HAMLET: Substance Found in Breast Milk Kills 40 Types of Cancer Cells
"Frankenstein" or Scientific Breakthrough?: U.S. Biologist Starts Controversy with "Artificial" DNA
Eugenics, Margaret Sanger Now Part of Texas Textbook Controversy
Commentary: The Pill's Dirty Little Secret
Yale Study Says Babies Have Built-In Developing Sense of Morality
Free iPad Pregnancy App Reveals Development of Unborn Baby
World Bank Boosts Focus on Reproductive Health
Tax Funding Of Pro-Abortion Kansas PP that Faces 107 Criminal Charges Could Be Stopped by KS Governor
Commentary: Uzbekistan's Forced Sterilization and the West's Indifference
Did DHS Pressure Teen to Get Abortion?
NARAL's President Admits: Pro-Aborts Aging, Pro-Lifers Young and Zealous
Doctors Pursue House, Senate Seats
Limiting Nurse Workloads Good for RNs and Patients
Virginia Axes ‘Health’ Exception in State Funding for Abortions
Man Who Killed MI Pro-Lifer Gets Life Term
DOMINICAN REPUBLIC OFFICIALLY RECOGNIZES PREBORN
NEW DOCUMENTARY DETAILS BLACK GENOCIDE IN 21st CENTURY AMERICA Maafa21.com
Great News for Life in the 21 States that Currently Have the Choose Life Plate for Sale
Northwestern University Students Expose Planned Parenthood
PP is to Blame for the U.S. STD Epidemic…
HAMLET: Substance Found in Breast Milk Kills 40 Types of Cancer Cells
Swedish researchers have discovered that a substance found in human breast milk has the ability to kill cancer cells, according to a study published in the PLoS One Journal.
The substance known as HAMLET (Human Alpha-lactalbumin Made Lethal to Tumor cells), was discovered years ago, but has just recently been tested on humans.
In the trial conducted at Lund University in Sweden, patients suffering from bladder cancer were treated with HAMLET. After each treatment, the patients excreted dead cancer cells in their urine, healthy cells remaining intact.
Previous laboratory experiments showed that HAMLET has the ability to kill 40 different types of cancer cells, but this was the first test conducted on humans. The next step will be to test the substance on skin cancer and brain tumors.
The trial breakthrough increases the hopes that HAMLET will be developed into a cancer treatment medication in the future. [April 20, 2010, http://www.foxnews.com/story/0,2933,591289,00.html ]
Click here to read Research Article from PLoS One — "HAMLET Interacts with Lipid Membranes and Perturbs Their Structure and Integrity" published 23 February 2010, http://www.plosone.org/article/info%3Adoi%2F10.1371%2Fjournal.pone.0009384
Abstract
Background
Cell membrane interactions rely on lipid bilayer constituents and molecules inserted within the membrane, including specific receptors. HAMLET (human α-lactalbumin made lethal to tumor cells) is a tumoricidal complex of partially unfolded α-lactalbumin (HLA) and oleic acid that is internalized by tumor cells, suggesting that interactions with the phospholipid bilayer and/or specific receptors may be essential for the tumoricidal effect. This study examined whether HAMLET interacts with artificial membranes and alters membrane structure.
Methodology/Principal Findings
We show by surface plasmon resonance that HAMLET binds with high affinity to surface adherent, unilamellar vesicles of lipids with varying acyl chain composition and net charge. Fluorescence imaging revealed that HAMLET accumulates in membranes of vesicles and perturbs their structure, resulting in increased membrane fluidity. Furthermore, HAMLET disrupted membrane integrity at neutral pH and physiological conditions, as shown by fluorophore leakage experiments. These effects did not occur with either native HLA or a constitutively unfolded Cys-Ala HLA mutant (rHLAall-Ala). HAMLET also bound to plasma membrane vesicles formed from intact tumor cells, with accumulation in certain membrane areas, but the complex was not internalized by these vesicles or by the synthetic membrane vesicles.
Conclusions/Significance
The results illustrate the difference in membrane affinity between the fatty acid bound and fatty acid free forms of partially unfolded HLA and suggest that HAMLET engages membranes by a mechanism requiring both the protein and the fatty acid. Furthermore, HAMLET binding alters the morphology of the membrane and compromises its integrity, suggesting that membrane perturbation could be an initial step in inducing cell death.
["HAMLET Interacts with Lipid Membranes and Perturbs Their Structure and Integrity" published 23 February 2010, http://www.plosone.org/article/info%3Adoi%2F10.1371%2Fjournal.pone.0009384 ;
20 April 2010, http://www.foxnews.com/story/0,2933,591289,00.html ]
"Frankenstein" or Scientific Breakthrough?: U.S. Biologist Creates Controversy with Artificial DNA
An American pioneer biologist and entrepreneur, Craig Venter of the J. Craig Venter Institute (JCVI) in Maryland and California, has created an international media stir with his announcement yesterday that he has created the world’s first cell with artificially constructed DNA.
Despite media reports to the contrary, the researchers did not “create new life,” but instead artificially constructed an existing sequence of DNA of a naturally occurring bacterium and reproduced it in existing cells.
In the study, published in the peer-review journal Science, the researchers copied the genome, or complete genetic sequence, of an existing bacterium. They sequenced its genetic code and then used “synthesis
machines” to chemically construct a copy. The new DNA was inserted into cells of a different type of bacteria. These reproduced daughter cells with both the natural and artificial DNA. The bacteria with the artificially constructed DNA replicated over a billion times.
