A Picture of Health

Medicine is defined, by Wikipedia, as 'the science and art of healing'.  Wrong as usual.  The body heals.  Medicine is the science and art of preventing, diagnosing and treating illness.  If the illness is treated properly - the body heals.  Medicine turns to the next problem.

In many cases, when you visit a doctor, you are given a prescription and told "try this, and let me know how it works".  There is little art, no science with regards to healing. Take the drugs and hope your body heals.

Healthicine is the art and science of healthiness.  After you leave the doctor's office, after you take the prescription, after you are 'healthy' according to the doctor (eg. not sick), you can still benefit from the art and science of healthiness.

This diagram shows the relationship between medicine and healthicine.  Medicine is to the left of  the red line of diagnosis. Once an illness is diagnosed, medical techniques are used in an attempt to treat the 'illness'.  These technique is not always appropriate.

Some illnesses strike from external sources - bacteria, bullets, toxins and viruses.

But many illnesses are the result of declining healthiness. In these cases, a medicine is not the best solution, not an appropriate option.

Healthicine is the entire study of healthiness from perfect health to illness and death. Medicine is a small
subset of healthicine.

In most cases, medicine is not required. Most of the time, you are not sick.  But you can always be healthier. In many cases, medicine is not appropriate. Sometimes, when you are sick, it is because your health has deteriorated to the point where an illness is diagnosed. Medicines are constrained by diagnosis. Diagnosis is an artificial constraint designed to protect the interests of doctors, and marketed to protect the interests of patients.

It is clear that if your unhealthiness is to the right of the diagnostic threshold - you don't need medicines, you need healthicines.  In many cases, when your health is to the left of the diagnostic threshold - healthicines are still the most effective approach. But healthicines are seldom prescribed for illness, just medicines.

Many fields of medicine, and many drug manufacturers, are trying to move the 'diagnostic threshold' to the right, so that drugs can be prescribed earlier. Attempts to 'find cancer earlier' are a common example.  Moving the diagnostic threshold is presented as a 'preventative technique', but it often leads to an increase in 'false positive' diagnoses.  It also leads to the use of drugs, when healthicines are required.

We need to examine the diagnostic threshold more scientifically.  If an illness is really an unhealthiness - maybe the diagnostic threshold should move to the left for that illness. Or we need to examine treatment alternatives more scientifically.   No matter where the diagnostic threshold resides, we need to study all of the alternatives, and continually test the most effective ones - not just the 'latest new drug'.

We use drugs to treat diagnosed illness.

We use healthicines to improve our healthiness.   To reverse unhealthiness.

We need scientific studies of the differences between illness and unhealthiness.  We need to choose the best alternative for every illness and unhealthiness, and keep improving our choices.  We need the freedom to choose - and the ability to study and document choices and results.

http://www.personalhealthfreedom.blogspot.com/p/subject-index.html
You have a right to life, liberty and the pursuit of healthiness,
tracy

Tracy is the author of two book about healthicine: 

Monsanto: Paving the Road to Hell?

"The road to hell is paved with good intentions" (1855 H. G. Bohn Hand-Book of Proverbs 514)

Monsanto is paving our planet with pesticides, herbicides and genetically modified plants that are able to grow on this toxic desert. Are they setting us up for disaster?

“The nation that destroys its soil, destroys itself.” --- Franklin Delano Roosevelt


According to research, posted on GreenMedInfo.com

"Ever since Monsanto developed, marketed and patented the glyphosate molecule -- Roundup(®) herbicide’s active ingredient -- beginning in the early 70’s, a substantial and ever-growing portion of the earth’s arable surface has been transformed into an environmental and human health experiment, of unprecedented scale."

"Glyphosate is now contaminating vast subterranean stretches of groundwater "


I previously blogged that Monsanto's monocultures result in cheap foods - and that makes us all poor: 
http://www.personalhealthfreedom.blogspot.com/2012/02/monsanto-how-cheap-food-makes-us-all.html

And now it seems that we are making the earth poor as well.

Monsanto executives believe they are working with good intentions - to produce inexpensive foods, to grow their company, to produce and sell effective pesticides and herbicides.  But instead they are helping farmers produce cheap foods, using pesticides and herbicides that severely damage our planet and our health. They are making their own foods toxic, and their own planet toxic. Our planet.

