CONEM

Council for Nutritional and Environmental Medicine

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Petition for the Release of Publicly Funded Research Data in the US on Mercury and Infants

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Kaiser Permanente in the US used public funding to collect data and conduct a study on infants and mercury exposure. In their study, which had serious methodological flaws, they purportedly found that mercury exposure is safe for infants.

Mercury Free Baby has requested the data from Kaiser Permanente, but even after repeated requests and even though taxpayer dollars funded the study, they refuse to release the data for other researchers to check the results.

Infants are exposed to mercury from several sources, such as their mother’s mercury fillings, flu shots containing mercury, ingesting mercury-containing fish, and from inhaling coal power plant emissions. Approximately 630,000 infants are born every year in the US with high levels of mercury in their blood. Numerous studies show that mercury has detrimental effects on child development.

Kaiser Permanente has a conflict of interest on this matter because they promote a policy that exposes pregnant women to mercury through flu shots given during pregnancy and so they have a vested interest in finding mercury exposure in infants to be safe. The Kaiser Permanente study which purports that mercury exposure is safe for infants has the potential to influence public policy, and that would be bad for our children.

Please sign the petition requesting that Kaiser Permanente releases this data to the researchers.

This petition will be delivered to:
Tracy A. Lieu, MD, MPH, Director, Division of Research, Kaiser Permanente, Oakland, CA, USA

Only One-Fifth of Global Population Achieves Sufficient Vitamin E Status to Receive Functional Health Benefits

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A recent study published in the International Journal for Vitamin and Nutrition Research (1) establish that just 21% of the studies of the examined populations globally reach a serum α-tocopherol concentration of ≥30 μmol/L. This is the vitamin E threshold that several studies suggest has major effects on human health in multiple areas. The research is unique, and the first of its kind to review over 170 existing papers worldwide on studies into vitamin E intake levels and serum concentrations. The findings conclude that vitamin E status is inadequate in a substantial part of the reviewed populations. Infographic: Vitamin E status remains low in most countries

Vitamin E StatusVitamin E is an essential micronutrient that protects cell membranes from oxidative damage, including those rich in polyunsaturated fatty acids (PUFAs). The higher the level of PUFA intake, the more vitamin E is required. This study finds vitamin E status to be alarmingly low globally. Modern changes in diet may be a contributing factor. Vitamin E status can be increased by eating more foods high in vitamin E, such as vegetable oils, green vegetables, nuts, seeds, whole grain bread; fortified foods and beverages, and dietary supplements.

Dr. Simin Meydani, Director of Jean Mayer USDA Human Nutrition Research Center on Aging at Tufts University comments: “This global assessment of vitamin E status – the first of its kind – is an important step to generate awareness because so many people around the world do not consume recommended amounts of vitamin E. An adequate vitamin E intake is needed to maintain the immune system, cognitive function, cardiovascular health, and liver function. The findings of the publication suggest that health authorities need to dedicate more attention to the intake, status, and role of vitamin E in human health.”

Applying a Recommended Daily Allowance (RDA) of 15 mg/day and Estimated Average Requirement (EAR) of 12 mg/day to all populations with a minimum age of 14 years, 82% and 61% of data points were below the RDA and EAR respectively. The new paper further reveals that globally 13% of the scientific publications indicated serum concentrations below the suggested deficiency threshold concentration of 12 μmol/L, mostly in newborns and children.

Szabolcs Péter, MD, PhD, Senior Scientist at DSM, and one of the co-authors says: “This comprehensive review of vitamin E dietary intake and serum concentrations demonstrates that the majority of the reported intake values worldwide are below recommended levels. Similarly, it shows that a considerable proportion of the global population do not reach the proposed optimal serum concentration for vitamin E. This study should help stimulate needed research to understand the complex field of vitamin E and its impact on human health.”

The study found that vitamin E intake differed regionally. People living in the Middle East and Africa (27%) were more likely to be consuming below the RDA, but the prevalence was also relatively high in Asia Pacific (16%) and Europe (8%). Considering a threshold concentration of 30 μmol/L recommended by experts, 27% of the American, 80% of the Middle East/African, 62% of the Asian, and 19% of the European populations are below this serum value. On the other hand, only 21% of the total data points included in this global review reach a desirable mean serum concentration of 30 μmol/L or higher. This can be explained by varying diets and nutrient availability across the world.

Reference

1. Szabolcs P, Angelika F, Roos FF, Wyss A, Eggersdorfer M, Hoffmann K, Weber P. A Systematic review of global alpha-tocopherol status as assessed by nutritional intake levels and blood serum concentrations. Int J Vitam Nutr Res 2016. DOI: 10.1024/0300-9831/a000281.

Digestive Enzyme Therapy: A Possible Option in Autism Spectrum Disorder

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There is growing evidence for a gut-brain connection associated with autism spectrum disorder (ASD), which suggests a potential benefit for digestive enzyme therapy in autistic children (1). Working with an Egyptian team, Geir Bjørklund and collaborators performed a double-blind, randomized clinical trial on 101 children with ASD (82 boys and 19 girls) aged from 3 to 9 years (1). The autistic children were diagnosed according to the Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders 4th edition, text revision (DSM-IV-TR) diagnostic criteria. Structured interviews of at least one hour were first performed both with the parents and the children. In a later two hours session was the Childhood Autism Rating Scale (CARS) applied. After this, the children with ASD were randomized to receive digestive enzymes or placebo (1). It was found that autistic children that received digestive enzyme therapy for three months had significant improvement in emotional response, general impression autistic score, general behavior, and gastrointestinal symptoms. These results indicate that digestive enzyme therapy in the future may be a possible option in the treatment protocols for ASD (1).

The first author of the article, Khaled Saad, is Associate Professor of Pediatrics at Assiut University, Assiut, Egypt. Geir Bjørklund is the founder and president of the Council for Nutritional and Environmental Medicine (CONEM).

 

Reference

1. Saad K, Eltayeb AA, Mohamad IL, Al-Atram AA, Elserogy Y, Bjørklund G, El-Houfey AA, Nicholson B. A randomized, placebo-controlled trial of digestive enzymes in children with autism spectrum disorders. Clin Psychopharmacol Neurosci 2015; 13(2): 188-193.

 

Vitamin D Deficiency Correlates with Severity of Autism and Shows Improvement with Supplementation

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Vitamin D deficiency has been previously reported in patients with autism spectrum disorder (ASD). However, the data on the relationship between vitamin D deficiency and the severity of ASD are limited. In collaboration with Egyptian researchers, Geir Bjørklund (2015) performed a case-controlled cross-sectional analysis on 122 children with ASD, to assess their vitamin D status compared to healthy control children and the relationship between the degree of vitamin D deficiency and the severity of ASD (1).

Fifty-seven percent of the patients with ASD in the study had vitamin D deficiency, and 30% had vitamin D insufficiency. The vitamin D levels in the children with severe ASD were significantly lower than those in children with mild/moderate ASD. It was found that the vitamin D levels had significant negative correlations with the Childhood Autism Rating Scale (CARS) scores (1).

106 children with low serum vitamin D levels (<30 ng/ml) then participated in an open-label trial of vitamin D supplementation. The patients were given 300 IU/kg/day (not to exceed 5000 IU/day) for three months. Eighty-three ASD patients completed three months of daily vitamin D treatment. 80.72% (67/83) of the children with ASD who received vitamin D3 treatment had significantly improved outcome, which was mainly in the sections of the Childhood Autism Rating Scale and aberrant behavior checklist subscales that measure behavior, stereotype, eye contact, and attention span (1). Of the 16 parameters measured, ten showed highly statistically significant improvements (see table below).

 

Parameter  P Value (* highly statistically significant)
Relating to people <0.001*
Emotional Response <0.001*
Imitation <0.001*
Body use 0.01*
Object use 0.01*
Adaption to change 0.004*
Listening response 0.01*
Taste, smell, touch 0.1
Visual response 0.003*
Fear 0.13
Verbal communication 0.3
Activity level 0.32
Non-verbal communication 0.2
Intellectual response 0.1
General impression <0.001*
Total CARS score <.001*

 

The researchers concluded that as vitamin D is inexpensive, readily available and safe it may have beneficial effects in ASD patients, particularly when the final serum level is more than 40 ng/ml (1). It should be noted that these results were achieved after only three months of vitamin D supplementation. In a condition that is often present at birth and lasts a lifetime, this is a highly significant finding and should be fully explored immediately.

The first author of the study, Khaled Saad, is Associate Professor of Pediatrics at Assiut University, Assiut, Egypt. Geir Bjørklund is founder and president of the Council for Nutritional and Environmental Medicine (CONEM). Also, one of the coauthors is John Cannell, MD. He is the founder of the Vitamin D Council in San Luis Obispo, California, United States. The study is registered in UMIN Clinical Trials Registry: UMIN000016770.

 

Reference

1. Saad K, Abdel-rahman AA, Elserogy YM, Al-Atram AA, Cannell JJ, Bjørklund G et al. Vitamin D Status in Autism Spectrum Disorders and the Efficacy of Vitamin D Supplementation in Autistic Children. Nutr Neurosci. Article first published online: 15 Apr 2015. DOI: http://dx.doi.org/10.1179/1476830515Y.0000000019.

 

Increased Frequency of Metal Allergy in Patients with Connective Tissue Disorders

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Stejskal, Reynolds, and Bjørklund examined the frequency of metal allergy in 38 patients with connective tissue disorders (1). Of these patients, 16 had rheumatoid arthritis, 13 had Sjögren’s syndrome, and nine had systemic lupus erythematosus. A control group of 43 healthy age and sex-matched subjects were included in the study. Metal allergy was evaluated using the optimized lymphocyte transformation test MELISA. For all subjects, the primary source of metal exposure was dental metal restorations. Most of the tested patients (87%) reacted to at least one metal, and many (63%) reacted to two or more of the tested metals. 43% of the healthy subjects in the study reacted to one metal, and 18% reacted to two or more metals. The increased frequency of metal allergy in the patient group compared with the control group was statistically significant (P < 0.0001). The most frequent allergens in the study were nickel, mercury, gold, and palladium.

Vera Stejskal is Associate Professor of Immunology at University of Stockholm, Sweden. She is founder and president of the MELISA Medica Foundation. Tim Reynolds is Professor of Clinical Biochemistry at the University of Wolverhampton, and a consultant chemical pathologist working at Burton Hospitals NHS Foundation Trust, Burton upon Trent, United Kingdom. Geir Bjørklund is founder and president of the Council for Nutritional and Environmental Medicine (CONEM).

Reference
1. Stejskal V, Reynolds T, Bjørklund G. Increased frequency of delayed type hypersensitivity to metals in patients with connective tissue disease. J Trace Elem Med Biol 2015; 31: 230-236.