“This is the first time any synthetic DNA has been in complete control of a cell,” said Venter, who likened the process to creating software for a computer. He told the BBC, “We’ve now been able to take our synthetic chromosome and transplant it into a recipient cell – a different organism.
“As soon as this new software goes into the cell, the cell reads [it] and converts into the species specified in that genetic code.”
Venter, who has been working for years to create artificial life forms, responded in his autobiography to criticisms that he has gone too far and is “playing God,” saying, “I always reply that – so far at least – we are only reconstructing a diminished version of what is out there in nature.”
“I think they're going to potentially create a new industrial revolution,” he said. “If we can really get cells to do the production that we want, they could help wean us off oil and reverse some of the damage to the environment by capturing carbon dioxide.”
Media has responded to the report with near-hysteria, with headlines referring to “Frankenstein” experiments and warnings against “playing God.” The Daily Mail asked, “Could it wipe out humanity?”
The Mail quoted Professor Julian Savulescu, an Oxford University ethicist, who said, “Venter is creaking open the most profound door in humanity's history, potentially peeking into its destiny. He is not merely copying life artificially or modifying it by genetic engineering. He is going towards the role of God: creating artificial life that could never have existed.”
“This could be used in the future to make the most powerful bioweapons imaginable. The challenge is to eat the fruit without the worm,” he added.
Despite the frenzied media reaction, however, responses from religious leaders have been more measured.
The cardinal at the head of the Italian’s bishops’ conference, Angelo Bagnasco, said the invention is “further sign of intelligence, God's gift to understand creation and be able to better govern it.”
Bagnasco told ANSA news agency, “On the other hand, intelligence can never be without responsibility. Any form of intelligence and any scientific acquisition … must always be measured against the ethical dimension, which has at its heart the true dignity of every person.”
[Friday May 21, 2010, Hilary White, www.LifeSiteNews.com, http://www.lifesitenews.com/ldn/2010/may/10052106.html]
Eugenics, Margaret Sanger Now Part of Texas Textbook Controversy
Backstory, from TheNewAmerican.com, May 1…
The TX State Board of Education is embroiled in a battle over textbook content that, media reports claim, could dictate public school curricula nationwide. As the single largest textbook purchaser in the country, TX is a major decision-maker regarding content of books available on the market, since publishers naturally cater to their most lucrative client.
… and from Fox News, May 20:
The TX Board of Education has 5 Democrats, and 10 Republicans, 7 of whom vote as a conservative block.
What does that mean? They control what happens here….
texas board of education 3.png
[W]hen Democrats enjoyed an identical majority, they too manipulated the curriculum to fit their agenda.
The debate began when a review group of teachers recommended replacing Christmas with a Hindu holiday and removing partially or entirely Alexander Graham Bell, Albert Einstein, religious references, and Christopher Columbus….
… which brings us to yesterday and today, from MyFoxNY.com…
The TX Board of Education is putting the finishing touches on a final set of proposed social study standards. For months the 2 sides have been far apart on a number issues ranging from race to religion.
sanger getty.jpg
The divide grew with the introduction of new amendments Thursday, including one that says high school books should outline the practice of eugenics – the sterilization of a selected group of people.
The idea supported by early progressives like Planned Parenthood founder Margaret Sanger [pictured above left]….
The board is set to vote Friday.
Here was one of the 2 changes proposed yesterday, the insertion of one little but potent word (click to enlarge) into the curriculum:
Recommended Change
A) analyze causes and effects of events and social issues, such as immigration, Social Darwinism, EUGENICS, race relations, nativism, the Red Scare, Prohibition, and the changing role of women…
The justification given for the curriculum change is compelling. I don't know why anyone would oppose educating our children about this sordid component of U.S. history:
[F]rom War Against the Weak, by Edward Black, 2003:
In the first 3 decades of the 20th Century, American corporate philanthropy combined with prestigious academic fraud to create the pseudoscience eugenics that institutionalized race politics as national policy. The goal: create a superior, white, Nordic race and obliterate the viability of everyone else.
How? By identifying so-called "defective" family trees and subjecting them to legislated segregation and sterilization programs. The victims: poor people, brownhaired white people, African Americans, immigrants, Indians, Eastern European Jews, the infirm and really anyone classified outside the superior genetic lines drawn up by American raceologists.
eugenics book.jpg
The main culprits were the Carnegie Institution, the Rockefeller Foundation and the Harriman railroad fortune, in league with America's most respected scientists hailing from such prestigious universities as Harvard, Yale and Princeton, operating out of a complex at Cold Spring Harbor on Long Island.
The eugenic network worked in tandem with the U.S. Dept. of Agriculture, the State Department and numerous state governmental bodies and legislatures throughout the country, and even the U.S. Supreme Court.
They were all bent on breeding a eugenically superior race, just as agronomists would breed better strains of corn. The plan was to wipe away the reproductive capability of the weak and inferior.
Ultimately, 60,000 Americans were coercively sterilized – legally and extra-legally. Many never discovered the truth until decades later. Those who actively supported eugenics include America's most progressive figures: Woodrow Wilson, Margaret Sanger and Oliver Wendell Holmes.
This is all just simple, sad, documented truth. Who would argue against teaching it? What would their arguments possibly be?
[HT: Susie Allen at Pro Life in TN; top photo via the New York Times]
First Comment Noted:
I'm not a fan of some of the Texas School Board's hyperpartisan recommendations, but like you said, there is no debating the fact that the eugenics movement played a sad role in American history. Students already learn abo
ut other stains on our history like the Japanese internment during WWII.
The whole point is that, by teaching history, we hope that the next generation of leaders will be able to avoid repeating it.
Perhaps the real objection to the inclusion of historical eugenics is that some bright students may realize that history is already being repeated…
Posted by: Kelsey at May 21, 2010 12:50 PM
[21 May 2010, http://www.jillstanek.com/eugenics-margaret-sanger-now-p.html ]
Commentary: The Pill's Dirty Little Secret
By Judie Brown
As the media hype begins to die down over the not-so-wonderful 50th anniversary of the birth control pill, Hollywood’s own Raquel Welch opines that she “laments the havoc that the free-sex ethos has wreaked on marriage and family life.”
In a CNN column entitled, appropriately, “It’s sex-o’clock in America,” she writes,
One significant, and enduring, effect of the pill on female sexual attitudes during the ‘60s was: "Now we can have sex anytime we want, without the consequences. Hallelujah, let's party!"
It remains this way. These days, nobody seems able to "keep it in their pants" or honor a commitment! Raising the question: Is marriage still a viable option? I'm ashamed to admit that I myself have been married four times, and yet I still feel that it is the cornerstone of civilization, an essential institution that stabilizes society, provides a sanctuary for children and saves us from anarchy.
In stark contrast, a lack of sexual inhibitions, or as some call it, "sexual freedom," has taken the caution and discernment out of choosing a sexual partner, which used to be the equivalent of choosing a life partner. Without a commitment, the trust and loyalty between couples of childbearing age is missing, and obviously leads to incidents of infidelity. No one seems immune.
You probably haven’t seen her interviewed about this startling, rather uncommon perspective but nonetheless, it is refreshing to witness at least some soul searching in one of the sectors of the cultural mix from which emanates so much depiction of sexual satisfaction as the only thing that matters.
On the other hand, as my good friend Chris Kahlenborn, M.D., pointed out, the American College of Obstetricians and Gynecologists, from which sprang the twisted attitudes that made the pill acceptable, continues to deceive and deny the truth. In its celebratory editorial on the pill, ACOG’s Vice President of Practice Activities Hal Lawrence, M.D., characterizes the birth control pill as perfectly safe. The article opines,
The pill remains one of the safest and most popular forms of contraception in the U.S. No other single medication has empowered American women and impacted their quality of life as has the pill. "The challenge ahead is to improve more widespread and consistent use of contraception in the U.S. to help reduce the number of unplanned and undesired pregnancies," said Dr. Lawrence.
This is all it took for Kahlenborn to respond since he is among the few honest physicians who have studied the pill and its connections to such dreadful diseases as breast cancer. Kahlenborn immediately wrote the following letter to the editor entitled “The Pill After 50 Years: That Dirty Little Secret.” Perhaps ACOG will ignore it, but here it is:
Last week was the 50th anniversary of the Food and Drug Administration’s approval of the birth control pill in the United States. Newspapers and magazines around the country ran stories on this, mostly extolling the social and medical benefits of the pill. This theme was bolstered by a recent communiqué from the American College of Obstetricians and Gynecologists (ACOG), which noted: “The pill remains one of the safest and most popular forms of contraception in the U.S.” (Office of Communications, ACOG, May 6, 2010,)
I find it disturbing that after nearly 50 years, both the media and the medical establishment have failed to give a true airing to one of the pill’s most dangerous side effects, namely, that “dirty little secret.”
What’s that?
One need only check the Mayo Clinic Proceedings—the major medical publication of the Mayo Clinic—to find our little-known study, which showed that the pill increases the risk of premenopausal breast cancer substantially when taken at a young age (see Mayo Clinic Proceedings: October 3, 2006).
In October 2006, we reviewed the medical literature and combined data in an analysis (referred to as a meta-analysis): We found that 21 out of 23 studies showed that using oral contraceptives prior to a woman’s first birth resulted in a 44 percent increased risk in premenopausal breast cancer.
Our meta-analysis remains the most recent study in this area and updates the previously analysis (the Oxford analysis published in 1996), which relied on older data with older women (two-thirds of whom were over age 45); unfortunately, the Oxford study continues to be quoted by ACOG, textbooks, the National Cancer Institute, the American Cancer Society and most researchers and obstetricians, claiming that oral contraceptives carry little breast cancer risk especially 10 years after last use.
I continue to be amazed at the discordance between the medical literature and public/medical awareness.
To my dismay, after our meta-analysis was published, the Mayo Clinic sent out a press release to all major media in the country. The response? ( ).
The blank space between the parentheses is purposeful. Although our meta-analysis received scant internet coverage, almost no major media covered this study, which is shocking, given the fact that about 40,000 women in the U.S. get premenopausal breast cancer annually, oral contraceptives are an elective risk factor and our study is the most recent meta-analysis to date on the oral contraceptive-breast cancer link.
In addition to our meta-analysis, it’s important to note that the World Health Organization classified oral contraceptives as a Class I carcinogen in 2005—the most dangerous classification.
Even more data has come forth recently in a paper by several researchers—one of whom is a major researcher of the National Cancer Institute—which not only cited our meta-analysis, but found that oral contraceptives increase the risk of triple-negative breast cancer in women under 40 by 320 percent (triple-negative breast cancers are extremely aggressive). (Cancer Epidemiology, Biomarkers & Prevention, April 2009.)
Few in the medical establishment, or the public, are aware of this data, or if they are, young women almost never hear about them. It’s been almost four years since the publication of our study in the Mayo Clinic Proceedings; I am beginning to think that our study has been effectively “buried.”
Breast cancer and the pill—that dirty little secret? Some day perhaps someone in the media and/or medical establishment will dust a little dirt off those pink ribbons and let young women hear all the facts so they can finally make truly informed decisions.
Dr. Kahlenborn is the lead author of the Mayo Clinic Proceedings' article cited above. He testified before the FDA in June 2000 regarding the link between oral contraceptives and breast cancer. His insights are notably absent from the current spate of publicity being given to the pill, but they are nonetheless among the most hon
est you are likely to see. If you want to learn more, feel free to contact or interview Dr. Kahlenborn any time.
CONTACT INFO:
The Polycarp Research Institute (www.polycarp.org)
Box 105
Enola, PA 17025
717-732-4904
[email protected]
[ALL Pro-Life Today, 14 May 2010, Judie Brown is president of American Life League, www.all.org]
Yale Study Says Babies Have Built-In Developing Sense of Morality
Researchers in baby psychology at Yale University in New Haven, Connecticut say that they have gathered evidence that suggests babies demonstrate a “rudimentary” moral sense very soon after they are born, indicating that morality may be hardwired into human beings from the very beginning.
The UK Daily Mail reports that researchers at Yale University devised several tests that they say showed that babies under a year old had an innate sense of “naïve morality,” as opposed to a blank mental slate that would be formed by their interactions with older members and their experiences.
Yale researchers at the Infant Cognition Center said that the babies in their study showed a preference for “helpful” actors versus “hindering” actors, thus showing a “rudimentary” sense of morality. One experiment involved a “one-act morality play” in which a toy dog is attempting to open up a box. The researchers found that the babies preferred to select the teddy bear who helps the dog open the box, over the bear who sat on the box frustrating the dog’s efforts.
Another scenario involved the babies watching a puppet cat roll a ball to two puppet rabbits. When the cat rolled the ball to the first rabbit, it rolled the ball straight back. But the second rabbit ran off with the ball that the cat had rolled to it. The babies also preferred the first rabbit, who rolled the ball back to the cat.
'With the help of well designed experiments, you can see glimmers of moral thought, moral judgment and moral feeling even in the first year of life,” said Professor Paul Bloom, a psychologist at Yale University in Connecticut, who has devoted years of study to observing how moral sense can develop in babies. “A growing body of evidence suggests that humans do have a rudimentary moral sense from the very start of life.”
Bloom in a recent essay for the New York Times, explained more insights from the experiments that he and his colleagues had conducted at Yale’s Infant Cognition Center.
“The results were striking. When the target of the action was itself a good guy, babies preferred the puppet who was nice to it,” wrote Bloom. But he added that he saw this intuitive moral hardwiring in babies when it came to the administration of baby justice.
“What was more interesting was what happened when they watched the bad guy being rewarded or punished. Here they chose the punisher,” said Bloom. “Despite their overall preference for good actors over bad, then, babies are drawn to bad actors when those actors are punishing bad behavior.”
“In the end, we found that 6- and 10-month-old infants overwhelmingly preferred the helpful individual to the hindering individual. This wasn’t a subtle statistical trend; just about all the babies reached for the good guy,” he continued.
Bloom speculated that this rudimentary sense of morality was “not for action, but for learning” – a sort of baseline for developing moral faculty. He said that it was similar to how all human beings are born with sexual faculties that, while they are there, are still immature, and do not develop until well after birth.
Bloom clarified that his research does not show that babies “believe” that the helpful character is in fact “good” and the hindering one is actually “bad,” but that they showed a “preference” for the object behaving in a way that adults would characterize as “good” and an “aversion” to the one behaving as “bad.”
But Dr. Nadja Reissland of Durham University told the Mail that while she believed that babies begin to learn the difference between right and wrong from birth, she said the Yale psychologists work does not conclusively show that a moral sense is hardwired into the body.
“By saying pushing the ball up the hill is helpful, the researchers are making a moral judgment. The babies might just prefer to see things go up rather than down,” she said. She added that babies also do not show an understanding as to whether the actors in certain scenarios may be actually doing something beneficial, and therefore good, when they are frustrating some goal which would be harmful, and therefore bad.
“In the other test, perhaps the bear closes the box to prevent the dog from getting in there because there is something dangerous inside,” said Reissland. “It is like a mother keeping children out of an area where there is something harmful.”
Read Dr. Paul Bloom’s Essay “The Moral Life of Babies” in the New York Times. [ http://www.lifesitenews.com/ldn/2010/may/10051009.html
[10May10, Peter J. Smith, London, www.LifeSiteNews.com]
Free iPad Pregnancy App Reveals Development of Unborn Baby
Pro-lifers have often struggled to counter the assertion that unborn babies are "just a clump of cells" that look nothing like human beings. Now, they have one more method to help show the truth: an application for the iPad that displays images of unborn babies from week four to week forty.
The app allows the baby's gender, size, due date, and weight to be entered to customize the information it displays. It can display life-size images of the baby as the baby changes throughout pregnancy, with close-ups, information to read, and even audio clips.
The program was developed by the baby products company Pampers, and directs users to the Pampers pregnancy calendar for further information. It also allows users to post their baby's progress on Facebook.
The app may be downloaded for free here… http://itunes.apple.com/us/app/hello-baby-pregnancy-calendar/id364683781?mt=8
[10May10, by James Tillman, www.LifeSiteNews.com]
World Bank Boosts Focus on Reproductive Health
In releasing a new 5-year Reproductive Health Action Plan, the World Bank said it would increase len
ding to reduce high fertility rates and prevent deaths of mothers and their children in 58 developing countries.
It will do this by increasing access to contraceptives, encouraging more frequent prenatal visits for pregnant women, expanding education on the subject and investing more in training new health workers. [http://www.reuters.com/article/idUSTRE64A53620100511, Reuters; Pro-Life Today | 12 May 2010]
Tax Funding Of Pro-Abortion Kansas PP that Faces 107 Criminal Charges Could Be Stopped by KS Governor
For the second year in a row, the Kansas legislature has passed the Huelskamp Amendment that would stop tax dollars from funding Planned Parenthood in Kansas. This particular Planned Parenthood currently faces 107 criminal charges – 23 of which are felonies – all related to the commission of illegal late-term abortions.
Right now, Planned Parenthood is getting hundreds of thousands of tax dollars each year from the state of Kansas even though it stands accused of over a hundred counts of criminal conduct. Why? Because the governor vetoed this legislation.
It's shocking but true. Without our tax dollars, this Planned Parenthood would struggle to say in business.
In fact, last year, Gov. Mark Parkinson, an avid abortion supporter, not only vetoed this budget amendment, but increased Planned Parenthood's funding by a outrageous 21.1% despite undercover audio recording provided by Operation Rescue that showed Planned Parenthood was still willing to violate the law by concealing an incident of child rape and even handing over birth control pills to help the rapist cover up his crimes!
To add insult to injury, Parkinson then completely defunded pro-life pregnancy help centers, just to insure that struggling abortion sites stayed in business.
This year, Kansas is so cash-strapped that it is raising taxes to burdensome new levels – all so they can give abortionists at Planned Parenthood another raise.
"This gross injustice – not to mention the lack of common sense on behalf of political hacks that are in bed with the abortion lobby – makes me sick with 'righteous indignation,'" said Operation Rescue President Troy Newman. "We simply cannot allow that to happen again this year."
The Huelskamp Amendment, introduced by pro-life hero Sen. Tim Huelskamp, has passed the legislature and now sits on Parkinson's desk awaiting his signature.
Operation Rescue asks that members of the public contact Gov. Parkinson's office today and ask him to allow the Huelskamp Amendment to become law: (877) 579-6757.
"It is simply unconscionable that the taxpayers should be burdened with footing the bill for Planned Parenthood's baby-killing business – especially while it is facing over 100 serious criminal charges related to illegal late-term abortions," said Newman.
[Topeka, KS, PFLI Pharm Facts E-News Update — 14 May 2010, www.pfli.org]
Commentary:
The Silence of the Complicit: Uzbekistan's Forced Sterilization and the West's Indifference
by Colin Mason
Gulbahor Zavidova's story is a tragic one: brought in for a caesarian section, she was sterilized during the procedure—and never informed. Frustrated at her inability to conceive again, she visited a doctor, only to be informed that she had been sterilized. Upon learning this, her husband left her.
Zavidova's story has become unfortunately common in Uzbekistan. According to news sources in the area, Uzbekistan's “president” (read: Soviet-era dictator) Islam Karimov has revisited an old mass sterilization campaign, bringing thousands of women in to be sterilized like farm animals. The Times Online reports:
Activists say mass sterilisation began in 2003, but was eased after two years following an outcry. It is said to have restarted in February this year, when the health ministry ordered doctors to recommend sterilisation as an “effective contraceptive”. Critics claim every doctor was told to persuade “at least two women” a month to have the procedure. Doctors who failed faced reprisals and fines.
“We estimate that since February, about 5,000 women have been sterilised without consent,” said a local human rights campaigner who fears detention if she is named.
In many cases, doctors opt for delivery by caesarean section and then perform a sterilisation without telling the woman. Widespread rumours of the practice have resulted in women opting for home births to avoid the risk.
Although news of this shocking campaign has reached the West via outlets like the Times Online and LifeSiteNews, reaction from most major human-rights groups has been, well, nonexistent.
We think we know why.
Following the collapse of the Soviet Union in 1991, the five former Soviet Central Asian Republics (the “stans:” Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan, Tajikistan, Turkmenistan, and Uzbekistan) finally achieved independence. Naturally, the United States was quick to offer a diplomatic relationship with these countries. However, with these diplomatic ties came U.S. foreign aid dollars—and a now-infamous U.S. foreign aid agenda.
In a 1997 report, PRI reported on how USAID quickly made population control their highest priority in all 5 central Asian nations—with a vengeance. USAID's “assessment team” was sent in to decide what was most needed by the Central Asians, but before they set foot on Asian soil, the assessors had already decided what the answer would be.
“Predictably,” PRI reported, “the assessment team discovered that there was a critical need for birth limitation and large quantities of contraceptive supplies were required throughout the region again, even though it is one of the least densely populated places on the planet. Indeed, since USAID officials had already begun planning a seminar on dealing with the alleged deficiencies, what was the purpose of the 'assessment' trip? Typically, the basic decisions had already been made as to how to address the 'needs' yet to be discovered.”
As a result of this “investigation,” USAID proceeded to sterilize women. Lots of women. In fact, one USAID report claimed that USAID officials had implanted IUDs (intrauterine devices) in more than one million women in 1991 alone.