Read GreenMedInfo's article on Monsanto here: http://www.greenmedinfo.com/blog/un-earthed-monsantos-glyphosate-destroying-soil


You can to learn more about health, healthiness and healthicine on my blog: http://www.personalhealthfreedom.blogspot.com/p/subject-index.html

you have a right to life, liberty and the pursuit of healthiness,
tracy

Tracy is the author of two book about healthicine: 

The truth about milk: raw? or pasteurized?

The debate over raw milk, like many health debates is typically presented in black and white. A healthy debate would have many more colours.

Raw milk is healthier - says one side.  Pasteurizing milk destroys much of the nutritional value of milk.

Pasteurized milk is safer says the other, and just as healthy.  The US Centre for Disease Control and Prevention has demonstrated that raw milk is unsafe, compared to pasteurized milk. http://wwwnc.cdc.gov/eid/article/18/3/11-1370_article.htm#results

This is a classical case of the medical approach vs the alternative health approach. Perhaps more 'classical' than we might like to admit. The medical establishment wants to put an arrow in raw milk.  And the alternative health establishment insists that raw milk is healthy, while pasteurized milk is damaged and unhealthy.

Remember, 'alternative health' is not really about health, it is about alternative medicine.

Each side has a very narrow point of view.  X is bad. Y is bad.  Both sides are using the medical viewpoint. Traditional medicine vs alternative medicine. Look for bad things.  Look for illness, causes of illness.  Look for things that prevent or cure bad things. A medical viewpoint focuses attention on illness - to force a decision. It is a powerful tool against illness.

But it is not a view to build healthiness.

What is a healthy view?  How does a healthy view compare to a medical view?

We need healthy view to understand and pursue healthiness.

The medical view focusses attention on illness in order to diagnose, treat
cure and prevent illness.  This is a powerful view with regard to illness but not appropriate for understanding and learning about healthiness.

In theory, the healthy view and the medical view see the same information - the same milk in this case. But they see from different points of view. The medical view sees illness. Medical practitioners, conventional and alternative, spend their lives looking at people who are ill, trying to make them better.

The medical view often comes to conflicting conclusions as the focus jumps from one illness to another. A factor that seems to 'prevent' one illness can easily shift health balances towards another illness.

A healthy view, on the other hand, examines how we enable healthy genetics, create healthy cells, how they create healthy tissues and organs, resulting in healthy systems and bodies.  Healthy bodies, minds, spirits and communities provide a feedback loop that continues to improve healthiness while minimizing conflict.

People who are not ill - and want to be healthier require a healthy viewpoint for healthy decision making.

What are the health questions? There are many more - oriented towards health, not towards illness. Does milk improve the healthiness of your cells, your tissues, your organs, your body?

Is milk essential, or is milk the optimal food - for babies?  for children?  for teens? for adults?  for seniors? We know that milk is not a vitamin.  It is not essential to health, like Vitamin C or specific fats or proteins.

We know that human milk can be a near optimal food for babies.  In most mammals, milk is not consumed once a baby is weaned.

We don't know if milk is a healthy food for teens, adults, seniors. Why don't we know?  Because we study medicine very thoroughly, but we don't study healthiness.

Is milk healthy?  Is pasteurized milk healthy or unhealthy? Is raw milk healthy or unhealthy (assuming it is not tainted). Is milk actually good for you? Do you need milk for health? What are the truths about milk?

Do we need milk? The answer is clearly no.  Milk is not required for health.  We can get the nutrients that are in milk in many different foods. Consumption of milk, processed or raw is not necessary - it is a health choice - your choice, to consume milk or not.

Does drinking milk make you healthier?  The evidence shows that the answer clearly is 'sometimes yes, sometimes no'.  We know that illness is caused by a deficiency, or an excess.  How much milk is 'excessive'? How much milk does it take to cause unhealthiness?

We need the right to choose.  We need information to support our choices.

Will we ever know the truth about milk?  Which is healthier, raw milk, or pasteurized milk?  I suspect we will never know.  Pasteurized milk fits our marketing practices.  It has a long shelf life.  It's dead, so it doesn't spoil for a very long time.  It has a 'minimum risk' profile - more important to sales than a 'maximize health' profile. There is huge incentive for corporations who sell milk to sell pasteurized milk. No research is necessary.

Raw milk?  No big corporations care. Individual people care, but they don't sell milk to the super stores. And they can't buy milk in super stores There is no financial incentive to do true research into raw milk - or into the healthiness of milk.

If you want raw milk - you need to buy a cow.

