After a recent trip to the juice bar at the Naples Whole Foods – a place, mind you, I usually avoid at all costs because they don’t explicitly label the ingredients in their prepared foods as being certified organic –  I allowed my good judgment to be euthanized by the sweet-sounding clerk’s assurance that they use "mostly organic" ingredients,  with the highly non-binding qualification: "whenever possible."

Of course, my main concern with not buying 100% organic juice is the greater likelihood that the produce was grown in factory-farmed animal manure, or raw-human sewage, which is a breeding ground for serious, even deadly pathogens, and which may contaminate both the food grown in it, and the people who consume the contaminated food.

But, a battery of factors conspired against what I would like to consider my better judgment: 1) being fatigued by the morning outing at the Zoo. 2) knowing our favorite organic juice bar (at Food & Thought) was taking a much deserved day of rest. 3) being in the company of less "neurotic" and equally exhausted child-towing company ... I just decided to shut up and give it a shot.

And so, with all my pre-purchase doubts happily behind me I sat down to an already half-consumed glass of raw vegetable juice, only to discover the following warning sticker staring back at me, declaring in CDC-speak that I had just engaged in highly risky, if not downright dangerous behavior:

"WARNING: This product has not been pasteurized and, therefore, may contain harmful bacteria that can cause serious illness in children, the elderly and persons with weakened immune systems." ~ Whole Foods Market

And then, to my dismay, I noticed that my sweet 3 year old daughter’s Whole Foods Almond Milk Smoothie also bore the same terrible warning, which needless to say was giving me a bit of indigestion as I contemplated the implications of the statement further.

First, I was a bit incredulous! "Really?? I just spent a good chunk of the remainder of my last paycheck buying a presumably healthy drink for my family, and I’m being told that it could make us terribly ill??"

Second, angry: "Good lord. I can buy genetically engineered (GE) food in this country (which should bear the skull and crossbones), without any label warning me of this fact, but I can’t buy an organic raw juice without being told that it may contain 'harmful bacteria’ and could cause serious illness in my child because it was not pasteurized????"

Third, empathic: "I understand the heavily litigation wary context within which all consumer purchases now take place, and Whole Foods must be trying to protect itself against frivolous lawsuits..."

….nah, that explanation, while a convenient one and likely close to the official one I might have received if I had asked, just seemed plainly disingenuous.

Knowing that people have recently been threatened with arrest, or actually arrested in this country for selling raw milk products, made this situation all the more irritating. How can I go down a block to a highly-subsidized fast food joint and order and consume food that I should rightfully be required to wear a Hazmat suite to interact with, and yet they bear no warning stickers?

I think warnings like this require a certain dumbing down of the general public to be fully accepted without incredulity. For one, if the juice in that cup was truly produced from vegetables (as I was told) grown in organic soil, the bacteria found there in all likelihood would be highly beneficial to my health – not harmful. In fact, if we pasteurized everything we ate, we would die from a lack of bacteria – probiotics – which are required to sustain the very infrastructure of our health.  Pasteurizing a healthy food containing healthy bacteria, virtually guarantees it (and we who consume it) will become more susceptible to being overrun by unhealthy bacteria. Case in point…..

If RAW Milk Is So Dangerous, Why Does Pasteurization Make It Spoil?

Since the raw/pasteurized debate (to put it mildly) seems presently focused on milk, let’s look at the findings of a recent study published in the European Journal of Pediatrics titled, "Impact of pasteurization on the antibacterial properties of human milk," which revealed that the pasteurization of milk – in this case, human breast milk – actually increased the rate of proliferation of Escherichia Coli and Staphylococcus Aureus.

The very justification for pasteurization of all milk is to reduce the transmission of infection, but pasteurization destroys naturally present immunological factors, as well as beneficial bacteria which keep the pathogenic strains in check.  Pasteurization also denatures the delicately folded proteins within milk, increasing the risk for antigenicity, i.e. allergies, asthma, dermatitis, etc.

I guess what I’m most indignant about is the "homeland security" mentality that seems to suffuse every nook and cranny of our lives today. Food fascism purports to care so much about our health that it is willing to strip us of our constitutional and basic human rights just in order to keep us from making decisions concerning what we choose to eat and how we choose to eat it.  Between pure food freedom and absolute food security is a middle ground, and in that balanced, yet increasingly utopian place, cups of raw organic juice NEVER have warning stickers telling you that you could become seriously ill, perhaps even die, as a result of not pastuerizing them.  I refuse to accept the implicit Pasteurian metaphysics and germ theory contained within that Whole Foods warning sticker. It is the concept of an imposed universal pasteurization and not raw food (at least when organic), that scares me the most. We should have the freedom to live raw, or die, if you will, without being labeled and stickered into submission by exceedingly rare, worst case scenarios, i.e. "CAUTION: This straw could impale you."  Thomas Jefferson said it well: "If the people let government decide what foods they eat and what medicines they take, their bodies will soon be in as sorry a state as are the souls of those who live under tyranny."

