Category Archives: Health

100K person study links milk drinking to early death

November 4, 2014 Kimi Leave a comment

A Swedish study of 100,000 pasteurized milk drinkers shows a strong correlation between 1-2 glasses per day milk consumption and early death, plus osteoporosis leading to bone breaks. The results from eating cheese and fermented milk products like yogurt are different, and do not produce these unfortunate results.

Natasha Longo in a RiseEarth article reviews the study and breaks down the science of how pasteurization transforms healthy, raw (unheated) milk into a compound that leeches calcium out of bones and injects our bodies with toxins we can’t handle. More damningly, Natasha talks about why Big Dairy uses pasteurization.

(People) think (milk’s) safe due to pasteurization. However, heat destroys a great number of bacteria in milk and thus conceals the evidence of dirt, pus and dirty dairy practices. It’s cheaper to produce dirty milk and kill the bacteria by heat, that to maintain a clean dairy and keep cows healthy. To combat the increase in pathogens milk goes through ‘clarification’, ‘filtering’, ‘bactofugation’ and two ‘deariation’ treatments. Each of these treatments uses heat ranging from 100-175 degrees Fahrenheit. Dairies count on many heat treatments to mask their inferior sanitary conditions: milk filled with pus, manure and debris. Consumer Reports found 44% of 125 pasteurized milk samples contained as many as 2200 organisms per cubic centimeter (fecal bacteria, coliforms)

Pasteurization also destroys vitamin C, and damages water soluble B vitamins diminishing the nutrient value of milk. Calcium and other minerals are made unavailable by pasteurization.

Environment, Food, Health, Justice

Solution to China’s food pollution issues: eat local

July 7, 2014 Kimi Leave a comment

An Alternet report examines how many China grown food products contain dangerous heavy metals, which are toxic and dangerous to consume. 50% of rice tested in Guangzhou and as much as 10% of all China grown rice contains cadmium.

Wary consumers who aren’t interested in waiting for FDA to ramp up its testing of Chinese food imports can take their own measures to minimize the possibility of contamination. Local, as in American-grown produce, will trump labels such as “organic,” if the food in question was grown in a potentially polluted place.

In fact, if it’s grown in a polluted place, organic produce could contain more heavy metals than conventionally grown food. Organic agriculture practices include the use of manure, which could add heavy metals to the soil if the cattle were eating contaminated feed, such as hay grown in a contaminated field, according to Michael Schmitt, a soil scientist at the University of Minnesota. “Once you put metals in a field,” he said, “they don’t go away.”

Thus, organic food from a polluted area of China could carry significantly more heavy metals than nonorganic food from the U.S. This puts a new spin on the idea of eating locally. In this case it could mean from anywhere in this vast continent—Canada and Mexico don’t seem to have heavy metal problems. But in a way, the reasons are similar to why many people prefer buying from the local farm stand: you have more information about how something is grown.

Not all food is required by law to be labeled with a country of origin. Foods purchased abroad and processed in the USA, for example, are exempt, as are foods containing multiple ingredients. The safest way to confirm a food item didn’t come from China is to look for labels that announce where it is from. If no information is given, avoid it.

Best practices are: eat local; avoid foods not labelled with country of origin and eat only foods minimally processed. And, be wary of nutrition supplements because they concentrate ingredients, including poisonous ones.

More photos of pollution in China

At Green Drinks, Environment, Events, Health, Justice, New solutions, Sustainable communities

March Green Drinks & Sustainability Events in 3 North Jersey EJ Cities

March 3, 2014 Kimi Leave a comment

Green Drinks is about Environmental Justice and Sustainability, not green colored drinks – Green Drinks is just our name! We usually meet monthly in three north Jersey Environmental Justice (EJ) cities. Our informal gatherings are held in friendly spaces so people can come together over food and chat about the green and sustainable issues relevant to our lives and communities.

But, this is Mix It Up March! Instead of holding to our usual Green Drinks schedule this month, we’re going visiting … Take a look at our schedule below.

Green Drinks/Issues in 3 EJ cities every month

Green Drinks Newark 1st Mondays | 7-9pm
Mon 03 Mar 2014 7-9pm
This month, Green Drinks be at the Newark Mayoral Candidates Forum for the “Good Jobs, Healthy Neighborhoods, & Clean Environment” debate, which is being co-sponsored by Clean Water Action, the Coalition for Healthy Ports and other organizations. This is an important topic, as Newark residents suffer the brutal environmental impact of ports that produce billions in revenue but don’t share locally. Free and open to the public.

Green Drinks Hackensack 2nd Mondays | 7-9pm
Mon 10 Mar 2014 7-9pm
This month, Green Drinks will be at Ramapo College for a panel discussion on the impact of local farms, the creation of a sustainable food system and to discuss and celebrate the creation of the Bergen County Education Farm at Saddle River County Park in Fairlawn, New Jersey. Free and open to the public, but your RSVP is requested.

Green Drinks Clifton-Paterson (this location has no fixed date or spot for now)
TBA (Check back here for this month’s date) | 7-9pm
Sultan Restaurant
429 Crooks Avenue, Clifton NJ (on the Paterson border)
Safe street parking

Discussion themes this month

If your business or non-profit relies on the internet, you will definitely want to help Save the Internet before your internet service provider shuts down access to your website.
How does Big Money in general elections impact the environment? We’ve partnered with Represent.Us in a campaign to get Big Money out of politics and end corporate domination of general elections!
Time to start your seeds for this year’s crops. Where and what are you going to grow?
How can we make environmental justice communities healthier through green jobs and pollution controls?
Preventing school closures in Newark and other NJ EJ communities.

Other green/sustainable activities & events

People’s Organization for Progress (POP) meets weekly in Newark
The People’s Organization for Progress meets every Thursday | 6:30pm
Abyssinian Baptist Church
224 West Kinney Street, Newark NJ

Sign to stop elephant slaughter
More than 30,000 elephants were slaughtered last year for their tusks, which are used to make ivory trinkets and carvings, which are sold in black markets around the world, including in the US. But it’s important to stop this illegal trade. There may be only 250,000 elephants left in the wild. Sign to show you care!

All, Food, Health, Justice, Plants, Pests, Rescue, Protection

Farmers & people creatively resist GMOs

December 19, 2013 Kimi Leave a comment

Two of the problems farmers face with GMOs is how much they strengthen weeds and insects, and how much they cost. Over time, the amount of pesticides and herbicides farmers use to kill weeds and insects increases as GMO crops become immune to their effect. Modern Farmer shares these chilling statistics,

Between 2001 and 2010, the consumer advocacy group Food & Water Watch reports, total on-farm herbicide use increased 26 percent as weed resistance grew.

Genetically altered seed producers in the United States and the processed food companies that support them have quadrupled their investments in lobbying efforts and public relations campaigns to fool politicians and the public into believing GMO foods are safe and there’s no need to label them. If that’s true, why are these companies so determined that the public not know that GMOs are in all of the common processed foods they eat and all corn products, most soy products and now, even wheat? Monsanto, Pepsi, Coke, Nestlé and other companies are spending tens of millions of dollars to make sure United States residents do not realize how pervasive GMO contamination has become in the US.

This has led some US crop farmers to return to traditional seeds – not because they believe in a GMO free world, but for economic reasons. GMO seeds cause farmers more out of pocket expense to purchase them and increasing amounts of the pesticides and herbicides they use to protect crops. And, GMO contaminated harvests can’t be sold everywhere. Aside from foreign countries that have banned them, some US buyers won’t touch them either. Modern Farmer explains,

Clarkson Grain, which buys conventional and organic corn and soybeans, pays farmers a premium — up to $2 extra per bushel over the base commodity price of soybeans, $1 for corn — to not only grow the crop but also preserve its identity. (That is, keep it separate from genetically modified grain all the way from planting through harvest, storage and transportation.)

And talks about other players in the non-GMO space. The most interesting of which is the Non-GMO Project. It’s ironically funny that since Monsanto & its friends have successfully blocked most legislation to require GMO labeling, this organization emerged to champion the flip side of the issue with recognition for and labeling of, foods that are GMO free. Modern Farmers tells us that for food producers, the benefits of non-GMO verification are many

Sales at Hiland Naturals, which makes conventional and organic feeds for livestock, have more than doubled since it received Non-GMO Project verification last year. Most of Hiland’s customers are small farmers who sell eggs or meat at farmers markets and natural grocery stores. But many sell birds to Whole Foods and to institutions like colleges. Some of Hiland’s growth, owner Dan Masters says, comes from people wanting to know what they’re eating, some is from pending labeling laws and some is from “people who are tired of big corporations and big agriculture.”

Good on us.

Abuse of public trust, Food, Health, Justice, Nature

GMO apples will begin the end of real food. Tell Feds NO.

December 16, 2013 Kimi Leave a comment

Submit your comment to the US federal government saying why you stand against the approval of GMO apples. The time to act is now! Here’s some scientific background on GMO apples are so bad, even McDonalds and Gerber doesn’t want them. After you post your comment, please share it with us. Here’s mine:

Private companies cannot be allowed to put in claims to own nature or our food supply. It’s time to radically head off manufacturers of GMOs from attempts to take over society by stopping them from selling their products, ever. The US government must act immediately to make the GMO process and the sale of GMO seeds, illegal.

GMO products and patented seeds, are responsible for the killing of bees, natural ecosystems, and ring the death knoll for small farms around the world.

Our food system relies on bees for pollination. Ecosystems rely on a diversity of plant and animal life to thrive, much in the same way that human bodies do. Small farms are being seized and eradicated by GMO distributors through a variety of nefarious and underhanded moves.

GMO producers are dishonest and extremely dangerous.

You cannot allow them to continue harming the earth, our food supply and the people of the United States. GMO incursion is bad for people and the natural world that God created, which it is the fundamental and inalienable right of US citizens and all people, to enjoy.

The myth is being sold by self-serving producers of mono-culture crops that our societies will be better, or safer, if we allow them to take over the growing process, beginning with seed alteration and patenting, but this is the reverse of true. Mono-cultures are exactly the opposite of good, and the results GMO companies bring into the world are disastrous over both the long and short terms.

The approval of GMO apple seeds will open the door to other varieties of patented seeds being brought into the food supply chain. In the short run, family farmers and small farms will be ruined. In the long term, GMO producers want to make sure that only their eco-system destroying apples can be planted and sold. They want to make natural seeds illegal and own the growing process from start to finish.

GMO crops which contain pesticides also produce pesticides resistant super-insects that cannot be controlled by normal strength pesticides. The GMO crops are directly responsible for the super-insects wiping out natural crops (grown by family/small farmers) in regions where the GMO crops that create them are grown. We can only imagine how bad the pesticide-based crops will reveal themselves to be for human health.

GMO companies seek to replace good, healthy food grown by loving hands which shares a beneficial, symbiotic exchange with nature … with chemically altered food that destroys nature, ecosystems, the natural pollination process (and bees), health, family farms and world society as we know it.

They cannot be allowed to continue to operate in society. There must be NO place for them at all. Please, cast a vote for the wellbeing of United States residents and the world at large, by banning GMO seeds from entering the world.

All, At Green Drinks, Energy, Events, Food, Health, Justice, Nature

Green Drinks celebrates World & US Food Days

November 20, 2013 Kimi Leave a comment

Green Drinks celebrated Food Day and World Food Day in November at our Paterson-Clifton gathering. We discussed the relationship between producers, consumers and the food that binds us together … and read stories of how sustainable ag lifts us up by creating economic opportunities, healthy lives and a sustainable planet.

All, At Green Drinks, Environment, Events, Food, Health, Nature, New solutions, Protection, Water

November Green Drinks schedule & sustainable activities

November 9, 2013 Kimi Leave a comment

Green Drinks (Sustainability) chats monthly in 3 north Jersey cities

Green Drinks are not a type of drink! They are informal gatherings that bring people together to chat over food and drinks about green and sustainable issues relevant to our lives and communities. Green Drinks meetings are open, everyone is welcome and there is no admission fee. Pay for the food and drinks you order at the restaurants where we meet – each location serves good food at moderate prices.
Green Drinks Newark 1st Mondays | 7-9pm
November: 04 Nov 2013
Rio Rodizio
1034 McCarter Highway, Newark, NJ
Green Drinks Hackensack 2nd Mondays | 7-9pm
November: 11 Nov 2013
Villa de Colombia
12 Mercer Street, Hackensack, NJ
If parking lot is full, park weekdays after 7 across the street in the jewelry business parking lot and on weekends park at the Salvation Army lot on the corner of Mercer and State Streets.
Green Drinks Clifton-Paterson (this location has no fixed monthly date for now)
November: Thursday, 21 Nov 2013 | 7-9pm

Sultan Restaurant
429 Crooks Avenue, Clifton NJ
Discussion themes this month: stormwater management, composting, climate change

Like us on Facebook!

Other green/sustainable activities & events

Stand Against Fracking at the Next DRBC Meeting
Tues 03 Dec | 12-1:30 pm
LOCATION TBD – Commissioners have not announced final meeting location
RSVP & look for carpool (as of 11/13, none from north Jersey yet, so feel free to add your own)
The Delaware River Basin Commission put plans on hold to allow drilling in this critical watershed two years ago. Now the executive director of the DRBC is talking about developing a strategy for drilling in the basin. Fracking will destroy this precious landscape and threaten the water that we all depend on. Their next meeting will be on December 3 — please join Food & Water Watch and our allies to celebrate two years of no drilling in the Delaware River Watershed and stand up for the only strategy we should be support: A Ban on Fracking!.

Fund Raising Campaign Kick Off Reception for the
MLK Jr. Bergen County Monument Committee
Tues 19 Nov 2013 | 6-9pm
Rothman Center at Fairleigh Dickinson University
140 University Avenue, Hackensack NJ
The public is welcome. Come out for the unveiling of the MLK Jr. monument, network, support the committee’s efforts.

Free Screening of A Place at the Table and Panel Discussion
Thu 21 Nov 2013 | 6:30pm
Bergen Community College
Technology Center Building Room TEC-128
400 Paramus Road, Paramus NJ
The Community FoodBank of New Jersey and Bergen Community College collaborate to screen this dramatic documentary about hunger and food insecurity in America. In Bergen County, 88,000 are hungry. There will be a panel discussion after the film and we invite you to come and take your place as part of the soluton. All are welcome, admission is free, and light refreshments will be served. For more info visit cfbnj.org/bcc or email driley@cfbnj.org.

Public Rally to shut down the compressor station
Sat 23 Nov 2013 | 12-1:30pm
621 Eagle Rock Avenue (Next to the Essex County Environmental Center), Roseland, NJ
There is widespread community concern in Roseland New Jersey that a new 30,000 horsepower gas compressor is being built right next to a major electric transmission terminal and both of these are within a major flood zone of the Passaic River. Star Ledger story about the Roseland Compressor station.

Sierra Club Trenton Environmental Lobby Day
Thu 19 Dec 2013 | Time TBA
This Lame Duck Session will have a huge impact on New Jersey’s environment and we need your help! Join us in Trenton for an Environmental Lobby Day focused on several important issues. The Lobby Day will include briefings on these important issues, meetings with our representatives, and a Rally in front of the Statehouse. Please Save the Date for now .. more details to come. Email Kate.Millsaps@sierraclub.org to RSVP

Sign to stop elephant slaughter
More than 30,000 elephants were slaughtered last year for their tusks, which are used to make ivory trinkets and carvings. They are sold in black markets around the world, including in the United States. But we’re working to stop this illegal trade.

Nearly six tons of elephant ivory will be crushed into gravel by the US Fish and Wildlife Service. It is the largest amount of seized ivory ever destroyed in the US. By destroying its store of seized ivory, the US government is sending a strong signal to the rest of the world that we need to end the demand that is fueling ivory trafficking and get serious now about saving elephants. Sign to show you care.

Abuse of public trust, All, Health, Protection

“Fragrance” hides dangerous ingredients – are your beauty products safe?

June 10, 2013 Kimi Leave a comment

How messed up in this? Companies can hide the cancer causing ingredients they use in cosmetics and beauty products by calling them “fragrance”. The ingredients in fragrance are protected by Trade Secret laws and can be just about anything. The Environmental Working Group (EWG) cautions us to be careful with “fragrance free” products too: fragrance free doesn’t mean chemical free. Often, “fragrance free” products are created by adding a smell masking chemical to the other chemicals present. This 2:22 minute EWG video gives the scoop:

Are your skin, beauty care and cosmetic products safe? Plug them into the Skin Deep searchable database and find out.

All, Environment, Health, Justice, Nature, Water

Bottled water is soooo bad – for health, environment, budgets & waste streams

June 7, 2013 Kimi 1 Comment

People have no idea how bad bottled water is – for the health of the world, their communities and their bodies. Bottled water is also a social justice issue.

Let’s start with the health issues: single use bottles contain BPA which leeches into water, especially when stored in hot temperatures. Plus, bottled water contains more bacteria than tap water. Stop Corporate Abuse explains,

Bottled water is often sold with images of snowy peaks and pristine rivers with slogans boasting the “pure fresh taste.” Through marketing that presents bottled water as somehow cleaner or safer than tap water, the bottled water industry has effectively cast doubt on the quality of America’s tap water. In 2003, a Gallup poll found that one in five people was drinking only bottled water, largely because of such doubts.

However, the “alternative” sold by these corporations is often a matter of perceived quality rather than an actual substantive difference. In reality, close to half of all bottled water is basically bottled tap water – sold back to consumers for thousands of times the price.

What’s more, bottled water is subject to far less independent regulation and oversight than our public water systems. The Environmental Protection Agency has jurisdiction over public water systems, while the Food and Drug Administration (FDA) is responsible for overseeing bottled water quality. Both agencies use a similar set of quality standards. While these standards are similar on paper, the FDA lacks adequate capacity to effectively monitor the industry, and largely relies on bottlers to police themselves.

Next, consider the environmental impact to manufacture plastic bottles; spend the energy to put it into bottles and ship it to distributors, then transport it to stores and refrigerate it until a customer spends up to $2 to buy a bottle. Pablo Pastër of Triple Pundit calculated the natural resource cost to be close to 7 times the amount of water actually contained in the bottle, plus a bunch of fossil fuel.

Taxpayer cost: even small towns spend hundreds of thousands of dollars a year to buy bottled water, instead of investing in tap water infrastructure, and the management and treatment of stormwater. Is this how you want your taxpayer dollars being spent?

We’re not done yet. Empty bottles still need to be thrown out! Stop Corporate Abuse tells us that according to the US Government Accountability Office (GAO),

… about three-quarters of the water bottles produced in the United States in 2006 were discarded and not recycled. Each year more than four billion pounds of PET plastic bottles end up in landfills or as roadside litter … Waste generation has a huge monetary impact on municipalities… Assuming the average national tipping fee of $35 per ton, these four billion pounds of plastic waste cost US cities at least $70 million annually, not including the costs of collection, trucking and litter removal.

Finally, people have begun to fight back against bottled water abuse.

Concord, Massachusetts has become one of the first communities in the U.S. to ban the sale of single-serving plastic water bottles … Octogenarian Jean Hill lead the charge, telling The New York Times in a 2010 interview, “The bottled water companies are draining our aquifers and selling it back to us.” She declared, “I’m going to work until I drop on this.”

And you can fight back too. Try a campaign in your own town or school. Here are some resources to get you started:
Ban the Bottle
The Water Project

All, Food, Health, Protection

Major corps take over organic brands & dilute them

April 17, 2013 Kimi Leave a comment

The organic designation in the United States doesn’t have the quality guarantee that it once did. That’s because major corporations have taken over the organic industry and are obviously looking to increase profits. That means buying up independent organic brands and then diluting the “organic” label by throwing their mega-billions of dollars behind lobbying to lower the standards that have protected the organic designation. Lower standards mean more profit, after all.

Is there something else going on here as well? For example, do major corps want to sell us frankenfood because they’re heavily invested in nursing homes, the healthcare and pharmaceutical industries? Well, maybe. That research is still waiting to be done, so stand by, folks.

For today, I can give you this graphic showing all of the once truly “organic” brands that are now owned by major food corporations.

I hope all my Jersey friends went out and voted for Board of Education candidates today. Let me know …