You have a right to life, liberty and the pursuit of healthiness. You have a right to information, and choices.
http://www.personalhealthfreedom.blogspot.com/p/subject-index.html
tracy

Tracy is the author of two book about healthicine: 

Healthiness: Balances in Motion

The hierarchy of health is a hierarchical view of the major components of healthiness from genetics, thru cells, tissues organs, etc. to community.

Each element in the hierarchy has many health components and sub-components as well as processes and sub-processes.  For each major component, sub-component, process and sub-process, there are healthy balances - and possibly deficiencies or excesses.  Serious deficiencies or excesses result in illness.

We can represent the comprehensive overall view of someone's healthiness with a very, very tall spinning top with the health factors as spindles. Many of your health factors are in balance and the top spins healthily.

Maybe you don't get enough Vitamin C - that health factor would show as a minor deficiency, creating a slight wobble. If your thyroid gland is slightly over-active, you have a minor excessiveness creating another minor wobble in your health balance.

If you have an serious deficiency, then the bar is farther to the outside - demonstrating that your health in that area is more off balance.  A similar bar appears when you have a seriously excessive health factor.

Here is a hypothetical Health Balance for Nutrients - only a few nutrients are shown.

The diagram might be a result of the following data:

Vitamin A - blood test shows healthy levels of Vitamin A.  Dietary analysis shows healthy intake of Vitamin A and Vitamin A precursors.

Vitamin B12 - blood test shows healthy levels of Vitamin B12.

Vitamin C - dietary analysis indicates that the subject sometimes meets the daily requirements for Vitamin C, but often falls below the RDI minimum for several days in a row.

Water - dietary analysis indicates that the subject consumes slightly more than the normal amount of water per day. This may indicate health deficiencies in other areas.

Omega 3 - dietary Analysis indicates that the subject does not consume sufficient levels of Omega 3 for optimal healthiness.

Calories - dietary analysis indicates that the subject consumes not just more calories than are required, but sufficient excess that healthiness declines.

When we map the healthiness, deficiencies and excesses onto a spinning top - we can see that each will create a wobble in your healthiness.  Some more than others. Our medical systems are quite experienced in measuring illness caused by dietary deficiencies and excesses.  But do little to measure how healthiness is affected. Our bodies are quite good at re-balancing.  We feel healthy.  Our doctor says we are healthy. It's easy to ignore small unhealthinesses when we "feel healthy".  Sometimes our bodies create an unhealthiness to balance another unhealthiness.  Sometimes we take unhealthy drugs to counter-balance an unhealthiness.

With the Health Top, we can display healthiness for very specific health factors.

To chart the health a more complex health factor, of someone's diet for example, it is necessary to combine the bars for nutritional elements to create an overall bar for nutrition.  In this case the health top may be required to represent deficiencies and excesses for diet in the summary bar.  You might be deficient in Vitamin C, Essential Oils, and Vitamin D, while you are consuming an excess of calories.   A combined or summary bar would show a health factor that is both deficient and excessive.  The details must be examined to see what changes might be effective.

How are the many nutritional factors combined to create a summary bar for nutrition?  It's very complex.  Complex is not impossible - but I believe it can only be done by a computer analysis technique that can evolve over time.

There are over 100 nutrients that are essential to health.  We have no information at present that helps us to compare one deficiency to another and create a useful summary. At present, we can only assume that all are of equal value until we learn more.  Remember - health is different from illness.  Healthiness changes slowly.  Illness can proceed slowly or quickly.  Measurements of healthiness are less critical than measurements of illness.

It gets more complicated.  There may be essential nutrients that we don't know about. Some people might have more essential nutrients than others.  Our essential nutrients for health might change as we grow, mature and age. Understanding healthiness is a complex puzzle. It's much easier to understand illness - most of the time.

But that's no reason to give up.

To create a Top Diagram of Healthiness for the elements in the Hierarchy of Healthiness, we need to measure as many elements as possible and combine them to create summaries for each element in the hierarchy. The truth is - we don't know how many elements there are. Does this matter?

We might never create a perfect diagram of healthiness - but each diagram is better than none - and every diagram can be used to create a better version. Let's start with a simple diagram for nutrition.  Each nutritional health measurement that is made provides information about the overall nutritional balance.

Some measurements are more useful than others.  For example, the measurements on the USDA's food plate are almost totally useless to measure healthiness.  Did you consume 2 cups of fruit a day - is the USDA measurement for health.  But 1 banana counts as 1 cup of fruit, as does 1 cup of 100 percent juice of any fruit. Notwithstanding the fact that it is almost impossible to buy 100 percent juice - 1 banana has vastly different nutritional properties than 1 cup of apple juice. The RDI for Vitamin C is 60 mg per day - this is the minimum to avoid deficiency.  If you eat one large apple a day, the USDA recommendation for fruit, as your source of Vitamin C - you will be deficient every day. Two McIntosh apples will provide about 10 mg of Vitamin C. Two bananas a day provides less than half the RDI requirement. It is extremely difficult - probably impossible - to meet your health needs, for optimal health, using the food plate.

Is there a reason to measure healthiness this thoroughly?

I see two major reasons.

First - to optimize, or facilitate optimal healthiness in individuals.  Most of us, as well as our doctors, have only a vague idea of our level of healthiness.  The more measurements we can take that truly measure healthiness - the more opportunities we have to improve our personal healthiness. Remember that healthiness measurements are not 'immediate' - they are measurements over time. Illness can strike fast.  Healthiness does not 'strike'.  It is a measurement of your overall state of health.  Today, we try to guess which unhealthiness is most critical - do I need to lose weight?  Do I need more vitamins? Minerals?  Do I need to exercise more?  As we develop and study the measurement of healthiness, we will gain more understanding of the importance of different factors in individual cases. We will learn more over time, taking our understanding to a new level, and then moving beyond that level.

Second: if we are to learn more about healthicine - the study of healthiness, including illness - we need to measure and track healthiness in a comprehensive fashion. This type of measurement can lead to many insights that cannot be attained by looking solely at illness.

There may be some illnesses, or syndromes, that only appear when a specific set of unhealthiness conditions is met.  It is easy to imagine someone who has 10 or 20 or 30 low level deficiencies or excesses, but does not have a specific illness.

In a previous blog titled "Are you sick? Or Just Unhealthy" we met Alice and Zizi.  Both are 'relatively healthy' according to their doctors.  But Alice gets many colds a year - and Zizi gets almost none.  Alice's colds have severe symptoms and last a long time.  Zizi's colds have few symptoms and last only a short time.  There are many Alice's and Zizi's in our medical system - and they are all treated pretty much the same.  Medicines when they are diagnosed as sick.  Nothing when they are diagnosed as healthy.

When we begin to measure healthiness effectively, we will learn that Alice and Zizi are very different.  Zizi might be 'very healthy', with few imbalances.  Alice, somewhat healthy, but with many health imbalances.  Which imbalances lead to an 'Alice'?  We can learn when we begin to measure healthiness.

Healthiness is not a single state.  It is not a binary condition, where you are either healthy or not healthy.  Our bodies are alive and in motion.  Healthiness is about the many balances that are in motion in our bodies as we live, grow, heal, spin, and eventually die. To truly study health we must study all of our healthiness, not just our illnesses.

You have a right to life, liberty and the pursuit of healthiness.

to your health, tracy

Tracy is the author of two book about healthicine: 

Healthy Spirituality vs Broken Spirits, Broken Hearts and Shattered Egos

A merry heart doeth good like a medicine: but a broken spirit drieth the bones. Proverbs 17:22.

How big is the difference between a broken heart, a broken spirit and a crushed ego? From the health perspective - what is 'Spirit'? What is spirituality?  How can we recognize or measure the healthiness of someone's spirit?

In the Hierarchy of Healthiness the body is defined by its physical presence.  The mind houses the rational processes we use to plan and execute specific actions; calculation, memory and possibly intuition. Each new level requires the levels below - but rises above them all to create a distinct new entity. The body exists, by itself, above the structures of your organs, systems, tissues, cells, etc.

Your spirit exists above the physical mind and the body. The body might be damaged, the mind might be stressed - while the spirit prevails. Or your spirit might be crushed while the body carries on like an automaton.

The Hierarchy of Health 'Spirit', consists of your spirit, your spirituality, your ego and your personality. Your creative and artistic spirit. Your 'heart', as in 'a broken heart', and also as in 'you've  gotta have heart', is part of your spirit, not part of your body.

Communal aspects of spirituality are in the next layer of the hierarchy: team spirit, community spirit, etc. are in the layer Community Healthiness.

When does our spirit develop?  Do adult dogs have 'spirit'?  I suspect the answer is yes, but they do not have 'spirituality'. Dogs can be playful, bordering on creativity. They may have spirituality in the sense of being comfortable their place in life, but not in 'knowing their purpose', nor 'understanding the meaning of life'.

Spirit healthiness is a measurement of the health status of a person's spirit and spirituality. 

Can we measure the health status of someone's spirit? of their spirituality?

Physical strength is measured by what we can carry; spiritual by what we can bear. An interesting quotation, source unknown, that deserves further thought. Sometimes we can hardly bear to listen to, much less enjoy, the noise of children - other times the roar of traffic is easily ignored. Our spirit strength waxes and wanes as do our physical and mental strengths.

How can we tell if someone has an unhealthy spirit? 

Playfulness; creativity; artistic is an interesting dimension.  Many great works of art are created by people with troubled spirits.  But many are created by people who are spiritually comfortable - and have time to relax and explore their artist spirits. When very creative people have troubled spirits - they might channel their energies into their art.  Sometimes people may channel their troubled spirits into risk and destruction, or self harm.  Suicide might not exist if we didn't have a spirit to be troubled.

Music can sooth the spirit.  Or lift your spirits.  Even sad music can make you feel better - as discussed in a previous post: Is Listening to the Blues Healthy? Great music might be created by a contented spirit, a forlorn spirit, or a troubled spirit - and it can be enjoyed by all.

The Spirituality Index of Well-Being: A New Instrument for Health-Related Quality-of-Life Research
was presented by Timothy P. Daaleman, DO1 and Bruce B. Frey, PhD2 in 2002. The survey asks:
Which statement best describes your feelings and choices?
Strongly Agree 1 Agree 2 Neither Agree nor Disagree 3 Disagree 4 Strongly Disagree 5
 1. There is not much I can do to help myself.
 2. Often, there is no way I can complete what I have started.
 3. I can’t begin to understand my problems.
 4. I am overwhelmed when I have personal difficulties and problems.
 5. I don’t know how to begin to solve my problems.
 6. There is not much I can do to make a difference in my life.
 7. I haven’t found my life’s purpose yet.
 8. I don’t know who I am, where I came from, or where I am going.
 9. I have a lack of purpose in my life.
10. In this world, I don’t know where I fit in.
11. I am far from understanding the meaning of life.
12. There is a great void in my life at this time.

Questions 1 to 6 are primarily about 'spirit', although 4 and 5 are also about the ego.  Questions numbered 7 to 12 are about spirituality. Questions 7 and 9 are almost the same question.

The test is a powerful tool to measure spirit and spirituality of people who are ill.  It gives a useful number for a measurement of spiritual health.  The two sets of questions can give separate numbers to rate spirit separate from spirituality. It is not a tool to measure ego healthiness - as there are no direct questions to the ego.  I do wonder if it is possible to distinguish between a healthy and an unhealthy ego, especially by asking questions of the subject.

The weakness of this test - for measuring healthiness - is clear when we realize that all of the questions are negative. This measurement instrument was, like most so-called 'health measurements' developed in a clinical setting to measure the spirituality of people who are ill.  In fact it does not measure 'spirtual well being', rather each question measures 'spiritual weakness' (or illness), with the assumption that the opposite of illness is wellness.

The measurement of spirituality is made more complex by the presence of an objective, v.s. the subjective observer.  Someone might rate themselves very highly, or very low, on these scales - but their family, or their physician might give them a different rating.  Physical attributes like blood pressure and pulse can be measured accurately by a machine.  Attributes of spirituality are much more difficult to measure objectively.

There is also the ego.  Many religions and philosophies suggest that the ego is opposed to the true spirit and to spirituality.  eg. To become truly spiritual you must lose a large part of your ego. Someone with a forceful ego might rate their spiritual healthiness much higher than someone with a healthy self image and ego.

Does spirituality arise from having a purpose in life? from understanding the meaning of life? from feeling 'complete' in our lives? Or is there something more to spirituality?

Can you improve your spirit health? The things you do to improve your spirit healthiness might depend...  Are you relatively healthy in mind, body and spirit - and you want to improve your spiritual health?  In this situation, the recommended prescription is often solitude, quiet, fasting, meditation, etc. But if you are ill and you have a poor spirit, a more effective prescription might be involvement in family activities, yes - noise of children, and food - preferably with family or friends. This suggests that measuring the healthiness of our spirit is not effective in isolation from other aspects of health.

At what age do we begin to develop the spirituality aspect of our spirit?

