Opinion by Consumer Advocate Tim Bolen
This morning I received an e-mail from my attorney friend, and fellow health activist, Ralph Fucetola, The Vitamin Lawyer, telling me about the victory in Europe against the “European Food Directive”. It was held, by the Court, to be invalid. Here’s what Ralph said: Continue reading The Coming “US Health Movement v. Big Pharma” Codex War…
April 4th, 2005
Opinion by Consumer Advocate Tim Bolen
For years the “quackbuster” attacks against innovative health practitioners were handled, by health activists, in the “defense” mode. The California “Sinaiko” case was the turning point.
The reason: the “quackbusters” had won so many battles, and had caused so many problems for innovative health practitioners since the “Plan of ’96” took effect, that they were arrogant beyond belief. Continue reading California “Sinaiko” Case: The “Quackbuster’s” Breaking Point…
Opinion by Consumer Advocate Tim Bolen
In California we like to have first rate health care. The attitude is “we deserve it.” We’ve got the fifth largest stand-alone economy in the world – and it isn’t by accident. California is vibrant, and we’re into “health” here.
The North American “quackbuster” operation is scrambling for survival – because, among other things, Californians boil them in oil – so to speak. Continue reading In California: We know How to Treat “Quackbusters”…
Opinion by Consumer Advocate Tim Bolen
Someone forwarded to me an article coming up in your April 2005 issue of “Tennessee Medicine” called “The CAM Controversy: Should Tennessee Embrace Complementary and Alternative Medicine?” On the whole the article wasn’t too bad, and it portrayed the controversy fairly well EXCEPT FOR your use, as a credible resource, of known crackpot, and failed MD, Stephen Barrett, and the defunct National Council Against Health Fraud (NCAHF).
What were you thinking? Continue reading “Tennessee Medicine” – What Were You Thinking?… An OPEN Letter to the Tennessee Medical Association
Opinion by Consumer Advocate Tim Bolen
I just received word about a new Supreme Court Case Decision involving an attack on an innovative health practitioner, Edward W. McDonagh, D.O., from Missouri, who had the common sense to use chelation therapy on his heart patients. Continue reading Quackbusters “Horse-Whipped” by Missouri Supreme Court…
Opinion by Consumer Advocate Tim Bolen
I’m a severe critic of the broken North American Health Care System. For the most part, so far, I’ve focused my commentaries on the medical world. I’ve not ignored the dental world – I just haven’t given it all the attention it deserves. From what I’ve seen, though, North American Dentistry may be in worse shape than Medicine. Continue reading The “Quackbuster’s” Attack on Dental Medicine…
Opinion by Consumer Advocate Tim Bolen
Today I was forwarded a copy of your February 28th, 2005 online article titled “The Quack Catcher” by Staff Writer Julie Kirkwood.
After my laughter died down – I asked myself “Which Robert Baratz are they talking about? It couldn’t be the well known hair removal and ear piercing specialist one who claims to be the president of the self-styled National Council Against Health Fraud (NCAHF), for all over the internet is the REAL description of Baratz.” Continue reading Salem “Which” Hunt… An Open Letter to the Editors of the Salem News…
Opinion by Consumer Advocate Tim Bolen
I get a lot of e-mails, phone calls, and personal requests to “get involved” in the “Codex” problem. Until today, you haven’t heard anything from me on the subject. Why?
Because, simply, I haven’t yet figured out exactly what’s happening with the whole thing. I, myself, have been asking questions of my contacts all over the world. I have a lot of contacts. Continue reading Understanding “Codex”…
Opinion by Consumer Advocate Tim Bolen
The battle for reality in health care rages across Planet Earth. Big Pharma, in its murderous greed, throws money at its minions like hale on a Kansas farm. Despite massive cash infusions to protect their deadly interests – they are NOT winning.
