The Healing Power of Full-Spectrum Light 2/2

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The Healing Power of Full-Spectrum Light 2/2

 

 

http://www.nexusmagazine.com/light.html

 

So the full-spectrum lights corrected the children's deficiency of vitamin

D3 (not the same as the toxic form of vitamin D added to milk), now

considered a pro-hormone. This enabled more complete calcium absorption--and

lowers the risk of osteoporosis and hip fractures in later life. Recent

research has found that nearly half the people of all age groups taking

RDA-strength supplements have too little vitamin D. When the body doesn't

have enough of it to absorb adequate calcium from food, it extracts calcium

from bone.64

 

FS light also strengthens immunity in other ways. It helps protect against

multiple sclerosis, heart attacks and conversion of HIV to AIDS, among other

things. These are elaborated and fully referenced in the remainder of the

paper [see NEXUS website]. " Protect ourselves from ultraviolet whenever we

can see our shadow, " as the EPA frighteningly warns? Won't doing that then

constitute a full-employment plan for dentists, orthopaedic surgeons and

oncologists as well as pharmaceutical drug companies?

 

 

 

? FS Light vs Cancers

Cancers hate full-spectrum light. A tumour-susceptible strain of mice lived

more than twice as long under full-spectrum as under standard lighting, and

rats exposed to full-spectrum light had significantly lessened tumour

development.65 The tunnel-visioned National Cancer Institute and American

Cancer Society ignore these findings, which six major medical centres have

confirmed.66

 

Terminal cancer patients, who Dr Ott knew of personally, got well in a

rocking chair in the sunshine. Dr Jane Wright, directing cancer research at

Bellevue Memorial Medical Center in New York City in 1959, was fascinated by

Ott's ideas. So she instructed progressive-tumour patients to avoid

artificial lights and stay outdoors as much as possible that summer. They

were not to wear sunglasses or prescription lenses, which block UV light. By

that fall, the tumours in 14 of 15 had not grown, and some patients had got

better; the one whose condition deteriorated sat outdoors but wore

prescription lenses. Ott has been criticised for making no scientifically

controlled human studies. Well, funding for continuation of that study was

withdrawn--that was his experience over and over.67

 

One woman with cancer ventured out with Norwegian fishermen, ate a lot of

their catch and recovered; friends ate fish but stayed inside--and their

cancers killed them.68 Had she " protected " herself from UV when she could

see her shadow, as the EPA advises, would her cancer have ended? And if

sun-loving Arizonans threw away their sunscreens and sunglasses and limited

their sun exposure to about 30 minutes a day,69, 70 wouldn't their cancers

largely disappear?

 

A Chicago-area elementary school suddenly reported five times the national

average incidence of leukaemia, a kind of cancer of the blood. All of the

afflicted children but one were being taught in rooms where teachers kept

the blinds drawn, and the children were exposed all day only to

melanoma-promoting fluorescent light. When even the amount of UV that can

get through window glass was let in, the leukaemia cluster disappeared.71

(Raymond Peat, PhD, thinks FS sunlight is best received through glass.72)

 

 

 

? FS Light vs Arthritis and Blindness

Early in his research career, Dr Ott fell and broke his glasses; soon, his

arthritis disappeared. And in 1996, Marion Patricia Connolly, executive

director of Price & endash;Pottenger Nutrition Foundation (PPNF), had much the

same experience. Full-spectrum eyeglasses, i.e., lenses that transmit all

ultraviolet light, are difficult to find. I take off my glasses outdoors

whenever I can.

 

Exposed to full-spectrum light, a father rat is docile and even helpful

after his babies are born. But when the same rat pair is moved under

standard light, before the birth of the next litter the male must be removed

to prevent aggressiveness and cannibalism. Moved back to natural light for

still another litter, he is gentle again.73 Although human fathers aren't

likely to eat their babies, do we really want more domestic aggressiveness?

 

Alternating full-spectrum light and total dark cured children born blind as

a result of brain injury. The technique was advocated by W. H. Bates about

1904 and endorsed by Aldous Huxley in 1930. Efficacy was confirmed in the

recent Annual Report from the British Institute for Brain Injured

Children.74

 

How can all this be explained? Full-spectrum light, entering the eyes during

waking hours, promotes night-time pineal gland secretion of melatonin. This

sleep-promoting antioxidant destroys carcinogenic hydroxyl radicals--and

also slows ageing.75, 76 Melatonin can suppress growth of human breast

cancer cells in vitro (in a test tube), and can cross all barriers to enter

every cell.77, 78 So enough sleep--best achieved in total

darkness79--becomes anti-ageing, antioxidant, anti-cancer, anti-heart attack

therapy!

 

Except in short-term emergencies, people younger than about 50 should use

supplements of melatonin cautiously, if at all.80 For people over 40 to 45,

one to three milligrams before bedtime safely promotes both prompt falling

asleep and a good night's rest, in addition to its other benefits.81

 

In a laboratory, viruses are weakened by exposure to full-spectrum light

that includes traces of UV. Infectious organisms such as E. coli K12 AB2480,

which can cause food poisoning, dislike ultraviolet too.82 The Morris Center

in Winnipeg, Canada, promotes " amazing " healing by shining full-spectrum

light onto wounds.83

 

 

 

? FS Light vs Seasonal Affective Disorder

The power of full-spectrum light against SAD (seasonal depression)--again,

by entering the eyes--has been amply demonstrated. FS light benefits

nonseasonal depression, too,84 but not as much.85 Such light energises and

regulates the body's entire chemistry. Won't " protecting " millions of people

from UV, as the EPA advocates, then worsen the growing epidemic of

depression?

 

Dietary sufficiency of vitamin D also needs consideration here. " Seasonal

affective disorder has been treated successfully with vitamin D. In a recent

study covering 30 days of treatment comparing vitamin D supplementation with

two-hour daily use of light boxes, depression completely resolved in the D

group but not in the light-box group. " 87

 

The cells in the retinas of your eyes will not divide and regenerate without

a small amount of ultraviolet light. And so full-spectrum light reduces the

risk of retinal degeneration, the leading cause of blindness among the

elderly.88 Retinal haemorrhage, the most severe phase of the condition, can

also result from long-term use of aspirin.89 (A prominent ophthalmologist

declared the outcome " unlikely " ; however, an exhaustive computer literature

search by Kirk Hamilton, PA-C, publisher of Clinical Pearls News, found no

refutation of the finding.) White willow bark provides the same benefits as

aspirin without stomach irritation or blindness, as do three glasses daily

of purple grape juice. And unlike aspirin,90 the flavonoids in purple grape

juice remain effective when adrenaline levels rise.91 Two 400-milligram

capsules of white willow bark are equivalent to one baby aspirin.92 Eating a

lot of dark-green leafy vegetables such as spinach,93 kale and Brussels

sprouts also helps avoid this condition.94, 95

 

Many dermatologists advise older patients to stay out of the sun to avoid

skin cancer. The thousands of elderly patients rotting in nursing homes come

to mind. That advice may unintentionally help to make patients sicker and

older beyond their years. Staying indoors will cause problems a lot worse

than skin cancer. Older people's bones will crumble and break

(osteoporosis); these elderly patients will hate living (depression).

Articles in the journals Cancer, Cancer Research and Preventive Medicine

suggest that avoiding sunlight could promote the development of cancers

other than those of the skin.96, 97, 98

 

 

 

? FS Light vs Neurological Diseases

Research by Reuven Sandyk, MD, who practises medicine in Connecticut, shows

that long-term deprivation from sunlight exposure increases the risk of

multiple sclerosis and Parkinson's disease through depressed secretion of

the hormone melatonin by the brain's pineal gland. This appears to explain

the south-north gradient in the incidence of MS: the farther from the

equator, the more common it is.99 All the MS patients he tested had

extremely low melatonin levels and their pineal glands were calcified, or

hardened.

 

Reduction in melatonin secretion, he found, may be associated with zinc

deficiency in ADHD (attention deficit hyperactivity disorder).100 " Since

melatonin stimulates serotonin synthesis,[101] and serotonin deficiency has

been linked to aggressive behaviour,[102] it is possible that a high

prevalence of conduct disorder and aggressive behaviour in ADHD patients

could be related to reduced melatonin and serotonin associated with (but not

caused by) zinc deficiency.[103] "

 

Dr Sandyk applies extremely weak alternating-current fields to the brain;

this stimulates melatonin secretion, bringing about remarkable subjective

and objective improvement of MS and Parkinson's patients within one to two

minutes. The magnetic field he uses is at 2 to 7 hertz (vibrations per

second), a physiological frequency, i.e., near the rate used by brain

neurotransmitters.

 

Melatonin destroys carcinogenic hydroxyl radicals by neutralising their

precursor molecules, and so it should help against Parkinson's and

Alzheimer's diseases.104 Melatonin interferes with oestrogen receptor sites

on cells; excessive oestrogen from the Pill and from HRT causes breast cells

to hyperproliferate (become cancerous), and melatonin blocks this action.105

It also slows senescence.106 The decline in its levels in everyone's bodies

owing to longer daily exposure to light has been suggested as one possible

factor explaining the continual spread of cancer in the 20th century.107,

108 Some of Dr Sandyk's patients with Alzheimer's disease, migraine and pain

syndromes also benefit from exposure to such magnetic fields--suggesting

that sunlight deprivation may contribute to the aetiology of those

distressing illnesses.109

 

 

 

? FS Light vs CHD and Infections

Staying completely out of the sun may also increase the risk of heart

attacks and much more by another route. David Grimes, MD, at Blackburn Royal

Infirmary in Blackburn, UK, notes that heart attacks are commonest in the

parts of the world--such as northwest United Kingdom--that have the least

sunshine. And Asian populations in the British Isles have a particularly

high risk of death from heart attack that cannot be explained on dietary

grounds. Having come from countries in which the sun is so strong that

exposure must be minimised, they have a cultural tendency to avoid the sun.

 

Dr Grimes traces causation of many cases of CHD (coronary heart disease) to

the microbe Chlamydia pneumoniae and low immunocompetence from too low a

level of vitamin D among those avoiding sunshine. Sunlight could determine

whether squalene, the precursor to both vitamin D and cholesterol, converts

into vitamin D (in the presence of enough sunshine) or into excessive

cholesterol (if sunlight is deficient.)110 A deficiency of vitamin B6

promotes infection, e.g. by H. pylori and Chlamydia, as one of its

mechanisms of increasing risk of heart attack.111, 112

 

Dr Grimes links respiratory infections and chronic bronchitis, called " the

English Disease " , to poor immunocompetence due to sunlight deficiency,

worsened by cigarette smoking. (In southern Europe, smoking rates are much

higher, but recurrent respiratory tract infections are scarce.) Glasgow,

Scotland, has high rates of osteomalacia and rickets, which he says are

definitely the result of sunlight deficiency. Dr F. A. Spencer has noted a

higher incidence of heart attacks in winter; he has related this to low

levels of vitamin D and to depression from the winter months.113

 

Also, Crohn's disease (regional enteritis or intestinal irritation) is much

more common in cloudy northwest England than in sunny southern Europe--that

is, if we accept that Crohn's is a microbial disease, as current research

confirms, probably due to Mycobacterium paratuberculosis. Once again,

sunlight in the Mediterranean area could be protective through

immuno-enhancement.114

 

There are other risks. An Alabama researcher found that lack of enough

sunshine exposure may increase the risk of hypertension in blacks and other

dark-skinned people. Those with greater amounts of pigment in the skin

require six times the amount of ultraviolet B (UVB) light to produce the

same amount of vitamin D3 found in lighter-skinned people.115 And Dr Esther

John of Northern California Cancer Center reported that daily exposure to

sunshine, without sunscreen, appears to lessen the risk of breast cancer.116

 

 

 

Addendum I

? Skin Cancers

What about skin cancers? One was taken off my nose in 1989, and another in

1997; such skin cancers are totally harmless if removed promptly. Recent

research has found at least two ways to minimise even that occasional

inconvenience, and these offer other major benefits:

 

(a) Drink lots of green tea. In one study, cancer-sensitive mice were

pre-treated with a strong carcinogen; their only source of liquid, green

tea, lowered keratoacanthomas and carcinomas by 65 to 90 per cent.

Decaffeinated tea has been found to be nearly as effective as plain.117

Applying green tea to the skin was equally effective against tumour

formation from a carcinogen or intense UV light.118 And in an animal tumour

model, green tea ingredients induced apoptosis (programmed cell death " for

the good of the organism " ) among cancer cells.119

 

Recent research has found that tea can be high in fluoride. The tea plants

grow best on fluoride-rich soil and can suck up the chemical from dumped

fluoride as well. This fluoride is toxic and can weaken thyroid

function.119a

 

The bioflavonoids--flavone compounds that accompany vitamin C in plant

structures120--in green tea help prevent cancers, cardiovascular and liver

diseases as well as keratoses.121 And they explain why green tea is nearly

20 times stronger an antioxidant than vitamin E in the alpha-tocopherol

form.122

 

(b) Eat a diet low in trans- fats, supplemented by fresh, organic,

refrigerated flaxseed and cod liver oils for omega-3 essential fatty acids

(EFAs).

 

One hears warnings of glaucoma (excessive pressure in and hardening of

eyeballs) from sun exposure. That is a risk if you eat a processed-food

diet. The EFAs are largely lacking in low-fat Western diets, including the

US Department of Agriculture's " food pyramid " . Among many other health

benefits, omega-3 EFAs regulate eye pressure.

 

Glaucoma can also result from the use of inhaled steroids for treating

asthma. For many older patients, inhaled steroids intended to block or

reduce inflammation, and formerly claimed not to circulate throughout the

system, promote glaucoma--the leading cause of blindness--and cataracts. In

a comparative study, the glaucoma risk appeared to be elevated by 44 per

cent compared to matched patients not using inhaled steroids. Lea Davies of

Georgetown University Medical Center in Washington, DC, adds that inhaled

steroids may cause about one-third of the 3,000 glaucoma cases developing

each year among Americans over the age of sixty-five.123 Also, a published

clinical test showed that melatonin offers still another benefit: it lowers

eyeball pressure in glaucoma patients--and the insomnia age group, for whom

its use is safe and appropriate, is the same as the glaucoma age group.124

Flaxseed oil is best taken with 400 international units (IUs) of antioxidant

vitamin E,125, 126 which should include the other members of the

natural-source tocopherol complex as well as the d-alpha part.127 Germany's

late Johanna Budwig, PhD, developer of this therapy,128 was nominated seven

times for a Nobel Prize and continued activity into her tenth decade of

life. How much flax oil? Healthy people should have one to three

teaspoonfuls a day, either out of a spoon or in food, e.g., on salads (the

oil must have a pleasant, nutty flavour). And sick people? In her books, Dr

Budwig told of hundreds who recovered from cancer, diabetes, lupus,

bronchial spasms, Hodgkin's disease, atherosclerosis, stomach ulcers,

prostate disease, arthritis, eczema and immune deficiency syndromes

including multiple sclerosis. They accomplished these healing miracles by

taking three tablespoonfuls of flax oil a day with unpasteurised cottage

cheese to improve absorption. The benefits of this diet can be strengthened

by resveratrol, another bioflavonoid found in grapes and other natural

foods.129

 

No one is interested in paying for a controlled trial of flaxseed oil

therapy. Its successful proof and wide use would destroy much of medical

practice and the pharmaceutical drug industry as well as the careers of the

researchers involved and the editor of any journal that published the

findings. And since medical journals rely on hundreds of millions of dollars

yearly in revenues for advertising from pharmaceutical drug companies, the

journal itself would be out of business in 10 minutes.

 

Raymond Peat, PhD (chemistry), a world authority, has shown that coconut

oil, consumed in the diet at an ounce [29.6 cc] or more per day, enables the

body to generate ample essential fatty acids (also see below). He also warns

that supplemented EFAs can weaken immunity and actually poison the body;

they are deliberately used in organ transplantation to minimise risk of

rejection by the recipient's immune system.130

 

 

 

Addendum II

? Selenium supplements

Supplemented selenium (Se) at 50 to 250 micrograms daily protects the skin

against damage from excess sun exposure.131 (Intakes above 250 mcg, which

could be toxic, should be used only for short periods under the guidance of

a knowledgeable practitioner.) Two grams a day of vitamin C, taken together

with 1,000 IU of vitamin E, also protects against sunburn.132

 

Hardly anyone will experience skin damage from our suggested 20 to 30

minutes' daily sun exposure. But the selenium supplement is worth taking on

its other merits, which are extremely important:

 

(a) A massive scientific/medical literature supports selenium's efficacy

against cancer and cardiovascular disease (CVD). A map of the United States

showing areas of low soil selenium almost perfectly matches maps showing the

areas of highest incidence of both cancer and CVD. The same is true in New

Zealand and Australia.133 Crib death (cot death, or SIDS, sudden infant

death syndrome) is also more common in areas of low soil selenium, such as

in America's Pacific Northwest and parts of New Zealand.134 (See also Dr

Lendon Smith's and my work on SIDS.135, 136)

 

(b) More than 10 papers published in the past two years relate declining

selenium levels to the progression of HIV (human immunodeficiency virus)

disease. An article in the Journal of AIDS (September 30, 1997) found that

patients deficient in Se are almost 20 times more likely to die of causes

related to HIV than are people with enough Se.

 

Recent research has discovered that selenium at 200 & endash;250 mcg a day can

likely prevent mutation of latent, dormant retroviruses, including HIV, into

virulent forms.137, 138, 139, 140, 141, 142, 143, 144, 145 This should lower

and perhaps eliminate the risk of AIDS (acquired immune deficiency syndrome)

among HIV-positive persons.

 

Dr Harold Foster argues:146 " The association of depressed CD4 T-cell counts

and depleted plasma selenium stores is not coincidental. Rather, it provides

evidence of the operation of a positive feedback system in which a fall in

serum selenium triggers a reduction in the number of CD4 T-cells, which in

its turn causes a further decline in serum selenium. This downward spiral

undermines the immune system " --in what he dubs the " selenium-CD4 T-cell

tailspin " . Accordingly, incidence of HIV/AIDS is high in areas of Africa

where selenium in the soils is low, irrespective of people's sexual

behaviour.147, 148

 

Intramuscular injections of vitamin B12,149 supplements of vitamin E complex

and N-acetyl-cysteine (NAC)150 also strengthen this AIDS defence. NAC seems

to help replenish stores of reduced glutathione, lower inflammatory

oxidative stress reactions and help protect against mitochondrial DNA

damage, in turn decreasing replication of the virus.151, 152 Glutathione is

humans' chief internally generated antioxidant. The DNA in the mitochondria,

the " power houses " of all our cells, has been described as 2,000 times more

susceptible to oxidative damage than nuclear DNA.153 Adequate NAC serves

further to facilitate detoxification in persons who have poor phase-II

glucuronidation.154

 

Will Taylor, PhD, proposed a mechanism for selenium's action. He is at the

Computational Center for Molecular Structure and Design, Department of

Medicinal Chemistry, University of Georgia. Dr Taylor sequenced the genetics

of innocent, harmless retroviruses that normally lie dormant and cause no

symptoms--retroviruses such as herpesvirus Simplex A, Coxsackievirus and

HIV. (The usually benign character of HIV has been massively documented by

Peter Duesberg, PhD, a leading retrovirologist at the University of

California, Berkeley. To label HIV " the AIDS virus " or say that it " [always]

causes AIDS " is wrong. Half of American AIDS patients are HIV-negative; and,

as Dr Duesberg wrote in 1996, probably 90 per cent of the approx. 21 million

HIV-positive people worldwide are healthy.155, 156)

 

Dr Taylor concluded that Coxsackievirus, HIV and certain other retroviruses

are coded for the production of a selenoprotein; and he predicted that the

selenoproteins produced by those viruses act as brakes on the viruses'

reproduction. In effect, with enough Se present, the HIV retrovirus makes

its own " birth-control pill " . And so selenium has become very popular in HIV

virus clubs.157 When there isn't enough Se (the low level may not reflect

inadequate dietary Se intake, Dr Taylor said), the virus goes wild.

Supplemented selenium, even if the HIV can't be eradicated, can effectively

put it to sleep, preventing its conversion into AIDS.158

 

 

 

? Coconut Oil

Coconut oil, like mother's milk, is rich in lauric acid, which the body

converts to the antiviral fatty acid monolaurin. Dr Robert Atkins writes:

" This may help in disarming a number of infectious viruses, including those

that cause measles, herpes, Cytomegalovirus, vesicular stomatitis, and

possibly AIDS. " However, Dr Atkins's endorsement doesn't extend to coconut

milk, which contains too much sugar.159

 

(Excessive sugar intake is now recognised as the number one risk factor for

heart attacks in women, and number two for men; excessive animal fat intake

is number two for women, and number one for men.160 A major part of the

explanation is this: just one teaspoon of sugar impairs the immune system by

about 40 per cent for several hours, as Emanuel Cheraskin and associates

found.161 Many Americans consume an average of two or more teaspoons of

sugars of all kinds, every hour and all day, and thus keep their immunity

constantly low. A very large number of heart attacks appear to be the result

of infection, e.g., by H. pylori and Chlamydia pneumoniae.)

 

Mark Konlee, in his newsletter, Positive Health News, wrote about how

coconuts saved an AIDS sufferer's life:

 

" Chris, an AIDS sufferer, found his viral load had reached almost 700,000.

He went for a relaxing vacation, packed all his drugs and headed for an

Indian village in Surinam; there he dined on fresh coconut meat every day.

Within two days his peripheral neuropathy was gone, and within two weeks he

was 'running through the jungle'.

 

" Back home, continuing to consume at least half of a coconut per day, his

lab tests showed the viral load had dropped to just over 300,000. Within

another month the viral load had dropped to non-detectable. 'My doctor is

completely baffled,' said Chris.

 

" PPNF members may not be so puzzled. They read about the amazing health

benefits of coconut, especially its antiviral characteristics, in Dr Mary

Enig's article in vol. 20 #1 of PPNF Health Journal in 1995. " 162

 

 

 

Author's Note:

This paper enlarges and updates my article on full-spectrum light, first

published in Price-Pottenger Health Journal, Winter 1995, with added

details, Spring 1995. Recent research, not yet incorporated into this paper,

fully supports the statements made and conclusions here reached.

Endnotes on url

 

 

 

 

 

 

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