Loevinger's stages of ego development traces development from birth (pre-ego) to the rarely attained 9th integrated ego stage, where the subject is at peace with inner conflicts. Erikson's stages of psychosocial development trace through stages of hope, will, purpose, competence, identity, love, care to wisdom. Carl Jung classified Psychological Types into eight categories by first classifying perception into sensation vs. intuition, judging into thinking and feeling - and then mapping them against introvert and extrovert mental types. Note: Jung does not pass judgement, classifying one category over another he simply groups people into different categories based on some aspects of their spirit.

We might look at each of the classification criteria and measure it on a scale of deficient - healthy - excessive.  For example an introvert might be healthy, or so introverted as to be a hermit, or hardly introverted at all.  Of course introvert deficiency is not a negative, but excessive introversion might be a health problem.

How can we measure spirit healthiness?

First, we can enumerate some attributes of the spirit for measurement. The 12 questions from Daaleman and Frey provide some suggestions. Each question measures some aspect of the spirit.  However, as noted - they are worded to measure only 'negative' aspects of the spirit. |

Illness arises from deficiency or excess.  Healthiness is the large or small 'normal' area between deficiency and excess.  If we re-word the concepts of these questions into a scale that measures deficiency and excess, we have something like:

1. Ability to look after self.  Deficient - not able to look after self. Healthy - able to look after self most of the time.  Excessive - not able to ask for or accept assistance when required.
2. Ability to complete tasks.  Deficient - not able to complete most task that are started (may indicate tendency to start too many tasks or tasks that are too challenging).  Healthy - normally able to complete tasks that are started.  Excessive - never takes on challenges that present risk of failure.
3. Able to understand own problems. Deficient - not able to understand own problems.  Healthy - has a normal understanding of own problems. Excessive - understands everything about themselves (or claims to).
4. Dealing with personal difficulties and challenges. Overwhelmed - Healthy - denial.
5. Confident when new problems encountered. Unsure, indecisive - Healthy - overconfident.
6. Able to plan for the future. Impulsive - Healthy - anal retentive.
7. Comfortable with role in life. Unhappy - Healthy - lazy.
8. Know thyself. Confused about self - Healthy - arrogance or excessive pride.
9. Have a purpose in life. Lost - Healthy - driven.
10. Know place in society. Submissive - Healthy - defiant.
11. Understand the meaning of life. childlike - Healthy - philosopher
12. Feel complete and whole. insecure - Healthy - complacent

I'm not saying these are the best questions to measure spirituality healthiness.  At this time they may be the best we have. We can work on something better.  What are the most important dimensions of spirituality?  Are some more important than others?

There might always be disagreement about what the spirit is, and what is not part of the spirit.  In the context of the Hierarchy of Healthiness we can define spirit clearly for specific purposes.  Spirit Healthiness encompasses all of the aspects of people that are at a higher level than the body and mind - and at a lower level than those attributed to communities of people.  Introversion, intuition, purpose, understanding, compassion - these are all aspects of the spirit.  Each can be healthy - in the normal range - or not.  If we can attain that goal, we might attempt to 'optimize' spirit health - a much more challenging goal.

Our spirit healthiness scores can change over time as we mature, grow older and age - and as a result of life circumstances.

Keep your spirits up, tracy
www.personalhealthfreedom.com

Tracy is the author of two book about healthicine: 

I water down my Coke. Is it OK to drink bottled water?

I buy bottled water.  I drink bottle water.  I've heard all the theories about bottled water is bad for me, bad for the environment.... I should drink tap water.

Truth be told, I have no idea what the truth is. Let's check some commonly expressed opinions.
1. Bottled water is not good value.  Tap water is cheaper.
2. It's no healthier than tap water.
3. Water is being bought up by corporations and changed to a commodity.
4. Bottled water isn't 'green'.

But wait, there's more... There are the poison plastic reasons:
1. Plastic water bottles can release hormone like chemicals when they are heated. If the bottle sits in a hot car, for example.
2. Plastic bottle in the environment last hundreds or thousands of years.
... and so on...

But what's the reality?  Is it bad to choose bottled water?

Bottled water is a health choice. First of all, let's understand that most, probably all health choices have positive and negative aspects. I'm in favour of health freedom, freedom to make personal choices. Bottled water can also be a healthy choice.

I also think it is important to look at the choice, the decision, not just the perceived BAD 'bottled water'. Let's look more closely at the choice.  Here's the choice I encounter often.