Attached is a story sent to me from New Zealand, detailing the efforts of the New Zealand Health Freedom Movement – where they are, so to speak, battering Big Pharma’s goon squads in the streets… Continue reading New Zealand Counter-Assaults Big Pharma…
Opinion by Consumer Advocate Tim Bolen
The Connecticut Medical Board, on Tuesday February 15th, 2005, was presented with a negotiated settlement in the Connecticut Health Department versus Robban Sica MD case. The parties recommending this settlement were the Connecticut Department of Health (DOPH), the Connecticut Attorney General, Robban Sica MD and her attorneys, the International College of Integrative Medicine (ICIM), and the American College for the Advancement of Medicine (ACAM). The board accepted the recommendation. Continue reading Health Freedom: CHELATION VICTORY in Connecticut…
Opinion by Consumer Advocate Tim Bolen
Just a little north of the US border, in Waterloo/Kitchener, Ontario, is the home, and acne care business, of Terry Polevoy MD, Canada’s number one self styled “quackbuster.” Polevoy, well versed in bigotry and scare tactics, operates a “hate” operation. His hatred is for those that espouse “alternative medicine,” in any form. His website, healthwatcher.net, is a miasma of crazy talk, odd colors and combinations, and a presentation that seems clearly out of the mind of a seriously disturbed individual. Continue reading “Stalker” Terry Polevoy; The Quackbuster’s Nut Case?…
Opinion by Consumer Advocate Tim Bolen
As we sit here, the very structure of western civilization is at risk because of the sheer murderous greed of the number (1) component of Western Medicine – Big Pharma. Health Care costs in the the US and Europe have gone over the top, just because Big Pharma thinks it’s OK to gouge. US Seniors on a limited income have to make choices between food or drugs each month. The Vioxx scandal points out just how murderous Big Pharma executives can become, in the name of profit. Continue reading “Western Medicine:” The World Has Suffered Enough…
Opinion by Consumer Advocate Tim Bolen
The “quackbusters,” or in this case the more aptly descriptive term “quackpots,” are getting desperate for a victory. They thought the Jim Shortt MD case in South Carolina would do the trick. But it isn’t happening for them. Today was another example. Continue reading Quackbusters “Shortt-Circuited” in South Carolina…
Opinion by Consumer Advocate Tim Bolen
There’s a war going on in North America between the forces of “Health” and “Medicine.” “Health” is winning, not because it has more money and power, but because the people of North America, and the world, have found out that there is a definite difference between the two – and that it is better to be healthy than medicated.
In fact, it is becoming clear that the two are opposites. Continue reading Doctors Attack “60 Minutes” Shortt Story…
But from the phone calls, and e-mails, I’m getting, much of the real world doesn’t agree with him. They say it was a typical CBS – Dan Rather, “make up the news as you go along” report. Something CBS is publicly known for.
Opinion by Consumer Advocate Tim Bolen Continue reading So, You Didn’t Like the “60 Minutes” Jim Shortt MD Story…
As yet, no arrests have been made of the Merck executives involved – or of the US Food & Drug (FDA) agents involved in the cover-up.
Opinion by Consumer Advocate Tim Bolen Continue reading “60 Minutes” to Air Jim Shortt MD Story Tonight…
By Leo Cashman
After a six-year journey through the court system, the case of Dr. David Barnes, DDS v. Kerr Corporation, the nation’s largest amalgam manufacturer, appears to be a sad defeat: the trial court granted Kerr’s motion for summary judgment, and this ruling was recently affirmed by the Sixth Circuit Court of Appeals. While our sympathies go out to Dr. David E. Barnes, the Tennessee dentist who had been injured by his daily occupational exposure to amalgam/mercury, there appears to be a silver lining: the federal appellate court recognized the dangers of mercury amalgams and declared that the manufacturer provided a clear and unqualified warning that its product – amalgam – is very dangerous! The appellate court’s opinion is recommended for publication, which would make the decision binding legal precedent. The potential consequences of this ruling are fascinating.
Barnes, who used mercury amalgam fillings for the first ten years of his practice, alleged that he had been poisoned by the mercury in the amalgam fillings that he placed and removed on a daily basis. In 1999, Dr Barnes brought a products liability case against Kerr Corporation, the manufacturer of the only amalgam products Barnes ever purchased. Barnes retained Jim Love and Robert Reeves, attorneys most knowledgeable about mercury amalgams, to represent him. Dr. Mark Richardson, PhD, F.L. Lorscheider, Ph.D., Gary Ordog, M.D., Robert Granacher, M.D., George Colpitts, D.D.S., and other expert witnesses testified on Dr. Barnes’s behalf concerning the various scientific, medical, and dental issues that arose in the case. Kerr challenged the admissibility of Dr. Barnes’s scientific and medical testimony on the basis that it was not supported by valid and reliable published science. However, the trial court ruled that the supporting science was valid and reliable and overruled Kerr’s motion.