Few beverages on this planet are as biocompatible to the human body and its hydration needs as coconut water.  Indeed, coconut water has been reported to have been used for intravenous hydration and resuscitation of critically ill patients in remote regions of the world for over half a century. [1]  It is also an excellent preserving medium for avulsed teeth (and semen!), besting even Hank's balanced salt solution, a commonly used medical solution. [2]

Ever since the World Health Organization admitted in 2011 that cell phone radiation is "possibly carcinogenic," and may be contributing to the global uptick in brain cancer cases, its far harder to label someone a hypochondriac for being concerned about the health consequences of exposure.[i]  In fact, one study cited in their report showed a 40% increased risk for gliomas in the highest category of heavy users (reported average: 30 minutes per day over a 10-year period) – not exactly a small effect.

A recent study published in the journal Cellular and Molecular Neurobiology confirms that the microwave radiation given off by mobile phones is capable of transforming normal cells into cancerous ones.

It has been known for some time that during pregnancy, the placenta enables a two-way trafficking of immune cells between mother and fetus. Some of the exchanged cells are capable of establishing long-lasting cell lines that persist for at least half a century after birth and are immunologically active.

Known as microchimerism, two genetically distinct and separately derived populations of cells are present in the same individual or organ. While it can occur artificially, as with recipients of blood transfusions or bone marrow transplants, it occurs naturally during most pregnancies. For instance, approximately 50-75% of women after giving birth carry fetal immune cells,[1] and about half as many offspring carry maternal immune cells.

Increasingly, the front lines of the information warfare being perpetuated by corporations upon the people are moving into peer-reviewed biomedical and life sciences journals. Once considered a place where rigorous, empirical science -- i.e. the truth -- is vindicated and publicly acknowledged, these journals, and the scientists who publish in them, are no longer capable of maintaining the once hard and fast illusion that they are immune to the corrupting influence of industry.

A new study published in the Journal of Applied Toxicology has raised some disturbing possibilities regarding the dangers of common hormone-mimicking preservatives found in thousands of consumer products on the market today.[1]

Titled "Parabens detection in different zones of the human breast: consideration of source and implications of findings," researchers discussed the role that parabens -- a class of estrogen-mimicking chemicals widely used in drugs, foods and cosmetics -- may have in breast cancer and childhood disease.

It is an awesome fact of nature that we have trillions of organisms within our body – containing completely foreign DNA – some of which break down toxic chemicals that we humans have created to kill other things, but are now killing us, e.g. pesticides. Who are these strange helpers?

Bacteria!

Wait. Aren’t bacteria supposed to harm us? Aren’t they the enemy in the endless war against infection?  

Well, when our immunity fails, some can grow out of bounds opportunistically. But they respond to the environment within which they are raised, not unlike most other creatures. Provide organic, wholesome vegetables, for instance, and you have a hotbed of positive activity in your gut. Provide sugar, processed foods and an increasing burden of chemicals and it can get ugly in there!

From the perspective of conventional cancer treatment a diagnosis of multi-drug resistant cancer is equivalent to a death sentence. By the time such a diagnosis occurs, the patient’s body has been irreversibly damaged by chemotherapy and radiation, and an even more aggressive cancer has emerged to take the place of the original one.

Tragically, these treatments do not simply fail, but make the cancers more malignant.  This fact is effectively concealed by the name multidrug resistant cancer which makes it seem as if the cancer was so exceptionally resistant and malignant that the normally effective drugs used to treat it just couldn’t do the job.  

So, you are looking to lose a few pounds, or keep them off. What better way to accomplish this feat than to eliminate both empty sugar calories and synthetic sweeteners, which studies show can generate excessive cravings for sweets and actually increase weight gain.

Worry not, because Nature has the solution. There are two proven ways to satisfy your sweet tooth without the adverse caloric consequences and without worrying about poisoning yourself (e.g. sucralose, aspartame, saccharin) in the process.

Food addictions are not strictly "psychological" problems, but have a hard-wired, organic component.  Many of the most commonly consumed foods in Western culture actually contain narcotic properties associated with the presence of psychoactive chemicals that bind to opioid receptors in the nervous system.  These peptides are so powerful that researchers block their action with drugs such as naltrexone which is used to treat addiction among heroin abusers, and naloxone which is used to prevent death from heroin overdose.

These "food opiates" are heavily concentrated in wheat and dairy products, especially cow’s milk. Wheat contains the following opioid peptides, known as gluten exorphins, alongside which are listed their amino acid structure: