of the media and the public the way other issues grab them?
Within the next few weeks or so (date to be confirmed), EU member states will vote on the European Commission's proposal to restrict the use of three of the most widely used neonicotinoid insecticides on certain flowering crops throughout Europe. The results of this vote are of ENORMOUS consequence. We're talking here about nothing short of mass extinction if our already depleted pollinator population is not protected from continuing poisoning by these, and other insecticides. It's not as if we haven't already pushed them to the brink by destroying, degrading and fragmenting their habitat.
Some of the other member states have raised objections to certain aspects of the EC's proposal, but the UK, alone, rejects the entire proposal. Incredibly and shamefully, the UK government are doing everything they can to block this partial ban.
You'd have thought the unprecedented decline of the creatures responsible for pollinating a third of the world's food - not to mention over 80% of all the flowering plants on this planet - might prompt concern; that it might justify a mention on the six o'clock news, or an appearance on the front page of the national newspapers. You might also have thought the media would have something to say about our government's dangerous stance on this issue.....
But no. This issue is barely ever discussed in the media so the majority of the population remain completely oblivious of the fact there even IS a problem. I believe people would be outraged if they were to understand exactly how serious bee decline has become - but the fact it's not making headline news means we are not party to the information that might make us think twice about using pesticides - and/or prompt us to plant bee attracting flowers in our gardens. One of the most frustrating things about bee decline is that it is something we could all do something about. If only we knew it was happening.
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Factory Farming & Terrorism
30/1/13
States weigh laws that would make it an act of terrorism to report abuses at factory farms
How do you keep consumers in the dark about the horrors of factory farms? By making it an "act of terrorism" for anyone to investigate animal cruelty, food safety or environmental violations on the corporate-controlled farms that produce the bulk of our meat, eggs and dairy products.
And who better to write the Animal and Ecological Terrorism Act, http://www.greenisthenewred.com designed to protect Big Ag and Big Energy, than the lawyers on the Energy, Environment and Agriculture Task Force at the corporate-funded and infamous American Legislative Exchange Council (ALEC).http://alecexposed.org/wiki/Environment,_Energy,_and_Agriculture
New
Hampshire, Wyoming and Nebraska are the latest states to introduce Ag-Gag
laws aimed at preventing employees, journalists or activists from exposing
illegal or unethical practices on factory farms. http://alecexposed.org/wiki/Environment,_Energy,_and_Agriculture
Lawmakers in 10 other states introduced similar bills in 2011-2012.
The laws passed in three of those states: Missouri, Iowa and Utah. But
consumer and animal-welfare activists prevented the laws from passing
in Florida, Illinois, Indiana, Minnesota, Nebraska, New York and Tennessee.
In all, six states now have Ag-Gag laws, including North Dakota, Montana and Kansas, all of which passed the laws in 1990-1991, before the term "Ag-Gag" was coined.
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Couple Face Jail For Saving Deer
Police state gone wild: Couple facing 60 days in jail for rescuing injured baby deer
29/1/13
An Indiana couple saved a wounded baby deer and nursed it back to life, saving its life and giving it a home. They named it "Little Orphan Dani." When Indiana state officials got word of this courageous act of compassion, they ordered the deer euthanized. (Because government wants to kill everything you love.)
When the deer "escaped" right before it was schedule to be killed -- and yes, I think the couple probably set it free rather than have it killed -- the man and woman were charged with unlawful possession of a deer.
They now face $2,000 in fines and 60 days in jail.
This is yet another example of the government police state gone wild, and it's on top of seemingly countless other stories of similar police state insanity such as armed government raids on raw milk distributors.
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Aborted Children In Child Vaccines
29/1/13
Warning: Many childhood vaccines contain aborted human fetal protein, DNA
The National Vaccine Information Center (NVIC), a non-profit vaccine safety group, recently conducted an independent review of the contents of childhood vaccines and found that many of them are tainted with ingredients that would shock most parents. According to the manufacturer-produced package inserts included with each vaccine batch, many vaccines are made with disturbing ingredients like aborted human fetal proteins, altered DNA material, and even genetically-modified (GM) human albumin.
This shocking information was compiled as part of an NVIC safety review on the childhood vaccination schedule, which has been called into question in recent years due to a steady increase in cases of autism and other forms of neurological and brain damage among vaccinated children. As it turns out, there are at least eight, and as many as 23, vaccines routinely administered to children that contain one or more of these questionable ingredients -- and if the general public truly knew about this, there would likely be a massive vaccination fallout resulting in the complete collapse of the vaccine industry.
Back in 1966, researchers extracted lung tissue from a 14-week aborted baby and developed a cell line from it known as MRC-5 that is still used in many vaccines today. MRC-5 has admittedly been used to developed the Varivax vaccine for chicken pox, the ProQuad vaccines for both chicken pox and MMR (measles, mumps, and rubella), and several other vaccines for Hepatitis A, DTaP, Hib, polio, and rabies. Similarly, a cell line known as RA 27/3, which was derived from another aborted human baby in 1964, is still being used today to produce both ProQuad and MMR II.
The controversial MMR II vaccine also reportedly contains a genetically-engineered human protein known as Recombumin, or recombinant human albumin, that most parents are unaware is being injected into their babies. MMR II is the only known vaccine that contains GM human protein, according to NVIC, but its unique presence in this contentious combination vaccine could help explain the unusual uptick in vaccine-induced neurological damage associated with it in recent years.
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Mercury Ban Exempts Vaccines
20/1/13
UN's Global Mercury ban exempts......vaccines
Mercury: A deadly poison. Just the tiniest drop will contaminate everything Land, air and water and people...
"It attacks the central nervous system and is particularly harmful to children"
Except when it is contained in vaccines. Then it is perfectly acceptable. Because apparently direct injection of mercury, into a living being with a central nervous system and a brain is not harmful? According to the UN. WHO clearly caters to the big pharma cartel. Treaty on mercury would not affect vaccines with mercury (thimerosal)
The treaty says that certain mercury-added products, such as batteries, lamps, switches, skin-lightening cosmetics, pesticides and thermometers, may not be manufactured, imported or exported no later than 2020. Mercury-added dental amalgams are also to be phased out. No mercury in cosmetics, pesticides, thermometers and dental amalgams.... but
Certain mercury-added products are to be exempted from the ban, including those used for military and civil protection, products with no mercury-free alternative, products used in religious or traditional practices and vaccines containing thimerosal, an ethylmercury preservative. The omission of thimerosal-containing vaccines from the ban disappointed advocates who believe the preservative plays a role in sickening some children.
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US Scientists Find Chemotherapy Boosts Cancer Growth
18/1/13
Marco Torres, Prevent Disease - Waking Times
Chemotherapy can damage healthy cells? Say it isn’t so? You don’t need a degree to figure this one out. Poison kills indiscriminately– always has and always will. While damaging healthy cells, chemotherapy also triggers them to secrete a protein that sustains tumour growth and resistance to further treatment. Researchers in the United States made the “completely unexpected” finding they claimed while seeking to explain why cancer cells are so resilient inside the human body when they are easy to kill in the lab.
Only through the forces that have carefully conspired to thwart meaningful advances in cancer research and treatment over the past century has chemotherapy succeeded. In what reality do we live in when cut, poison and burn are the only ways acceptable to treat cancer?
No chemotherapy drug has ever actually cured or resolve the underlying causes of cancer. Even what mainstream medicine consideres “successful” chemotherapy treatments are only managing symptoms, usually at the cost of interfering with other precious physiological functions in patients that will cause side effects down the road. There is no such thing as a drug without a side effect.
They tested the effects of a type of chemotherapy on tissue collected from men with prostate cancer, and found “evidence of DNA damage” in healthy cells after treatment, the scientists wrote in Nature Medicine.
Chemotherapy works by inhibiting reproduction of fast-dividing cells such as those found in tumours. The scientists found that healthy cells damaged by chemotherapy secreted more of a protein called WNT16B which boosts cancer cell survival. “The increase in WNT16B was completely unexpected,” study co-author Peter Nelson of the Fred Hutchinson Cancer Research Center in Seattle told AFP. The protein was taken up by tumour cells neighbouring the damaged cells. “WNT16B, when secreted, would interact with nearby tumour cells and cause them to grow, invade, and importantly, resist subsequent therapy,” said Nelson.
In cancer treatment, tumours often respond well initially, followed by rapid regrowth and then resistance to further chemotherapy.
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American Milk Banned In Europe Because It Does Body No Good
18/1/13
Anna Hunt, Staff Writer - Waking Times
As a mother of three young children, the debate centered around the nutritional value of cow’s milk has been at the forefront of my mind for quite some time. Conditioned by the well-known campaigns of milk marketers “Milk. It does a body good.” and “Got Milk?”, I’ve been led to believe that milk is needed – especially by young children – for good bone growth, brain development and, of course, to meet the body’s calcium needs.
If milk does a body so much good, why is US-produced milk banned in Europe? It turns out that in 1994, the US Food and Drug Administration approved the use of recombinant Bovine Growth Hormone (rBGH). rBGH in milk is believed to increase the risk of cancer. In an attempt to protect its citizens from genetically-modified milk, the Codex Alimentarius Commission, the U.N. Food Safety Agency representing 101 nations worldwide, has banned rBGH milk in the 101 nations that it represents. Canada is another country where rBGH milk is banned.
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Children Paralysed By Vaccine
13/1/13
Video Footage Shows Prime Minister Visits Paralyzed Children, Powerful Groups Involved in Vaccine Campaign
This child was paralyzed after being injected with a dangerous meningitis vaccine
The details of a vaccine campaign disaster that occurred last month in a north African country continue to unfold, while headlines of this tragedy are strangely absent from news organizations around the world. VacTruth shared the story last week with the world in an exclusive report, and we have additional updates to share with you about the plight these families are now facing.
On January 6, 2013, I wrote an article entitled Minimum of 40 Children Paralyzed After New Meningitis Vaccine describing how at least 40 children in Gouro, Chad, located in northern Africa, became paralyzed after they had received the meningitis A vaccine, MenAfrivac. [1]
Further research about the Meningitis Vaccine Project shows the effort was a massive collaboration among major organizations. The vaccine, developed by the India Serum Institute, was funded by The Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation, in partnership with WHO and PATH, specifically to combat meningitis in Africa. We wonder why none of these groups are offering a statement about this devastating event.
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Global Warming Stopped 16 Years Ago
13/1/13
Global warming stopped 16 years ago, Met Office report reveals: MoS got it right about warming... so who are the 'deniers' now?
By David Rose
Last year The Mail on Sunday reported a stunning fact: that global warming had ‘paused’ for 16 years. The Met Office’s own monthly figures showed there had been no statistically significant increase in the world’s temperature since 1997.
We were vilified. One Green website in the US said our report was ‘utter bilge’ that had to be ‘exposed and attacked’.
The Met Office issued a press release claiming it was misleading, before quietly admitting a few days later that it was true that the world had not got significantly warmer since 1997 after all. A Guardian columnist wondered how we could be ‘punished’.
Pause: Last year The Mail on Sunday reported global warming had 'paused' for 16 years
But then last week, the rest of the media caught up with our report. On Tuesday, news finally broke of a revised Met Office ‘decadal forecast’, which not only acknowledges the pause, but predicts it will continue at least until 2017. It says world temperatures are likely to stay around 0.43 degrees above the long-term average – as by then they will have done for 20 years.
This is hugely significant. It amounts to an admission that earlier forecasts – which have dictated years of Government policy and will cost tens of billions of pounds – were wrong. They did not, the Met Office now accepts, take sufficient account of ‘natural variability’ – the effects of phenomena such as ocean temperature cycles – which at least for now are counteracting greenhouse gas warming.
Surely the Met Office would trumpet this important news, as it has done when publishing warnings of imminent temperature rises. But there was no fanfare. Instead, it issued the revised forecast on the ‘research’ section of its website – on Christmas Eve. It only came to light when it was noticed by an eagle-eyed climate blogger, and then by the Global Warming Policy Foundation, the think-tank headed by Lord Lawson.
Then, rather than reporting the news objectively, Britain’s Green Establishment went into denial. Neither The Guardian nor The Independent bothered to report it in their paper editions, although The Independent did later run an editorial saying that the new forecast was merely a trivial ‘tweak’. Instead, they luridly reported on the heatwave and raging bushfires in Australia.
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Bugger The Bankers
2/12/12
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Hunt Sabs Rescue Fox
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The Marmots & Me
28/8/12
The schoolboy, 8, who has struck up a remarkable friendship with a colony of alpine animals
They are notoriously shy around humans, beating their tails and chattering their teeth to try to warn us off before emitting loud whistles to tell other members of their colony to flee. But when these alpine marmots see Matteo Walch, they scuttle to his side and show him nothing but affection. The eight-year-old built up a remarkable relationship with the creatures since first being taken to see them by his nature-loving family four years ago.
Special bond: Matteo Walch has struck up an unlikely friendship with a group of marmots in the Austrian Alps
The family return to visit the colony in Groslocker in the Austrian Alps for two weeks every year. Matteo’s mother Michaela said: 'Their friendship has lasted for more than four years now. 'He loves those animals and they are not at all afraid of Matteo because he has a feeling towards them and they understand that.
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Secret trials hide UK role in torture: Activists
18/8/12
The British government has been planning to introduce secret trials called Kafkaesque, which could themselves be kept secret under legislation before the Lords
The UK government is planning to introduce secret trials, which opposition groups condemn.
The UK government would be able to apply to the courts for a case to be held in closed material proceedings (CMP) under the Justice and Security Bill. The government could present evidence under CMP to a judge without the defence having a right to challenge it or even being aware of the nature of the evidence. These plans of secret trials have been widely condemned by human rights lawyers and civil liberties groups as an attempt by the UK government to place itself and the security services above the law. During debates among the Lords, government minister Baroness Stowell stated that "in some instances the fact of the application (for CMP) will not be made public."
Lord Falconer asked the minister "whether it is envisaged that the fact of an application being made for a closed material proceeding should be kept secret."
The legal charity Reprieve also opposed the introduction of secret trials and condemned any suggestions under which CMP applications could be kept secret.
Reprieve's executive director Clare Algar said, "These courts could be used to sweep serious state human rights abuses - such as torture - under the carpet."
http://www.presstv.ir/detail/2012/08/18/256924/secret-trials-hide-uk-role-in-torture-activists/
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Supporting Terror In Syria
14/8/12
Hague’s ‘non-lethal’ support for al-Qaeda in Syria is absolutely lethal; British tax-payers become incriminated in war crime
in a response to what looks like a slow death at Aleppo for his al-Qaeda proxy-army, William Hague announced that further support (thanks, of course, to British tax-payers) will be made available to the terrorists and foreign mercenaries that constitute the Free ‘Syrian’ Army. Clarification then followed regarding how this support would consist of the latest satellite telephones and media training. Dubbed ‘non-lethal’, on one level, Hague’s insistence that this British aid is somehow neutral is a lie because provision given to the terrorists in Syria for propaganda purposes has already proven quite deadly. As the established pattern now indicates, the requirement to create a media narrative always provokes a massacre committed by the terrorists to be blamed on the Syrian Government. Besides which, it has become clear that British Special Forces are on the ground to ‘liaise with opposition leaders’ – which is a euphemism for directing the battles. Either way, the British tax-payer is culpable for the death of innocent human beings in Syria because it cannot bring its rogue government to heel.
As the conflict in Syria goes on, the Western powers have become more blatant in their support for the Free ‘Syrian’ Army. Amongst the coverage of the process of this alignment, there are readily available fragments of information which, when they are pieced together, show how from the very top, in Washington and London, a decision has been made to facilitate none other than al-Qaeda, and to operate, in an alliance with Islamist terrorists, in order to overthrow a sovereign government by a military invasion.
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2,115 Beagles Rescued From Marshall Farm's Green Hill Breeders In Italy
9/8/12
The rescue of Green Hill dogs has been halted today after 2,115 beagles have been taken out of the beagle breeding 'farm' in the past 10 days. This is after a long fought campaign in Italy, more information about the campaign (in Italian) at: www.fermaregreenhill.net
There is still 59 female breeders, either pregnant or with too young puppies, staying inside the kennels until September, for health reasons.
Then they will all be rehomed in 1 or 2 days with all the puppies... and the breeding farm will be completely empty!
This seems incredible to all of us!!! Much love and solidarity go out to those activists that have worked hard to make this happen! :]
Anyway, Green Hill is empty but has not been closed yet! So, please join in with this campaign.
A news agency story in english, here
Video of first beagle to be rescued:
http://www.shac.net/news/2012/august/9.html
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Chemotherapy Backfires - Causes Healthy Cells To Feed Growth Of Cancer Tumors
7/8/12
by Mike Adams
Ever since chemotherapy was introduced into the practice of western medicine, doctors and oncologists have been trying to answer this nagging question: Why does chemotherapy seem to work at first, but then cancer tumors cells grow back even more aggressively while the body becomes resistant to chemotherapy?
It turns out that chemotherapy damages healthy cells, causing them to secrete a protein that accelerates the growth of cancer tumors. http://ca.news.yahoo.com/chemotherapy-backfire-boost-cancer-growth-study-164516832.html
This protein, dubbed "WNT16B," is taken up by nearby cancer cells, causing them to "grow, invade, and importantly, resist subsequent therapy," said Peter Nelson of the Fred Hutchinson Cancer Research Center in Seattle.
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Ban On Cancer Cures
3/8/12
The Stranglehold that the UK 1939 Cancer Act Exerts in Great Britain
Orthomolecular Medicine News Service - by Madeline C. Hickey-Smith
Most citizens of Great Britain are totally unaware of the 1939 Cancer Act which effectively prevents them from finding out about different treatments for cancer.
Excerpts from the UK 1939 Cancer Act:
"4 - (1) No person shall take any part in the publication of any advertisement -
(a) containing an offer to treat any person for cancer, or to prescribe any remedy therefor, or to give any advice in connection with the treatment thereof; or
(b) referring to any article, or articles of any description, in terms which are calculated to lead to the use of that article, or articles of that description, in the treatment of cancer.
In this section the expression "advertisement" includes any "notice, circular, label, wrapper or other document, and any announcement made orally or by any means of producing or transmitting sounds". [1]
Publication of such advertisements is permitted to a very restrictive group comprising members of either House of Parliament, local authority, governing bodies of voluntary hospitals, registered or training to become registered medical practitioners, nurses or pharmacists, and persons involved in the sale or supply of surgical appliances. A very tight grip, therefore, is exercised on information that is fed to citizens of Great Britain; interestingly, the Act does not apply to Northern Ireland.
That pretty much wraps it up, and wraps us (in Britain) up in the legal stranglehold that this outdated Act still exerts. Was this enacted to protect the citizens from charlatans and "quacks" or to safeguard the interests of the National Radium Trust, to whom the British Government lent money? If no one is allowed to tell us, how can we, the general public, ever find out what alternatives there are to those offered by mainstream medicine, mainly surgery, chemotherapy and radiotherapy?
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Why Doctors Are More Dangerous Than Guns - Health Ranger Investigation
2/8/12
http://tv.naturalnews.com/v.asp?v=0EDADA92DA486FA54A8367504DEE7244
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Captain Paul Watson Sends First Message To Supporters Since Departing Germany
30/7/12
Captain Paul Watson, founder of
the Sea Shepherd Conservation Society.
Photo: Mike Mulle
For the first time since the world began speculating why Captain Paul Watson made the decision to forfeit his bail and depart Germany after being held there under house arrest for 70 days, the Captain himself is speaking out. He relayed a message to Sea Shepherd headquarters over the weekend, asking that it be provided to his supporters.
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Milk Industry Health Claims Proven Wrong
12/3/12
Photo Credit: Eskemar via Shutterstock
AlterNet / By Martha Rosenberg
Got Propaganda? Why All of the Milk Industry's Health Claims Have Been Proven Wrong
Marketers have been trying desperately for over a decade to increase the public's consumption of milk, but they keep failing. Here's why.
Selling milk looks easy and even fun when you see the celebrity milk-mustache ads. "Got Milk?" ads may be the most recognizable and spoofed of all ad campaigns, yet they are probably also one of the least successful: Milk sales have actually fallen every year since the ads began. The National Dairy Promotion and Research Program and the National Fluid Milk Processor Promotion Program admit "consumption has been declining for decades in the United States at about 1.0 percent per year," in their yearly reports to Congress but plead that their marketing has "helped mitigate at least some of this decline." Key words "help," "at least" and "some."
Why the milk-drinking slide? First, many U.S. groups simply do not drink much, or any, milk -- including ethnic minorities, those who are lactose intolerant or allergic, dieters, the health conscious, and vegans. Kids themselves often dislike milk -- probably why they invented chocolate and flavored milk -- and it is often the last choice among teens and tweens, on whom much milk marketing is focused. Healthcare professionals, unless subsidized by the dairy industry, seldom recommend milk because of its cholesterol, fat, calories, allergens and impurities and its possible links to rBGH (recombinant bovine growth hormone) since milk made with the cow milk enhancer has never been labeled. Benjamin Spock, the famous baby boom-era pediatrician, recommended no milk for children after age two to reduce their risks of heart disease, obesity, high blood pressure, diabetes, and diet-related cancers.
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Peta Kill 95% Of Adoptable Dogs & Cats
26/2/12
PETA 'killed more than 95 per cent of adoptable dogs and cats in its care last year' shocking new report says
In
2011, government report obtained by nonprofit organization claims 1,911
animals killed
Only 34 adopted in same time span
People
for the Ethical Treatment of Animals killed more than 95 per cent of
animals in its care last year at a Virginia shelter, a shocking new
report states.
The report, released by non-profit consumer group, claims that PETA
- which is known for its outspoken stance on animal rights - were responsible
for the deaths of nearly 2,000 adoptable animals last year alone. The
records also show that the animal-rights organization has killed more
than 27,000 animals at its headquarters in Norfolk, Virginia since 1998.
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Unforeseen In Animal Tests
Newspaper headlines 16 Nov 2011 to 24 Feb 2012
“Antipsychotics death risk charted in dementia
patients”
BBC News. 24 February 2012.
“Alzheimer’s Drugs Harmful? The researcher
who helped develop an Alzheimer’s treatment now in clinical trials
warns that the compound may actually impair memory.”
The Scientist. 20 February 2012.
“HIV drug tenofovir increases risk of kidney
damage”
SF Gate. 18 February 2012.
“Novartis to Add Warnings to Rasilez Blood-Pressure
Drug”
Bloomberg. 17 February 2012.
“Cause of deaths unclear in Actelion drug
trial”
Chicago Tribune. 14 February 2012.
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Meats Skyrocket Your Risk Of Cancer
15/1/12
A recent study conducted by Swedish researchers has shown a further link between processed meats such as sausage or bacon and an increased risk of pancreatic cancer. This kind of connection is not necessarily new, but the study provides further evidence that indulging in processed meats may not be the greatest decision for your health.
Colon
cancer by 50 percent
Bladder cancer by 59 percent
Stomach cancer by 38 percent
Pancreatic cancer by 67 percent
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75% Of Physicians In The World Refuse Chemotherapy For Themselves
13/1/12
Doctors used to think that if they drained a sick person's blood it would purge the "evil" infection or disease right out of the body, but all that did was make the ill person much weaker, unable to fight off whatever was invading their body, and the patient was then highly likely to lose the battle for life, and in less time.
