Daily Motion Interview
Written on March 4th, 2013Concerned Scientist interviewed on Daily Motion
Dr. Shiv Chopra:Concerned Scientist & Activist… by smtvuploads
Politics of Food Safety
Written on October 18th, 2012The latest recall of E. coli infected beef should not only be a concern for beef and beef products but also other meats, cheeses, vegetables and water.
E. coli is a generic name for billions of such bacteria thriving in the alimentary canal of humans and animals. Their presence in food or water indicates fecal contamination. The consumption of any such food or water can cause deadly disease. It cannot become safe by cooking or irradiation. Irradiation of the end products, such as steaks, hamburger, etc., may kill microbes but it does not exclude their original source which is feces and urine. Irradiation of meat may also generate carcinogenic substances. All such food and water must be rejected.
Virtually every E. coli infection traces to unsanitary conditions in which food-producing crops and animals are being cultivated, processed, transported, stored, and ultimately sold for human consumption.
Most food-producing animals these days are raised at mega farms, commonly called factory farms. From there, they get transported for thousands of miles to similarly large slaughterhouses without being fed or watered for as long as 48 hours. Covered in feces and urine, dehydrated, frozen and badly bruised, approximately fifty percent of them are reported to arrive there already dead. Moreover, the mechanized tools and procedures used to slaughter these animals convey their infection-loaded excreta into the eventual meat and meat products for human consumption. Finally, the waste water from these mega farms, slaughterhouses, packing plants and other establishments gets drained into fields, rivers, lakes and wells. Reports indicate that every year approximately 36 million Americans and 11 million Canadians contract food-borne infections, out of which many thousand get hospitalized and several thousand die.
Central to this problem are the drug manufacturers selling tons of different antibiotics to prevent frivolous infections in farm animals. However, what ends up happening in these animals is that thus used antibiotics destroy harmless microbes in their alimentary canal and yield room to antibiotic resistant “super-bugs”, such as E. coli, Salmonella, Listeria, etc. Due to these problems, large scale use of antibiotics is no longer allowed in EU. In contrast, it continues to prevail in USA and Canada with government approval.
Another cause for concern is illegal approval of sex hormones by USFDA and Health Canada in beef production. Beef stimulating hormones are recognized to be “complete carcinogens”. In other words, they can initiate cancers and also promote existing cancers. In addition, sex hormones are recognized to cause endocrine disruption. As such, sex hormones cause reproductive disorders, such as infertility, precocious puberty, drop in sperm count, etc. Like antibiotics, no such hormones to increase beef production are allowed to be utilized in EU.
Yet another concern for food safety should be the Canadian approval of slaughterhouse waste being fed to food-producing animals, which is known to transmit BSE in cattle and CJD in people. Once again, any such use of slaughterhouse waste is strictly forbidden in EU. The only other industrialized country allowing agricultural applications of antibiotics hormones and slaughterhouse waste is USA, whose food safety record is no better than that of Canada.
At issue also are Genetically Modified Organisms (GMOs) attached to various herbicides and pesticides to increase agricultural yields of milk, meat, vegetables, fruits and ethanol whose public safety is being questioned throughout the world but not in Canada or USA.
These should be sobering thoughts for both Health Canada and CFIA. They cannot go on pretending the Canadian food supply to be the safest in the world when it is so frequently found to be unsafe. People have the right to know how their food is produced. The only sure way to know that is to conduct a public inquiry.
The Current Interview on CBC
Written on November 23rd, 2011Shiv Chopra and Margaret Haydon were interviewed this week on CBC’s The Current This is part of their “Game Changer” series and a lead up to them receiving the 2011 Integrity Award from the Canadian Journalists for Free Expression.
Read about the show Here
CFJE award for 2011 Integrity
Written on November 23rd, 2011Newest CJFE Award highlights need to protect those who speak out in the public interest; three former federal scientists honoured
Book Review: Vaccine Epidemic
Written on March 14th, 2011Vaccine Epidemic is the latest book on vaccine damaged Americans crying out for help.
Authored by eminent lawyers, health care professionals, philosophers, medical science historians, human rights advocates, vaccine affected patients and their closest relatives, it portrays a grim picture of modern medicine and the justice system. It may as well be a cry to God for delivering their fate to corporate greed in complicity with their own government.
Not surprisingly, the cry is not without proof. For instance, the most compelling argument against the uselessness of measles vaccine is made from a notoriously high death rate of this disease at nearly four percent in 1900 to virtually zero by 1948, fifteen years before measles vaccine was introduced in 1963. A similar observation applied to the not so deadly infectious diseases including scarlet fever, typhoid, whooping cough and diphtheria. The death rate due to Rubella, Mumps and Chicken Pox was so minute that it did not even make it to the epidemiological list.
Why then, is the ongoing push for more and more vaccines and boosters especially since their application is increasingly being associated with a concomitant increase in childhood illnesses, including autism, diabetes and various other autoimmune conditions? It is a legitimate question. It is one that should be answered by politicians of all stripes, the medical profession and the justice system to serve the public interest.
A must read book.
The HPV Vaccine: Science, Ethics and Regulation
Written on November 30th, 2010Great article on the HPV Vaccine….
A recent civil society-led investigation has highlighted serious ethical violations in a trial of the Human Papilloma Virus vaccine on girls in Khammam district in Andhra Pradesh. The findings are presented along with a review of clinical trials of the hpv vaccine in India and an analysis of the Drugs and Cosmetics Act and Rules. Together they illustrate how the promotional practices of drug companies, pressure from powerful international organisations, and the co-option of, and uncritical endorsement by, India’s medical associations are influencing the country’s public health priorities.
Two New DVDs released by Dr. Shiv Chopra
Written on November 17th, 2010
Food Security: who feeds whom?
One on One with Shiv Chopra – About Food Security
DVD Video, NTSC, All Region
Total Length 65 minutes
Produced by Northica.media
Item MR9416 $.24.95 Plus S&H
Click Here to purchase or preview
Vaccines, prevention or curse?
DVD Video, NTSC, All Region
Length 1 hr, 23 minutes
Produced by Northica.media
Item MR9414 $24.95 Plus S&H
Click Here to purchase or preview
BNN: Genetically Modified Food in Focus
Written on April 14th, 2010Watch the April 12 / 2010 interview of “Genetically Modified Food in Focus” on the Business News Network
Click Here
Bayer ordered to pay $2M for illegal GMO rice
Written on January 27th, 2010By Rady Ananda
A United States federal jury ruled this month that Bayer CropScience must pay $2 million to two Missouri farmers for contaminating their rice crops with illegal GMO rice. Farmers Ken Bell and Johnny Hunter, the first in a series of 1200 such litigants, lost sales overseas as a result.
Battle against GMOs is socio-economic too
Written on January 27th, 2010Most people have heard about how GMOs can affect their health, cause cancer, reproductive disorders, diabetes and the likes. This is true, but the adverse consequences of GMOs are actually even more frightening. Take the example of a bacteria-modified plant. The plant is injected with bacteria to make it more robust, but because of this, the plant actually thinks it is a bacteria and spreads toxins in the area around it, killing other plants and organisms like earthworms.