I am thirsty.  I want something to drink in my car, on my bike, on my walk, etc... There is no fountain or tap nearby.  But there is a gas station, a small store - or a large store.  I want something that I can carry with me, sip slowly, rather than gulping a lot at one time.

I can choose bottled Coca Cola, bottled Pepsi, Sprite or 7-UP.  Or I might choose bottled orange juice, or an energy drink.  Or bottled water.

What's the healthiest choice? Bottled water.

 When we check the list of objections to bottled water - they all apply to Coca Cola, to Pepsi, to bottled juices.  But all of those other choices have more negatives.  Coke, Pepsi, Sprite, and 7-UP all have high sugar content, definitely a health negative. The diet versions might actually be worse - virutally all of the sugar substitutes used in pop are poorly tested, potentially dangerous chemicals.  Juices are generally high in sugar or non-organic sugar substitutes.  Even 100 percent Orange Juice is not real Orange Juice - it is a highly processed juice to ensure a long shelf life.  As far as I know, there has been very little study of the health effects of processed OJ.  Choose milk?  Commercially available milk is highly processed, often supplemented with many other chemicals - and possibly taken from antibiotic dosed, hormone injected cows. I can buy flavoured water - but when I think about it - I find myself reading the list of ingredients -and moving over to choose bottled water again.

The healthy choice is bottled water.


You might hear comments like 'why is water the same price as Cola, it's just water?'  I, on the other hand, wonder why they don't charge MORE for bottled water.  It is the healthiest choice - maybe it should be more expensive?

Which is healthier for the environment?  All choices seem to have the same effect on the environment.  So why is it OK to buy Coke, but NOT OK to buy bottled water?

The final nail.  I have heard it said that, if I want bottled water - I should get some bottles and take tap water with me instead of buying bottled water.  It's a good suggestion some of the time - and I do it some of the time.  Maybe you've done the same?

But did you notice?  I certainly did - that tap water does not do well in plastic bottles.  What's up with that?  When I put tap water in a plastic bottle, and leave it in my car for a few days - it develops a strange smell. It goes 'skunky'. But I can open a commercial bottle of water and sip it over several days without any strange smells.  I don't know what's happening there - but it reinforces my decision.

Bottled water is a healthy choice. When I can, I drink tap water.  I'm not happy that tap water in my city, and in many cities, contains fluoride. I travel to many countries - and I sometimes drink tap water.  When I need a bottle of water - I make that choice, over other, less healthy, drinks. Sometimes, I drink Coca Cola, or Pepsi.  I like the taste, but it's too sweet for me, so I tend to water them down - with tap water of course.  


Yours in health, tracy

Tracy is the author of two book about healthicine: 

www.personalhealthfreedom.com

Genetic Healthicine

If you want to live a long, healthy life - choose your parents well.

How can we tell if we have healthy genes?  Can we measure the health of our genes? Can we affect our healthiness through choices related to our genes?

You have probably seen reports of diseases that are caused by genetic defects, or genetic tendencies towards disease.

A Search for the Healthy Genes, an article from Wired magazine, suggests that maybe we should search for, in the words of Maynard Olsen "mutated genes that make people healthier."

What is healthier? Should we search for genes that 'make people healthier'?  Or search for genes that make us healthy. Maynard goes on with an important observation:

"This is what physicians have always done: find sick people and find out why they're sick," he said. "It can't be emphasized enough how embedded that (mindset) is. "Studying healthy people is an essentially unexplored approach, and healthy genes are probably plentiful."

The field of genetic health is virtually unexplored in humans.  We have some research into genetic illness, and genetic dispositions for illness, but virtually no research into healthiness genes. 

We do know some complexities.  Many genetic factors that we know about can be good and bad.  Is there a  word for something that is good and bad? The genetic tendency for sickle cell anaemia, for example protects against malaria, but when the gene occurs twice, it cause the disease sickle cell anaemia. 

Many genetic factors are good for some aspects of health - and  not good for other aspects.  

When we look at the other layers in the hierarchy of health - it gets more complex.  How do our genes affect our nutritional health?  How do they affect our cellular health, our tissue health, our organ health, system health, body health, mind health, spirit health and community healthiness? 