This is all documented in a groundbreaking downloadable PDF report published by NaturalNews.
Research using polls and questionnaires continue to show that 3 of every 4 doctors and scientists would refuse chemotherapy for themselves due to its devastating effects on the entire body and the immune system, and because of its extremely low success rate. On top of that, only 2 to 4% of all cancers even respond to chemotherapy or prove to be "life extending," yet it is prescribed across the board for just about every kind of cancer.
Polls were taken by accomplished scientists at the McGill Cancer Center from 118 doctors who are all experts on cancer. They asked the doctors to imagine they had cancer and to choose from six different "experimental" therapies. These doctors not only denied chemo choices, but they said they wouldn't allow their family members to go through the process either! What does that say about their true opinion of this archaic method?
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More Than 2,000 Vaccinated Babies Died
24/3/11
...The Cost Of Doing Business
Earlier this month (March 2011), Japanese authorities ordered doctors to stop using pneumococcal and Hib vaccines because four children died after receiving the shots. However, the real news was never reported: more than 2,000 babies died in the United States after receiving vaccines for these very same diseases, yet authorities refuse to warn parents and halt production. A safety review is vital to determine whether a recall of the dangerous shots may be necessary to protect additional American babies from disability and death.
According to Paul Offit, media spokesperson for the vaccine industry, "the Japanese Ministry of Health was foolish to suspend the Hib and pneumococcal programs." Offit thinks the deaths were probably caused by SIDS, or underlying conditions, or another cause - anything except the vaccines. Often, children get sick and die by chance.
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700,000 Poisoned By Pharma Drugs
23/3/11
Study: 700,000 people, mostly children, end up in ER every year for pharmaceutical drug poisoning
Besides motor vehicle accidents, the second leading cause of injury death in the US is drug-related poisoning, according to a new study published in The American Journal of Emergency Medicine. The study indicates that nearly 700,000 people end up in emergency rooms (ER) every year from pharmaceutical drug poisoning -- and most of these visits involve young children.
Roughly 28,000 people die every year due to drug-related poisoning, and the highest poisoning rates are among children under five years of age. Forty-three percent of all these poisonings are caused by antidepressant drugs and common painkillers, many of which are available without a prescription. And all this death occurs under the watch of the US Food and Drug Administration (FDA) and the US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC).
The American College of Emergency Physicians (ACEP) and the American Association of Poison Control Centers (AAPCC) are together participating in Poison Prevention Week, an awareness campaign designed to warn the public about the poisons that lurk in their homes -- which apparently is dominated primarily by pharmaceutical drugs.
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Canadian Fur Store Closes
16/3/11
The fine folks from the Canadian Animal Liberation Movement (CALM) have won their campaign to close down Kaufman Furs in Kitchener, Ontario...
"I just wanted to share with everyone some really exciting news. Kaufman Furs has officially closed! The campaign took us a little over 3 months with 4 full-time activists.
If you want to check out the updated campaign website, the link is: www.CALMaction.org/fur
We won- the monster is closed :) "
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China Seeks Alternatives To Animal Tests
9/3/11
First congress on alternatives to animal testing in China
While the Chinese legislation on cosmetics still requires products to be tested on animals, the Beijing Technology and Business University is organising a forum on alternatives to animal testing.
For the first time ever, the People’s Republic of China is exploring
alternatives to animal testing. This issue will be the subject of the
first edition of the International Forum on Cosmetic Technology and
Applications, initiated and organised by the China Cosmetics Research
Centre of the Beijing Technology and Business University.
Premium Beauty News
Full article here:
http://www.premiumbeautynews.com/First-congress-on-alternatives-to,2812
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Investigators Prosecuted For Filming Pig Farm
8/3/11
In November 2009, the Animal Rights Alliance in Sweden released photographs and film from 100 Swedish pig farms.
One of the farms visited, Blackstaby, belongs to the former chairman of the meat industry’s association; Swedish Meats. We reported his, and another 91 farms, to the police for breaking the animal welfare regulations. .
Despite hours of film, 400 photographs, veterinarians supporting the case and that two people testified about what they had documented at the farm, the owner was never prosecuted. Instead, the two witnesses are now being prosecuted for opening the doors to the piggery and filming the conditions. The owner also demands around 100,000 Euros.
The meat industry tries to scare us to silence with threats of large sums but we will continue reporting on animal abuse.
Today a support page was launced with information in english as well; http://www.grisvittnena.se
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Supreme Court Will Not Hear SHAC 7 Case
7/3/11
The Supreme Court announced today that it will not review the case of the SHAC 7, a landmark First Amendment case in which a group of animal rights activists were convicted as “terrorists” for running a controversial website.
The campaign of the SHAC 7 didn’t involve anthrax, pipe bombs, or a plot to hijack an airplane. They ran a website. On that website, they posted news about the campaign — legal actions like protests and illegal actions like stealing animals from labs — and unabashedly supported all of it.
For this they faced a slew of conspiracy charges, including conspiracy to violate the Animal Enterprise Protection Act and commit “animal enterprise terrorism.”
The defendants lost at the trial level, and were sentenced to between one and six years in prison. Upon appeal, the Third Circuit issued a sweeping ruling. It held that SHAC’s fiery rhetoric constituted a “true threat” (even though they were never accused of destroying property, or violence, or inciting such activity) because illegal conduct has taken place in the same campaign.
To put it another way, the court held that the First Amendment rights of a group of people could be restricted based on the past actions of others.
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Austrian Trial Abruptly Stopped
4/3/11
-
Judge Arleth makes unexpected announcement on Thursday that a ruling
is to be issued by April
- Year-long trial has drawn criticism from legal experts for evident
similarities to Nazi-era, show trials
- Animal activists accused of no crimes, put on trial under special
anti-terrorism paragraph
- People all over Europe could be summoned to similar trials under
provisions of the European Arrest Warrant
The trial of German second world war resistance heroes Sophie and Hans Scholl had one plus poin: it was short. Nazi Judge Roland Freisler sentenced them to death in 1943 in a few short hours for their „crime“ of distributing leaflets calling for freedom.
The trial of 13 animal right’s activists in Austria for engaging in a similar civil rights activities, on the other hand, has been going on since March 2, 2010, under a special anti-mafia and terrorism paragraph 278a.
The regular news bulletins on the bizarre show-trial announced to Austrians that a new era of universal repression by the state had started. Coupled with plans for a massive expansion of the surveillance state through data monitoring and storage, it opens the door to a return of a Nazi-style terror regime by the state.
Under the European Arrest Warrant, people all over Europe could find themselves being summoned to face such trials in Austria. However, the notorious animal right’s trial seems finally to be coming to an end. Yesterday, Judge Sonya Arleth announced without warning that she had abandoned plans to call in another 200 witnesses and would give her ruling in April. Activists believe they will be freed because so far none of the 100 or so witnesses called against them has implicated them in any crime and the witnesses called in their defence have not been allowed to take the stand so far.
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Victory! Utah Pound Seizure Stopped
1/3/11
Following PETA's undercover investigation and an intense year-long campaign, the University of Utah (also known as "the U") has announced that it will no longer purchase dogs and cats from North Utah Valley Animal Shelter (NUVAS) —or any other animal shelter—to be used in invasive and deadly experiments. Since the U was the last Utah purchaser of homeless animals for use in experiments, this victory means the complete end of "pound seizure" in the state of Utah!
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Should We Be Eating Dogs In Britain?
28/2/11
Animal Aid asks whether all animals should be treated equally
In Korea and some other Asian countries dogs (and cats) are considered a good source of protein. Although UK residents are likely to be shocked at the thought, why is it considered wrong to eat dogs yet acceptable to eat cows, pigs, chickens and other animals? This is the question that national campaign group Animal Aid is asking during March, which is designated national Veggie Month.
Of course, rather than adding dog to the menu, during Veggie Month Animal Aid is urging the British public to recognise that pigs, sheep, cows and chickens are not so different from the dogs and cats who share our homes, and instead to try a meat-free diet. Animal Aid supporters will be communicating this thought-provoking message to the general public by distributing tens of thousands of the group’s ‘Friend or Food?’ leaflet, as well as setting up street stalls in different parts of the country. A large controversial poster, depicting a golden retriever lying in a grassy field, will be displayed on the stalls asking passers-by, ‘Would you eat dog for dinner? If the idea disgusts you, tell us why’.
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More Illegal Hunting In The Kent Countryside
28/2/11
East Kent Hunt Saboteurs
Featured on BBC South East Today News
This hunting season has seen members of the East Kent Hunt Saboteurs monitoring fox and hare hunts all over the county both openly and undercover. We have seen much this year that we believe to be illegal hunting activity, and have collated evidence that the hunting act is being routinely flouted, both in Kent, and all over the country.
On Saturday 26nd Feb, some of our members were monitoring the East Kent Foxhounds, at Crundale estate. It was obvious that they did not know that we were there, as they appeared to be openly hunting illegally. When monitors found them, the foxhounds were "IN CRY" in a wood (this means the hounds were following a scent), at this point the huntsman should have called them back - under the Hunting Act, it is illegal for them to chase a wild animal.
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Unforeseen In Animal Tests
22/2/11
5th January to 22nd February 2011
Antipsychotic drugs: Class Labeling Change - Treatment During Pregnancy and Potential Risk to Newborns.
FDA cites Sanofi over drug side effect reporting.
Can Prescription Amphetamine Use Raise Parkinson's Risk? Study found those who said they had used Benzedrine or Dexedrine showed 60 percent greater likelihood.
Diabetes drug to be withdrawn over heart risk fears.
State sues drug maker.
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Pamela Anderson Urges End To India Monkey Testing
19/2/11
New Delhi (Reuters Life!) - Former Baywatch star and model Pamela Anderson has accused one of India's most prestigious research centers of animal cruelty, urging it to retire decades-old test monkeys and adopt humane practices. Anderson, famous for slow-motion beach running scenes in the hit 1990s lifeguard TV show, wrote to R.C. Deka, director of All India Institute of Medical Sciences (AIIMS) after watching a video allegedly exposing animal cruelty at the New Delhi center. "It broke my heart to see the suffering that is documented in the enclosed video," wrote Anderson, in a letter sent on behalf of People for Ethical Treatment of Animals (PETA). "But the animals suffering behind closed doors at AIIMS must endure this nightmare every day."
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Austrian Trial: Human Rights Abuse
16/2/11
Animal Protection Trial: Turkish Human Rights Campaigners angered. Charge against Austrian Association of Judges
Turkish human rights campaigners have responded angrily to a statement given by the Association of Judges earlier this week. The association's statement followed strong criticism from the media for the decision to charge a professor of law for criticising the judge's handling of the animal protection case
In the newspaper interview the professor stated that, after being at the court she was of the opinion that the defendants were not being given a fair trial. The Vice President of the Association of Judges told the press We are not in Turkey, we are not in Sudan. Here we conform to human rights.
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Amerijet Stops Transporting Primates!
14/2/11
In a one-sentence letter received on February 14 (download here), Amerijet International CEO David G. Bassett confirmed that the airline had stopped transporting primates:
"This letter on behalf of Amerijet International, Inc. is intended to confirm that, as stated on our website, Amerijet has ceased transporting primates for any and all purposes."
The letter follows a five month letter-writing campaign by the Animal Rights Foundation of Florida and numerous protests by local animal advocates. ARFF is thrilled to be able to add Amerijet International to the list of companies that have made the compassionate decision to dissociate themselves from the cruelty and suffering of the international trade in primates.
http://www.animalrightsflorida.org/Alerts.html
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Walter Bond Gets Minimum Of 5 Years
11/2/11
Animal Liberationist Walter Bond Gets Minimum 5-Year Sentence for Colorado Arson
Denver: Animal liberationists Walter Bond received the minimum sentence allowed by a Colorado court, 5 years prison and 3 years probation, after pleading guilty to burning the Sheepskin Factory in Glendale. Hon. Christine Arguello, while stern with him, noted that she read all 50 letters to her from Mr. Bond's supporters and every essay he had written on his support site. The judge commented that she realizes Walter is very intelligent by his writing, and urged him to focus in the future towards his essays on Animal Liberation and to move away from arson in his life.
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Austria: Another Police Infiltrator Exposed
3/2/11
Agent 481 had contact to VGT as early as 1999 when she took part in protests against live animal transport
VGT identifies Undercover Agent 481 – Permanently under the influence of alcohol, served time in prison and whose application for a job with VGT was turned down
A déjà-vu: yet another infiltrator who, once again, has nothing of any criminal relevance to report. As with the first infiltrator, 'Danielle Durand', police also attempted to cover up her operation. However, this second infiltrator, unlike 'Durand', is not a police officer. Undercover agent 481 operated inside VGT, or in other words, was animal rights active from the beginning of May 2007 until the beginning of November 2007.
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What Are They Doing To Brian Haw?
It was deeply sad to get the message about Brian in America which said he was in hospital in London with lung cancer and could I contact him.
I was travelling back through London to my next event in Europe and I headed straight from the plane to see Brian at his hospital near the Houses of Parliament. What struck me immediately was that despite the diagnosis his focus was on getting back to his spot in the Square as soon as possible.
He had been told he had lung cancer and that it was 'operable'. But the term 'operable', it turned out, meant to remove the lung and then they changed their mind because they said the other lung was not strong enough to cope alone.
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The Downfall Of Science & The Rise Of Intellectual Tyranny
21/1/11
The very reputation of so-called "science" has been irreparably damaged by the invocation of the term "science" by GMO lackeys, pesticide pushers, mercury advocates and fluoride poisoners who all claim to have science on their side. It seems that every toxin, contamination and chemical disaster that now infects our planet has been evangelized in the name of "science."
Where "science" used to be highly regarded in the 1950's, today the term is largely exploited by pharmaceutical companies, biotech giants and chemical companies to push their own for-profit agendas. Actual science has little to do with the schemes now being pushed under the veil of science.
To make matters even worse for the sciences, many so-called "science bloggers" have been revealed to have financial ties to the very same companies whose profits are shored up by their activities http://www.ageofautism.com/2010/08/the-new-york-times-exposes-scienceblogs.html
Rather than defending any sort of scientific truth, science bloggers have become the internet whores of Big Pharma, Monsanto, pesticide manufacturers, chemical companies and toxic mercury factories. There's hardly a dangerous chemical in widespread use today that the science bloggers haven't venomously defended as safe and effective. Many are just blatantly paid off by corporate entities to run around the internet pushing GMOs, chemicals and vaccines.
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US Govt Poisoning Bird Populations
21/1/11
USDA found to be poisoning bird populations, causing mass die-offs involving millions of birds
Not all the mysterious bird die-offs that have been witnessed around the globe recently are due to unexplained causes. A recent mass die-off event witnessed in Yankton, South Dakota was traced back to the USDA which admitted to carrying out a mass poisoning of the birds.
After hundreds of starlings were found dead in the Yankton Riverside Park, concerned citizens began to investigate. Before long, a USDA official called the local police and admitted they had poisoned the birds. "They say that they had poisoned the birds about ten miles south of Yankton and they were surprised they came to Yankton like they did and died in our park," says Yankton Animal Control Officer Lisa Brasel, as reported by KTIV http://www.ktiv.com/Global/story.asp?S=13865540
The USDA then confirmed the story and explained it was all "part of a large killing" in Nebraska. Some of the birds that ate the poison apparently flew all the way to Yankton before succumbing to the poison.
Watch
the video yourself, as reported from KTIV:
http://naturalnews.tv/v.asp?v=191572F79E8B2C64705B4AB182AF54F9
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600 Orangutans To Be Set Free
The Restorasi Habitat Orangutan Indonesia, part of the Borneo Orangutan Survival Foundation, has been given permission by the Indonesian government to release over 600 orangutans into thousands of acres of land. There had been no releases of orangutans from their animal facility for the last nine years. The new releases will take place in East and Central Kalimantan in Borneo through 2015. East Kalimantan has experienced a boom in logging, coal mining, forest products and petroleum production. The logging and mining have caused habitat loss for orangutans, so much so that even the newly released orangutans will go to lands that have already been logged, although some areas were replanted with trees in 2002. The Restorasi Habitat Orangutan Indonesia will have to pay $1.4 million dollars for 60 years for the orangutans to live on the lands where they will be released.
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MFA'S Fish Investigation Reveals Horrors
20/1/11
Photo | Merseyside Animal Rights
A new Mercy For Animals undercover investigation provides a startling glimpse into “Catfish Corner,” a fish slaughter facility in Mesquite, Texas.
Behind the operation’s jaunty name lies a grisly reality. From the water to the cutting table, fish are tortured – suffocated, skinned and dismembered, all while conscious and feeling pain.
MFA’s hidden camera video reveals:
* Workers using pliers to pull the skin off of live fish
* Dozens of fish crammed into buckets and baskets, gasping for oxygen
* Skinned fish still moving and gasping on the cutting table
* Fish flailing and struggling to escape the workers’ knives
* Live fish sliced and split in half
* Workers tearing the heads off of live fish
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Commons' Speaker In Hunt Row
19/1/11
Commons Speaker John Bercow is at the centre of a fresh row over his impartiality after he revealed he backed the hunting ban
The Buckingham MP told a constituent he agreed hunting foxes to kill them was "wrong in the 21st Century". A constituency spokesman said it was Mr Bercow's "duty" to represent his constituents' views. But Conservative minister Alan Duncan said Speakers should not express party political opinions.
The international development minister told BBC News: "The most important quality in any Speaker is his impartiality. "Of course he has to look after his constituents, but he should be a step removed from any party political opinion."
Some Conservative MPs are hoping to repeal the Hunting Act when it comes back to the Commons. The coalition agreement promises a free vote on the issue, although no date for the debate has been set, with some press reports suggesting Prime Minister David Cameron was keen to delay it to avoid a potentially damaging row with his Lib Dem coalition partners.
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Indian Bullfight Injures 76 People
19/1/11
The Indian bull taming sport of jallikattu injured 76 people on Monday
The jallikattu took place on Monday in the southern Indian state of Tamil Nadu as part of the harvest festival of Pongal.
Jallikattu differs from other such sports in the West in that there is no attempt to favor the bull over the humans involved and the bulls are not killed. In jallikattu, the bull's horns are sharpened and the human competitors are not allowed weapons.
There are variations on jallikattu, but generally the sport involves people attempting to subdue or simply hold onto a bull that is running and thrashing about. Those who can subdue the animal or hold onto him for a predetermined amount of time are awarded prizes.
There has been a lot of attention paid to jallikattu recently, as activists work to have the games outlawed. A recent legal battle brought by activists resulted in jallikattu being banned in 2008, but was later reinstated, albeit with more restrictions.
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Canada: Hospitals End Fatal Use Of Animals
19/1/11
Canadian Hospitals End Fatal Use of Rabbits and Pigs: One Action
Together, we continue to save lives and stop cruel training practices! We recently learned that PCRM was successful in ending the use of rabbits and pigs in trauma training courses at two Canadian medical facilities.
In a pediatric trauma training course in Hamilton, Ontario, trainees made an incision between live rabbits’ ribs and inserted a plastic tube into the animals’ chest cavities. In another course at Hamilton Health Sciences, up to 91 pigs per year were used in a course in which needles were inserted into the animals’ chest cavities and the sacs around their hearts. Pigs were also used in a trauma training course at Saint John Hospital in New Brunswick. Both hospitals now teach these crucial lifesaving procedures with medical simulators modeled on the human body.
PCRM urged course directors and administrators at both medical centers to adopt nonanimal training methods. We also filed a federal complaint against Hamilton Health Sciences with the Canadian Council on Animal Care before the hospital confirmed that it had replaced animal use.
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25 Lions Rescued From Circus Cages
19/1/11
Twenty-five rescued circus lions from all over Bolivia were gathered this week, in preparation for their trip to an animal rescue center in Colorado. Animal Defenders International worked with Bolivian authorities enforcing the country’s ban on the use of animals in circuses. The lions will be transported to The Wild Animal Sanctuary near Denver, CO, where they will have about 80 acres of open land to move around in. Preparations are being made to move the lions now.
“These lions have endured incredible pain and hardship, but their new home will be a natural oasis where they can live freely in family prides the way nature intended,” said Executive Director Pat Craig of the Wild Animal Sanctuary.
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China Bans Animal Circuses!
18/1/11
China has banned animal circuses and warned its zoos they must stop abusing animals or face closure
Live animal shows and circuses are hugely popular in China, and draw around 150 million visitors a year at 700 zoos. However, animal rights campaigners have repeatedly complained that the shows should be stopped.
“A zoo in my city had a show where they forced an adult lion to stand on the back of a horse for a sort of animal acrobatic performance,” said Xiao Bing, the chairman of the local animal protection association in the southern city of Xiamen.
“I also saw one entertainment park where the monkeys seemed to have wounds all over their bodies. The manager told me the monkeys got hurt during live monkey-fighting shows,” he said.
Other cases of abuse include beating lions to make them jump through rings of fire and forcing bears to walk across tightropes, said Hua Ning, at the International Fund for Animal Welfare.
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Vegan Activist Reveals New Measure of Intelligence
14/1/11
A new measure of intelligence: Big-picture thinking trumps narrow-minded expertise
Observing the various realms of science, medicine, experts and world events, I've come to the conclusion that our modern definition of "intelligence" (IQ) is seriously lacking. The label of "high IQ" is typically assigned to those who are experts in narrowly-defined fields such as disease pathology, pharmacology, particle physics, mathematics or other so-called "hard science" areas. And yet, it's not uncommon to see a high-level mathematics professor with an IQ of 175 chowing down on a processed hamburger laced with toxic chemical additives, while wearing clothes washed in carcinogenic mainstream laundry detergent.
The professor may be brilliant in mathematics, in other words, but he's unknowingly bathing his entire body in cancer-causing chemicals at the same time.
Not too bright.
Similarly, a typical conventional doctor thinks he knows about health, but he buys breakfast cereals made with genetically modified corn and doesn't even know that GMOs are bad for your health. A quantum physics professor wears antiperspirant deodorant and cologne products that contain powerful cancer-causing chemicals that are absorbed right through the skin. A pharmacist who is an expert in the world of drugs and synthetic chemicals has no clue that the common mineral zinc is crucial for proper immune function.
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Save The Wolves
14/1/11
©AFP/Olivier Morin
Tomorrow the slaughter of wolves starts in Sweden again and wolf-lovers has taken a picture, where they are armed and with a murdered hunter saying they will be in the forests to to protect the last remaining wolfes in Sweden;
http://www.aftonbladet.se/nyheter/article8408750.ab
The pictures is to be seen as a posing picture, the way the hunters to with murdered animals, and is not a threat. But lots of different activists will be out in the forest tomorrow when the illegal wolf hunt starts to do what they can to stop it.
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Bullfighting Banned From Spanish TV
12/1/11
Spain´s national television broadcaster, RTVE, have announced that it will no longer allow bullfighting to be broadcast across the television network.
The move has come after the broadcaster took steps to self regulate the program content, based on the idea of protecting children from images that could be harrowing, distressing or damaging.
The ban on showing these gruesome acts falls under their newly devised “Violence with animals” charter.
The country on the whole is still debating the merits of bullfighting with some people claiming it is a right of heritage of Spanish culture, whereas many animals supporters are outraged that the slaughter of animals for sport should continue in this modern world.
Bullfighting was outlawed in Catalonia in 2010, joining a ban that has been in place in the Canary Islands since 1991.
By Mark Nolan
http://www.theleader.info/article/26700/spain/costa-blanca/bull-fighting-banned-from-tv/
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36 Beagles Rescued - Spain
12/1/11
Anonymous Communique
Click here for a photo gallery from the rescue, and here to view video; see below for details about downloading the photographs/video
"Thirty six dogs have been rescued by a group of animal rights activists from the breeding facility of animals for experiments Harlan Interfauna located in the outskirts of the catalonian town Sant Feliu de Codines (Catalonia, Spain), offering a new life to these animals in this new year.
Once inside we documented the miserable life of these animals and start preparing their transportation. Permanently locked in the kennels without being able to run, play, explore their environment or relate with each other, several of them had sores –as shown in the images we filmed that night- since they had to sleep in winter in direct contact with the cold concrete that was covered with their own feces and urine.
One of the rescued dogs was living in total isolation without any kind of contact with the other animals. This is a form of psychological torture for social animals who need the company of other animals. Others were so anxious on having any contact and stimuli after been in those kennels for nearly four years that they desperately tried to touch us through the bars and call our attention in any way possible. When we entered into their kennel, they excitedly jumped onto us looking for affection. Few minutes later they happily accompanied us out of that place in the first walk free they do in their whole lives.
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Monkey Gets Revenge On Cruel Trainer
10/1/11
See how you like it! Moment a performing monkey got its revenge on his cruel trainer
A cruel street performer who whipped his monkeys got the shock of his life when one of the animals turned on him.
The incident happened when the man and his performing monkeys were putting on a show on a street in Nanchang, capital of southern China's Jiangxi Province.
A trainer got quite a surprise when, after threatening his monkey with a whip, the animal pulled his hair
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Activists Target Mink Farms In Italy
9/1/11
Yesterday we launched a day of action against mink farms in Italy. Around 2pm o'clock 400 people (according to local media) started to march from the local ex concentration camp of Fossoli (http://www.fondazionefossoli.org/) to a modern one located since so many years 1 km far from the camp: the Italo Rossi's mink farm. We made connections between the two realities for all the march and also for the previous days through our press releases.
Anyway we spent also the previous days answering to media which criminalized the protest often writing Campagna AIP was similar to Alf and the demos of yesterday were organized to free the animals from cages. We had some positive responses to local media we got in touch, making clear we're not connected with Alf even if we strongly support direct actions against mink farms.
The march and the demos were really really good, people were so involved and large part of them probably never got in touch directly with a mink farm, just seeing that was so important. But the best news arrived at the beginning of the march when we were informed the mink farm located in Novi (where the second demo was planned, not so far from the one in Fossoli) was definitely closed. Yes, we can announce another mink farm closed down in Italy! And surely bacause of direct actions against it (There were during the past years: two liberations, two cars of the owner's family were burned, several raids in the middle of the nights with fireworks, menaces through phone callings... All these actions according to what media reported). We think the owner was really stressed.
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Child Flu Vaccine Contains Mercury
9/1/11
Up to a million under-fives have been inoculated against the flu virus with a controversial vaccine containing poisonous mercury
Pandemrix has been given to almost a quarter of all healthy babies and young children as well as thousands of older children with health problems. Inquiries by the Sunday Express reveal it contains a preservative made with a form of mercury that was phased out of childhood vaccines in 2004 after fears about its safety
The preservative, called thimerosal, has been linked with autism and developmental disorders in children and was withdrawn from childhood vaccines in the United States and parts of Europe 10 years ago. Yet the UK government has always insisted there is no persuasive evidence it poses a health risk. When it was withdrawn, Labour health minister Rosie Winterton said the move was part of “a global goal to minimise environmental exposure to mercury”. However, many experts disagree. Dr Richard Halvorsen, author of the book, The Truth About Vaccines, said: “Thimerosal is an extremely toxic substance and known poison to the brain.
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Patients Are Now The Real Guinea Pigs
6/1/11
Antidote Europe. Press Release
Antidote Europe welcomes recent French media reports warning the public about dangerous medicines.
Antidote Europe welcomes recent media reports warning the public about dangerous medicines (the latest are the drugs mediator and buflomedil). The French-based NGO fully endorses this latest expose that reveals the enormous gulf between reliable scientific methods and some of the currently used tests, which are hopelessly out of date.
All medical drugs are required to undergo extensive animal testing, even though animals cannot reliably predict what will happen in a human. This message was clearly brought home by the near fatal Northwick Park clinical trial involving six young men, who received an experimental drug at one five hundredth the dose found safe in monkeys. While cases like this are relatively rare, the rate of adverse drug reactions in the general population is far greater. In fact, nine out of ten drugs that pass animal tests fail to make it through clinical trials involving people (1). This begs the question of why our regulatory authorities still require animal tests.
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Anti Hunt MPs Face Backlash
2/1/11
Conservative MPs face a backlash over hunting ban
Conservative MPs opposed to repeal of the hunting ban face a backlash
from hunt campaigners in their constituencies, it has emerged. Barely
a few hours after he became Prime Minister, David Cameron spoke to a
leading member of the hunting community instrumental in moves to overturn
the ban on hunting with hounds.
"Tell me how to do it and I will do it," Mr Cameron said.
Despite having arguably more pressing issues such as the economy on
his mind, the new Prime Minister was clearly eager to find a way to
deliver on his oft repeated promise to the traditionalists of rural
England, a community he comes from after all and one he is unlikely
to want to betray.
No one close to Mr Cameron believes that he is anything but still personally
wedded to the commitment he made in opposition to bring forward repeal
of the hunting ban with a government bill in government time. Whether
he can deliver on the promise, however, is looking increasingly in doubt.
In the past few days, suspicions have grown that the issue has been
kicked into the longest possible grass. Claims by the anti-hunting lobby
that more than 20 of the new intake Tory MPs would not support repeal
have caused particular disquiet.
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Uni Vet Quits Over Animal Testing
31/12/10
Brown: 'If you can't take care of the animals, you shouldn't take the money.'
The University of Wisconsin has been accused of bullying a senior veterinarian into resigning after he spoke out against animal welfare abuses at their research facility.
UW has been cited over twenty times for violations of the Animal Welfare Act in the past year and a half, and its consistent noncompliance with even the bare minimum of standards imposed by the AWA has been a source of criticism, both from within the university and without.
From within the university, Dr. Richard “Jim” Brown has raised concerns about the welfare of the animals in the school’s labs. Brown was a senior program veterinarian at the university’s Research Animal Resource Center, where he says he was bullied and retaliated against for raising such concerns.
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EU Delay Cosmetic Test Ban
31/12/10
Cosmetics industry criticised
as EU set to admit delay in animal testing ban
Critics accuse pharmaceuticals industry of stalling on tests.
EU rule could involve extra 54m animals in lab experiments.
Cosmetics
counter A Europe-wide ban on the sale of cosmetics tested on animals
anywhere in the world may now be delayed for up to four years. The
final phase of European law designed to eradicate testing on animals
of chemicals used in the cosmetics industry is set to be delayed for
as long as four years because it is thought
that alternative ways of testing the safety of ingredients' will not
be ready in time. Cosmetics and testing experts predict the European
commission will announce shortly that it is unable to introduce the
third phase of the European cosmetics directive, as planned in 2013.
This directive would have banned the sale in Europe of any cosmetics
tested on animals anywhere in the world. Neil Parish MP, chair of the
associate parliamentary group for animal welfare, said "sufficient"
replacement safety tests would not be available until 2017.
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Unforeseen In Animal Tests
News Headlines 16th Nov 2010 to 31st Dec 2010
“Pfizer Ordered to Pay $1.5 Million in Prempro Damages.”
Bloomberg. 31 December 2010.
“New
Drug Approvals Fall in 2010 as Safety Concerns Slow U.S. FDA Decisions.”
Bloomberg. 30 December 2010
“FDA
places experimental pain drugs on hold.”
Reuters. 28 December 2010.
“Regeneron
pain drug put on clinical hold by FDA.”
Reuters. 27 December 2010 Reuters. 27 December 2010
“Obecure
obesity drug fails trial. In contrast to a previous trial, Obecure's
Histalean did not prevent weight gain by patients taking the antipsychotic
drug Zyprexa.”
Globes. 24 December 2010
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Austrian Trial – Activists Accuse Prosecutor
29/12/10
Animal Protection Trial – VGT accuses Prosecutor
In her first comment to the press since the scandal came to light about the denied existence of a police infiltrator and her exonerating reports, the Minister for Justice told the media that this was an 'unusual' procedure but she was not prepared to stop the case
Her comment has done nothing to quieten the press: articles continue to appear in the major newspapers scorning the judge, the prosecution and the Ministry for Justice. It now remains to be seen what the Minister for Justice will make of the report of the proceedings ordered by her from the prosecution.
Meanwhile VGT manager Harald Balluch, one of the defendants, has written a seventeen page long open letter to the Ministry for Justice detailing the various ways in which the prosecutor in the case has broken the law.
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Diet Drug Kills Thousands
29/12/10
How slim French women may have paid for their figures with their lives as 'miracle' diet drug is 'linked to deaths of thousands'
French people had been using the potential killer drug for 30 years
A 'miracle' slimming pill may have killed thousands of people in France and could become the worst health scandal in the nation's history. The drug Mediator was prescribed to up five million people, originally to overweight diabetes sufferers, from its launch in 1979 until it was banned last year. And for 30 years it was also used as an appetite-suppressing drug by thousands of healthy men and women, with its cost even subsidised by the French healthcare system. But a forthcoming official report is now warning that it may be linked to the deaths of up to 2,000 people and caused heart problems in 3,500 more.
Paris government scientists claim the active ingredient in Mediator, called benflourex, could have caused thickening of the heart valves, fatigue, breathlessness - and had no effect at all on weight loss. Politicians and successive health ministers are now under pressure to answer why they ignored repeated warning from experts that the drug could be highly dangerous.
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NASA Monkeys Spared
27/12/10
Animals victory: NASA cancels plans to dose monkeys with radiation
Certainly a victory for the animals that would have been used in a $1.75 million project to inject 2-pound squirrel monkeys with doses of high-energy radiation has been stopped after activists, including PETA, showed the country the horrors of such experimentation. PETA and other animal rights groups have called much of NASA’s policies of using animals in experiments “cruel and unnecessary.” Many authoritative texts on animal testing and animal rights have pointed out that much of the data garnered in the testing process is disregarded by experts because humans are too different than animals.
NASA operates the Brookhaven Lab’s Space Radiation Laboratory where the experiments would have occurred. NASA has been in the media often in recent months after more and more reports of animal testing come from the US Space Program. Controversy over this specific experiment has been large, with protests and campaigns calling for the cancellation of the monkey experiments. Paul McCartney and Alicia Silverstone had joined the campaign to force NASA to shut down the project.
http://bikyamasr.com/wordpress/?p=23616
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No Plan To Overturn Hunt Ban
26/12/10
Tories abandon promise of early vote on hunting
Anti-hunt lobby scents first blood as officials admit there will be no repeal next year
The Government is to shelve a promised vote on repealing the ban on foxhunting until 2012 at the earliest, in a move likely to dismay countryside campaigners as they attempt to set out for Boxing Day meetings.
David Cameron, a self-confessed "country boy", has condemned the 2005 ban on hunting with dogs as a "mistake" which intruded into part of rural life "where the criminal law shouldn't go". However, the Conservative election pledge to hold a free vote on repeal "early" after polling day has been abandoned, senior officials at the Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs admitted on Friday.
With major reforms of the health, education, and welfare systems being piloted through Parliament, no vote is expected in 2011. "There are many greater priorities facing the Government at the moment," said Jim Paice, the Agriculture Minister. And deep divisions over the hunt ban remain within both Tory and Liberal Democrat ranks.
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In UK 10 Million Turkeys Killed For Xmas
25/12/10
Comparing to traditional and factory farming, organic way of breeding animals seems to be a healthier and more ethical solution.
Our new short film shows breeding and slaughter of turkeys in one of organic farms in Britain.
We are happy to spread the message so feel free to send the link, embed the video. If you wish to get a footage from us - let us know.
Xmas
Special - Short Life of Organic Turkeys
http://vimeo.com/17709581
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Revolutionary & Militant by Walter Bond
20/12/10
From Golden, Colorado jail
[Walter is making himself available to the media for interviews from
jail. Contact 303-277-0211]
Two buzzwords I often hear in various radical circles are “revolutionary” and “militant”. I think they are two very important words that have become far too commonly used and thus do not command the respect they deserve. In this essay, I am going to put a fresh perspective on the word “revolutionary” and get back to the definition of “militant”.All this from the perspective and for the benefit of the abolitionist animal liberation activists and radical environmentalists that care more about our mother earth and her animal nations than contemporary industrialized society.
Revolutionary. Advertisers would like us to think that their products
are revolutionary. Politicians would have us think that revolutionaries
are “radical” and “extreme”. Religionists believe
their prophets to be standard-bearers of revolution. I guess the common
usage for “revolutionary” might mean anything that brings
about great change, and in particular, great change for the cause or
causes in which one believes. But for me, the importance is in “How
do we effect great change?” Therefore, I view revolutionary as
a steadiness instead of an event horizon. From my unorthodox view of
the word, I find a planet in orbit to be the best and most accurate
depiction.
A planet in orbit stays in orbit. Revolution after revolution, our mother
earth stays that course of action. No matter what obstacles fall in
the path of travel, be it asteroids or comets. Even if a confrontation
with another planet were to occur, threatening the certain deaths of
both planets, our mother earth would not move. Even though, to an outside
observer, the failure to move out of the way or change direction may
seem suicidal, or the inability to budge may seem to be unreasonable.
In any case, the earth can only remain in orbit. She revolves, she is
revolutionary.
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Middlesex Activists Head For Heathrow
17/12/10
Activists in Middlesex headed for Heathrow Airport as part of the Gateway to Hell day of action.
Leaflets were distributed throughout the main terminals, informing travelers of the thousands of animals transported through the airport destined to die on laboratory cage floors.
Following this, we headed for the Animal Quarantine Station at the south of the airport. This is the unit where laboratory animals are transported through, before heading to vivisection facilities across the country. Leaflets were given to staff and those collecting companion animals, some of whom were horrified at the idea that their pets were held alongside sentient beings who will suffer a lingering death as part of archaic experiments. Security shortly joined us, as did a large number of police officers and we were escourted from the BAA Heathrow premises.
Heathrow is a hub for the import and export of laboratory animals. We strongly urge members of staff to leak information about the various companies operating from there and their involvement in animal testing.
For the animals, until next time.
http://www.antivivisection.info/news/17_12_10b.html
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Austrian Trial Reaches Critical Stage
17/12/10
Animal Protection Trial: Sixty-three Days in Court - Undercover Agent testifies - Journalists call for the Trial to be stopped
"Danielle Durand" - 16 months in the middle of the Austrian Animal Rights Movement
Undercover agent proves to be the best exonerating witness the defense could wish for
The last week of the trial for this year was dominated by the undercover agent 'Danielle Durant's' hearing. After police and prosecution denied the fact that an undercover probe had in fact been operating in the midst of VGT for nearly sixteen months, they now have to watch as she proves to be the best exonerating witness the defense could wish for.
After postponing the hearing on Monday to Wednesday, the judge took the decision to question 'Danielle Durant' in a neighbouring room and have the hearing displayed via a video link in the court room on Thursday. She argued that the 'health of the witness was otherwise in danger' and she was concerned that due to all the media interest, the witness may fall victim to stalking.
Usually witnesses are permitted to testify outside of the court room only when they have been the victim of, for example, sexual abuse in order to avoid the trauma of being in the presence of the abuser.
Given that everyone could see the witness on fotos displayed on the internet, and that she was an officer trained to be an undercover investigator it was obvious that the real reason for keeping her out of the court room was to avoid the defense being able to ask questions.
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Celebs Speak Up For Lab Primates
15/12/10
Celebrity wildlife heroes Brian
May & Bill Oddie support BUAV’s call for an end to the UK’s
role in cruel monkey trade
London: Rock guitarist Brian May and TV wildlife expert Bill Oddie have joined the BUAV in its call on the UK Government to stop supporting the cruel trade in wild-caught monkeys. Brian May and Bill Oddie joined a host of MPs, primatologists and other scientists who attended an event at the House of Commons for the BUAV’s Stop the Baby Trade campaign to end the cruel trade in monkeys for research. The event was hosted by Leader of the Green Party, Caroline Lucas MP, with guest speaker, field biologist and conservationist Ian Redmond OBE. Brian May and Bill Oddie were shocked to learn about the cruelty and suffering involved in the capture of wild primates. Despite a UK ban on the import of wild-caught primates since 1997, there is not a similar ban on their offspring. Since 2009, over 2,000 monkeys born to wild-caught parents have been imported into the UK. The majority of these came from Mauritius which is the UK’s main supplier of primates.
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Pharmaceutical Terrorism
14/12/10
Is Alive and Well
Dr. Suzanne Humphries writes, “It’s fall in the northern hemisphere and more than one type of darkness has set in. Vaccines are being injected at lightning speed. New vaccines, untested vaccines, double-strength flu vaccines for the over-65 group; none of which have been shown to be effective at keeping anyone healthy. The naïve are lining up at clinics, shopping malls, and retail stores. They don’t know which kind of vaccine they will receive. Which manufacturer is it? Does it have mercury? What chemicals does it contain? Why should they care? Why would they not trust their doctor (or their local pharmacist)?”
Pfizer Inc. said Friday it is pulling its blood pressure drug Thelin off the market and stopping all clinical trials because the drug can cause fatal liver damage.
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H1N1 Vaccine Linked To 700% Increase In Miscarriages
8/12/10
Recent data presented to the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention's (CDC) Advisory Committee on Children's Vaccines has revealed some shocking information about the effects of the H1N1 / swine flu vaccine on pregnant women. According to the report, the rate of miscarriage among pregnant women during the 2009 H1N1 / swine flu pandemic soared by over 700 percent compared to previous years, pointing directly to the vaccine as the culprit -- but the CDC denies the truth and continues to insist nobody has been harmed.
According to the CDC, nearly 50 percent of all pregnant women were vaccinated with the H1N1 vaccine during the 2009 / 2010 influenza season. Those whose physicians instructed them to get a seasonal flu shot were three times more likely to get it, while those instructed specifically to get the H1N1 shot were ten times more likely to get it. And the numbers clearly show that along with the rise in vaccinations due to the H1N1 scare came the sharp increase in miscarriages, including a slew of actual reported adverse events.
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Tory MP ‘Bullying’ In Greyhound Row
6/12/10
Iain Duncan Smith accused of 'bullying' in greyhound row
Mira Bar-Hillel, Property Correspondent
Police have been asked to investigate in an increasingly bitter row over the redevelopment of Walthamstow Stadium after a Cabinet minister was accused of making threats.
Work and Pensions Secretary Iain Duncan Smith, who is MP for Chingford, has come under fire after backing campaigners fighting a scheme to turn the greyhound-racing stadium into flats.
London & Quadrant, the housing association which bought the site two years ago, announced plans last week for 320 homes - but no racing. The project has been opposed by campaign group Save Our Stow, with the support of Mr Duncan Smith, Stella Creasy, the Labour MP for Walthamstow, and Mayor Boris Johnson.
L&Q has responded by cancelling two consultation meetings, and issued a statement saying it was calling the police to investigate alleged "individual and collective threats to members of staff" from those opposing the plans.
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A Brave Woman Takes A Stand
1/12/10
TV Licence Protest Over Grave Robbers
An animal rights activist involved in notorious protests against a former guinea pig farm near Burton is to stand trial after refusing to pay her television licence in protest at a BBC programme about the affair.
Janet Tomlinson claims the Crimewatch Solved show, broadcast in August 2006, contained ‘factual inaccuracies’ about the campaign against Darley Oaks Farm, in Newchurch, which shot to national prominence after the body of Gladys Hammond, mother-in-law of one of the farm’s owners, was stolen from her grave.
Tomlinson, of Shobnall Close, Burton, who was arrested and questioned about the exhumation before being released without charge, refused to buy a new TV licence until the BBC retracted claims made in the programme and apologised.
In an appearance at Burton Magistrates’ Court, a defiant Tomlinson said she would be using her argument against the BBC as the basis for a not guilty plea to a charge of using a television without a licence.
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20 Turkeys Liberated
25/11/10
Just before Thanksgiving, the Animal Rights Militia liberates 20 turkeys in Vermont
After a year that saw few liberations of domesticated animals, the Animal Rights Militia liberated 20 turkeys from a roadside pen in Vermont. The liberation came just hours before the turkeys were to be killed.
Tires on a mobile slaughter vehicle were also slashed.
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Big Pharma Plans to Ban Herbal Medicine
Herbal medicine is to be banned. Yes it is. As of April Fools Day 2011. This sound like some joke? It is in fact deadly serious. Please read on and then share this information widely. Some will call you names like conspiracy theorist or nut job but a great many more people will be grateful to you for opening their eyes to the truth. This legislation has not even been discussed in our parliament instead it is forced upon us by the European dictatorship which we need to remove ourselves from. Most UK MP's are as much in the dark as the rest of us so contact yours and let's force a debate. We don't have much time but we can still act to stop this blatant attack on our health and freedom.
You can contact your MP to object using this simple online form from Save Herbal Medicine - click here
Big Pharma Scores Big Win: Medicinal Herbs Will Disappear in EU
It's almost a done deal. We are about to see herbal preparations disappear,
and the ability of herbalists to prescribe them will also be lost.
Big Pharma has almost reached the finish line of its decades-long battle
to wipe out all competition. As of 1 April 2011—less than eight
months from now—virtually all medicinal herbs will become illegal
in the European Union. The approach in the United States is a bit different,
but it's having the same devastating effect. The people have become
nothing more than sinks for whatever swill Big Pharma and Agribusiness
choose to send our way, and we have no option but to pay whatever rates
they want.
Big Pharma and Agribusiness have almost completed their march to take over every aspect of health, from the food we eat to the way we care for ourselves when we're ill. Have no doubt about it: this takeover will steal what health remains to us.
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Plans To Increase Vaccine Dose For Kids
24/11/10
UK to boost vaccination rates by pumping babies with six vaccines at once
Apparently drug companies are no longer satisfied with a tiered vaccine schedule, and would rather have babies receive their shots all at the same time in order to ensure full compliance. A recent announcement by the U.K. Department of Health insists that babies should receive a six-in-one "super-vaccination" when they turn age one, for the primary purpose of increasing vaccination rates.
Normally, U.K. babies receive their meningitis shots separate from other shots, with about a month of buffer time in between. But officials are now telling general practitioners (GPs) to give three measles, mumps, and rubella vaccines, as well as two meningitis vaccines and a pneumonia vaccine, all at the same time. And they claim that there is no health risk involved with babies getting this barrage of vaccines.