Kerr filed an ensuing motion for summary judgment claiming that its warnings were adequate as a matter of law. Kerr also argued that the vast majority of Barnes’s exposure was not attributable to Kerr’s products, but to amalgam fillings that Barnes removed. Because the appearance of an amalgam filling will not reveal the filling’s manufacturer, Kerr argued that Barnes could not prove that Kerr’s products actually injured Barnes. The District Court granted Kerr’s motion. The judgment was appealed to the 6th Circuit U.S. Court of Appeals, but on August 11th, 2005, the Court of Appeals upheld the District Court’s ruling.
If the Sixth Circuit Court’s opinion is published, Barnes v. Kerr may profoundly change the legal landscape regarding amalgam. Barnes argued that Kerr’s warnings addressed only mercury—not mixed dental amalgam. Barnes admitted that he was aware of mercury’s toxicity, but testified that in dental school, he was taught that mixed dental amalgam was safe and the mercury rendered inert. However, the Sixth Circuit’s opinion held that the warning sufficiently notified Barnes that mixed dental amalgam was dangerous. The Court noted, “the label on each jar of dental amalgam capsules featured not only a skull and crossbones next to the word “Poison,” but also a list of illnesses, including “bronchiiolitis, pneumonitis, pulmonary edema [and] redness and irritation to [the] eyes and skin.” Likewise, the Court noted, the MSDS (material safety data sheet, provided to all dentist buyers) warned that chronic mercury exposure could lead to “nervous irritability, weakness, tremors, gingivitis, erethism and graying of the lens of the eye.” Further, the Court ruled that the other ingredients mixed in amalgam with the mercury – silver, copper and tin – are not claimed by the manufacturer to “neutralize the danger while the dentist is working with the product.”
Attorney Jim Love filed a petition for rehearing en banc, which requests a rehearing before all of the judges sitting on the Sixth Circuit Court. Such a remedy is normally disfavored. If the ruling stands as written, it will become legal precedent. The consequences of this ruling may include the following:
1) Under the “learned intermediary” doctrine, dentists are obligated to pass along manufacturer’s warnings to their patients. In light of the ruling in Barnes v. Kerr, dentists will be required to explain to their patients the dangers acknowledged in Kerr’s warnings.
2) Arguably, state dental boards will no longer be able to prohibit dentists from communicating the dangers of mercury amalgam to their patients.
3) In order for a dentist to obtain a patient’s informed consent, the information given to a patient concerning amalgam will change very dramatically.
4) The Court’s opinion will provide a direct challenge to the ADA’s proclamations of amalgam safety.
5) In formulating a successful legal strategy, Kerr may have impaired the market for its dental amalgam product.
Opinion by Consumer Advocate Tim Bolen
The government agencies WE THINK we put in place to monitor our health system have been completely corrupted by those “special interests.” Continue reading Health Care: Can We “Take it Back” in 2005?…
Opinion by Consumer Advocate Tim Bolen
Shortly after South Carolina MD Jim Shortt was falsely accused of killing a female Multiple Sclerosis (MS) patient this year, supposedly by applying a Hydrogen Peroxide IV to get rid of viruses and bacteria, armed Federal, State, and local law enforcement agents, in almost a “Waco style” assault team, donned their body armor, their mirrored sunglasses, activated their Public Relations teams, and screamed and battered their way into Shortt’s West Columbia, South Carolina clinic. With guns and warrant on hand, they seized everything in sight.
Although medical literature clearly shows that Hydrogen Peroxide IV, to get rid of viruses and bacteria, has been around for over ninety (90) years, and records show that over a million treatments have been made, with NO DEATHS, ever recorded, the mere “allegation” of death, false that it was, and made by an elected official with no medical training, caused a massive assault by US law enforcement. Continue reading Federally “Indict” Merck Executives…
Opinion by Consumer Advocate Tim Bolen
If there was a quiet smile on Hulda Clark’s face, and there was, it was for two reasons: (1) because her attorney, Carlos Negrete, had just informed her that the Federal Trade Commission (FTC) Commissioners had signed a settlement agreement over an internet website issue involving Clark’s name. Continue reading FTC Vindicates Hulda Clark….