Kids First CampaignIn September 2007 research from the University of Southampton in the UK was published in the esteemed medical journal, The Lancet, confirming that a combination of six artificial colours caused adverse behaviour effects in children “in the general population”. This research confirmed what parents and child health professionals have been saying for years – that some food additives have a very bad effect on children’s heath and behaviour. The scientists who conducted the study stated that the seriousness of the threat to children’s health from these additives in foods is comparable to the detrimental effect of lead on children’s development.The colours studied were Tartrazine 102, Quinoline Yellow 104, Sunset Yellow 110, Carmoisine 122, Ponceau Red 124 and Allura Red 129. As a result, in April 2008 the UK’s Food Standards Agency (FSA) called for these six colours to be removed from all foods in the UK by the end of 2009. The European Parliament has also introduced new legislation requiring manufacturers who continue to use these additives to display the following warning statement: Warning: may have an adverse effect on activity and attention in children.Action in Australia In comparison, Australia’s regulator, Food Standards Australia New Zealand (FSANZ), has taken no action at all. Indeed, the current advice on the FSANZ website states that the additives at the centre of the campaign are safe.To address this Julie Eady, best selling author of Additive Alert, has launched the Kids First Campaign with the aim of persuading FSANZ to follow the UK’s lead and remove these six additives from Australian food. The campaign is a combined initiative with Sue Dengate from the Food Intolerance Network and Kathleen Daalmeyer from Additive Education. To be launched on Monday 8 September, the campaign is supported by over 100 respected and influential Australians who have endorsed an open letter to FSANZ calling for a ban of these harmful additives.Where are these additives found?They feature widely in our everyday foods. They are added to fruit juices, cordials, muesli bars, dried fruit snacks, biscuits, custards and yogurts, as well as being used extensively throughout soft drink, ice cream and confectionery products.What can the public do?A national on line petition for the public to sign and add their voice to the campaign has also been launched at www.additivealert.com.au. The campaign will run for eight weeks and will enable thousands of Australian consumers to send a message to FSANZ stating that they expect better protection from our food regulator.At its core, the Kids First campaign aims to ensure Australian consumers are informed of to the dangers posed by these artificial additives.About Julie EadyJulie Eady is a full time mum to three young children and author of best selling book Additive Alert - Your Guide to Safer Shopping, which has now sold over 60 000 copies Australia wide. Her book has become the household shopping ‘bible’ for thousands of Australian families wishing to avoid harmful additives in foods and wanting to address health and behaviour problems, especially in children. She is the founder of Additive Alert Pty Ltd, established in 2004 to promote better awareness of harmful food additives and to advocate for better food labeling in Australia. Julie now coordinates the Additive Alert Consumer network of over 10,000 members, lobbying manufacturers and government to adopt a more precautionary approach to the use of some food additives. Julie is also a sought after public speaker and has become a well recognised advocate for the removal of harmful food additives from Australian foods. In 2007 Julie was awarded the West Australian Consumer Protection Award in recognition of the benefit her work, through Additive Alert, has delivered to the community, especially to children.About Sue DengateSue Dengate is a psychology graduate and former teacher who became interested in the effects of food on behaviour and learning through her own children’s experiences. Since then, Sue has published the best selling Fed Up series of books and a DVD, has twice been nominated as Australian of the Year and has talked to thousands of parents all over the world about the effect of foods on children’s health, behaviour and learning. In 1994, Sue founded the Food Intolerance Network to support families using an additive-free low-salicylate diet for health, behaviour and learning problems. With a current membership of over 6,000 families and 1,000 visitors a day, the network is run by Sue and her food scientist husband Dr Howard Dengate through the website www.fedup.com.au.About Kathleen DaalmeyerKathleen Daalmeyer is a psychology graduate who first became interested in the effects of food and additives after identifying the source of distressing food intolerance reactions in her own daughter. Through the Food Intolerance Network, Kathleen teamed up with another experienced mum, Jenny Ravlic, to form Additive Education. Their children changed from being argumentative, defiant, teary, annoying, and unfocussed, with sleeping, learning and health problems, to ones who enjoy each other’s company, sleep well, and can focus on school work - without coughs, rashes and tummy aches. This was all because of food! Having personally experienced the effects of food additives with themselves and their children, Kathleen and Jenny’s aim is to support others through the process of reducing or eliminating unnecessary food additives in their diet, and to increase understanding of the effects of food additives on children’s health, behaviour and learning ability. Through parent information sessions, supermarket tours, workplace seminars and school workshops, they help to simplify the process as much as possible. For many people, changing their eating and shopping habits to reduce the consumption of unnecessary and unsafe food additives can greatly improve health and behaviour.Media interviews Julie Eady, Sue Dengate and Kathleen Daalmeyer are available for media interviews by contacting Ruth Gourley at Shine Communications on (08) 9203 5891 or 0434 330 384.

I find it amazing that science spends billions of dollars on research on food and how food components, such as vitamins, minerals, phytonutrients, fats, carbohydrates and proteins help the health of the body.  I’ve always believed that if we eat food from nature as opposed to food that is technology born, then the body knows what to do with it in order to maintain a heathy, energetic body. We could have saved the money and just looked at food and how some foods resemble body parts. What is stunning is that all the research tells us what the food has been telling us for a long time. Read on;

A sliced Carrot looks like the human eye. The pupil, iris and radiating lines look just like the human eye…and science shows that carrots greatly enhance blood flow to and function of the eyes.

A Tomato has four chambers and is red. The heart is red and has four chambers. All of the research shows tomatoes are indeed pure heart and blood food.

Grapes hang in a cluster that has the shape of the lung. Each grape looks like a lung alveoli and all of the research today shows that grapes are also profound lung, heart and blood vitalizing food.

A Walnut looks like a little brain, a left and right hemisphere, upper cerebrums and lower cerebellums. Even the wrinkles or folds are on the nut just like the neo-cortex. We now know that walnuts help develop over 3 dozen neuron-transmitters for brain function.Kidney Beans actually heal and help maintain kidney function and yes, they look exactly like the human kidneys.

Celery, Bok Choy, Rhubarb and more look just like bones. These foods specifically target bone strength. Bones are 23% sodium and these foods are 23% sodium. If you don’t have enough sodium in your diet the body pulls it from the bones, making them weak. These foods replenish the skeletal needs of the body.Eggplant,

Avocadoes and Pears target the health and function of the womb and cervix of the female - they look just like these organs. Today’s research shows that when a woman eats 1 avocado a week, it balances hormones, sheds unwanted birth weight and prevents cervical cancers. And how profound is this? . It takes exactly 9 months to grow an avocado from blossom to ripened fruit. There are over 14,000 photolytic chemical constituents of nutrition in each one of these foods (modern science has only studied and named about 141 of them).

Figs are full of seeds and hang in twos when they grow. Figs increase the motility of male sperm and increase the numbers of sperm as well to overcome male sterility. 

Sweet Potatoes look like the pancreas and actually balance the glycemic index of diabetics.

Olives assist the health and function of the ovaries.

Grapefruits, Oranges , and other citrus fruits look just like the mammary glands of the female and actually assist the health of the breasts and the movement of lymph in and out of the breasts.

Onions look like body cells. Today’s research shows that onions help clear waste materials from all of the body cells They even produce tears which wash the epithelial layers of the eyes. 

Amazing

Cyndi O’Meara 

The Cancer Institute of NSW has released findings which establish that there is no safe level of alcohol consumption. The Institute recently released its report which reveals there is a strong link between alcohol consumption and cancer with high rates of risk from just two drinks a day. The Alcohol As A Cause Of Cancer report says the risk of cancer in the upper digestive tract is increased by 40% (voicebox) and 75% (mouth and throat) from consuming two drinks a day. The risk of breast cancer is 11% to 22% higher in women that drink than in non-drinkers. The Institute said there was evidence that heavy consumption increased the risk of liver cancer, starting at about 17% from two drinks a day. There was a smaller increase of 7% in the risk of stomach cancer from two drinks daily. Four drinks daily increased a man’s risk of bowel cancer by 64%. High alcohol consumption - about eight drinks a day - increased the risk at any site by 90%. Recently, the NSW Government announced an anti-alcohol program for students in year 3 to year 6. The National Health and Medical Research Council is reviewing its guidelines on alcohol consumption, with a draft recommendation that men and women not consume more than two drinks a day.

Being informed is the most important part of prevention.  My husbands very good mate loves his beer, and just recently he was diagnosed with throat cancer.  His doctor has not told him to stop drinking nor has his doctor told him to change his diet.  Instead he has been told to drink lots of fizzy drinks and to go through 7 weeks of radiation.  Cancer is an opportunity to change, if you continue to do the same things you’ll continue to get the same results.  If one cancer is cut out or goes into remission and you do not change your lifestyle then another cancer will eventuate.  

Let your children know the dangers of alcohol, fully inform them so that they don’t have to suffer the consequences later in life. 

Cyndi O’Meara 

Enough With The Statistics On Obesity Its Time For Action

Alright already we know that 1 in 4 Australians are either overweight or obese.  So what that we are now the fattest nation in the world by 1%.  Enough with the statistics it’s time to take action.

I believe the government should be taking action by taxing heavily, all processed and take away foods that do not support health and weight stability and use those taxes to subsidise healthy food such as meat, fish, chicken, fruit, vegetables, nuts, seeds, eggs, grains  and dairy.  Food prices are escalating, and more and more families are finding it harder to buy the basic foods to good health because of cost, so they are turning more to fast, processed takeaway food items that are cheaper.  But the economy stops there, as these people in turn are gaining weight as well as increasing the likelihood of heart disease, cancer and diabetes which in turn creates massive financial worries for medicare. 

The government and food science research are being ransomed by the big food producers of Australia.  All too often foods that are not healthy and conducive to weight management are being marketed as healthy and endorsed with bogus claims. 

Insanity is doing the same thing and expecting a different result.  For thirty years low fat, low joule has been pushed by a floundering weight loss industry and for 30 years we have been getting fatter as a nation.  If this was working then we wouldn’t be the fattest country in the world and we wouldn’t have a diet industry worth billions.

Time to do things different and instead of promoting weight loss and creating weight loss products such as low joule and low fat foods, its time to promote health by promoting healthy foods and making them affordable for every Australian.   

My 21 Day weight loss, get healthy e-book is the answer.  The results are phenomenal, no dieting, no counting calories, no low fat.  It is about eating again.  Eating real foods not diet foods.  For your copy go to www.changinghabits.com.au

Happy changing habits.

Cyndi 

Meat - My dilemma

For the past year my husband Howard has complained that there was not enough meat in the house.  I was in a real dilemma.  I was buying organic lamb, beef and chicken for many years but then the prices just became prohibitive, so I started to decrease the amount of meat I was buying and using.  In the interim I found a wonderful butcher who was selling meat and chicken wholesale and kept me happy for about a year.  After a year he closed up shop because he said the regulation with the organic food and meat was becoming cumbersome and bureaucratic.  I was back into my dilemma again.  

Just recently I was asked to speak at the Muttaburra Sheep Show which is about 1 hour north of Longreach QLD.  While I was there I met a lot of livestock farmers.  One in particular I had a very long conversation with about the husbandry of livestock farming.  I could tell immediately that he was the farmer I was looking for in order to supply my beef and lamb at a very competitive price and I knew that the meat was chemical free and farmed the way I endorsed.  And it just so happens that he was supplying direct from his farm lamb and beef. While I was in Muttaburra I tried his meat at three meals and I was most impressed, so when I got home I ordered my first lot from this wonderful farmer which arrived safely on Saturday.    Even though it has travelled a thousand kilometers to get to me I feel at last I’ve found my trusted farmer. 

If you’re interested in finding a farmer to supply good quality, chemical free, well farmed meat go to George and Anna Hetheringtons website and look at their farming practises and their ethics.  You will be very happy with their philosophy of chemical free, 100% grass fed, natural pastures meat.  www.mitchellgrassmeats.com.au 

Happy Changing Habits

Cyndi