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Austian Trial: Undercover Agent Confirmed
22/11/10
Undercover agent. Seventeen months at the heart of the VGT
Investigators and Prosecution give false evidence in Court. Seventeen months active within VGT: Undercover infiltration unlawfully carried out
It has recently been made public that a police special unit undercover agent was in place at the very heart of the VGT from April 2007 until September 2008. In the trial proceedings up until now police have always denied this was the case and have blocked access for the defence to these files. But now, due to proof of the existence of an undercover agent presented by the VGT, police have confirmed that this was the case, but claim that it was a measure to prevent crimes taking place and therefore not subject to authorisation. The VGT strongly refutes this.
Eberhart Theuer, human rights expert form the University of Vienna: “Undercover investigations for the prevention of crime are only possible under the security police law (SPG). Undercover investigating under this law consists only of the gathering of information. Infiltration and active participation, as was the case with the undercover agent 'Danielle Durand' within the VGT, is not permissible. And in any case, undercover information gathering necessitates a warrant, which the police did not have. In addition, the use of the security police law in this case is inappropriate due to the fact that clear suspects had already been identified.”
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Largest US Egg Producer Exposed For Extreme Inhumane Treatment Of Hens
22/11/10
An undercover investigation prompted by the Humane Society of the United States (HSUS) has revealed horrific conditions at hen houses owned by the nation's largest egg producing company. Cal-Maine, a Jackson, Miss.-based egg producer that owns 26 million birds and sells eight billion eggs a year, operates a massive factory egg plant in Waelder, Texas, that an HSUS investigator found to be ridden with filth, disease, and death.
HSUS discreetly hired one of its own to work at the Cal-Maine plant for about a month in order to document what was happening there while incognito. During that time, the investigator noted "multiple abuses and food safety threats," many of which are highly shocking.
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Hounded Out? The Garden Hunt Saboteur
20/11/10
A prominent hunt saboteur is bringing a landmark discrimination claim – after he was allegedly sacked by a garden centre because of his "philosophical" objection to blood sports.
Joe Hashman's undercover filming helped convict celebrity chef Clarissa Dickson-Wright of attending illegal hare coursing. Joe Hashman, 42, is arguing that his anti-hunting beliefs deserve protection in the workplace. Mr Hashman's undercover filming helped convict celebrity chef Clarissa Dickson-Wright of attending illegal hare coursing. The next day, the owners of the centre allegedly had him sacked by email because they were keen fox hunters. He was instructed not to bother coming back to work.
The professional gardener is suing Orchard Park Garden Centre, of Gillingham, Dorset, for discrimination on the grounds of philosophical belief. The centre's owners Sheila Clarke and Ron Clarke are keen supporters of the South and West Wiltshire Hunt, and its company secretary Lucinda Stokes is the former joint Master of the Hunt.
Tensions were also allegedly heightened by the death of a keen local huntsman with whom Mr Hashman had regular run-ins over the years. Married father-of-two Mr Hashman, of nearby Shaftesbury, is seeking £50,000 for loss of earnings and injury to feelings.
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Unforeseen In Animal Tests
News entries 12th October to 19th November
Testing medications on animals means drug trials and drug releases littered with surprises. This isn't an occasional event, it is commonplace.
“Propoxyphene:
Withdrawal - Risk of Cardiac Toxicity. Sold as Darvon, Darvocet, and
generics.”
FDA Medwatch. 19 November 2010
“Heart
drug Multaq linked with 387 reports of adverse effects.”
Sacramento Bee. 19 November 2010.
“Study
of Pfizer, Bristol drug halted by bleeding.”
Reuters. 19 November 2010.
“Heart
drug raises questions. Report links Multaq with 387 reports of adverse
effects.”
JS Online. 19 November 2010
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School Milk Challenged As Unhealthy
17/11/10
Critics of the United Kingdom's school milk program are becoming more vocal, challenging the widespread national assumption that drinking milk is good for children.
"From Winston Churchill's wartime order to keep the milk flowing, which was formalized under the 1946 School Milk Act ... the idea that it is natural, healthy and an essential part of a good diet has been unchallenged," writes Andrew Marszal in The Telegraph.
That consensus is wavering. Recently, junior health minister Anne Milton suggested that the national program to provide free milk for children under five should abolished. And research continues to emerge that milk is neither an essential nor healthy part of the human diet.
As Marszal notes, milk contains no nutrient that cannot be found in a balanced, dairy-free diet. Although milk is high in calcium, most of this nutrient cannot actually be absorbed by the human body, making green leafy vegetables a much more effective source. Cow milk, designed for calves, also contains more fat and protein than the human body needs -- which is unsurprising considering that while it takes a human infant 180 days to double its birth weight, it takes a newborn cow only 47 days.
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Weight Loss Drug 'Caused 500 Deaths'
16/11/10
A weight loss drug that has been taken by millions of French is likely to have been the cause of death of 500 people, the country's drug safety body announced on Tuesday, amid claims that health authorities long ignored calls for the drug to be banned.
France's second-largest pharmaceutical group was yesterday at the heart of a spiralling health scandal over Mediator, a drug initially reserved for obese people with diabetes that became a popular appetite suppressor.
Afssaps, the drug safety body, yesterday said expert epidemiologists believed Mediator, made by Servier, had been lethal for at least 500 people and had caused 3,500 others to be admitted to hospital since its launch in 1976.
Some 300,000 people were taking the drug when Afssaps pulled it from the market last November, saying it had little effect on diabetes and might lead to a dangerous thickening of heart valves. The European Medicines Agency followed suit.
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Hollywood Actress Joins Sea Shepherd
16/11/10
Avatar Michelle Rodriguez Star Joins Sea Shepherd
Whale Wars: Michelle Rodriguez will set sail with anti-whaling activists Sea Shepherd from Fremantle this afternoon. Picture: Reuters Source: news.com.au
Hollywood actress Michelle Rodriguez, star of blockbuster Avatar, is in Fremantle throwing her support behind anti-whaling activist group Sea Shepherd.
Rodriguez said she will be on board Sea Shepherd’s flagship vessel MY Steve Irwin when it sets sail at 4pm today for Hobart where crew plan to replenish supplies before heading to the Southern Ocean in December.
The trip, dubbed 'Operation No Compromise', will be Sea Shepherd’s seventh mission into the frigid waters of Antarctica to try and stop the slaughter of whales by Japanese researchers.
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The Cancer Business
15/11/10
Cancer & Biopsy
Epidemic
by Pat Rattigan ND
The Dark at the End of the Tunnel
In Britain, at the present time, around one third of general hospital patients are suffering from cancer. Two out of five of the population have, or will develop, the disease. If we accept the figures, for cancer incidence, of 30 percent in 1980, 40 percent now and 50 percent in the year 2010, at the present rate of increase the figure will reach 100 percent around 2080. A multitude of factors suggest that the rise is set to accelerate.
The 5-year survival figures, not to be confused with the successful treatment of the disease, for the major cancers are:
stomach - 5 percent
trachea, bronchus and lung -5 percent
breast -50 percent
oesophagus -5 percent
large intestine - 22 percent
pancreas - 4 percent
liver - 2 percent.1
There has been no significant increase in survival rates since records began.
The Solid Gold Source
The cancer business is second only, in size, to its big brother, petrochemicals.
In the 20 years from 1970 to 1990, in the USA alone, the cancer business was worth an estimated 1 trillion dollars ($1,000,000,000,000).2 If the same percentage of the overall disease bill applies in Britain as in the US, the current expenditure on cancer will be 3 to 6 billion pounds per year.
With these kind of amounts involved it is quite understandable why the drug/radiation/scalpel/vivisection cancer cartel have maintained a constant, ruthless campaign to suffocate, at birth, any and all attempts to introduce rational therapeutic regimes to deal with the species-threatening plague.
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P Diddy Announces He Turned Vegan
15/11/10
P Diddy has continued his Monday morning announcements on Twitter, with the news that he has now become a vegan.
Minutes earlier, the notorious ladies' man had told his three million-plus followers that he was getting married on Valentine's Day, although it's not known whether he was being serious.
The 41-year-old hip-hop star, who is rumoured to be dating R&B singer Cassie Ventura, tweeted: 'I also became vegan today!'
http://www.monstersandcritics.com/people/news/article_1599185.php
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Vet Calls For End To Monkey Drug Tests
14/11/10
The cruel practice of testing drugs and chemicals on monkeys is outdated and "bad science", according to a new report. Veterinary surgeon and zoologist Andre Menache, who lives in Sevenoaks, has produced research calling for an end to use of non-human primates in toxicity testing. He told how the monkeys are captured in the wild and torn away from their family groups before being shipped in crates from countries including China, which takes 54-hours, to the UK.
"Once here they are put in single cages, nothing resembling their natural environment, and taken away from their families. They go bananas, biting and beating themselves," Mr Menache, director of the non-governmental organisation Antidote Europe, said.
"Before they’ve even been experimented on, the animals are so stressed it invalidates the data... They will be killed at the end of the experiment or may be used more than once before they are killed."
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Sea Shepherd Latest Report from Taiji
To read click here
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McDonald’s & PepsiCo To Help Write UK Health Policy
12/11/10
Exclusive: Department of Health putting fast food companies at heart of policy on obesity, alcohol and diet-related disease
The Department of Health is putting the fast food companies McDonald's and KFC and processed food and drink manufacturers such as PepsiCo, Kellogg's, Unilever, Mars and Diageo at the heart of writing government policy on obesity, alcohol and diet-related disease, the Guardian has learned.
In an overhaul of public health, said by campaign groups to be the equivalent of handing smoking policy over to the tobacco industry, health secretary Andrew Lansley has set up five "responsibility deal" networks with business, co-chaired by ministers, to come up with policies. Some of these are expected to be used in the public health white paper due in the next month.
The groups are dominated by food and alcohol industry members, who have been invited to suggest measures to tackle public health crises. Working alongside them are public interest health and consumer groups including Which?, Cancer Research UK and the Faculty of Public Health. The alcohol responsibility deal network is chaired by the head of the lobby group the Wine and Spirit Trade Association. The food network to tackle diet and health problems includes processed food manufacturers, fast food companies, and Compass, the catering company famously pilloried by Jamie Oliver for its school menus of turkey twizzlers. The food deal's sub-group on calories is chaired by PepsiCo, owner of Walkers crisps.
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Victory in Row Over Animal Testing Data Access
12/11/10
Animal rights campaigners have won a legal row with a North East university over access to animal testing data
The British Union for the Abolition of Vivisection (BUAV) launched action after a failed Freedom of Information request on experiments carried out at Newcastle University.
BUAV asked the university’s medical research department for details on testing procedures and welfare controls for tests on primates undertaken in 2008. Almost 21,000 animals were used in medical experiments at the university that year, including Macaque monkeys for examining new treatments for Parkinson’s disease, Alzheimer’s and spinal conditions.
University bosses rejected the FoI request, claiming the institution itself did not hold the information requested and that sensitive research programmes would be endangered if details were released before the work was completed. They argued that research details remained the “intellectual property” of individual scientists and not the university until work was finished and published in UK medical journals.
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Monkey Tests Must Be Disclosed
12/11/10
State must disclose information on substance-abuse tests using monkeys
The state must turn over documents that detail taxpayer-funded experiments conducted on monkeys and other non-human primates for substance abuse research, a state Supreme Court justice ruled in Albany.
The state Office of Mental Health attempted to block the Freedom of Information Act request filed by the Physicians Committee for Responsible Medicine saying that the scientists who performed the studies may be targeted by animal-rights terrorists if the details of their experiments were disclosed.
State Supreme Court Justice Richard M. Platkin threw out nearly every argument OMH offered.
PCRM requested public records relating to OMH-funded research done by three Columbia University scientists at the New York State Psychiatric Institute in New York City, including grant applications, complaints filed against the researchers and research protocols. OMH provided 27 pages of information but denied the group access to the bulk of the records.
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Austrian Solidarity & A Chance To Achieve A Vctory
11/11/10
I'm looking for activists from Austria-neighbouring countries to join an international action on the Austrian border as part of the Shame on Austria campaign http://www.shameonaustria.org to support the persecuted activists in Austria.
It is now a very important time for the campaign as the Austrian parliament is to have a session on 23rd November where an amendment of the anti-mafia law, which has been used against the 13 activists on trial, will be considered. There is a chance to achieve a reform that would make it impossible for the prosecution to sustain the current charge! Moreover, there is a significant support of the reform among the Austrian politicians BUT how much they will push it through depends on the amount of public pressure that we are able to create (this was literally said by one influential social democrat).
That's why the campaign is so important now. If we manage to achieve the reform of the law, not only will it help the currently persecuted activists, it will become an important precedent proving that it is possible to successfully defend oneself against vicious state repression.
So in the week between 15th and 21th November, we would like to have protest actions on different border crossings with Austria. We have called this a "banana week". Why banana? Because the idea is to block the crossings for a few minutes and give the people in the vehicles free bananas. These bananas would have stickers "Produce of Austria" and the protestors could have some funny banana costumes with flags of Austria that would have a banana "emblem" in the middle. The message of the action would be that, in a few days, Austria would be about to make a very important decision - whether they want to walk the way of a developed constitutional state or rather the way of a banana republic (i.e. whether they want to keep the law as it is, giving a blessing to persecuting people for their political activities and opinions, or whether they want to reform it to give a clear stance that such practices won't be tolerated in Austria).
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Anti Fur Motion Passed Ireland
9/11/10
I'm delighted to report another success in our fight against the fur trade!
Last night, Fingal County Council passed our motion to 'Ban the Import and Sale of real fur' in their jurisdiction. The motion was proposed by Cllr. David McGuinness, and it passed unanimously gaining cross-party support. Apparently many councillors also spoke highly of our efforts, and showed a lot of support for the issue. They then wrote a letter to government, on our behalf, asking for a review of the current legislation.
There are a few more councils that will be proposing the fur ban motion soon - I'll keep you all posted!
For a fur-free Ireland,
Laura Broxson
CAFT
Ireland / National Animal Rights Association
http://www.naracampaigns.org
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Smoking Chimp Rescued
9/11/10
A 12-year-old chimpanzee is heading to a sanctuary in Brazil after animal rights workers discovered him smoking cigarettes to entertain visitors at a Lebanese zoo.
Omega has never climbed a tree or seen other chimpanzees.
Organisers of Omega's evacuation say it marks the first time a chimpanzee
has been rescued in Lebanon, a country with virtually no animal rights
protection laws.
In his younger years, Omega was used in one of the local restaurants
to entertain people and was made to smoke cigarettes and serve water
pipes to customers.
After he grew stronger, he was locked up and taken to a zoo where for
the past ten years he has lived in a small cage.
Chimpanzees and other highly endangered wildlife are regularly smuggled to the Middle East to be displayed in private zoos, hotels and for the pet trade.
http://uk.news.yahoo.com/4/20101109/toddly-smoking-chimp-rescued-cc3a409.html
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Webcam Exposes Egg Farm Cruelty – Israel
9/11/10
Battery hens' reality on Israeli farm exposed by hidden webcam
Israeli pressure group Anonymous for Animal Rights reveals battery cage conditions ahead of parliamentary vote
Three hens confined to a small wire coop in a battery farm in central Israel have become the stars of a 24-hour web-feed aimed at drawing attention to the plight of caged chickens ahead of a key parliamentary vote tomorrow.
The chickens, who barely have room to move inside their 40cm x 33cm x 45cm cage, are forced to peck for food through wire mesh.
Activists from Anonymous for Animal Rights, a Tel Aviv-based pressure group, installed a hidden camera in a covert operation at an unidentified chicken farm in central Israel.
"We had to use small yet reliable equipment that could transmit continuously from the chicken coop to a PC hidden in its vicinity," said one activist involved in the operation. "Today, in the free-flowing era of the internet, one cannot hide such things any more."
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Obesity Drug Dangers
9/11/10
Safety Data Worsens For Arena’s Obesity Drug
A long-awaited study testing Arena Pharmaceuticals’ weight loss drug lorcaserin in diabetic patients raises new safety concerns about the medicine, lowering the odds that the Food and Drug Administration will ever approve it.
The weight loss results were not impressive, but were statistically significant and strengthen the case for the drug, which the FDA rejected last month. The result in HbA1C, a measure of blood sugar, was better, showing a 0.5% absolute reduction. That’s as much as Kombiglyze, the recently approved diabetes pill from Bristol-Myers Squibb and AstraZeneca, lowered blood sugar compared to an older drug, metformin.
But those results are outweighed by the safety result, which shows more patients on lorcaserin had heart valve problems, or valvulopathy, than those on placebo. Valvulopathy has been the main safety worry for lorcaserin from the start, because the drug was designed to hit the same receptor as the diet drug fenfluramine, which was withdrawn because it caused heart valve damage.
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Painkillers Linked To Reproductive Disorders
8/11/10
Use of mild painkillers such as paracetamol, aspirin and ibuprofen during pregnancy may partly account for a sharp increase in male reproductive disorders in recent decades, according to a study published on Monday.
The research found that women who took a combination of more than one mild analgesic during pregnancy had an increased risk of giving birth to sons with undescended testicles. This condition, called cryptorchidism, is known to be a risk factor for poor semen quality and a greater risk of testicular cancer in later life.
The researchers from Finland, Denmark and France, whose work was published in the Human Reproduction journal, said more studies were urgently needed and advice to pregnant women on use of painkillers should be reconsidered. "Women may want to try to reduce their analgesic use during pregnancy," said Henrik Leffers of Copenhagen's Rigshospitalet, who led the research. "However, as biologists this is not something we can advise women about. So we recommend that pregnant women seek advice from their physician."
According to the Leffers team, more than half of pregnant women in Western countries report taking mild analgesics. Doctors generally say women should avoid taking medicines while pregnant, but that paracetamol, ibuprofen and aspirin are considered safe in some conditions and at certain times.
Cryptorchidism has been found to affect as many as one in 11 Scandinavian boys, although rates vary from two to nine percent in various Scandinavian countries.
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Statin Drugs = Liver & Kidney Damage
7/11/10
Statin drugs cause liver damage, kidney failure and cataracts, says BMJ
by: David Gutierrez
Cholesterol-lowering statin drugs significantly increase a person's risk of cataracts, muscle weakness, liver dysfunction and kidney failure, according to a study in the British Medical Journal.
The study also confirmed that the drugs lower the risk of heart disease and esophageal cancer, but claims of other health benefits were unsupported.
Researchers from Nottingham University in the United Kingdom examined data on more than 2 million patients between the ages of 30 and 84, seen at 38 different general practices, who had been prescribed the cholesterol-lowering drugs. More than 70 percent were taking simvastatin (Zocor), 22.3 percent were taking atorvastatin (Lipitor), 3.6 percent were taking pravastatin (Pravachol, Selektine), 1.9 percent were taking rosuvastatin (Crestor) and 1.4 percent were taking fluvastatin (Canef, Lescol, Lochol, Vastin).
The researchers confirmed prior data suggesting that statins increase patients' risk of cataracts, liver dysfunction, kidney failure and a form of muscle weakness known as myopathy. They found that for every 10,000 women treated with the drugs, 23 would develop acute kidney (renal) failure, 39 would develop myopathy, 74 would develop liver dysfunction and 309 would develop cataracts. Men suffered an even higher risk of myopathy, but their risks of the other three conditions were similar to those suffered by women.
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Tranquillisers Linked To Brain Damage
7/11/10
Drugs linked to brain damage 30 years ago
MPs and campaigners predict class action after failures to mount full-scale research into warnings left millions of patients at risk. Secret documents reveal that government-funded experts were warned nearly 30 years ago that tranquillisers that were later prescribed to millions of people could cause brain damage.
The Medical Research Council (MRC) agreed in 1982 that there should be large-scale studies to examine the long-term impact of benzodiazepines after research by a leading psychiatrist showed brain shrinkage in some patients similar to the effects of long-term alcohol abuse. However, no such work was ever carried out into the effects of drugs such as Valium, Mogadon and Librium – and doctors went on prescribing them to patients for anxiety, stress, insomnia and muscle spasms.
MPs and lawyers described the documents as a scandal, and predicted they could lead the way to a class action costing millions. There are an estimated 1.5 million "involuntary addicts" in the UK, and scores display symptoms consistent with brain damage.
The MRC hosted a meeting of eminent experts and government representatives in 1981 after research by Malcolm Lader, now emeritus professor of the Institute of Psychiatry, showed brain shrinkage occurred in some benzodiazepine patients.
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Primate Research Continues Despite Ban
6/11/10
A Marmoset monkey used in animal research climbs up the bars of its cage at a testing centre. Photograph: Graeme Robertson/Graeme Robertson
Thousands of monkeys have been imported into the UK for use in laboratory research despite a legal ban, animal rights campaigners have claimed. The trade in primates continues because the ban, introduced in 1997, does not include the offspring of wild-caught parents, said the British Union for the Abolition of Vivisection (BUAV). Between 2008 and 2009 almost 5,000 primates were brought into the UK to be used in experiments. The figures were disclosed by the Home Office minister Lynne Featherstone in response to a parliamentary question.
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Red Meat Linked To Cancer
5/11/10
Red-meat lovers may have a greater likelihood of developing certain cancers of the throat and stomach than people who limit their intake of steaks and hamburgers, a new study suggests.
Researchers found that among nearly 500,000 older U.S. adults followed for a decade, only a small number developed cancers of the esophagus or stomach. However, the risks were relatively greater among those who ate a lot of red meat, or certain compounds generated from cooking meat.
Overall, study participants in the top 20 percent for red-meat intake were 79 percent more likely than those in the bottom 20 percent to develop esophageal squamous cell carcinoma -- a cancer that arises in the lining of the upper part of the esophagus.
Meanwhile, the risk of a type of cancer in the upper portion of the stomach near the esophagus (gastric cardia) was elevated among men and women with the highest estimated intake of one form of heterocyclic amine (HCA). HCAs are compounds that form when meat is cooked using high-temperature methods, such as grilling over an open flame; they have been found to cause cancer in lab animals.
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Haemophilia Drug Can Damage Heart
4/11/10
Using high doses of Novo Nordisk's anti-clotting medicine to treat dangerous bleeding in non-haemophiliacs may raise the risk of heart attack or related complications, researchers said. The drug, NovoSeven, is a genetically engineered version of factor VII, a key protein missing in some people with the bleeding disease haemophilia.
Some doctors prescribe the drug in "off-label" use to stop unwanted bleeding associated with stroke, trauma, surgery, transplantation and other medical conditions. Doctors may prescribe any approved drug for any reason they want to. But this drug may not be worth the risk, said Dr Marcel Levi of the University of Amsterdam and colleagues at Novo Nordisk.
Their analysis of 35 studies found that the overall likelihood that an artery would clog was 68 percent higher with NovoSeven therapy compared to a placebo. The risk of heart attack, angina or related complication more than doubled, the researchers reported in the New England Journal of Medicine.
People over 65 who got the drug were more than twice as likely to develop an unwanted clot in an artery than younger patients, they found. Those over 74 were three times more likely.
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HLS Monsters Enjoy Hollow Victory
1/11/10
Those who complain they are harassed should perhaps consider how lucky they are. The screaming, crying terrified victims of this HLS saga are the 500 animals slaughtered in all manner of barbaric ways at HLS every day. They suffer behind closed doors while their perpetrators walk around freely, taking their chances, laughing, joking and mocking their victims. They will rejoice at the sentencing of yet more of those who speak for the animals. Perhaps they will feel safe from those who sent sanitary towels through the post. Perhaps such an adversary would be preferable to one who seeks real revenge. The funny thing is none of the defendants in this weeks stage show were in any way implicated in posting anything offensive to anyone, none was found guilty of breaking so much as a window. They were merely party to a widespread and growing campaign of opposition to violent extremism and a collection of incidents and offences committed by A N Other used to justify the oppression of compassion.
Please write letters to them and your offer support:
Nicola
Tapping (HK9804)
HMP Bronzefield, Woodthorpe Road, Ashford, Middx. TW15 3JZ
Tom
Harris (A8086AX)
HMP Winchester, Romsey Road, Winchester, Hampshire, SO22 5DF
Jason
Mullen (A8076AX)
HMP Winchester, Romsey Road, Winchester, Hampshire, SO22 5DF
Sarah
Whitehead (VM7684)
HMP Bronzefield, Woodthorpe Road, Ashford, Middx. TW15 3JZ
Nicole
Vosper (VM9385)
HMP Bronzefield, Woodthorpe Road, Ashford, Middx. TW15 3J
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Novartis Hid Drug Dangers
1/11/10
Novartis Officials Hid Bone Drugs' Risks, Lawyer Tells Jurors
Novartis AG officials downplayed risks that the drugmaker’s bone-strengthening medicines Aredia and Zometa could destroy patients’ jaws, a lawyer for a woman suing the company told a North Carolina jury.
Officials of the Basel, Switzerland-based drug company got reports from doctors as early as 2002 that Rita Fussman and other cancer patients taking Aredia and Zometa to prevent bone loss during treatment suffered irreplaceable jawbone damage, Bob Germany, a lawyer for Fussman’s family, said in opening statements in a trial over the medicines. Fussman died in 2009 of complications from breast cancer.
Fussman’s family contends Novartis didn’t adequately warn that Aredia and Zometa could cause disfiguring jaw damage that forced cancer patients such as Fussman to subsist on baby food, Germany told jurors in federal court in Winston-Salem.
Patients and their doctors “were not told the whole story about these drugs,” Germany said. “In fact, we were not told half the story.”
The Fussman family’s lawsuit is the third product-liability case to go to trial over the bone-strengthening treatments, which had 2009 sales of $1.5 billion, according to Novartis’s annual report. Both drugs are still on the market.
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Norweigian Fur Industry Exposed Again
31/10/10
Norway: New investigation into the Norwegian fur industry
PRESS RELEASE: Strike three, you're out!
In the wake of the investigation of 45 Norwegian fur farms last year, Norwegian Minister of Agriculture, Lars Peder Brekk, condemned the cruelty exposed in the media. Following the disclosure, he promised that the industry would lose his political support if such negligence were documented again.
During the summer of 2010, Network for Animal Freedom and the Norwegian Society for Protection of Animals have documented systematic and widespread animal cruelty at 39 Norwegian fur farms. Thousands of pictures and several hours of video footage document countless injured and severely sick animals. Foxes and minks with missing legs, grave bite injuries and stereotypical behaviour were common sights at the farms investigated. The investigations show that the regulations for breeding fur animals does not prevent animals from suffering daily in their small wire mesh cages.
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Bullfighting Comes Under Attack in France
31/10/10
Bullfighting has a loyal following in France - but as David Chazan reports, the sport is coming under strong pressure from animal rights groups. Think of bullfighting and you naturally think of Spain, but the controversial blood sport is also popular in parts of southern France. Since a vote to ban it in the Spanish region of Catalonia from 2012, French animal welfare groups have been stepping up their campaign to get bullfighting outlawed in France as well. About 100 bullfighting contests are held each year But some towns in the south are planning to stage more bullfights because they're hoping to attract fans from Spain. In Manduel, outside Nimes in southern France, hundreds of spectators are packed into the stands at a small village bullring.
They tense visibly and fall silent as the matador goads the black bull with flourishes of his red cape, and the bull snorts and lowers his head to charge. The sense of gladiatorial drama is heightened by the music coming over the PA system - brassy, Spanish-sounding melodies with a French touch. At one point, a few bars of the Marseillaise are played. "This is an important tradition which is part of our culture," says Brigitte Dubois, president of the bullfighting association of the nearby town of Nimes. Although bullfighting originated across the border in Spain, it took root in France a century and a half ago, partly because of an influx of Spanish immigrants. Wherever you go in this part of France, you see posters for bullfights - and the crowd in Manduel is loving every moment, undeterred by the knowledge that a few hundred metres away, there's a protest going on.
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Ninth Attack Against VGT Since December 2009: Smashed Window!
30/10/10
Instead of police investigating these crimes there has been a new wave of house raids of two animal campaigners and one animal protection organisation in Salzburg
The very same offences being used in court to claim the existence of a criminal organisation within the animal movement, which 13 campaigners supposedly supported with their legal campaigns, are being perpetrated against VGT on a regular basis. Since December 2009 VGT has been victim of slashed tyres, glued locks and smashed windows.
Dr Balluch: “We find ourselves in the position of being terrorised from all sides. As an organisation that uncovers the abuse of animals, not only do we suffer continuous damage to our property and regular death threats but also the seemingly never ending police persecution through this monster trial against us”.
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Dog Meat Promoted at UK Farmers Market
28/10/10
Labrador steaks, leg of Greyhound, Afghan burgers, Dachshund sausages, Beagle chops, Chihuahua poppers…these are just some of the exotic meats being promoted at the new organic and free-range dog meat catering trailer that will set up shop at the edge of farmers markets across the UK.
Featuring pictures of happy healthy dogs running through fields, chasing balls and swimming in streams, and the words ‘organic’ and ‘free-range’, the trailer will be offering dog meat to the public, with the assurance that all the animals were loved and well cared for before being butchered.
…And that’s when the unpleasant truth lying behind Animal Aid’s initiative is spelt out.
Whether organic, free-range, corn-fed or rested on the finest mattresses, at the end of the day it’s all the same for animals farmed for their flesh. They all end up in the same slaughterhouses; they are all alone and terrified; they are all hung upside down by their hind legs and all end up bleeding to death.
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Pharma Game Plan Revealed?
25/10/10
For those of us in the natural health field, any headline stating that B vitamins can help the brain, and be particularly useful for people with Alzheimer’s, certainly wouldn’t be considered ‘new’ or ‘ground-breaking’. We are repeatedly told by the media and mainstream medicine that vitamins are bad for you and even downright dangerous at dosages higher than the recommended daily allowances (RDA).
That is until a study comes along with such overwhelmingly strong evidence that even the diehards worshipping at the feet of evidence-based medicine (EBM) have to capitulate. So it is with the ‘new’ and ‘ground-breaking’ study conducted at Oxford University, UK, which found a staggering 53% improvement in 85 patients with brain shrinkage associated with 'mild cognitive impairment' (MCI) which, for many, precedes full-blown dementia and Alzheimer's disease. The drug's active constituents? You have it, the trio of good ol' B vitamins associated with lowering homocysteine: folic acid, B6 and B12.
Brain shrinkage or atrophy is a natural part of ageing, but it is known to be accelerated in people with MCI – a kind of memory loss and forgetfulness – and Alzheimer's. As with cardiovascular disease, Alzheimer’s patients tend to also have especially high levels of an amino acid called homocysteine in their blood. These B vitamins help reduce this age and disease related elevation, and the current research corroborates that high doses of B vitamins (including folic acid) can be particularly effective at lowering homocysteine levels. The Oxford University study further demonstrated that the participants who had the highest homocysteine levels benefited the most from the treatment with high doses of B vitamins.
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Austrian Judge Finds Police Unit Guilty
24/10/10
Austrian Animal Protection Trial: Judge finds police special unit guilty of denying defence access to investigation files
Soon after the defendants in this monster trial were put onto remand custody in May 2008 it became clear that police were not allowing lawyers access to investigation files. The defence quickly responded by bringing the police to court and judge Pablik passed the verdict that the withholding of investigative information showed the intention to keep the defendants in the dark and contravened rights set out in the constitution. Police were instructed by the court to provide the defence with immediate and complete access to files in order to ensure a fair trial.
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Antibiotics in Meat Pose Health Threat, Admits FDA
22/10/10
On June 28 of this year, the FDA issued a draft of new guidelines urging meat producers to refrain from using antibiotics to promote livestock growth, calling the practice an "urgent public health issue."
"To preserve the effectiveness [of antibiotics], we simply must use them as judiciously as possible," said FDA Deputy Commissioner Joshua Sharfstein.
The livestock industry regularly gives antibiotics to healthy animals to make them gain more weight faster, as well as to prevent infection. For more than 30 years, public health experts have warned that this practice is contributing to the evolution of drug-resistant bacteria, including strains that can infect humans.
"We are seeing the emergence of multidrug-resistant pathogens," Sharfstein said. "FDA believes overall weight of evidence supports the conclusion that using medically important antimicrobial drugs for production purposes is not appropriate."
In order to preserve the effectiveness of "medically important" antibiotics, including penicillin, tetracyclines and sulfonamides, the FDA issued new guidelines reiterating that antibiotics should be given to food animals only for health-protection purposes, and that veterinarians should oversee all such drug use, from selection to treatment.
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Kangaroo Incident Reward
21/10/10
Organisation
offers reward for information about kangaroo incident in nightclub
A €10,000 reward is today being offered for information surrounding
the reported death of a wallaby or small kangaroo after it was unleashed
at a 30th birthday party recently.
A long-term supporter of the Animal Rights Action Network (ARAN) anonymously contacted the group to offer the cash for information leading to arrest and conviction.
The Australian national took action after hearing about the incident which took place at the Clarion Hotel in Liffey Valley in Dublin.
ARAN are calling on members of the public and those who attended the party to contact the organisation.
"Animal abusers are cowards," said ARAN director John Carmody. "They take their issues out on the most defenceless beings available to them. In this case, with laws being so weak in Ireland to protect those most vulnerable, we’re hoping that people will now come forward with information that will convict the cowards who treated such a vulnerable, terrified and tormented animal with such recklessness and neglect.
The anonymous Australian national said: "Most people in Australia are horrified to hear of what has happened, this will no doubt leave Ireland with a bad reputation in my country.
"Please help us find these people."
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'Hunt Supporters Attacked Us' Claims
21/10/10
Avon and Somerset police say they are investigating allegations by South West Hunt Saboteurs that they were attacked and robbed by hunt supporters. The saboteurs claim that the incident took place on Saturday when members of the South West hunt saboteurs were out monitoring a hunt taking place on the Mendips at Ston Easton and Emborough.
Lee Moon, spokesman for the Hunt Saboteurs, said they were present at the hunt to monitor for evidence of illegal hunting and to present any such evidence to the police.
Mr Moon said: "Whilst standing on a public footpath watching the hunt, the group of eight anti-hunt protesters, made up of men and women, were approached by five vehicles whose number plates had been obscured with mud. "Approximately a dozen men jumped out of the vehicles and proceeded to attack the hunt saboteurs shouting "get the cameras". People were punched in the face and one man had his leg repeatedly stamped on.
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Swapping Rats for Pigs is Not Science
20/10/10
Celebrities' favourite pet set to be 'the next lab rat'
Mini-pigs, those celebrity pets par excellence, are being lined up as Europe's preferred laboratory animals. The miniature porkers, which can cost more than £1,000 for a piglet, have captured the hearts of various notables, from George Clooney and David Beckham to Paris Hilton and Megan Fox. Now they could be about to replace monkeys, mice, rats and dogs in the testing of new drugs and chemicals. A five-year study sponsored by the European Union has concluded that miniature pigs are better models for testing the effects of new drugs on humans than other creatures, because of their "close physiological and anatomical similarities to man".
Developed from species such as the Vietnamese pot-bellied pig, mini-pigs first appeared in the West in the 1960s and were initially bred for medical research. But since the 1980s they have become increasingly popular as pets, thanks to their smallness: they weigh about 150lbs, whereas an adult farmyard pig may be six times heavier.
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Hormone Therapy Causes Breast Cancer
20/10/10
Women who took hormone replacement pills had more advanced breast cancers and were more likely to die from them than women who took a dummy pill, raising new concerns about the commonly prescribed drugs, U.S. researchers said on Tuesday. The study, published in the Journal of the American Medical Association, is the first to report more breast cancer deaths among women taking hormone replacement therapy. And it contradicts prior studies that suggest women taking the drugs had less aggressive, easier-to-treat breast cancers.
"As opposed to the prevailing thought of two years ago, that cancers associated with estrogen plus progesterone would be favorable and not much of a problem, we are actually showing they are associated with an increased risk of death from breast cancer," Dr. Rowan Chlebowski of the Los Angeles Biomedical Research Institute, who led the study, said in a telephone interview.
The findings include 11 years of follow-up from the Women's Health Initiative study, which in 2002 found women who took estrogen plus progesterone for five years had higher rates of ovarian cancer, breast cancer, strokes and other health problems.
Sales of U.S. market leader Wyeth's combined estrogen plus progesterone pill Prempro have fallen by about 50 percent since 2001 to around $1 billion a year. Wyeth is now owned by Pfizer.
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Experts: Fund Lab Technology No Vivisection
19/10/10
Letter: Animal research and the squeeze on science funding
Scientists across the country will be awaiting the outcome of tomorrow's comprehensive spending review with understandable trepidation (Letters, 16 October).
Inevitable cuts to the UK science budget will likely have a devastating impact on Britain's research effort. Those of us whose work focuses on or benefits from novel 3Rs approaches – replacing, reducing and refining the use of laboratory animals – may have particular cause for concern.
Securing funding for 3Rs research is already a challenge. There are precious few dedicated 3Rs funders and mainstream funding sources seldom prioritise innovation aimed at reducing dependency on live animals or proposing entirely new approaches aimed at replacing animal models altogether. Reducing and replacing animal research wherever possible is, quite rightly, a requirement on all scientists. The government recognises the very real scientific and animal welfare advantages produced by novel alternative techniques in toxicology as well as medical research.
The government's National Centre for the Replacement, Refinement and Reduction of Animals in Research (NC3Rs) demonstrates what can be achieved when sufficient state funding for alternatives is in place. After years of funding neglect, alternatives are now far better supported and consequently Britain has become a world leader in alternatives technology development. But for how much longer?
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Drug Companies Bribe 17,000 Doctors
19/10/10
More than 17,000 doctors and other healthcare providers have taken money from seven major drug companies to talk to other doctors about their products, a joint investigation by news organizations and non-profit groups found.
More than 380 of the doctors, nurses, pharmacists and other professionals took in more than $100,000 in 2009 and 2010, according to the investigation released on Tuesday. The report said far more doctors are likely to have taken such payments, but it documented these based on information from seven drugmakers. The payments are not illegal and usually not even considered improper. But the investigation by journalism group ProPublica, Consumer Reports magazine, NPR radio and several publications showed doctors were sometimes urged to recommend "off-label" prescriptions of drugs, meaning using them for conditions they are not approved for. And the report points to several studies showing that even small gifts and payments to doctors can affect their attitudes, and many companies have stopped giving out once-common gifts such as pens, cups and other objects carrying drug brand names.
"Tens of thousands of U.S. physicians are paid to spread the word about pharma's favored pills and to advise the companies about research and marketing," the group says in its report, available here
The groups used information from seven drugmakers -- AstraZeneca, Cephalon, GlaxoSmithKline, Johnson & Johnson, Eli Lilly, Merck and Pfizer. "Some of the companies were forced to disclose this information as a result of legal settlements; others released it voluntarily," Consumer Reports said.
It said more than 70 other pharmaceutical companies have not disclosed payments made to doctors, although the healthcare reform law passed in March will require them to do so by 2013.
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Free Morgan! Contact Dolfinarium
17/10/10
Ask Dolfinarium in Harderwijk to Release an Orca
This past June, a very young orca was found separated from her pod and
swimming alone in the shallow Wadden Sea off the coast of the Netherlands.
She appeared thin, weak and distressed. According to Reuters, she was
the first orca to be found alive in Dutch coastal waters in more than
60 years.
Dutch marine mammal rescue group SOS Dolfijn captured the orca and transported
her to the marine park "Dolfinarium" in Harderwijk, the Netherlands.
According to original statements from the Dolfinarium, the marine park's
initial plan was to release the orca (named Morgan) back into the wild
as soon as she had recovered.
But now it appears that the marine park might keep Morgan in captivity
and possibly ship her to a SeaWorld theme park in the US or another
foreign facility, where she would suffer a lifetime of misery in a small,
concrete tank. Information requests from PETA Germany on the status
of Morgan's release have gone unanswered, and Dolfinarium's website
states that scientists around the world are considering what the best
option would be for Morgan.
The more time that passes, the more difficult it will be to release
Morgan back into the open ocean - her rightful home.
Please help spare Morgan from a lifetime of captivity!
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Drugs Causing What They Are Treating
16/10/10
In the past month, the Food and Drug Administration has concluded that in some cases two types of drugs that were supposed to be preventing serious medical problems were, in fact, causing them.
One is bisphosphonates, which is widely used to prevent the fractures, especially of the hip and spine, that are common in people with osteoporosis. Those drugs, like Fosamax, Actonel and Boniva, will now have to carry labels saying they can lead to rare fractures of the thigh bone, a surprising new discovery that came after another surprise — that they can cause a rare degeneration of the jawbone.
The other is Avandia, which is widely prescribed for diabetics, whose disease puts them at risk for heart attacks and heart failure. Two-thirds of diabetics die of heart problems, and a main reason for taking drugs like Avandia is to protect them from that. But now the F.D.A. and drug regulators in Europe are restricting Avandia’s use because it appears to increase heart risks.
In the case of bisphosphonates, the benefits for people with osteoporosis still outweigh the risk, bone experts say. And no one has restricted their use. But the fact remains that with decades of using drugs to treat chronic diseases, the unexpected can occur.
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Swine Flu Jab ‘May Cause’ Deadly Nerve Disease
16/10/10
Experts admit swine flu jab 'may cause' deadly nerve disease
Health chiefs have for the first time acknowledged that the swine flu jab may be linked to an increased risk of developing a deadly nerve condition. Experts are examining a possible association between the controversial jab and Guillain-Barre Syndrome, according to a report from official watchdog the Medicines and Healthcare products Regulatory Agency (MHRA).
Previously, the Government has always stressed there is no evidence to link the paralysing condition to the H1N1 vaccine.
After The Mail on Sunday revealed in August 2009 that doctors were being asked to monitor cases of GBS during the swine flu pandemic, a letter from the Health Protection Agency’s chief executive Justin McCracken stated: ‘There is no evidence to suggest an increased risk of GBS from the vaccines being developed to fight the current pandemic.’
Now the MHRA’s newly published report suggests the Government’s position has changed. It says: ‘Given the uncertainties in the available information and as with seasonal flu vaccines, a slightly elevated risk of GBS following H1N1 vaccines cannot be ruled out. Epidemiological studies are ongoing to further assess this possible association.’ It is not known precisely what causes GBS but the condition attacks the lining of the nerves, leaving them unable to transmit signals to muscles effectively.
It can cause partial paralysis and mostly affects the hands and feet – but it can be fatal.
The MoS report last year
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Sea Shepherd v The Dolphin Killers
16/10/10
UPDATE
Report from Taiji:
dolphins in the killing cove
After a very valiant and brave fight, 8-10 Risso dolphins were captured and slaughtered in Taiji, Japan today.
It went on for several hours, the relentless banging and boats charging back and forth. We watched this unfold from the shore of the public part of the cove. Over time, the hunter boats managed to push the small pod ever closer to the mouth of the cove. The dolphins refused to enter the cove. They must have sensed the evil there and actually from time to time dove under the hunter boats and headed back out sea. We all cheered them on, but they turned back at one point. I suspect that one of their members had not made it out and they would not abandon their mate.
The so-called fishermen wasted no time getting to their grisly task of bringing murder to these dolphins. In the past, it has been their practice to leave the dolphins in the cove overnight. Early the next morning, the trainers would come and examine them to possibly make selections for the captive trade. These, being Risso dolphins, are not in much demand at dolphanariums because they do not look like flipper. Two were selected earlier this week before most of that pod was slaughtered. This time though, the trainers were not interested.
The pressure must be getting to them now. They probably got the killing done right away to keep us from setting up cameras overnight to catch their early morning deeds. Well, we caught them anyway. At least the cameras of Save Japan Dolphins caught some of the slaughter and of the dead dolphins being dragged into the Taiji butcher house. Look for Save Japan Dolphins to post their vivid shots. No matter how much these pathetic excuses for men attempt to hide their shameful deeds, someone will film them.
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Briana Waters Released
16/10/10
Briana Waters Released from Prison Today on Bail. The 9th Circuit Court of Appeals reversed the environmental activist's conviction on September 14th, 2010, based on their findings that her conviction was improper because important rulings by the trial court deprived her of a fair trial. After serving 2 and a half years, she was released from prison today, October 14, 2010, pending a re-trial. She is ecstatic about being reunited with her daughter, Kalliope.
On June 19, 2008, Briana was sentenced to six years in prison after she was falsely accused of participating in a politically motivated arson which took place at the University of Washington in May 2001; a federal jury found her guilty of two counts of arson on March 6, 2008
http://www.animalliberationpressoffice.org press@animalliberationpressoffice.org
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Dire EU Figures On Vivisection
11/10/10
Latest EU figures on lab animals disappoint activists
LONDON: The European Coalition to End Animal Experiments (ECEAE), an umbrella group of key animal protection groups across the EU, has expressed “profound” disappointment at the lack of a significant decrease in the number of animals used in experiments across the European Union.
The organization was commenting on the publication of the Sixth Statistical Report by the European Commission which covers data collected by 27 Member States for the year 2008.
It was the first time since 2005 that the statistics were made available. They were released only weeks after the EU adopted new legislation on animal experimentation, which replaced an earlier directive from 1986. ECEAE branded the new legislation a missed opportunity to introduce measures that would have given greater protection to animals used in experiments.
“Despite the opportunity to improve the lot of animals in laboratories, the recently adopted legislation does not include any mechanism to systematically reduce and ultimately replace the use of animals in research. The future looks bleak for the millions of animals who will continue to suffer and die each year in EU laboratories” ECEAE Chief Executive, Michelle Thew, told Bikya Masr.
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Cancer Is A Man Made Disease
15/10/10
Environmental and lifestyle factors cause cancer, as a new study finds little evidence of the disease in ancient times
Cancer is a man-made disease caused by modern day environmental factors such as pollution and diet, a new study suggests.
After analysing the remains of hundreds of Egyptian mummies, researchers at the University of Manchester concluded that cancer was extremely rare in ancient times.
Ancient Greek literature rarely refers to illnesses resembling cancer, and there is scant evidence of tumour growth in animal fossils and non-human primates, the researchers said. Cancer rates in have risen massively since the Industrial Revolution, in particular childhood cancer, suggesting that the rise is not simply due to people living longer.
Professor Rosalie David, an expert in biomedical Egyptology said: “In industrialised societies, cancer is second only to cardiovascular disease as a cause of death. But in ancient times, it was extremely rare. There is nothing in the natural environment that can cause cancer. So it has to be a man-made disease, down to pollution and changes to our diet and lifestyle.
“The important thing about our study is that it gives a historical perspective to this disease. We can make very clear statements on the cancer rates in societies because we have a full overview. We have looked at millennia, not one hundred years, and have masses of data.”
Although it has been suggested that shorter life spans may be the reason why the researchers found little evidence of the disease, people in ancient Egypt and Greece lived long enough to show signs of other modern diseases such as hardening of the arteries, osteoporosis and other bone conditions.
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Drug Companies Make Wild Claims
15/10/10
Firms told to end ‘miracle’ drug sales
WASHINGTON — The Food and Drug Administration has warned eight companies to stop marketing “miracle cures’’ that they claim treat everything from autism to Parkinson’s disease by flushing toxic metals from the body.
Regulators say the products, sold over the Internet, can cause dehydration, kidney failure, and death. Known as chelation therapies, the products have been used for decades, although medical societies and government specialists say there is no evidence they cure diseases.
The only FDA-approved chelation therapies are used to treat lead and mercury poisoning.
“These products are dangerously misleading,’’ said Deborah Autor, the FDA’s director of compliance.
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A Love Affair Between a Shark & Man
15/10/10
An incredible relationship off the South Australian coast
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Greyhound Racing Harmless Fun?
15/10/10
Don't Bet On It!
A flutter, a wager, a punt, a bet; a night at the dogs or trip down the bookies is just a bit of harmless fun, right? For the dogs, there's more at stake than your cash. What you don't see trackside or in the betting shops are the thousands of greyhounds that are unaccounted for every year. Some go missing as puppies because they are too slow or shy for the tracks. Other ex-racing dogs lose their speed after a few years and disappear - the majority of them are presumed dead. (*1)
We campaign to protect animals. Our products are all vegetarian and mostly vegan, we work to eliminate animal experiments from the cosmetics industry, and we use our website and our shops to speak up on issues that we are passionate about. Not too long ago, a group of our shop managers got together and told us they wanted to campaign about reported cruelty in the greyhound racing industry. So, we consulted with expert sources, did our own research, and what we found left us speechless; we felt it was time to take a stand.
THE PROBLEM WITH GREYHOUND RACING
The life of a racing greyhound can be a far cry from the loving homes that many of the UK's dogs live in today. Some racing greyhounds are not treated as part of any family, they are bred and raised to make money for the racing and betting industries.
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Fox Slaughter Stopped
14/10/10
Fox off: Marksmen call off Roehampton cull following complaints
Pest controllers have been forced to back down from plans to shoot up to 10 foxes in a quiet cul-de-sac tonight after residents complained the slaughter would be inhumane.
Property management company Nightingale Chancellors said campaigners had bombarded its office with emails protesting against the cull in Roehampton Close, Roehampton.
Wildlife management boss Bruce Lindsay-Smith - a self-styled "Dirty Harry" of the pest control world - planned to take “marksmen” to the estate this evening and use live ammunition to shoot the animals. But Nightingale Chancellors, which warned residents to keep their pets indoors tonight, cancelled the booking with County Pest Control after police warned that campaigners planned to stage a protest.
A spokesman for Nightingale Chancellors, who refused to give his name,
said: “We’ve been saturated by emails from people who know
nothing about it.
“Apparently there’s a West Sussex Wildlife Protection Group.
We’ve also been contacted by the police.” He added: “The
amount of fuss this has created is quite ridiculous, I can’t believe
people haven’t got better things to do.”
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Object to New 'Super-Lab'
New “Super-Lab” Planned for Central London, Please Object Now
Please Add Your Comments by 14th October 2010
After many false starts and delays, the planning application for the new so called “Super-Lab” planned for St Pancras has been lodged with Camden Council.
There will be more details on the information below on the NAVA website soon http://www.antivivisection.info
We are still waiting to hear of a date for the planning meeting, as soon as we know we will let you know of details of protests. In the meantime, the planners have given very little time for objections to be raised, so please contact Camden Council, and the individual councillors and officials who will be taking the decision about whether to allow the building to go ahead, see below for contact details.
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Doctors Seek Ban on End Animal Testing
13/10/10
Doctors Urge Scottish Parliament to End Animal Testing
Two doctors spoke with Scottish parliament members about the need to end animal testing in Scotland on Friday.
Scotland for Animals arranged for doctors Ray Greek and Andre Menache to speak with members of the Scottish Parliament about the scientific falsehood that vivisection represents.
Instead of focusing on the inherent cruelty of animal experimentation, Dr. Greek and Dr. Menache gave a presentation outlining that not only is information gained from animal experiments inaccurate, it's potentially dangerous.
Dr. Greek is an anesthesiologist who specializes in Pain Management. He has a private practice, has taught at multiple universities, and has published several books about the need to end vivisection. Dr. Menache is a former president of Doctors and Lawyers for Responsible Medicine and received a 21st century award for achievement from the International Biographical Centre at Cambridge.
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Vaccine Lawsuits Opened?
13/10/10
Landmark case could allow injured persons to once again sue vaccine makers
Vaccines are implicated in causing all sorts of health damage, from neurological disorders like autism and Alzheimer's disease to intestinal problems like ulcerative colitis and Chron's disease -- and everything in between. And a vaccine injury case currently before the Supreme Court could be the landmark decision that once again allows those injured by vaccines to sue vaccine manufacturers for damages, a course of action that has been barred since 1986 because of special federal protections enacted to immunize vaccine manufacturers against having to abide by the rule of law.
Nearly 25 years ago, the U.S. Congress passed the 1986 National Childhood Vaccine Injury Act, which exempts vaccine manufacturers from being liable for damages caused by their vaccines. The Act established an entirely new "legal" system to deal specifically with vaccine injury cases, handling each one in a special "vaccine court" that essentially just dismisses most cases as unwarranted.
The Act is entirely unconstitutional as no company or entity can legally be exempted from due process within the real legal system, but it was enacted anyway and has served as a shelter for vaccine companies to hide behind in order to avoid costly litigation. And since the medical industry as a whole continues to deny a link between vaccines and autism, for instance, the "vaccine courts" can just automatically go along with the notion and arbitrarily reject all autism-related vaccine cases as unsubstantiated.
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Unforeseen in Animal Tests
47 news items 24th August to 13th October 2010
“Pfizer's
Antidepressant Reboxetine Doesn't Quell Illness, Analysis Find.”
Bloomberg. 13 October 2010.
“Pfizer depression drug ineffective, may be harmful: study.”
Reuters. 13 October 2010.
“Hormone replacement increases kidney stone risk.”
Reuters. 12 October 2010.
“Novartis's Afinitor Fails to Slow Rare Form of Pancreatic
Cancer in Trial.”
Bloomberg. 11 October 2010.
“Jazz Fails to Win U.S. Approval of Fibromyalgia Drug.”
Bloomberg. 11 October 2010.
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Antidepressant Ineffective & Harmful
13/10/10
An antidepressant prescribed to about 5,000 people in England at a cost to the NHS of almost £900,000 a year is "ineffective and potentially harmful", academics have concluded.
They discovered that reboxetine, marketed as Edronax by Pfizer, was no more effective at countering major depression than a placebo sugar pill, after studying all available data on the drug.
In the study, published in the British Medical Journal today (WED), the German researchers found that some trials which failed to show reboxetine worked well were not submitted for publication by academic journals.
This, they said, was "a striking example of publication bias" - where academics or drug companies decide not to publish unfavourable results in peer-reviewed journals.
Overall, data on nearly three in four patients who took the drug went unpublished, claimed the researchers, working for the German Institute for Quality and Efficiency in Health Care.
"Data on 74 per cent of the patients included in our analysis was unpublished, indicating that the published evidence on reboxetine so far has been severely affected by publication bias," they wrote.
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Tell The Truth About Animal Testing
12/10/10
Group demands UBC lift 'veil of secrecy' around animal testing
A group of 60 animal advocacy groups across Canada, the U.S. and Europe sent a letter today to the University of British Columbia demanding "its veil of secrecy surrounding animal research" be lifted.
Approximately 100,000 animals are subjected to research experimentation at UBC, but the public has no way of accessing up-to-date information about them, said Brian Vincent, who is with Stop UBC Animal Research, a group of about 300 volunteers that began its work in February. "Our ultimate goal is to end animal research at UBC. We are trying to find out information about the UBC program now but in Canada much of that information is hidden from the public," he said.
"UBC must lift its veil of secrecy surrounding animal research. Since much of UBC's animal research is funded by taxpayers, the public has a right to know what the university is doing to animals with public money."
In the letter to UBC, the group -- led by Stop UBC Animal Research, People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals, National Anti-Vivisection Society, Animal Alliance of Canada, Animal Defenders International, Born Free USA, In Defense of Animals, International Network for Humane Education, Liberation BC and the Vancouver Humane Society -- urged UBC to provide details about its animal research program, such as the exact numbers and species of animals used, research protocols, any reports of UBC noncompliance with animal care guidelines, and photo and video documentation of animal experiments.
"UBC's lack of transparency to date has given the impression it does not want the public to see what researchers are doing to animals privately," the letter states.
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‘Chimps Are Poor Models’
12/10/10
'Chimps are poor models for research -they fight disease via a different process'
The Gazette spoke with Theodora Capaldo, president of the New England Anti-vivisection Society, the oldest animal protection agency in the United States.
Capaldo is working with the Fauna Foundation's Gloria Grow on Project R&R (rescue and restitution), an initiative that aims to secure permanent and humane retirement for chimps used for biomedical research.
Here are some facts that Capaldo offered on chimpanzees and research:
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Hormone Replacement = Kidney Stones
12/10/10
Hormone replacement increases kidney stone risk
Women who take hormone replacement after menopause are at increased risk of developing kidney stones, new research shows.
"It doesn't mean that women should stop taking hormone therapy based on this fact, but it does need to be taken into account when deciding to take the hormones or not," Dr. Naim M. Maalouf of the University of Texas Southwestern Medical Center in Dallas, one of the study's authors, told Reuters Health.
From 5 to 7 percent of postmenopausal women in the U.S. suffer from kidney stones, Maalouf and his colleagues note in the Archives of Internal Medicine. Kidney stones aren't just extremely painful when they are passed out of the bladder; "people who have kidney stones over time tend to have more kidney damage," Maalouf said.
Studies to date of the relationship between hormone therapy and kidney stones have had mixed results. To investigate, Maalouf and his colleagues reviewed data from the Women's Health Initiative, the largest-ever randomized controlled trial of hormone therapy for postmenopausal women.
Their analysis included 10,700 postmenopausal women who had undergone hysterectomy and were randomly assigned to take estrogen or placebo, and another 16,600 who hadn't had hysterectomies and were put on either estrogen and progestin or placebo. Women in the first group were followed for nearly six years, while the women in the second group were followed for seven years.
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Cardiff University Kitten Experiments Exposed
13/10/10
Cardiff University asked to justify controversial kitten experiments exposed by BUAV
The BUAV's recent exposé of experiments carried out on kittens at Cardiff University has received widespread attention. Today, the South Wales Echo has carried a follow-up article in which it reports that the deputy leader of Cardiff council, Neil McEvoy, has written to the Vice-Chancellor at the University asking why its scientists are using cats in experiments.
The experiment, in which 19 two to six months old kittens were subjected to invasive surgery under anaesthesia and had parts of their brains exposed in order to implant electrodes, hit the headlines earlier this year in the Wales on Sunday newspaper.
Since that time an attempt by the BUAV to find out further information about this and other experiments on cats under the UK's Freedom of Information (FOI) Act, has been refused by Cardiff University. This lack of accountability and transparency is totally unacceptable. Much of the animal research carried out at universities such as Cardiff is funded by the tax payer. The Medical Research Council supported the kitten experiment. Therefore, it is important that Cardiff University is held accountable for the pain and suffering it inflicts on animals.
Use our online lobby tool to ask your MP to take action on Freedom of Information.
In 2009, Cardiff University was responsible for using 46 cats, which accounted for 26% (over a quarter) of all those cats used in research facilities in the whole of the UK during that time period.
In another experiment uncovered by the BUAV, cats were implanted with electrodes and placed in sound-proofed large boxes so researchers could record their brain activity. Other cats were deeply anaesthetised and their brains removed while they were technically still alive so that the researchers could do additional experiments on slices of their brains.
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Monkey Breeders Banned
12/10/10
Senate Votes to Bar Monkey Breeders
In some of the harshest language ever expressed by a legislative body, the Commonwealth Senate repudiated the experimentation with several types monkeys on the island Monday.
Led by New Progressive Party Sen. Melinda Romero, the Senate approved a resolution that not only expressed its concern regarding the use of ITAL macaca fasciculavis ITAL primates for biological experiments, but denounced the company that attempted to introduce the practice to Puerto Rico.
“I want to make sure that the federal authorities understand the problem here regarding the use of these animals for testing," Romero said. "I’m completely opposed to the issue on the grounds that other things could be done before a life is sacrificed.”
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Animals & Insects Know That Plants Heal
12/10/10
While mainstream medicine largely continues to deny the inherent healing capacity of natural plants and herbs, the insect world is abuzz with activities that confirm the plant world to be nature's medicine cabinet. According to a new study published in the journal Ecology Letters, the Monarch butterfly routinely uses medicinal plants to help its offspring resist disease and infection.
Researchers observed that Monarch butterflies prefer to lay their egg larvae on milkweed leaves, so they decided to investigate why this is the case. They discovered that milkweed plants contain vital compounds that help the larvae to stay healthy.
"We have shown that some species of milkweed, the larva's food plants, can reduce parasite infection in monarchs," explained Jaap de Roode, an evolutionary biologist at Emory University, and author of the study. "[W]e have also found that infected female butterflies prefer to lay their eggs on plants that will make their offspring less sick."
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Eating Animal Protein Raises Risk of IBD
11/10/10
A diet high in protein increases women's risk of the cluster of conditions known collectively as inflammatory bowel disease (IBD), according to a study conducted by researchers from the Center Hospitalier Universitaire de Bicetre in Paris an published in the American Journal of Gastroenterology.
IBD is characterized by severe inflammation of the digestive tract, and includes conditions such as Crohn's disease and ulcerative colitis.
"Our results may help better understand the role of diet in IBD risk," the researchers wrote. "If confirmed, they can lead to protective strategies, especially in families at risk of IBD, and possibly to advice for preventing relapse."
The researchers followed more than 67,000 women between the ages of 40 and 65 for an average of 10 years, during which time 77 participants developed IBD. The researchers then analyzed all participants' dietary patterns for a potential link with the disease.
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Thousands More Mink Run Free
received anonymously:
"During the night of October 10th animal liberation front gave 4000 minks freedom from a furfarm near Vaggeryd, Sweden.
In
a few weeks many of the 1,4 million mink on Swedish furfarms will be
killed for their fur. Now its up to you to give them a second
chance for a life in freedom.
Its time to shut down the fur industry!"
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Tories Against Hunting
9/10/10
Independent 6-10-10:
Birmingham Diary: Save the bulls,whales, stags, hares, and even the foxes
by Andy McSmith
There is a meeting on the fringe of the conference this morning which is fated to be sparsely attended, and not just because it is at 8am. It will be gathering of Conservatives Against Fox Hunting. Yes, that word is "against".
Tory MPs who opposed fox hunting used to be as rare as Labour MPs who defended it. Now there is a small but growing faction in the party who think it would be wrong or foolish to repeal the Hunting Act. In their manifesto, the Conservatives promised a free vote on the matter, with David Cameron committed to voting for legalisation.
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Botox Testing Blamed for Rise in Animal Experimentation
8/10/10
Nearly 90,000 lab mice are used to test batches of Botox each year in the European Union.
Photo: China Photos/Getty Images
Botox
injections are making it more difficult to smile than ever before, thanks
to statistics recently published by the European Commission (EC) regarding
the use of animal experimentation.
Nearly 90,000 lab mice are used each year in the European Union alone
to test batches of Botox before they can be used on humans, according
to the journal Nature. That number has increased from 33,000 mice in
2005.
The
EC report singled out Botox testing as a major reason that animal experimentation
persists at sustained levels in the EU despite the fact that it has
been reduced in many other fields. Currently, every single batch of
Botox must be safety tested on mice before it can be injected into the
face of a human.
Overall, the report indicated that over 12 million animals are tested
on for scientific purposes in the EU each year, the largest proportion
of which are research animals used in fundamental biology studies. More
than two thirds of the animals were used by five of the EU's member
states — France, the UK, Germany, Spain and Italy.
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Secret Footage Exposes Abuse
8/10/10
Secret abattoir video shows 'sickening' abuse of animals
Charity's secret video shows pigs being kicked and stamped on – prompting calls for CCTV cameras in all abattoirs
The government is calling on nearly 370 slaughterhouses in Britain to install surveillance cameras to help enforce legislation against cruelty to animals, following a controversial campaign run by animal rights activists.
The Food Standards Agency plans to override objections in the meat industry to the move by saying breaches of the law are "unacceptable" and enlisting the support of consumers and supermarkets for the campaign.
The move, to be discussed by the agency's board on Tuesday, represents a victory for the animal rights charity Animal Aid, which installed secret cameras in seven abattoirs across England. The charity said it had footage of pigs being kicked, stamped on and inappropriately stunned. Sainsbury's said it had suspended its contract with an abattoir in June as soon as allegations were made. It had resumed beef supplies last month once it was satisfied improvements had been made: "We have the highest standards of animal welfare and we are working with all suppliers across all species with a view to them all installing CCTV."
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Cancer Chemical Was Approved By Animal Tests
7/10/10
Cancer alert on chemical in plastic
drink bottles. The chemical found in every day containers may cause
prostate cancer
[See more at: http://antidote-europe.org/index.htm]
A “GENDER bending” chemical found in everyday plastic food and drink containers, tins and baby bottles may cause prostate cancer, scientists are warning. Levels of the chemical typically found in humans can damage the prostate but also make it inflamed – creating ideal conditions for the disease to develop. It is the latest research to show that bisphenol A (BPA) is harmful to human health.
It is widely used to harden plastics and is found in baby bottles, CD cases, plastic cutlery and the lining of food and drink cans. Scientists are concerned at its use because it mimics the female sex hormone oestrogen and may interfere with the way hormones are processed by the body.
Some studies on animals have shown the chemical to be safe, but others have linked it to breast cancer, liver damage, obesity and fertility problems.
It is estimated that BPA is detectable in more than 90 per cent of people and is one of the world’s most widely manufactured chemicals, with more than 2.2million tons made each year. Denmark became the first EU country to ban BPA in food and drink containers for the under-threes earlier this year and it has also been barred in Canada and three US states.
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Disgraceful EU Statistics for Animal Experiments Released
7/10/10
News Release
Europe’s shame – animal groups react to the latest EU statistics for the number of animals used in experiments The European Coalition to End Animal Experiments (ECEAE), a coalition of key animal protection groups across the EU, has today expressed its profound disappointment at the lack of a significant decrease in the number of animals used in experiments across the European Union. This follows the publication of the Sixth Statistical Report (1) by the European Commission which covers data collected by 27 Member States for the year, 2008 (2).
The statistics, the first publicly available since 2005, have been released only weeks after the EU adopted new legislation on animal experimentation (replacing the earlier Directive 86/609/EEC) (3). This new legislation has been criticised by the ECEAE as being a missed opportunity to introduce measures that would have given greater protection to animals used in experiments.
The latest statistics show:
Total number of animals used in 2008 was just above 12 million which is a small decrease from 2005 (reported as 12.1 million)
Main user countries continues to be France, UK and Germany, constituting approximately 55% of the total number of animals used throughout the EU. Germany use increased by 11% (to 2,021,782), UK by 21% (to 2,266,884) and France by 0.13% to (2,328,380).
Significant increases in the number of animals used in certain countries, including Spain (increase of 51% to 897,859), Estonia (increase of 610% to 34,794), Ireland (increase of 197% to 112,835), Austria (increase of 32% to 220,456) and Portugal (increase of 22% to 50,888).
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Austria Declared An Unconstitutional State
7/10/10
Animal Protection Trial: Border signs declare Austria as an Unconstitutional State
International human rights activists change Austrian border signs to protest the ongoing animal protection trial
Taking advantage of Austria being bordered by so many different countries, creative human rights activists from various neighbouring countries set about making changes to border signs to protest at Austria's misuse of laws to curb and silence NGO work.
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Comedy Writer Supports Non-Animal Science
7/10/10
Seinfeld Writer Supports Animal-Friendly Research
Comedian and author Carol Leifer, who has written for “Seinfeld” and “Saturday Night Live,” is starring in a new national campaign to promote health charities that don’t fund or conduct animals experiments.
In the new 30-second radio public service announcement produced by the Physicians Committee for Responsible Medicine (PCRM), Leifer urges potential donors to “Give and Let Live” by supporting compassionate charities that provide vital care to patients and advance research without using animals.
The ad introduces The Humane Charity Seal of Approval, a unique certification program that allows potential donors to quickly identify those health charities that match their values and don’t fund animal tests. The Humane Charity Seal of Approval offers a rapidly expanding directory of charities that fund only humane, human-based research or patient services.
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New Setback for Bullfights in Spain
6/10/10
Madrid - Spain's bullfighting tradition suffered a new setback Wednesday as the senate rejected a proposal to declare bullfights a part of the country's cultural heritage.
Senate rejected the proposal presented by the main opposition conservative People's Party (PP) with 129 votes against 117 and one abstention.
Bullfights had inspired countless Spanish artists, PP representative Pio Garcia-Escudero argued, describing the matador as an artist who had improvise and risk his life.
The PP had the support of about 60 people representing the bullfighting industry, including bullfighters and bull breeders, who came to follow the debate at the senate.
Prime Minister Jose Luis Rodriguez Zapatero's Socialist Party, however, said the PP's proposal violated the authority of Spain's 17 semi-autonomous regions, which were responsible for decisions concerning cultural heritage.
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RSPCA Exposed Again For Cruelty
6/10/10
EXCLUSIVE INVESTIGATION: RSPCA's Freedom Foods label exposed
It is a label that promises high welfare for animals at a premium price for consumers. But a Five News investigation has exposed a farm under the RSPCA's Freedom Food scheme which is flouting the rules.
We found chickens in cramped conditions, dead birds and electric wire at the farm producing eggs for a well-known brand.
Over the past two years we've exposed five farms keeping their birds in poor conditions.
In response to our findings, the RSPCA and Noble Foods provided us with the following statements.
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Heart Drug Fails
6/10/10
Once-Promising Heart Failure Drug Fails in Trial
It's 'the end of the story' for rolofylline against this tough-to-treat condition, researcher says. A new experimental drug for treating patients who have acute heart failure plus kidney failure did not show any overall benefit, indicating that the future of this particular drug, called rolofylline, is over.
"I think this is the end of the story for this drug," said Dr. Barry Massie, lead author of a study appearing in the Oct. 7 issue of the New England Journal of Medicine. "There was a very promising pilot trial but these results . . . were neutral. I am disappointed," he said.
The results were presented last year at the European Society of Cardiology meeting. Shortly before that, drug company Merck, which has been developing the medicine and which funded this study, announced that it would not be filing for U.S. Food and Drug Administration approval for rolofylline. Rolofylline is known as an A1-receptor antagonist and is intended to make diuretics work more effectively.
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20,000 Mink Released Sweden
5/10/10
received anonymously (translation); image from Sveriges Television:
"During the night of October 4th all 20,000 mink were released from a fur farm outside Skillingaryd. Although most Swedes are against fur farming, there are currently 1.4 million animals trapped in cages. This is contrary to Swedish animal welfare legislation, but with the tacit acceptance of a paralyzed government. Our action during the night is a reaction to an industry that does not respect the law, democracy or animal welfare. There is now a wild population of mink in Sweden, which originated from fur farms. There is evidence that animals raised in captivity successfully re-adjust to a life of freedom when they are given the chance. Some get caught, some may be run over by cars. This is nothing we desire for any of them, but for those who escape, that means everything. Our goal is to close the farm and that the cages remain empty. Forever. For mink on Animals' Day"
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Human Experimental Conspiracy
5/10/10
Government collusion in human medical experiments no longer just a conspiracy theory
It used to be that when you talked about Big Government conspiring with Big Pharma to use human beings as guinea pigs in bizarre medical experiments, people would look at you as if you were some kind of loon. "Oh, the American government would never do that," they'd say, smug in their self assurance that they are somehow ruled by compassionate, honest government operatives and corporate do-gooders who are always looking out for the public's best interest.
Imagine their shock when the thin veil of disinformation was lifted with last Saturday's announcement that the U.S. government was apologizing for intentionally infecting innocent Guatemalans with diseases so they could study the effects of antibiotic drugs. http://www.naturalnews.com/029946_government_conspiracy_medical_experiments.html
All of a sudden, all those people who somehow thought medical science was all about protecting people found themselves stunned -- and even ashamed -- to learn that their own government would conspire with the medical industry to intentionally engage in such behavior.
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Animal Groups Call For Lab Probe
5/10/10
SAN ANTONIO, An animal rights watchdog group says it wants a new U.S. Department of Agriculture probe into monkey deaths at a nationally known research lab.
In a release, the group, Stop Animal Exploitation Now, also calls for an Inspector General's investigation of the conduct of the Animal & Plant Health Inspection Service regarding the Southwest Foundation for Biomedical Research in San Antonio.
SAEN says previous USDA reports revealed primates have died at the Texas lab from dehydration and hypothermia, while others have simply been "found dead" -- possibly without veterinary care -- after suffering from serious disease conditions that include temperatures up to 105 degrees.
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Science Report Slams Primate Tests
BBC wildlife presenter Dr Charlotte Uhlenbroek joins leading scientists
and doctors to launch campaign
The campaign’s report presents an immediate science strategy to end poisoning tests on non-human primates
Authored by Dr Andre Menache, director of science group Antidote Europe, the report is endorsed by biologists, toxicologists, conservationists, doctors and animal behaviourists.
Poisoning tests comprise around 90% of all primate experiments in the UK and US; are some of the most shockingly cruel; and are not predictive for human biology. Says Dr Uhlenbroek: “I have never filmed inside a primate laboratory, nor would I want to. However I have seen undercover footage of monkey breeding farms and macaques undergoing invasive test procedures filmed inside laboratories — and I was shocked by those images. It is difficult to imagine the emotional and psychological trauma that these animals endure when they are separated from their family groups, transported in tiny cages to far away destinations, to be used as living test tubes.
“We are told that toxicity tests are performed on non-human primates to safeguard human health, because of their similarity to us. However, by the same token we have a duty and an obligation to afford them special protection. Given that modern science has the means to obtain the required safety data without the use of animals, we must act immediately and decisively to end those animal experiments.”
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Slaughterhouse Fined for Animal Deaths
4/10/10
£10,000 fine for meat firm: Sheep left with no water for days
A HALAL meat producing company have been fined almost £10,000 after hundreds of sheep were left without drinking water or room to move. Premier Halal Meats Ltd of Brookwoods Industrial Estate in Holywell Green, was fined £9,401 after pleading guilty to three counts of failing to look after their animals.
Calderdale Magistrates heard how 864 sheep in the slaughterhouse were left for days without drinking water, enough space to lie down, stand up and turn around and were caused unnecessary pain and suffering. Mr Howard Shaw, prosecuting for DEFRA, said that sheep were standing on top of each other and that drinking water troughs had been turned off. The sheep had been forced into the pen by a delivery driver and the abattoir supervisor after a mix up regarding what time sheep would be delivered.
In total 11 sheep died during the incident which took place at the end of February of last year, many through asphyxiation and being trampled. A senior meat hygienist said that "he had never seen anything as bad as this" when he visited the slaughterhouse, Mr Shaw told the court. Debbie Wilson, who attended court as a representative of Halal Meats, said that the company had made significant changes to the way they operated following the incident.
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Lions Fight Back
4/10/10
Lion tamer hospitalized, attacked by lion during circus performance in Lviv
An animal tamer was taken to hospital on October 2 after having suffered an attack by a lion during a circus show in Lviv, reads a statement made by Lviv municipal council.
"A lion attacked the tamer in the circus during the show," the statement said.
The performance was stopped immediately, and the spectators evacuated. The tamer was rushed to city hospital No.8, where he underwent an urgent surgical operation. No victims among the spectators have been reported.
Ukrainian News - http://www.kyivpost.com/news/nation/detail/84823/#ixzz11QtWduGR
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Monkeys Torn From Families
3/10/10
Monkeys torn from families on paradise isle and used to breed babies for UK lab tests
Cruelly dangled upside down by its tail and swung from side to side... a monkey is sickeningly tormented after being snatched from the wild.
With a high-pitched scream the animal is then thrown in a cage and forced to become a breeding machine – churning out babies to be sold across the globe for scientific tests. And thousands are sent to Britain, where the demand from pharmaceutical and cosmetic companies for animals to use in tests is soaring.
Figures reveal the UK imported more than 2,000 monkeys from Mauritius in the past year – making snaring an animal from the jungle on the Indian Ocean isle a lucrative business for hunters.
Today the Sunday Mirror exposes the cruel ways in which these monkeys are captured and condemned to a life of suffering. Our disturbing pictures were obtained by campaigners from the British Union for the Abolition of Vivisection, which has been working under cover for a year investigating the trappers in Mauritius.
A covert video shows huntsmen snaring long-tailed macaques – an endangered species – by laying traps baited with bananas and sugar cane around the forest where the creatures live.
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Glaxo Vaccine Failure
3/10/10
Glaxo Meets Big Disappointment in Failed Herpes Vaccine
An effort that began eight years ago to develop a herpes simplex vaccine for women has ended in failure and uncertainty. After assessing final Phase III trial results, the GlaxoSmithKline (GSK) vaccine, known as Simplirix, failed to meet its primary endpoint, which was preventing genital herpes. However, it remains unclear why the vaccine was not effective. Safety issues were not cited as a problem.
The outcome is a huge disappointment for the drugmaker, which has been attempting to expand its portfolio of vaccine products, given that an estimated one in four women in the US alone has genital herpes. In other words, the afflication is one of the most common infectious diseases and that can translate into huge revenues.
The study, which was a randomized, double-blind trial, was undertaken with the US National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases, and tested 8,323 women between 18 and 30 years old, who were tested at 50 sites in the United States and Canada. Participants received either Simplirix or a version of Havrix, an FDA-approved vaccine for thwarting hepatitis A that is sold by Glaxo (see the NIAID statement and a question-and-answer from the agency).
Earlier studies were encouraging. These involved men and women who did not have genital herpes but whose sexual partners were known to be infected, and the vaccine prevented genital herpes disease in more than 70 percent of the female volunteers although there was no clear effect in men. Moreover, Simplirix reduced the risk of developing antibodies to herpes, which are used as an indicator that a person has been infected with HSV, by 40 percent.
http://seekingalpha.com/article/228112-glaxo-meets-big-disappointment-in-failed-herpes-vaccine
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Irish Fur Ban Proposed
4/10/10
At October's Dublin City Council's monthly meeting, Councillor Cieran Perry proposed our motion to ban the import and sale of real fur, in the jurisdiction of Dublin City.
Seconded by Cllr. Mannix Flynn, the motion passed successfully - with only one councillor voting against it! Unfortunately though, due to current trading laws, this motion will only have effect on fairs, markets, stalls and council-organised events - not individual shops or boutiques. However, this is still a wonderful achievement in our fight against the fur trade - and this is only the beginning of our country-wide campaign to get fur permanently out of Ireland in time for the fur farming ban.
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Trade In Lab Monkeys Exposed
3/10/10
Monkeys torn from families on paradise isle and used to breed babies for UK lab tests
Cruelly dangled upside down by its tail and swung from side to side... a monkey is sickeningly tormented after being snatched from the wild.
With a high-pitched scream the animal is then thrown in a cage and forced to become a breeding machine – churning out babies to be sold across the globe for scientific tests. And thousands are sent to Britain, where the demand from pharmaceutical and cosmetic companies for animals to use in tests is soaring. Figures reveal the UK imported more than 2,000 monkeys from Mauritius in the past year – making snaring an animal from the jungle on the Indian Ocean isle a lucrative business for hunters. Today the Sunday Mirror exposes the cruel ways in which these monkeys are captured and condemned to a life of suffering.
Our disturbing pictures were obtained by campaigners from the British Union for the Abolition of Vivisection, which has been working under cover for a year investigating the trappers in Mauritius. A covert video shows huntsmen snaring long-tailed macaques – an endangered species – by laying traps baited with bananas and sugar cane around the forest where the creatures live.
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Stop This Horrific & Cruel Trade
3/10/10
by Ricky Gervais
I am shocked by the findings of the BUAV's investigations into the trade in monkeys for research. This is a horrific market which inflicts great cruelty on our primate cousins. Monkeys, torn from their families and homes, are imprisoned in farms to produce babies to feed the research industry.
These animals are kept behind bars on concrete and are deprived of the green foli-age of their jungle homes. Their babies are snatched away at just a few months old. Taking infants from their mothers is incredibly cruel. The distress they must feel is unimaginable. In the wild, monkeys usually stay with their family group for many years, sometimes for life. These sensitive young animals are later sent around the world to laboratories. Handled like cargo, they are stuck in wooden crates and shipped in the holds of airlines as if they were luggage.
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Ray Greek Meets UK Science Minister
2/10/10
Science Minister Meets with Researchers
Andre
Menache
Leading members of the science community met in Havant to discuss the
pros and cons of animal testing. Dr Ray Greek and Andre Menache, as
well as Leigh Park Councillor Faith Ponsonby, met yesterday with Havant
MP David Willetts, who is the science minister.
Dr Greek believes that testing on animals for new drugs should be massively reduced.
Instead he believes more pharmaceutical testing should be on human tissue. They believe animals such as rats have a very different biology to humans and therefore the testing is not thorough enough.
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Side Effects May Include Lawsuits
2/10/10
For decades, antipsychotic drugs were a niche product. Today, they’re the top-selling class of pharmaceuticals in America, generating annual revenue of about $14.6 billion and surpassing sales of even blockbusters like heart-protective statins.
While the effectiveness of antipsychotic drugs in some patients remains a matter of great debate, how these drugs became so ubiquitous and profitable is not. Big Pharma got behind them in the 1990s, when they were still seen as treatments for the most serious mental illnesses, like hallucinatory schizophrenia, and recast them for much broader uses, according to previously confidential industry documents that have been produced in a variety of court cases.
Anointed with names like Abilify and Geodon, the drugs were given to a broad swath of patients, from preschoolers to octogenarians. Today, more than a half-million youths take antipsychotic drugs, and fully one-quarter of nursing-home residents have used them. Yet recent government warnings say the drugs may be fatal to some older patients and have unknown effects on children.
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US Apologises For Syphilis Experiment
1/10/10
The United States apologised on Friday for an experiment conducted in the 1940s in which government medical researchers deliberately infected Guatemalan prison inmates with syphilis.
Secretary of State Hillary Clinton and other top officials issued a statement about the experiment, which echoed the infamous 1960s Tuskegee study in which black American men were deliberately left untreated for syphilis.
"The sexually transmitted disease inoculation study conducted from 1946-1948 in Guatemala was clearly unethical," the statement reads.
"Although these events occurred more than 64 years ago, we are outraged that such reprehensible research could have occurred under the guise of public health. We deeply regret that it happened, and we apologise to all the individuals who were affected by such abhorrent research practises."
The experiments, aimed at testing whether penicillin could prevent syphilis, were discovered by Susan Reverby, professor of women's studies at Wellesley College in Massachusetts.
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Novartis Fined Millions
30/9/10
Novartis to pay millions in fines for off-label marketing of drug
Novartis Pharmaceuticals Corp. has agreed to pay $422.5 million in civil and criminal fines for promoting drugs for uses that had not been approved by the Food and Drug Administration, the U.S. Department of Justice announced Thursday in Philadelphia. The corporation is the U.S. subsidiary of Novartis AG, which is based in Switzerland.
Under the settlement, which requires approval by federal court in Philadelphia, Novartis agreed to plead guilty and pay a criminal fine of $185 million for off-label marketing of the antiepileptic drug Trileptal. It also will pay $237.5 million in civil penalties for off-label marketing of that drug and for offering financial inducements for doctors to prescribe Trileptal and five other Novartis medicines - Diovan, Exforge, Tekturna, Zelnorm, and Sandostatin. The "kickbacks" included payments for speaker programs, advisory board memberships, entertainment, travel, and meals to encourage doctors to prescribe the drugs.
In a news release, Novartis said it had disclosed earlier this year that it had set aside money for the settlement. The company said it had agreed to five years of additional federal monitoring, auditing, training, education, reporting, and disclosures.
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Will NASA Start Their Monkey Experiments?
30/9/10
Animal Defenders International:
Concern As NASA Steps Closer to Irradiation Experiments On Monkeys
LOS ANGELES, Sept. 30th, 2010 NASA bill S. 3729 (National Aeronautics
and Space Administration Authorization Act of 2010), has passed the
House and will now go to the President for his signature.
Animal Defenders International is disappointed that The House passed
the Senate version of the bill, which did not include the original House
language that required "justification and rationale for any additional
research involving non-human primates".
After Russia commenced experiments on monkeys which were condemned by
Russian and European astronauts, the European Space Agency (ESA) announced
that it would not be using primates in future, and saw no need for animal
experiments. However, here in the US, NASA then followed the Russian
announcement with plans to spend $1.75million on widely-criticized monkey
tests, despite having recently laid off 5,000 workers. A NASA aerospace
engineer has resigned in protest.
The monkey experiments will see squirrel monkeys given massive doses
of radiation and then forced to perform tasks, and have been criticized
from every side, scientists, animal protectionists, astronauts, former
NASA employees, and even the European Space Agency.
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Animal Protection Trial – Update September 2010
29/9/10
To Recap
Endless - This trial against 13 animal rights campaigners accused of being members of a Mafia-like criminal organisation started on 2 March 2010. So far there have been 50 days spent in court and the end of this monster trial is no where in sight. On the contrary, the court is still only hearing witnesses from the prosecution!
Criticism and costs - It is expected that the case will be heard until well into 2011. An increasing number of notable legal experts and journalists openly criticise the trial, not only condemning the initial decision to use anti-Mafia laws against NGO campaigners, but also the treatment of the defendants in the court proceedings and the unbelievably long duration of the trial. Aside from the cost of such a trial for the tax payer, the defendants have been unable to work since the trial began and can look forward to personal financial ruin incurred through lawyers costs alone.
Absence of evidence - In all these hours and days in court spent listening to the prosecution's case not one piece of evidence has been brought forward to implicate the defendants in belonging to a criminal organisation, or indeed that such an organisation even exists!
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Mink Go on The Run From Ardara Farm, Ireland
28/9/10
What was described as a "large number" of mink have escaped from a farm in the Ardara area, it was confirmed yesterday.
The animals were being rounded up after getting out from their confines at the mink farm.
One motorist, who came upon the animals while travelling on the Ardara to Killybegs road on Sunday, said he saw a number of the animals dead on the road after they had been struck by passing vehicles.
"I saw five living ones. They were startled in the middle of the road - the lights were blinding them and they didn't move. When we saw the first one, my girlfriend thought it was a cat but I said to her 'that's no cat, that's a mink."
A number of other witnesses also reported seeing the mink who were being farmed in the Meenavalley area. They are understood to have escaped from the Anderson's Mink Farm.
Nobody from the farm was available to comment at the time of going to press. But a spokesman confirmed that the animals were being rounded up yesterday.
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Nets Cut & Dolphins Released in Taiji, Japan
28/9/10
Fishermen transfer selected dolphins caught at
the drive hunt to sea pen for the dolfinarium trade
Divers
from the European conservation organisation The Black Fish have last
night cut the nets of six holding pens in Taiji, Japan, that were holding
dolphins caught during a dolphin drive hunt a few days earlier. During
this hunt a number of dolphins were selected for the international dolphinarium
trade and transferred to these holding pens. In rough weather conditions
the divers swam out and cut the nets of six of these holding pens, allowing
a number of dolphins to swim back out to
sea. No arrests were made.
Every year, between September and April, the sea around the fishing village of Taiji on the east coast of Japan turns red as it becomes the scene of one of the biggest mass slaughters of marine wildlife in the world. The dolphin drive hunt, which recently made global headlines through the Oscar winning documentary 'The Cove', is responsible for capturing and killing over 2,000 dolphins of Japan's annual quota of 20,000. Fishermen drive the dolphins from sea into a cove, where some animals are selected for dolphinariums while the others are killed for their meat.
The
Black Fish and other marine conservation and animal welfare organisations
run ongoing campaigns to push for the closure of the remaining dolphinariums
in Europe, where some of the dolphins caught at Taiji inevitably end
up. Dolphinariums are already banned in United Kingdom. The Black Fish
believes that it is unacceptable to keep dolphins, orca's and other
marine wildlife in captivity, given the vast areas which these animals
normally inhabit, the miserable and squalid
conditions under which they are often kept and the stress that public
performances put on them.
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Farm Worker Jailed For Abuse
27/9/10
Farm Worker sentenced to jail for cruelty to Conklin Dairy cows
When Mercy for Animals released an undercover video of Billy Joe Gregg Jr., 25 hitting cows in the face with crowbars, poking cows with pitchforks, breaking their tails, punching defenseless baby calves and kicking them, the nation gasped at such an egregious demonstration of animal cruelty. Friday, at Marysville Municipal Court Gregg pleaded guilty to six counts of animal cruelty. He was given an eighteen month jail sentence, but the judge suspended it to eight months. He is also required to pay a $1000 fine, receive psychological counseling, and will not be allowed contact with animals for the next three years.
Dr. Bernard Rollin, a Distinquished Professor of Animal Studies at Colorado State University viewed the tape and stated, "This is probably the most gratuitous, sustained, sadistic, animal abuse I have ever seen. The video depicts calculated, deliberate cruelty based not on momentary rage, but on taking pleasure through causing pain to cows and calves who are defenseless."
Gregg is the only worker to have faced criminal charges, and in court he apologized but gave no explanation as to his behavior.Gregg was fired the day the video was released.
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SHAC Statement
26/9/10
Stop Huntingdon Animal Cruelty, a global animal rights group whose sole aim is to close down animal testing laboratory Huntingdon Life Sciences (HLS), has today announced it will target all companies linked to Fortress Investment Group LLC, in particular those who are considering assisting Fortress with their upcoming re-financing.
The news comes after the revelation that Fortress are seeking $440million in a pair of loans to re-finance the company due to increasing debt. Fortress have been deemed a top priority target by SHAC after it became known that they had secretly loaned $70million to HLS in 2006 after Stephens Inc. pulled out, which as a result kept the 7 times exposed animal testing facility open throughout severe financial difficulties during the past few years, helping to fund the continuation of the torture and deaths of over 600,000 animals.
The $70million loan provided by Fortress remains essential for HLS to continue; without it, they would have been crippled by staggering debt and forced to liquidate years ago. As a result, SHAC intend to step up their campaign against Fortress, and will start to pressure them from all angles possible – including targeting the companies who are helping Fortress with their re-financing efforts.
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10,000 March Agaist Vivisection in Italy
26/9/10
We
counted about 10.000 protesters marching on Saturday sept 25th in the
streets of Rome against Green Hill and against vivisection!
I guess this was probably the biggest AR demo ever, maybe not only in
Italy.
Since we knew this demo would attract thousands of non-activists or just animal-lovers, outraged by the latest EU directive and the news on vivisection becoming public and spread all over, we decided to use this demo to give a lot of messages:
We had speeches on abolitionism, antispeciesism connected to racism, grassroots activism, campaigning with no political flag or big organization needed, veganism, direct action and supporting prisoners. The crowd cheered and liked them all, especially when we said we were there with no political flags or big AR groups names! We gave hundreds of specific flyers inviting dog lovers to become vegan and active for the animals.
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Avandia Diabetes Drug Banned
23/9/10
Avandia diabetes drug placed under severe FDA restrictions in US as European regulators ban it outright
The diabetes drug Avandia, shown to raise heart attack risk by 40 percent in a paper published in the New England Journal of Medicine, was banned today across many European countries in a coordinated global announcement. The FDA didn't quite ban the drug but placed it under severe restrictions that will all but guarantee the drug's sales in the United States drop to almost zero.
Specifically, the FDA's new restrictions require that doctors and patients first "try every other diabetes medication" before turning to Avandia as a last resort. And even then, they must acknowledge being made aware of the drug's serious risks.
The Avandia scam
Avandia has been the subject of seemingly endless accusations and criticisms from both alternative and conventional medicine practitioners. Just here on NaturalNews.com, we reported how the FDA's own scientists backing Avandia's so-called "safety" had financial ties to the drug manufacturer http://www.naturalnews.com/029268_financial_ties_Avandia.html
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Vet College Ends Dog Experiments, Ontario
22/9/10
ONTARIO VETERINARY COLLEGE ENDS INDEFENSIBLE KILLING OF HEALTHY DOGS
Effective this academic year, the Ontario Veterinary College (OVC) will end the training of students through terminal surgeries which have taken the lives of hundreds of healthy dogs. The termination of these animal experiments, and their replacement by models, cadavers and supervised clinical learning opportunities with shelter animals, was announced September 10, 2010 on the OVC website following a sustained campaign. The process of change began in 2009 with a friendly beagle, Rainbow, who was one of the OVC dogs whose fate was to be killed after surgical practice.
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As always the fight goes on...
22/9/10
Thomas Paine’s Corner has received yet another communication from Walter Bond, the alleged “ALF Lone Wolf.” He asked us to make his essay public:
On the Second of September, 2010, my grandmother, Gwen Bond, passed away in Mason City, IA. I regret not being by her side when she went, but I regret even more that I could not be there to console my father, James L. Bond (yes, my father’s name is actually James Bond). He was always very close with his mother and I know it is a hard time for him, as having not only lost his mom but also having his son imprisoned at the same time together create quite a tribulation for him.
Gwen, or Grahm as we all called her, was the last of my grandparents to pass. She will be missed by many in north Iowa, as she was the life of the party–literally singing and dancing the night away well into her 80’s. She was also a friend to any cat who crossed her path. My grandmother had two homes, one in Mason City and one in Clear Lake, IA, which was a cottage. At the cottage she diligently cared for 8 indoor cats, fed the strays in the neighborhood, and provided food for the ferals in the woods around her property.
Her home in Mason City was damaged by flooding a few years back. This forced her to move in with my father at his adjoining property. She never allowed the house to be destroyed though. Since she could not live there, she donated it to the cats. She would have my father walk her over several times a week to visit them. My grandmother taught me that the very best way to fall asleep is with a cat on your chest, one on your legs, and perhaps another one by your side. Wherever you are, Grahm, I will miss you and I know the cats do too.
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Osteoporosis Drug Doubles Cancer Risk
22/9/10
Warning: Bisphosphonate drugs to prevent osteoporosis double the risk of esophageal cancer
In a series of television commercials, actress Sally Fields has long promoted the drug Boniva as a wonderful and super easy way to treat and prevent the bone robbing disease known as osteoporosis. Just pop a pill once a month and stay strong, youthful and energetic like Sally, the ads imply. The trouble is, Boniva and other drugs in the class of medications known as oral bisphosphonates not only have a host of side effects, including heartburn and diarrhea and constipation, now scientists have found out these medications can be deadly. Research just published in the British Medical Journal (BMJ) shows the drugs double the risk of esophageal cancer.
Bisphosphonates (which, along with Boniva, include Fosamax, Actonel and Didronel), are the most commonly recommended and prescribed Big Pharma drugs for post-menopausal bone loss. And as they've grown in widespread use, troublesome case reports have mounted suggesting people who take oral bisphosphonates for osteoporosis are developing esophageal cancer far more often than would be expected. In fact, a letter to the editor by an FDA official published last year in The New England Journal of Medicine warned that these drugs might be linked to esophageal cancer -- and, in some cases, the drugs were suspected of causing deaths from bisphosphonate-linked malignancies.
However, despite the huge numbers of people, mostly women, taking the drugs, no large study looking specifically at the potential cancer-causing risk of bisphosphonates has been conducted until now. Researchers from the University of Oxford's Cancer Epidemiology Unit and the Medicines and Healthcare products Regulatory Agency in the United Kingdom (UK) have carried out large-scale research to finally investigate whether bisphosphonates are a cancer risk.
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Glaxo Vaccine Bowel Risk
22/9/10
FDA sees bowel risk in early Glaxo vaccine data
GlaxoSmithKline Plc's rotavirus vaccine may be linked to a small increase in a life-threatening type of bowel obstruction, U.S. health officials said on Wednesday.
Early data from a study in Mexico suggested infants given the Rotarix vaccine may face a higher chance of an intestinal problem known as intussusception in the 31 days after their first dose, the Food and Drug Administration said on its website.
"Although the results are preliminary and will require further evaluation, FDA approved revised labeling to inform healthcare providers of this finding," the agency said.
Rotavirus is the world's leading cause of severe diarrhea and dehydration in young infants. The benefits of rotavirus vaccines continue to outweigh risks, the FDA said.
Glaxo's rotavirus vaccine sales in 2009 were $440 million globally, including $118 million in the United States.
The British drug company's shares slipped 0.7 percent to $40.06 in morning trading on the New York Stock Exchange.
(Reporting by Lisa Richwine; Editing by Maureen Bavdek)
http://www.reuters.com/article/idUSTRE68L3A420100922?feedType=nl&feedName=ushealth200
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Antipsychotic Drug Link to Blood Clots
22/9/10
UK study links antipsychotic drugs to clot risk
Modern antipsychotic drugs, especially AstraZeneca's blockbuster Seroquel, may increase the risk of patients developing life-threatening blood clots, British researchers said on Wednesday.
The finding, from a trawl of tens of thousands of patient records, adds to a growing body of evidence linking so-called atypical antipsychotics to adverse side effects.
Atypicals -- which also include Eli Lilly's Zyprexa, Johnson & Johnson's Risperdal and Bristol-Myers Squibb's Abilify -- dominate the antipsychotic market, which had sales of $16 billion in 2009, according to Thomson Reuters data.
First introduced more than 20 years ago, such drugs cause fewer of the involuntary-movement problems associated with older medicines but have been linked to diabetes and increased mortality in people with dementia.
There has also been limited evidence linking them with dangerous blood clots, such as deep vein thrombosis and pulmonary embolism, although previous studies have been small.
The large British study, which compared 25,000 cases of patients with venous thromboembolism (VTE) against 89,000 controls, found people prescribed antipsychotics had a 32 percent greater risk of serious blood clots, after adjusting for other potential risk factors.
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Infant Vaccine Dangers Exposed
21/9/10
Hidden government papers expose lies about measles vaccines for infants
British government policy on measles vaccination for children has changed for no discernible reason notes Christina England, writing on vactruth.com, citing an internal document from 1968.
The document, titled "Notes On the Use and Storage of Measles Vaccine (Live Attenuated) for Routine Vaccines," clearly states in Section 7 that the vaccine should not be given to children under the age of nine months old. According to the paper's authors, the presence of maternal antibodies in the blood of such children interferes with the action of the vaccine, making it ineffective. Instead, the government recommended vaccination at the age of two after vaccination for diptheria, polio, tetanus and whooping cough.
England contrasts this with the ongoing push for earlier measles vaccination, most recently highlighted with a study that found almost no maternal antibodies present in children's bodies by the age of six months.
She also draws attention to Section 6 of the government document, which acknowledges that "mild febrile reactions and transient rashes may be expected to follow the administration of the vaccine in a substantial proportion of cases" but that "the Committee on Safety of Drugs ... does not however, wish to receive reports of mild febrile reactions and rashes associated with the use of this vaccine."
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Monkeys Bones Broken During Trapping
21/9/10
Wild monkeys sustain broken limbs from commercial trapping in island nation Mauritius
In this Nov. 3, 2009 photo released Sept. 21, 2010 by the British Union for the Abolition of Vivisection, BUAV an injured wild monkey is seen in Mauritius. A new report "Mauritius: The trade in primates for research" released to The Associated Press on Tuesday Sept. 21, 2010 says that wild, long-tailed monkeys sustain broken limbs and other injuries when trappers catch the primates and transfer them to breeding farms on the island nation of Mauritius. Mauritius has four major breeding farms and a fifth farm is to be opened soon, evidence that the trade is expanding, said the report by BUAV _ the British Union for the Abolition of Vivisection _ which calls itself the world's leading organization campaigning to end animal experiments. (AP Photo/British Union for the Abolition of Vivisection, HO)
NAIROBI, Kenya - Wild long-tailed monkeys sustain broken limbs and other injuries when trappers catch the primates and transfer them to breeding farms on the island nation of Mauritius, said a new report released Tuesday.
Photos in the report showed handlers swinging monkeys by the tail and monkeys confined to small, rusty metal cages.
The Indian Ocean island nation has four major breeding farms and a fifth farm is to be opened soon, evidence that the trade is expanding, said the report by BUAV — the British Union for the Abolition of Vivisection — which calls itself the world's leading organization campaigning to end animal experiments.
"Monkeys are highly social and intelligent animals with strong family ties. Their brutal capture from the wild and forced captivity in Mauritius is morally unacceptable," said the BUAV's Sarah Kite. "We call on the government of Mauritius to put an end to this brutal trade and for the USA, European Union and Israel to ban primate imports and stop perpetuating this appalling cruelty."
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Drug Giant Guilty of Illegal Marketing
20/9/10
J&J pleads guilty to illegal marketing of psychiatric drugs
A subsidiary of pharmaceutical giant Johnson & Johnson (J&J) has pleaded guilty in federal court to misdemeanor charges of marketing a drug for unapproved uses.
The guilty plea comes as part of a larger, $81-million settlement signed by J&J to settle government allegations that it illegally marketed its anti-seizure drug Topamax for the treatment of conditions including bipolar disorder and drug and alcohol addiction.
U.S. law allows doctors to prescribe drugs for any use they see fit, but prohibits drug makers from actively promoting drugs for any use not specifically approved by the FDA.
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Arthritis Drug: Hundreds Harmed
20/9/10
Tylenol side effects unveiled: Hundreds injured, possible deaths
The FDA has announced that it is investigating reports of at least 775 serious side effects, including 30 deaths, associated with Tylenol and other over-the-counter drugs recalled by Johnson & Johnson subsidiary McNeil.
The side effects were reported by consumers who experienced them after taking products involved in one of four McNeil recalls in recent months. The FDA will determine whether the drugs were directly responsible for any of the incidents. Thus far, researchers have determined that most of the deaths were not caused by the drugs, a source close to a Congressional investigation said.
The first word of side effects came in November 2009, when McNeil recalled five lots of Tylenol Arthritis Pain 100 count with EZ-open cap, after consumers reported an unusual odor that caused nausea, stomach pain, diarrhea and vomiting. One month later, the company expanded the recall to include all lots of the product.
The next month, after reports emerged of consumers experiencing feelings of sickness associated with a strange odor from other McNeil drugs, the company recalled an unspecified number of Tylenol, Motrin, Benadryl and other over-the-counter products. The recall concerned drugs produced between January 1, 2008 and April 30, 2010.
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FDA: Diabetes Pill’s Cancer Risk
18/9/10
WASHINGTON — The Food and Drug Administration is reviewing data suggesting a possible link between the widely used diabetes medication Actos and bladder cancer.
The agency said yesterday that five-year results from an ongoing study show that patients who have taken Actos for the longest period of time had a higher risk of bladder cancer. Bladder cancer was also more prevalent in patients who had taken the largest cumulative dose of the drug.
Actos manufacturer Takeda Pharmaceuticals is conducting the study, which is scheduled to run 10 years.
“The agency has not concluded that Actos increases the risk of bladder cancer,’’ the agency said in a statement. Patients should continue taking Actos unless told otherwise by their doctor, according to the agency statement.
Actos agreed to study the risk of bladder cancer with its drug in 2003. But a company executive said yesterday the results are too preliminary to make any conclusions about the drug.
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200 Animals Rescued From Lab
17/9/10
Mass Animal Rescue Held at Closed Lab
Corapeake, N.C. — Three dozen animal groups rescued more than 200 animals from a North Carolina research lab closed after People for Ethical Treatment of Animals released video of alleged animal abuse by lab workers. The U.S. Humane Society coordinated an 14-hour effort Friday to remove the animals from the closed Professional Laboratory and Research Services Inc. facility in Corapeake.
"The (animal) shelter on the whole East Coast came together," said Mike Williams, with Wake County Animal Care and Control. "No one shelter can absorb that many in one night."
Rescue workers had to follow strict rules once they were inside the lab, said Karen Carlton, Triangle Beagle Rescue of N.C. Only one group was allowed in at one time, and rescue workers couldn't carry recording or communication devices, such as cell phones or cameras. Lab workers loaded the animals and did little or no talking.
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Vivisection Funny? Yes Says Researcher
17/9/10
Animal researchers usually try to display some respect for the animals they experiment on. They may do things they don’t want you to know about to animals and install elaborate security measures just to be sure, but they usually say they honor the animal’s sacrifice and it will benefit people as well as other animals. But not so with a primate researcher at Wake Forest University. In a PowerPoint presentation at a National Institute on Aging workshop which appeared on the NIA web site until July, the researcher finds the primates who will give their lives to science…funny.
The first photo shows an orangutan who someone has put in an aqua colored flannel dress with white diamonds on it. Her face is contorted in terror. A green, comic strip style balloon is coming out of her mouth. It says, “I just don’t know what to think,” as if her anguish stems from research questions in the lab instead of her tenure there. Ha ha
The next mirthful photo shows a chimpanzee appearing to have typed a
page on a typewriter to illustrate the “cognition research”
being performed in the lab. Get it?
A third amusing photo shows a capuchin monkey who someone has dressed
up in big, black eyeglasses that are barely supported by her little
skull. She is also commenting about the ongoing research in the lab.
There is a chain around her neck and she appears to be held in position
by human hands.
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More Cancer Treatment Failure
13/9/10
At the recent meeting of the American Association of Clinical Oncologists (ASCO), some 25,000 doctors met to discuss advances in cancer therapy. Over 10,000 scientific abstracts were presented.
Surely now, after countless billions have been spent on research since
President Nixon’s war on cancer was declared in 1971, there must
be some dramatic cures. Something must have emerged from this meeting
to reverse the growing cancer epidemic and justify the skyrocketing
medical costs for cancer treatment. Surely.
But not so.
The meeting highlighted how that cancer therapy is shifting from conventional cut-burn-poison to a more technologically sophisticated, molecularly targeted pharmaceutical approach. It’s a cash cow heyday for drug companies and a wonderful fix for the addicted Rx generation.
A new fleet of drugs include tyrosine kinase inhibitors such as Gleevec and Iressa. Tarvesa is an ingenious pharmaceutical that targets the epidermal growth factor receptor (EGFR) in neoplasms. Another category is antiangiogenic drugs, such as Avastin, that inhibit the growth of blood vessels in tumors.
There have been some qualified ‘successes’ but not without downside serious side effect risks. For example, Avastin causes serious and even fatal bleeding into the lungs (hemoptisis). In one instance 31% of patients experienced this side effect. But, you might say, so what if there is a good chance of cure? Surprisingly, during this meeting, little discussion could be heard about meaningful results. Everyone was giddy about the science (like kids with new toys), but the take away for the cancer victim was sobering and depressing.
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Yet Another "Mysterious" Death at SeaWorld
13/9/10
SeaWorld has had quite the banner year ... if we're talking about funeral
banners. Just last week, they lost yet another killer whale, bringing
Shamu's 2010 death toll to 3 orcas and 1 trainer.
Sumar was a 12-year-old orca. Born in captivity, Sumar was separated from his mom — who he would have stayed close to his entire life in the wild — when he was just a calf after she reportedly attacked him during a show. (It should go without saying that, in the wild, they wouldn't have been subjected to the stress of turning tricks for food in a small tank in front of an audience.)
Earlier this year, while Sumar was living in exile in San Diego, his father, Tilikum, was involved in the death of a trainer. Tilly is pimped out by SeaWorld in, as Marc Bekoff aptly puts it, their "whale mill" operation, where they continue to breed killer whales like it's a puppy mill, and ship the calves all over the country with no regard for their family bonds. A couple months ago, Sumar's mother, Taima, impregnated yet again by Tilly, died along with her stillborn calf.
That's a pretty troubled life story for someone of any species. But, nonetheless, SeaWorld called Sumar's death "mysterious," much like the previous deaths had been "unexpected."
By Stephanie Feldstein
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Big Pharma Plans to Ban Herbs
12/9/10
Big Pharma Scores Big Win: Medicinal Herbs Will Disappear in EU
It's almost a done deal. We are about to see herbal preparations disappear,
and the ability of herbalists to prescribe them will also be lost.
Big Pharma has almost reached the finish line of its decades-long battle
to wipe out all competition. As of 1 April 2011—less than eight
months from now—virtually all medicinal herbs will become illegal
in the European Union. The approach in the United States is a bit different,
but it's having the same devastating effect. The people have become
nothing more than sinks for whatever swill Big Pharma and Agribusiness
choose to send our way, and we have no option but to pay whatever rates
they want.
Big Pharma and Agribusiness have almost completed their march to take over every aspect of health, from the food we eat to the way we care for ourselves when we're ill. Have no doubt about it: this takeover will steal what health remains to us.
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Dolphins To Be Released
11/9/10
Campaign Success: Münster dolphinarium to release dolphins
Author: The Black Fish Posted on:
The Black Fish, WDSF and ProWal which have all campaigned for the closure of a dolphinarium in Münster, Germany, are celebrating today after the announcement that the four dolphins in the facility will be re-homed at the latest by the end of 2012. It is still to be decided where the animals will go to but The Black Fish activist Arne Feuerhahn is hopeful on a positive outcome: "We will find a respectful and acceptable solution for the future of these four bottlenose dolphins. Transferring them to another concrete prison is not one of them."
http://www.animalrightsmedia.net/
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Another US Lab Exposed
9/9/10
PETA says video shows cat, dog abuse at NC lab
Raleigh, N.C.— An animal-welfare group believes workers at a North Carolina research lab abused dogs, cats and rabbits, and the activists released what they said was undercover video of caretakers handling the animals violently. A local prosecutor and the company's president are now taking a close look.
In one scene of the video released Wednesday by People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals, a beagle cowers in the corner of its cage as a person approaches, derisively describing the dog's condition before snatching it by the back of the neck: "They act like they've been abused."
Another clip shows an employee at Professional Laboratory and Research Services Inc. purposely letting a cat grasp a fence with its claw before yanking it in an apparent attempt to rip off its nails, according to PETA's account of the video. In another portion, a caretaker drops a dog back to the ground before pushing it into the cage with a foot. Another scene shows a dog squirming through a tooth removal as workers acknowledge that the sedation drug is a couple years past its expiration and may not be working very well.
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The Animal Issue
8/9/10
Time after time headlines in the news will spotlight a recently developed
drug that may potentially provide treatment to patients that suffer
from diseases like Alzheimer’s, Parkinson’s and multiple
sclerosis. These drugs appear in the news because they have reached
the late or near final stages of the drug development process where
they can be tested in clinical trials involving humans who are living
with these diseases. But again and again it seems that these drugs are
discontinued at this late stage and are thwarted out of becoming the
medical therapies their developers had hoped to create. Why is this
so?
In a recent edition of The Lancet Neurology, an article discussed the problems for drug development in Alzheimer’s disease. And, although the summary only focused on this disease, the problems discussed can explain why drugs being tested for diseases like MS are also failing. One of the reasons that The Lancet Neurology gives to explain drug failure is the animal issue.
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Monsters: Monsters are Everywhere
7/9/10
Adapted from a screen shot of They Live! 1988. Directed by John Carpenter.
If we consider the problem of monsters as a whole, its size is gargantuan. To begin to understand the problem, we can identify the places and circumstances that attract them. One thing they look for is the shield of authority, so it makes sense to look for them in government. And there are places in government where they flourish.
CIA interrogators, prison guards, county and state mental institution doctors and nurses, all of these professions have a disproportional incidence of employees abusing the people under their control. The circumstances have common elements. They are out of the public eye; the people being abused have absolutely no recourse; authority figures tacitly or overtly condone the abuse; and most importantly, the people being abused are deemed of low status, powerless, and deserving and personally responsible for the ills visited upon them.
Law enforcement is a place where monsters can be found without too much trouble as well. You don’t have to watch many episodes of COPS to get an idea of what passes as normal and accepted police behavior, or watch Jail to begin to wonder just what sort of being is attracted to such a job. You can’t watch the many available videos of groups of police officers surrounding and striking with their clubs, kicking, pepper spraying, and tasering people, without beginning to understand that this is a profession that attracts monsters and people who can’t do much more than follow orders or implied orders, people whom Milgrim called “moral imbeciles.” And it isn’t a coincidence that most such cases involve minorities as victims—poor, sometimes alien, usually non-Caucasians.
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2010 - HLS' Primate Supplier Exposed
4/9/10
Click here
to see the photos
http://www.shac.net/HLS/photos.html#photos/primateproducts02.jpg
(warning - disturbing content)
This is the yet another example of the heartless, cruel vivisection supplier PPI and the suffering involved in the global primate trade. Thanks to the work of The Animal Liberation Investigation Unit we have been made aware of the suffering inside the chilling confines of Primate Products, Inc. (7780 NW 53rd Street Miami, FL). The ALIU has released ten damning photographs from within Primate Products.
The photos depict lifeless monkeys, many bloodied with their skulls exposed. We don't know what happened to these unfortunate animals, but the injuries shown in the pictures are horrific. These pictures have become public and follow on only two weeks after the leaked documentation showing PPI's involvement in the supply of primates to HLS in New Jersey. If you are in the Florida area and can help with the campaign to close down this primate supplier, then please do get involved!
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Victory: El Al Airlines Stop Shipping Monkeys
3/9/10
This is a major victory against primate vivisection suppliers, since
El Al was the only company flying pimates form Mazor Farm in Israel
to the rest of the world!
EL AL Stops transporting primates!
This morning EL AL has announced its decision to stop transporting primates, and any other animals, for the vivisection industry.
The decision came after regular demonstrations outside EL AL's offices, both in Israel and abroad.
We want to use the opportunity to thank all of you, who participated in this campaign - whether it was by coming to protests, writing letters, phoning EL AL, or spreading the info in any other way - it is thanks to you all that EL AL came to this decision!
If you're in Israel, please join on Saturday night for a victory party, which will take place at the Rogatka - a vegan bar in Tel Aviv.
Address: Yizhak Sade 32, Tel Aviv
http://www.mazor-cruelty.org.il/english/index.php/news/43-news11
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Vaccination & Science - A Conflict
2/9/10
Evidence-based vaccinations: A scientific look at the missing science behind flu season vaccines
As someone with a good deal of education in scientific thinking and the scientific method, I have put considerable effort into attempting to find any real scientific evidence backing the widespread use of influenza vaccines (flu season shots). Before learning about nutrition and holistic health, I was a computer software entrepreneur, and I have a considerable scientific background in areas such as astronomy, physics, human physiology, microbiology, genetics, anthropology and human psychology. One of my most-admired thought leaders is, in fact, the late physicist Richard Feynman.
I don't speak from a "scientific" point of view on NaturalNews very often because it's often a dry, boring presentation style. But I do know the difference between real science and junk science, and I find examples of junk science in both the "scientific" side of things as well as the "alternative" side of things.
For example, so-called "psychic surgery," as least in the way it has been popularized, is nothing more than clever sleight-of-hand where the surgeon palms some chicken gizzards and then pretends to pull diseased organs out of the abdominal cavity of some patient. The demonstrations I've seen on film are obvious quackery.
Similarly, flu season vaccines are mainstream medicine's version of psychic surgery: It's all just "medical sleight of hand" based on nothing more than clever distractions and the obfuscation of scientific facts. Flu season shots, you see, simply don't work on 99 out of 100 people...
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Animal Lab Exposed
1/9/10
Sick Pics Leaked From Miami Animal Research Facility Internal photos show severely injured primates, firm offers explanation
The public is getting a rare, if unsettling, glimpse inside an animal
research facility right here in South Florida after ten internal photos
of severely injured primates fell into the hands of animal activists.
When it comes to experimentation on live animals, emotions and opinions
run the gamut. Are animals still used unnecessarily? Isn't it worth
saving human lives?
The ten photos don't answer these questions. But they are certainly
sparking a very public debate.
Primate Products, located in a non-descript warehouse in Doral, imports
primates from around the world and sells them to animal research labs.
They're also licensed for research, according to the USDA.
The photos depict bloodied, lifeless primates in a surgical setting,
deep gashes on skulls, an open wound on an arm, and you can see reddish
or inflamed areas on the hindquarters in one photo.
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