We do know some simple things - most adult Asians, for example, are lactose intolerant. Is lactose intolerance healthy? or unhealthy?  It's not that simple. People who are lactose intolerant as adults should not consume milk. Most adult mammals are lactose intolerant, presumably an adaptation to ensure that the young animals get the milk.  We humans have adapted and take milk from cows (sheep, goats, etc.), so milk shortage is not an issue.  As a result, some humans can consume milk as adults.  This might be a healthy adaptation - but it's moot.  If you are, or are not - you can't choose lactose tolerance. You can only choose to drink, or not to drink milk. Or maybe you can.  Genes are 'activated'.  The gene for lactose intolerance appears to be activated by weaning - up to that time, it is dormant. Maybe if Asians don't stop drinking milk - then won't become lactose intolerant?  Maybe we have more genetic choices than think.

Each of us is an alphabet soup of genetics, with random genes chosen from each of our parents, and random (or not) genes activated by our environments. Genes can be activated, modulated or silenced. 

Genetics and Nutritional Health:  How do our genes affect our nutrition?  How does the activation of our genes affect our nutrition? Can we learn about our individual genetics to improve our personal nutrition health?  For example, we can find people proposing a "body type diet", a 'blood type diet", "nutritional typing".  Is there any scientific research to support any of these dietary approaches?  If so, can these diets be linked to genetic factors?  Do our nutritional needs change as genes are activated and modulated?

Genetics and Cellular Health:  do genes affect the health of our cells?  In fact, the activation of genes determines what types of cells develop in each part of our body.  Can we choose to influence these genes?  Scientists are starting to learn.  Sickle cell anaemia is a direct link from genetics to cells. 


There is another important genetic component of cellular health.  Many of the functioning cells in our bodies are foreign.  Our mouth, stomach, intestines and bowels have a very active group of healthy foreign cells to aid our digestion. It is estimated that the average healthy person harbours 500 different species of healthy bacteria cells. What do we know about the genetics of the healthy bacteria we harbour?  And what about the unhealthy bacteria?   Are some bacteria healthy sometimes - and unhealthy in other situations? 


Genetics and Tissue Health: is the health of our muscular tissues, our connective tissues, other tissues affected by our genes and by our genetic healthiness - the activation of our genes? There are, for example, connective tissue illnesses that are linked to genetics.  How about connective tissue healthiness that is linked to genetics? How much control might we have over this aspect or our health as we learn to understand genetic healthiness? 


Genetics and Organ Health: can we influence the health of our organs by making decisions about our genetics?   As we move through the Hierarchy of Health it becomes apparent that our current studies of health and healthiness are very shallow. Will we learn to regenerate damaged organs through studies of genetic healthiness? 


Genetics and Body Health: We tend to think of diet and exercise as the ways to improve the health of our bodies.   Those are the easiest to control directly and see positive or negative results. What types of exercise, for example are best for your body?  Can clues be found in your genetics?  What diets are best for your body?  What clues lie in your genes? 

Genetics and Mind Health: do your genes make your mind more active?  Less active? More fragile? Less fragile?  More prone to illness?  Less prone to illness? than someone else's genes?  Studies of twins suggest that tendencies to be introverted, or extroverted are linked to genetics.  Is it healthier to be introverted? Or Extroverted?  Probably neither is healthier - but it may help us improve our health, or take healthier actions if we understand our genetic mind tendencies. 


Genetics and Spiritual Health: It is interesting that the Catholic church expects priests to not have children. If the spirituality in the priest is not passed to a child - does the Catholic religion tend to 'breed out' spirituality?  Spirituality and spiritual healthiness is very poorly understood. We do not have any effective way to measure spiritual health - certainly not a way that would be accepted by all religions.  If we cannot measure spiritual healthiness - how can we expect to improve it?  Is genetics linked to spiritual health? 


Genetics and Community Health: An interesting concept.  Is community health learned?  Or genetic?  We can understand that community health of bees, wasps and ants is a result of their unique genetics.  What about people?  Measurement of community health is also a challenge we have not attempted to study.  We have many measures of the illnesses - but not the health -- of individuals in different communities.  Is that community health?  We need distinct measurements to determine and compare the health of different communities. Once we learn to effectively measure the health of communities - we will be able to start the analysis of how genetics and gene activation of individuals affect the health of the community. 


I'm not suggesting we try to change the world by controlling genetics through controlled reproduction.  The concepts of eugenics directly conflict with the goals of this blog - Personal Health Freedom. 


We need to study genetics from a health point of view.  And health from a genetics point of view.  At present, most 'scientific studies' of genetics seem to be done by drug companies, looking for ways to cure illness.  


We need to find ways to find and to create healthiness in and through our genes.


To your health,  tracy
www.personalhealthfreedom.com   

Tracy is the author of two book about healthicine: