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A study that supports the controversial link between chronic fatigue syndrome and a new type of virus has been blocked from being published in a leading scientific journal even though it had been accepted for publication by its editors. The study, by virologists working for the US Government's Food and Drug Administration (FDA), is believed to support earlier findings published last October claiming that patients with the syndrome, also known as ME, are likely to be infected with a virus called XMRV, which some scientists believe may trigger the condition.

However, American government officials have persuaded the journal, the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, to hold off from publishing the scientific paper because it contradicted a second study by other government scientists at the Centres for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC), which like the FDA is also an arm of the US Department of Health and Human Services.

The CDC study did not find evidence for the presence of XMRV in patients with chronic fatigue syndrome, which led officials to postpone the paper's publication until the two government groups could clarify the discrepancy. However, the CDC paper has been published online by the journal Retrovirology after intervention by senior virologists concerned about it being held up.

Patients' groups fear there has been a conspiracy to suppress data in support of the idea that chronic fatigue syndrome is caused by a viral infection. However, scientists who have seen the FDA study have told The Independent that it is seriously flawed and should not be published in its present form because it cannot support its assertion of a link between chronic fatigue syndrome and XMRV.

Chronic fatigue syndrome affects about three in every 1,000 people – some 250,000 Britons – and results in severe physical and mental exhaustion. For many years it went unrecognised as a genuine medical condition and many doctors today would say that it has a psychological as well as a physical basis, but few believe it is caused solely by a viral infection.

However, last October the journal Science published dramatic findings suggesting that XMRV – murine leukaemia virus-related virus – could be infecting the vast majority of chronic fatigue patients. The work was carried out by a team led by Judy Mikovits, director of research at the Whittemore Peterson Institute in Reno, Nevada, who said that the discovery of a viral cause of the condition could revolutionise the treatment of ME.

Nevertheless, several attempts to replicate the findings by Dr Mikovits failed to establish a link between XMRV and the condition. Two groups in Britain and one in the Netherlands published studies showing no links to the virus, and three other groups, two in the US and one in Europe, have reported negative findings at conferences.

But in May, at a blood safety meeting in the Croatian capital of Zagreb, a respected virologist, Harvey Alter of the US National Institutes of Health Clinical Centre, gave a talk where he told the audience that he and his colleagues have independently confirmed the Mikovits' study, which is "extremely strong and likely [to be] true".

It is this study, led by Shyh-Ching Lo of the FDA laboratory in Bethesda, near Washington DC, that was submitted to and initially accepted by the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences. However, when officials from the Department of Health and Human Services heard about it they took fright that it would contradict the only other American study into XMRV and the syndrome that was ready for publication, according to sources.

William Switzer of the CDC failed to find any evidence for the presence of XMRV in 51 patients with chronic fatigue syndrome and a similar number of healthy people. "These data do not support an association of XMRV with [chronic fatigue syndrome]," the researchers concluded in their paper published in the journal Retrovirology.

Dr Mikovits said that the study was flawed because it failed to use patients that had been formally diagnosed with chronic fatigue syndrome and it failed to use "positive controls" in the form of blood from people who were known to be diagnosed with XMRV infection.

"We've now got more than 1,000 individual patients from around the world in whom we've detected and isolated the virus ... no, I haven't changed my mind on this," Dr Mikovits said.

XMRV was originally found in men suffering from prostate cancer and it was this discovery that led Dr Mikovits and her collaborators at the US National Institutes of Health to test blood samples stored from patients with chronic fatigue syndrome.

Shelly Burgess of the FDA said: "The FDA/NIH paper has not yet been accepted for publication. The paper is currently undergoing a rigorous scientific review process."

The Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences declined to comment

ME: the facts

* Chronic fatigue syndrome, or ME as it is often called, affects about 250,000 people in Britain and is estimated to have blighted the lives of some 17 million people worldwide.

* It was originally known by the derogatory term "yuppie flu" and was dismissed by many medical authorities as not a genuine condition with a physical basis.

* The condition seems to affect more people in their 40s and 50s although it can affect children and adolescents. More women than men report having the symptoms which can range from relatively mild tiredness to severe physical and mental exhaustion.

* Common symptoms can include impairment of short-term memory, sore throat, tender lymph nodes, muscle and joint pain, headaches and unrefreshing sleep. The main symptom however is chronic fatigue lasting for four months or more.

* Treatment can include cognitive behavioural therapy, a psychological approach to treat people with the severest symptoms. Physical treatment can include graded excercise therapy, where patients are encourage to gradually do more to combat their feelings of exhaustion.

* There is no strong evidence that the condition is infectious, although close relatives of a sufferer are at higher risk, possibly because of a genetic predisposition.

driver from www.independent.co.uk

A terrified young woman in a red headscarf bolts through a door into a darkened room. Chased by an angry mullah, she pulls out her phone and desperately tries to call for help, but there is no signal.

The scene could be another piece of secret video smuggled out of Iran by the kind of young activists who took to the streets in their hundreds of thousands last summer in the country's largest protests since the Iranian Revolution. Instead it is the opening scene of a new cover of Pink Floyd's seminal protest song "Another Brick in the Wall" which is becoming an underground anthem of resistance for those opposed to the Tehran regime.

Blurred Vision, a rock band fronted by two brothers whose family fled Iran in the late 1980s and settled in Toronto, have reworked the 1979 classic. Sepp and Sohl – the pair prefer to keep their full name secret to protect family members still in Iran – recorded the video with virtually no budget, but were helped by Babak Payami, an Iranian filmmaker who now lives in Austria and Terry Brown, one of Canada's best-known rock producers. Spliced with footage of last year's protests, the video is a rallying cry for Iran's disaffected youth and culminates with an altered version of Pink Floyd's original chorus: "Hey Ayatollah, leave those kids alone!"

The track has already racked up more than 100,000 hits on You Tube and has been shortlisted in the music category of tonight's Soho Shorts film festival. In a central London café, the brothers explained how their song has captured the imaginations of young Iranians in a country where rock music is banned. "We've been getting messages from so many Iranians saying they are using the song as a way to voice their protests," said Sohl who, at 35, is the older of the two brothers.

Sepp, 28, added: "A message came through to us last week and when Sohl translated it he had tears running down his cheeks. It was from a fan in Iran and he just kept saying over and over again: 'Keep our voice alive. If you don't then no one will hear us.'"

The brothers are also keen to encourage activists inside Iran to use a piece of software called Haystack, an ingenious encryption device which circumvents the government's internet controls. "It was invented by this 24-year-old guy from California who was so outraged at what was happening in Iran he decided to build some software," explained Sepp. "It works so well that it would take supercomputers hundreds of years to hack in and stop it. He wasn't even Iranian, he just wanted to help.

"We were initially worried that people might get angry," admits Sepp. "Hell, I'd get angry if anyone tried to top Pink Floyd. But the lyrics seemed to fit Iran so perfectly."

The pair began by recording the song and sending it to Roger Waters, one of Pink Floyd's founders. "We didn't want to do it without his approval, but he emailed back right away and said: 'From here on in, that version of the song is yours.'"

The band now have high hopes that their single will inspire Iranian protesters as it once did in South Africa when anti-apartheid activists used Waters' anthem to demonstrate against racial segregation in schools.

Sohl hopes that the crackdown on last year's protests will help to change perceptions of Iran among westerners from being an Islamic republic bent on acquiring nuclear weapons to a country crying out for change like South Africa once was. "On the surface it may look like the protesters were crushed but they have now opened a gate to the inevitable," he says. "Opinion in the West is changing and I think, in time, people will speak out with Iranians. It's about bridging that gap between east and west. Hopefully this song will help a little with that."

driver from www.independent.co.uk

SHOULD the Turks and Kurds live together? The answer from many of Turkey’s restive Kurds has long been no. A vicious separatist campaign launched by rebels of the outlawed Kurdistan Workers Party (PKK) has been raging since 1984. In recent months the PKK has stepped up its attacks, killing dozens of Turkish soldiers in and beyond the predominantly Kurdish south-east. Most recently, on July 20th, a Kurdish raid near the town of Cukurca killed six Turkish troops and injured at least 15.

But now a growing number of Turks are questioning the merits of cohabiting with the country’s estimated 14m Kurds. Never mind that Istanbul is the world’s largest Kurdish city, or that few of the provinces claimed by the Kurds are ethnically homogenous. In television debates and across the blogosphere support for the idea that the Kurds should go their own way is growing. Onur Sahin, who heads the Chamber of Agriculture in the Black Sea province of Ordu, says his fellow producers no longer want seasonal migrant Kurds to harvest their hazelnut crops.

Meanwhile, the military campaign against the PKK is intensifying. The mildly Islamist Justice and Development (AK) party, which has governed Turkey since 2002, plans to deploy a new professional army along the border with Iraq, where the PKK has havens. Some fear a return to the excesses of the 1990s, when over 3,000 Kurdish villages were forcibly evacuated and thousands of Kurds were imprisoned, murdered or disappeared.

Over the border, Turkish air raids on the PKK’s mountain bases in northern Iraq are increasing. America is helping by providing intelligence and broadening the air corridor used by Turkish fighter jets. Yet the Americans are worried by Turkey’s increasingly strident calls for the Iraqi Kurds to hand over some 200 rebels, including their own leaders. The last thing the Americans want to see, as they pull out of Iraq, is a war between Turkey and Iraqi Kurds.

All of this is a far cry from last year when AK heralded its so-called Kurdish “opening”. It made peace with the Iraqi Kurds and opened a consulate in Erbil, their capital. At home, a set of political and cultural reforms was meant to coax the PKK into laying down its arms, in the wake of a unilateral PKK ceasefire that was declared in April but that never took full effect. But the opening ground to a halt following the return last October of 34 PKK fighters to Turkey from Iraq. More were meant to follow. But the group prompted a public outcry by touring the south-east in guerrilla outfits, declaring victory. In response the government stepped up its arrests of members of the pro-Kurdish Peace and Democracy Party (BDP), accusing them of PKK membership. Half of the returnees have been put on trial for refusing to repent; ten are in prison. Last month the PKK hit back by calling off its truce.Some voices plead for a return to peace. A group of Turkish intellectuals has petitioned the government to change a controversial article of the constitution that deems all Turkish citizens to be Turks. One AK mayor has suggested that Turkish men take Kurdish women as second wives. Others say that AK must talk to the PKK’s imprisoned leader, Abdullah Ocalan. Despite 11 years of solitary confinement in an island prison off Istanbul, Mr Ocalan retains the loyalty of his fighters and the affection of millions of Kurds.

In fact, secret talks with Mr Ocalan, supposedly conducted by security and intelligence operatives, have reportedly been going on for some time. Murat Karayilan, the PKK’s commander in northern Iraq, says his group wants to talk to politicians, not spooks, and this week proposed a bilateral ceasefire. But as next July’s parliamentary elections draw nearer, Turkey’s prime minister, Recep Tayyip Erdogan, is unlikely to risk nationalist ire by openly talking to a group deemed by Turkey and its Western allies to be terrorists. On the other hand, as Mr Erdogan knows, abandoning reform in favour of war will only strengthen the hand of his opponents within the army. He is, as an old Turkish saying goes, holding a stick with shit at both ends.

driver from www.economist.com

She says in her "end of assignment report" to Ban that he tried to take control of investigations after her Office of Internal Oversight Services resisted his efforts to launch official probes into news leaks. The OIOS is meant to operate independently within the U.N.

Ahlenius at the time told Ban's Deputy Chief of Staff Kim Won-soo that, "in my opinion, it would also be seen as very negative on the secretary-general, who had advocated transparency, to pursue leaks."

She did not specify which news stories Ban was so concerned about.

The U.N.'s ability to police itself for major fraud and corruption since the disbanding of an elite, anti-corruption U.N. Procurement Task Force in 2008 is of concern to the United States and other major donors, who worry about the billions of dollars they contribute to improve the lives of the world's poorest people.

The task force had been set up in 2006 to supplement the work of OIOS, which was created in 1994 as the main U.N. agency for conducting audits, inspecting programs and investigating alleged fraud and corruption. But after the task force aggressively completed more than 300 investigations in three years and identified 20 significant fraud or corruption schemes, it was shuttered by the General Assembly because of opposition from some member nations that protested findings of wrongdoing involving their citizens or companies.

Its functions and caseload were supposed to be folded into OIOS' investigation division, but an AP investigation found a steep drop-off in the U.N.'s pursuit of fraud and corruption cases since the start of 2009.

Much of Ahlenius' report deals with her frustration at lacking real independence within the U.N., most notably by being blocked by Ban's office with filling top posts within OIOS.

"The fact is that you are not upholding to the letter, nor to the spirit, the General Assembly's decision to ensure an operational oversight body in the interest of the organization," she said. "In this sense your actions are not only deplorable, but seriously reprehensible. No secretary-general before you has questioned the authority delegated to (the head of OIOS) to appoint the staff in OIOS. Your action is without precedent and in my opinion seriously embarrassing to yourself."

Last year, similar criticism was voiced by Norway's then-U.N. Ambassador Mona Juul in another unusual personal attack on Ban. Juul accused him of weak leadership, lack of charisma and angry outbursts, in an internal memo leaked to Norwegian news media. Ban said in response he has provided quiet and effective leadership on many issues.

The staffing problems at OIOS included Ahlenius' inability to put in place her choice for a permanent head for the investigation division, a position filled by temporary directors since 2006. One of OIOS' other two main divisions also lacks a permanent director – and a replacement for Ahlenius has not yet been named despite the General Assembly instructing Ban to fill the post in a "timely" manner.

Ahlenius said an independent panel twice deemed a highly respected former U.S. federal prosecutor, Robert Appleton, to be the most qualified candidate for the directorship of the investigation division after two full recruitment rounds, with global advertising.

Catherine Pollard, assistant secretary-general for human resources, said Ahlenius failed to follow U.N. rules when she tried to hire Appleton by failing to put forward three names, including one woman. Ahlenius said in her memo, however, that Ban and his senior managers blatantly and intentionally blocked the appointment, showing disrespect for her oversight independence, and following Pollard's advice to consider unqualified female candidates would have violated U.N. rules.

UNITED NATIONS — A portrait of Ban Ki-moon as a secrecy-obsessed U.N. chief seeking to wrest control of internal investigations emerges from a blistering 50-page confidential memo by his former oversight chief.

The unusual memo by Inga-Britt Ahlenius, a copy of which was obtained by The Associated Press, describes Ban as more concerned with preventing news leaks than with releasing possible criminal evidence to prosecutors. It also details how she fought Ban's efforts to set up a competing "new investigative capacity" within the United Nations.

The Swedish former auditor general also stated that the secretary-general improperly refused to allow many of her office's audit reports to be made public, or to allow nearly all of its confidential investigative reports, with evidence of potential criminal wrongdoing, to be referred to outside prosecutors.

"Such secretiveness serves us poorly," Ahlenius wrote to Ban. "In fact you repeatedly profess to a leadership style of teamwork and collaboration. ... In reality, however, your style comes out as one of command and control."

U.N. spokesman Martin Nesirky said Thursday that Ban regrets that Ahlenius' confidential memo was leaked, but he considers her "frank thinking and advice" an important tool for improving his management and he and his senior advisers are "carefully reviewing" it.

Angela Kane, undersecretary-general for management, said Thursday the General Assembly, not Ban, had directed setting up a "task force" to help with investigations. "It is not correct to say that the secretary-general was attempting to set up another investigative capacity," Kane said.

Kane also argued that it was right for Ban to go after news leaks.

"There have been a number of leaks and, of course, the secretary-general would turn to OIOS to investigate any breaches. And a leak is a breach. I think that is perfectly understandable," Kane said.

Ahlenius, who stepped down as undersecretary-general in charge of U.N. oversight last week, was appointed in 2005 to a non-renewable five-year term by then Secretary-General Kofi Annan.

WASHINGTON — President Barack Obama on Thursday signed legislation intended to slash by $50 billion the taxpayer money improperly paid to dead people, fugitives and those in jail who shouldn't be getting benefits.

But that goal, if achieved, would not even halve the $110 billion made in such payments last year.

The new law will strengthen the efforts by federal agencies to halt the flow of improper money in a series of ways. Among those steps: requiring more audits of programs and adding penalties for agencies that don't comply with the law. The legislation also broadens how any recovered money can be used.

Obama chose to sign the bill in front of cameras in the White House's State Dining Room in hopes of bringing attention to the new law. He announced a goal of reducing improper payments by $50 billion by 2012; the White House says that last year's total of nearly $110 billion in these payments was the highest ever.

The president said the ultimate to goal is to end all improper payments.

"We have to challenge a status quo that accepts billions of dollars in waste as the cost of doing business," the president said.

Bad payments range from outright fraud to checks issued to the wrong person or for the wrong amount because of a typo. The president said that every dollar wasted should be going toward helping people afford college, providing benefits to the military and many other legitimate uses of tax money.

For perspective, he said the $110 billion figure in wasted money last year was more than the budgets of the Department of Education and the Small Business Administration combined. "That's unacceptable," he said.

The bill marked the latest effort by the administration to get a tighter handle on Washington spending, a politically sensitive issue as more Americans show concern about the nation's mounting debt. The president used the opportunity to recite a series of other measures to target unneeded spending under his watch.

Last month, he ordered creation of a federal "Do Not Pay List" – a database that agencies ultimately must search before writing checks to individuals and contractors.

Obama has proposed a three-year freeze in spending not tied to national security. He has instituted changes in how government contracts are awarded to save billions in such costs, and he has directed agencies to sell excess or underused real estate.

Las Vegas icon Wayne Newton spoke out on Tuesday about his undying support for Sen. Harry Reid (D-Nev.). The entertainment icon said on Fox News that although he is a Republican, he supports the Democratic Senate Majority Leader who he called a "personal friend."

"Anybody would be deaf, dumb, and blind to think that the second most powerful man in our nation, in terms of politics, should be replaced with someone else. Harry Reid is the best man I know for the job."
The Las Vegas legend did not show the same support for President Obama, whose criticism of Las Vegas earlier this year ignited an uproar from Nevadans. Newton explained that his "flippant statement had really incredible ramifications."

Wayne Newton holds a lot of sway in the state of Nevada (so much so that the Las Vegas mayor once reportedly skipped out on a meeting with Obama to see the entertainment star.) So, come November, Reid might just be singing "Danke Schoen" to Newton.

With Additional Reporting From Shahien Nasiripour

Two uniquely influential members of Congress announced their intention on Tuesday to push for Elizabeth Warren as the chair of the new consumer protection agency created under financial regulatory reform legislation.

House Financial Services Chairman Barney Frank (D-Mass), one of the key authors of the reform bill, formally signed a letter being circulated among House Democrats vouching for Warren's qualifications for the post. The letter calls the Harvard professor -- who envisioned the consumer protection agency and has been the chief purveyor of the idea -- the "best person" to lead the new bureau and "the perfect choice."

Frank's support of Warren was already known. But his signature on the letter -- authored by Rep. Carolyn Maloney (D-N.Y.) -- gives that effort a bit more weight.

A more symbolic Warren endorsement came elsewhere on Tuesday when Rep. Mary Jo Kilroy (D-Ohio) signed Maloney's letter and released a stand-alone statement explaining her support.

"Big banks and financial service companies spent the last decade telling us they could police themselves and what we got was the largest economic crisis since the Great Depression," said Kilroy. "The President must nominate Elizabeth Warren to the CFPB because we need aggressive regulators who are committed to protecting consumers from Wall Street excess."

An endangered freshmen Democrat whose re-election chances are very much in doubt, Kilroy's eagerness to align herself with the Warren cause underscores the extent to which the party views the nomination as a winning political issue.

Kilroy is far from a conservative member of the caucus. She backed the president's stimulus package, cap-and-trade legislation and health care reform (after much deliberation) -- all for which she has been relentlessly attacked.

But she's found solace and a campaign cause in contrasting her support for financial regulatory reform with her opponent's past as a bank lobbyist (on Wednesday Steve Stivers, who lost to Jo Kilroy in a remarkably close 2008 election, will host a fundraiser with financial services lobbyists). Supporting Warren helps solidify that contrast, an aide acknowledged, one that the congresswoman is hoping to demonstrate as prime evidence of her commitment to the regulatory reform cause.

The one possible trip-up, of course, would be if the Obama White House doesn't share the same enthusiasm for promoting Warren to the post. Though Frank and Kilroy certainly seem to be trying to force the president's hand.

Driver from: www.huffingtonpost.com

The Hampton Court Palace Flower Show is now the UK's largest gardening exhibition, run by the Royal Horticultural Society every July in West London.

Celebrating its 20th anniversary, the show was available to the public this year from July 6 to July 11.

Check out some brilliantly colorful pictures of the event below.

The Truth about Acid-Blocking Medications

At least 10 percent of Americans have episodes of heartburn every day, and 44 percent have symptoms at least once a month. Overall, reflux or GERD (gastroesophageal reflux disease, also known as heartburn) affects a whopping 25 to 35 percent of the US population! (i) As a result, acid-blocking medications are the third top-selling type of drug in America today. Two other drugs to treat reflux, Nexium and Prevacid, are among the world's best-selling drugs(ii) and account for $5.1 and $3.4 billion in sales annually (in 2006)!

Things have certainly changed since I was in medical school. In those days, GERD wasn't even considered a serious disease. Instead, people had heartburn or ulcers, but that was pretty much it. When acid-blocking drugs first came on the market, even the pharmaceutical representatives warned us how powerful these drugs were. They told us not to prescribe them any longer than six weeks and only for patients with documented ulcers.

Now, these drugs are given like candy to anyone who ate too many hot dogs at a ball game -- and one drug, Prilosec, is available without a prescription. Their manufacturers have created the illusion that we can eat whatever we want with no consequences, just by popping a pill. They even have commercials showing a family rushing to stop their father from eating a big sausage with fried onions and peppers -- and he tells them not to worry because he took his acid-blocking pill!

I know someone who used to work for the makers of Pepcid, another acid blocker. He told me that when it first became available over the counter, teams of drug company representatives would stand at the gates of county fairs and southern barbecues and hand out free samples.

In reality, acid-blocking drugs are a double-edged sword. Let's look at some of the recent research on the dangers of these drugs.

What the Research Tells Us About Acid-Blocking Medications

Acid blocking drugs obviously block acid that can cause symptoms of heartburn and reflux. But your body actually needs stomach acid to stay healthy. Stomach acid is necessary to digest protein and food, activate digestive enzymes in your small intestine, keep the bacteria from growing in your small intestine, and help you absorb important nutrients like calcium, magnesium, and vitamin B12.

There's evidence that taking these medications can prevent you from properly digesting food, cause vitamin and mineral deficiencies, and lead to problems like irritable bowel syndrome, depression, hip fractures, and more.

For example, studies show that people who take acid-blocking medications for the long term can become deficient in vitamin B12,(iii) which can lead to depression, anemia, fatigue, nerve damage, and even dementia, especially in the elderly.

The research also tells us that taking these drugs can cause dangerous overgrowth of bacteria in the intestine called Clostridia, leading to life-threatening infections.(iv) For many more people, low-grade overgrowth of bacteria in the small intestine leads to bloating, gas, abdominal pain, and diarrhea (many of the common "side effects" noted in the warnings for these drugs). This can cause irritable bowel syndrome.

In addition, a recent study in the Journal of the American Medical Association found that chronic use of acid-blocking drugs leads to an increase in the development of osteoporosis and increase in hip fracture because blocking acid prevents the absorption of calcium and other minerals necessary for bone health.(v)

All this is only part of the problem. There have even been some reports that these drugs may increase the risk of certain cancers.

These are serious health concerns, and it's pretty clear that in this case, the "cure" of acid-blocking drugs is worse than the "disease" of GERD. But that's of little comfort when you're suffering from heartburn.

So if drugs are not the answer, what is? We need to find the real causes of reflux and heartburn, get rid of them, and use the right foods, nutrients, and lifestyle therapies to heal the problem.

What Causes GERD?

Fried food, alcohol, caffeine, and soda can all trigger reflux. Spicy, tomato-based or citrus foods may also cause problems for some people. Smoking also increases the risk of reflux. Being overweight and having your belly fat push up on your stomach can prevent it from emptying, triggering reflux. Having a hiatal hernia (where your stomach pushes up through your diaphragm) can also cause trouble and can be diagnosed by x-ray. Eating large meals and eating before bed are two other main reasons for reflux. These are the most obvious causes, and the ones you have probably heard about. However, there are a few more that bear mentioning.

Stress contributes to reflux. Clearly, food is supposed to go down, not up, when you eat. That's why there are two main valves, or sphincters, that control food going in and out of your stomach -- the one at the top (or the lower esophageal sphincter) and one at the bottom (the pyloric valve). When you're stressed, the valve on the top relaxes and the valve on the bottom tightens up. This may result in food traveling back up your esophagus. Practice active relaxation and you mitigate this problem.

Magnesium deficiency is another cause of reflux because magnesium helps the sphincter at the bottom of the stomach relax, allowing the food to go down.

While controversial, I believe that a common infection can cause not just ulcers but reflux as well. This bug is called Helicobacter pylori and can be identified by a simple test blood or breath test. In my experience with patients, this treating the bacteria can eliminate reflux even if you don't have an ulcer.

Food sensitivities or allergies can also cause reflux. Common culprits include dairy and gluten-containing foods like wheat, barley, rye, and oats. Plus, overgrowth of bacteria in the small bowel or yeast overgrowth in the gut can cause reflux.

These are all treatable conditions that you don't need powerful acid blocking drugs to fix.

To properly diagnose the causes of your reflux, you may need to do the following.

1. Ask your doctor for an H. pylori blood antibody test or breath test.
2. Consider a test for IgG food allergies and celiac disease.
3. Get a breath or urine organic acid test to check for small bowel bacterial overgrowth.
4. If you don't get better with the suggestions below, consider getting an upper endoscopy or upper GI series x-ray to see if there is anything else wrong.

3 Steps to Permanently Overcoming Heartburn and Acid Reflux

Step 1: Treat the Bugs If You Have Them

• If you have H. pylori, treat it with triple antibiotic therapy from your doctor.
• Treat yeast overgrowth with antifungal drugs such as nystatin or Diflucan or herbs such as oregano or caprylic acid.
• Treat bacterial overgrowth in the small bowel with Xifaxin (see my blog on irritable bowel syndrome).

Step 2: Change Your Diet

• Try to eliminate dairy and gluten (see www.celiac.com for sources of gluten in the diet).
• Eliminate alcohol, caffeine, citrus, tomato-based, and spicy foods.
• Don't eat within 3 hours before bed.
• Don't eat junk food.
• Avoid processed foods.
• Eat cooked foods, like fish, chicken, cooked veggies, and rice; avoid raw food for now.
• Eat smaller, more frequent meals, at least four to five times a day.

Step 3: Try Some Natural Remedies to Help Soothe the Gut

• Take two to three capsules of digestive enzymes with each meal.
• Re-inoculate the gut with healthy bacteria by using probiotics.
• Try 75 to 150 mg of zinc carnosine twice a day between meals -- this has been extensively studied and is used frequently in Japan.
• Take 3 to 5 grams of glutamine powder in water twice a day to help heal the gut lining.
• Chew two to three chewable tablets of DGL (a form of licorice) 15 minutes before meals.
• Try 200 to 400 mg of magnesium citrate or glycinate twice a day.

As you can see, there's no need to suffer from heartburn and reflux -- or to take expensive and dangerous acid-blocking drugs. I hope the changes I've suggested here will soothe your stomach and have you feeling healthy in no time!

Now I'd like to hear from you...

Do you have heartburn, reflux or GERD? What seems to trigger it?

Have you taken acid-blocking drugs? What was your experience?

What changes have worked for you in preventing and treating these problems?

Please let me know your thoughts by leaving a comment below.

To your good health,

Mark Hyman, M.D.

The funding that has led to the development of the enormous American freeway system emerged from the historical needs of the society and was distinctively molded by its federal republic system of government. The first capital intensive movement for the improvement of

highways—publicly accessible throughways—began immediately after the American Revolution with construction of pay-as-you-go roads financing^^iElf )the expensive endeavor. Although some of the early turnpikes(ife j?£-$&), or toll roads, were public enterprises, it was primarily private sector companies, operating under federal land grant charters, that built and operated the first extensive roadways. However, when the maintenance fees eventually outpaced income, the majority of them abandoned their projects, thus leaving the federal government to step in and pick up the pieces. As the pattern of failing private road companies continued to the turn of the century, it became obvious that the only effective means of establishing and maintaining a project as financially intensive as the US highway system was to utilize the great fiscal power of public revenues(ifeA).

National financial aid to states for road funding began in earnest with the passage of the Federal-Aid Road Act of 1916, a major public works bill drafted to bring the government directly into the road business. In order to insure economic efficiency, the decision-making processes were kept at the local level to the greatest degree possible. According to the legislation, states chose the location of routes for development, planned the individual projects to be built, acquired the fight-of-way, and awarded construction contracts. Local governments paid for the work as it progressed and then claimed reimbursement(Sffj)from Washington for the federal-aid share of the cost.

The great success of the program, which has led to the impressive 6,230,012 km of streets in the U.S., has largely been attributed to the cooperation between the public and private sectors engendered by the legislative framework behind the spending plan. While central government funds ultimately support the roads, the state, county and city administrative bodies are free to procure bids from local companies, thus ensuring efficiency by maintaining a competitive environment.