However, according to PRI's documentation, this is not only appalling, it is impossible. “Inasmuch as the total population of Uzbekistan was some 21 million,” PRI reported. “there were less than five million women of reproductive age in the entire population. No matter how 'aggressively' pursued the task, is it credible that health officials could possibly have inserted IUDs in more than 20 percent of the relevant female population in just one year's time? Such an IUD 'success' story was all the more improbable in view of the outdated and creaky health care systems in the CAR, complicated by severe shortages of basic drugs and medical supplies, including IUDs.”
Whatever the number actually was, USAID turned out to be far less of a primary care provider than a militant contraceptive/sterilization pusher. The numbers of women permanently scarred and broken from their campaign remains unknown, but undoubtedly it remains tragically high. PRI's report concluded that “unfortunately, in Central Asia, deliverables to USAID will include much more than pounds of useless reports and wasted monies. Permanently sterilized women and victi
ms (including deaths) from Norplant, Depo-Provera, IUDs and birth control pills will also be delivered up by USAID's population control henchmen.”
To this day, USAID has a presence in Uzbekistan, albeit a more restrained one. Their FY 2011 Congressional budget justification allocates about $12 million for use in that country, including $146,000 on “reproductive health.”
Which brings us to this year's news about massive sterilizations. It seems clear that, even if USAID is no longer directly involved with sterilizing tens of thousands of women, their legacy lives on. It is highly doubtful that a nation like Uzbekistan, emerging from the murk of Soviet oppression and being only lightly populated, would prioritize population control in this way. And yet, it mysteriously continues to do so.
And worse, there is practically no public outcry in the West. Organizations like USAID count on their own silence, and the brevity of the public consciousness, to make these human rights scandals go quietly into the night. Rarely is there any press fanfare, or any collective public outrage.
The rationale is simple: if overpopulation is an issue, then the suffering of thousands is just collateral damage for the cause of saving the planet. And, as far as many of these groups are concerned, the sterilization of the faceless, nameless poor in faraway lands is an acceptable alternative to visiting the same measures upon women in the West.
Which brings us back to the core of the matter: that “overpopulation” is just another way to say “poor people,” and “reproductive health” is often just another way to say “ethnic cleansing.” [10 May 2010 PRI Vol. 12 / No. 13 Colin Mason is the Director of Media Production at Population Research Institute.
Comment: The population control program jumpstarted by USAID in Central Asia following the collapse of the Soviet Union continues. Women are being sterilized without their fore-knowledge or consent—in one of the least densely populated countries on earth. Steven Mosher]
Did DHS Pressure Teen to Get Abortion?
http://www.philly.com/philly/news/homepage/92649094.html?cmpid=15585797
Philadelphia Daily News; ALL Pro-Life Today, 04 May 2010]
A Department of Human Services caseworker pressured a pregnant Mayfair teenager to undergo a late-term abortion by threatening to take away either her toddler or her unborn baby if she had the child, according to the teen's foster mother. The alleged strong-arm tactic happened one day after DHS learned of the pregnancy, when the girl was about 22 weeks pregnant, according to her foster mother and the girl's social worker, Marisol Rivera.
NARAL's President Admits: Pro-Aborts Aging, Pro-Lifers Young and Zealous
The pro-life movement in America is growing in leaps and bounds, attracting young, zealous women to defend the unborn in droves – a fact that even the president of NARAL has now admitted.
NARAL's Nancy Keenan told Newsweek last week that she considers herself a member of the "postmenopausal militia" – a phrase that captures the situation of pro-abortion leaders who are aging across the board, including the leadership of Planned Parenthood, and the National Organization for Women. Newsweek's Sarah Kliff notes that "these leaders will retire in a decade or so."
[http://www.lifesitenews.com/ldn/2010/apr/10042108.html , Life Site News]
Doctors Pursue House, Senate Seats
47 vying, three times the number now in Congress
In an election year dominated by health care, dozens of candidates for Congress have a catchy campaign slogan at their disposal: Send a doctor to the House.
Forty-seven physicians — 41 Republicans and 6 Democrats — are running for the House or Senate this year, 3 timres the number of doctors serving in Congress today, according to a USA Today review. An influx of doctors to Congress could alter the landscape for future debates over Medicare and rising insurance premiums months after lawmakers approved Obama's 10-year, $938 Billion health law.
Physician candidates start with at least one political advantage: voter confidence.
A Gallup Poll in March found 77% of Americans trust doctors to do "the right thing" on health policy, compared to 32% for Republican leaders and 49% for Obama.
"Physicians just have a different mind-set toward problem solving" said Larry Bucshon, a Republican heart surgeon running for a House seat in Indiana. "It's very good training for being a congressman."
Most of the candidates are touting their profession on the campaign trail. Nan Hayworth, a Republican running for a New York House seat, posts a copy of her medical degree on her website. Ami Bera, a Democratic House candidate from California, told supporters, "My whole adult life has been given to the task of caring for others."
"We're trained as physicians to lead by listening" said Bera, who supports the new health law but worries it won't do enought to lower costs…
The political arm of the American Midical Association does not track how many doctors run in primaries, but reports that 30 physicians ran in the 2008 general election compared with 22 in 2006.
Sen. Tom Coburn (R-OK) a doctor and opponent of the health law, said more physician input may have led to a better law: "The physician perspective was ignored during the last year and a half."
There are 16 doctors in Congress today, 3% of lawmakers. Doctors made up nearly 5% of Congress during its first century, said Thomas Suarez, a cardiothoracic anesthesiologist in Baltimore who studied the issue: "There are a lot of physicians who are incredibly frustrated with the way medicine is today. A very small, though growing number want to make a change." [19Apr10, USA Today, front page, John Fritze, D.C.]
Limiting Nurse Workloads Good for RNs and Patients
Authors and Disclosures
A law passed in California in 2004 limiting the number of patients that can be assigned to a nurse has contributed to lower mortality rates among general surgery patients and increased job satisfaction among the state's nurses, according to the first comprehensive evaluation of the legislation, published online April 9 in Health Services Research.
The California law, the first in the nation, specifies that nurses may care for no more than
5 patients in a medical-surgical unit,
4 pediatric patients,
2 intensive care patients,
6 psychiatric patients, or
3 patients in labor and delivery.
Linda H. Aiken, PhD, RN, director of the Center for Health Outcomes and Policy Research at the University of Pennsylvania School of Nursing, Philadelphia, and colleagues examined general surgery outcomes data and hospital staffing information from California in 2006, 2 years after the law was enacted. The researchers did the same in Pennsylvania and New Jersey — 2 states without mandated nurse staffing requirements — and compared how nurse and patient outcomes are affected by differences in nurse workloads across the hospitals in these 3 states.
The analysis included 22,336 hospital staff nurses working in 604 adult nonfederal acute care hospitals in California (n = 9257 registered nurses [RNs] in 353 hospitals), New Jersey (n = 5818 RNs in 73 hospitals), and Pennsylvania (n = 7261 RNs in 178 hospitals). Small
(<100 beds), medium (101 – 250 beds), and large (>251 beds) hospitals were represented.
The authors report that average workloads were significantly lower (P < .05) for RNs in California than in New Jersey and Pennsylvania (mean patients per shift, 4.1 in California vs 5.4 in New Jersey and Pennsylvania). The percentage of California nurses on medical-surgical wards who reported overseeing 5 or fewer patients on their last shift, as mandated under California law, was 88%; the same was true of only 19% and 33% of medical-surgical nurses in New Jersey and Pennsylvania, respectively. On medical-surgical wards, California RNs cared for 2 fewer patients on average than New Jersey RNs and 1.7 fewer patients than Pennsylvania RNs.
"Sizeable" Effects on Surgical Inpatient Mortality
Dr. Aiken's team used logistic regression models to estimate the effects of nurse staffing on 30-day inpatient mortality. The results suggested that there would have been 13.9% fewer deaths among surgery patients in New Jersey and 10.6% fewer in Pennsylvania if hospitals in those states had been staffed at the same average level as California hospitals .
"In these two states alone, 468 lives might have been saved over the 2-year period just among general surgery patients if the California nurse staffing levels were adopted," Dr. Aiken notes in a university-issued statement. "Because all hospitalized patients are likely to benefit from improved nurse staffing, not just general surgery patients, the potential number of lives that could be saved by improving nurse staffing in hospitals nationally is likely to be many thousands a year," she predicted.
Better Work Environment
The survey also found significantly and consistently greater job satisfaction among California RNs. Higher percentages of nurses in California than in New Jersey and Pennsylvania reported that
their workloads are reasonable (73% vs 59% and 61% for New Jersey and Pennsylvania, respectively),
they receive substantial support in doing their jobs (66% vs 53% and 55%, respectively),
there are enough staff RNs to provide quality care (58% vs 41% and 44%, respectively),
there are enough staff RNs to get their work done (56% vs 40% and 44%, respectively), and
30-minute breaks are part of their typical workday (74% vs 51% and 45%, respectively).
All of these differences were significant to the P < .01 level.
In addition, a smaller percentage of nurses in California than in New Jersey and Pennsylvania reported that their workloads caused them to miss changes in patient conditions (33% vs 41% and 37%, respectively; P < .01). There was also evidence that a significantly lower proportion of California RNs experience high burnout (29% vs 34% and 36%, respectively).
Dr. Aiken's team notes that although nurse self-reports of workloads may be prone to bias, in previous research they found them to have "considerable predictive validity and better predictive validity than [American Hospital Association] measures of nurse staffing." The researchers also say they rigorously controlled for a variety of nurse characteristics that might affect the data, such as education and experience, as well as patient and hospital characteristics that might affect the results.
"The California experience may inform other states that are currently debating nurse ratio legislation," Dr. Aiken and colleagues conclude, noting that Massachusetts, Minnesota, New Jersey, Illinois, and Oregon are among 18 states currently evaluating nurse staffing issues.
The study was supported by the National Institute of Nursing Research, National Institutes of Health, the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation, and AMN Healthcare Inc. The authors have disclosed no relevant financial relationships.
Health Serv Res. Published online April 9, 2010.
[21April2010, Megan Brooks, http://www.medscape.com/viewarticle/720583?src=mp&spon=24&uac=106103PV; N.Valko RN, 28Apr2010 ]
Virginia Axes ‘Health’ Exception in State Funding for Abortions
The Virginia General Assembly has approved budget changes requested by pro-life Republican Gov. Bob McDonnell on Wednesday, which would prohibit state funding for elective abortions except in cases of rape, incest, fetal abnormality or when the life of the mother is in jeopardy.
The amendment stops the state from having to reimburse Medicaid abortions justified for “health” reasons, and could potentially save hundreds of preborn babies from abortion per year. [http://www.lifesitenews.com/ldn/2010/apr/10042212.html, Life Site News ; 26Apr10, PFLI PharmFacts E-News Update]
Man Who Killed Pro-Life Protester Gets Life Term
A trucker who stunned a small Michigan community by killing an abortion protester and a businessman was sentenced Thursday to life in prison during a court hearing that began with an apology and ended with a verbal attack on the judge. Harlan Drake said he was sorry for causing pain to the families of his victims. But minutes later, he seemed bored by the hearing, urged the judge to "get on with this" and called him a racist and a hypocrite.
Shiawassee County Circuit Judge Gerald Lostracco lamented that he could not order "hard labor" along with the life sentence. [http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/36717795, MSNBC ; 26Apr10, PFLI PharmFacts E-News Update]
DOMINICAN REPUBLIC OFFICIALLY RECOGNIZES PREBORN
Earlier this year, with an overwhelming vote, the Dominican Republic approved a new constitution that affirmed the dignity of every human person, and protected them from abortion.
This was a major victory for babies around the world and especially the Latin community.
The Dominican Republic was under incredible pressure from the administration in our country and Planned Parenthood affiliate Pro-Familia to legalize abortion “for cases of rape.
”It was a privilege to help lead a team down in January to awaken the nation to the great evil that was coming, and to let them know it was their duty to stand against it.
Our message was simple: “Don’t do what we have done in America, stop the genocide before it starts!” Our bilingual team focused largely on reaching the people with the truth about abortion, and every Dominican with whom we interacted was very positive and thankful that we came to witness to the soul of the nation.
Armed with tens of thousands of beautiful high gloss newspapers from Human Life Alliance, our presence caused a great stir in the capital city of Santo Domingo.
Because of the buzz that we “Americans” caused, warning the people about the lie Pro-Familia was trying to sell, every media outlet in the whole country printed stories about us. This was huge, because as they wrote about us, they also said why we were there, thus informing the nation to the upcoming vote!
This was a huge blessing because it helped to develop a resolve to stand against the s
econd wave that was coming.
Immediately after the new constitution was approved, the pro-abortion forces began to scream.
They demanded another vote, which would allow them the opportunity to bribeand convince some of the politicians to change their vote. They got their second vote.
Then something incredible happened: hundreds of thousands hit the streets marching to show their support for protecting little Dominicans from abortion!
Some of them, I am told, were carrying the same pro-life fliers and HLA newspapers that we hadpassed out just a few months before!
When the second vote happened,the right to life was protected and enshrined in the constitution for the second time— hopefully for good!
So what can we learn from this in our battle for prenatal rights here in the U.S.?
We must awaken our nation to the dignity of every human person through every avenue available.
Making the truth of the personhood of the preborn child available everywhere isessential, through HLA newspaper distribution, video production, Internet saturation,Personhood initiatives, and legislation.
All of these together will help to awaken ournation to change from viewing the preborn as property, but rather to respect their dignity as human persons!
The thing that will convince and activate this nation to protect life is OUR passion and sacrifice in protecting our little neighbors in the womb.
Our message was heard in the Dominican Republic because we sacrificed and traveled to their little Caribbean country and worked passionately to protect preborn Dominican children.
Here in America, we have committed that we will not rest until every child is protected by love and by law. As we continue to follow through on our commitment, we expect dignity to be recognized in every human person, no matter how big or small.
For more information about Personhood USA visit www.personhoodusa.com.
[Winter 2010, HLA Action News, humanlife.org, Keith Mason, co-founder of Personhood USA]
NEW DOCUMENTARY DETAILS BLACK GENOCIDE IN 21st CENTURY AMERICA
Lynchings, Klan meetings, segregation laws, concentration camps, and other forms of racism stain U.S. and world history.
Thankfully we have moved past all of that, into “a world that does not judge people by the color of their skin but by the content of their character,” as the Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. dreamed years ago. Or have we?
In the brand new documentary Maafa 21, experts show that racism, and more specifically, black genocide, are very much alive in this country and worldwide through abortion and other forms of population control.
In fact, the leading cause of death among blacks is abortion, with a black child being five times more likely to be aborted than a white child.
Written and directed by Mark Crutcher, founder of the pro-life organization Life
Dynamics, the film begins by explaining how white elitists sought to control blacks after the United States government outlawed slavery in the 1860s.
Before the Civil War,slave owners kept blacks uneducated and trained for plantation work and little else.
When the government outlawed slavery, white supremacists did not want to have the former slaves in their cities and towns and wanted to send them to Africa, a processcalled colonization.
When that effort failed, many racists decided to rid the country of the black race through means of population control, namely eugenics, “to protect the
supremacy of the white race.”
The term “maafa” is a Swahili word that means disaster or tragedy and stands for the great sufferings of slavery and other inflictions upon the people of Africa and their descendants.
The concept of eugenics coincided with Charles Darwin’s theory of evolution. In fact, Darwin’s Origin of Species held the subtitle, “by Means of Natural Selection, or the Preservation of Favoured Races in the Struggle for Life,” which was later removed, referring to people groups who had not yet “evolved” to the level of white people.
One of the main propellers of the American eugenics movement was the American Birth Control League, led by Margaret Sanger, a woman who was listed as a eugenics member and a Ku Klux Klan event speaker.
One of the aims of the American Birth Control League was to make sure that people who were poor and uneducated did not reproduce, claiming that such conditions were caused by an inherited “feeble-mindedness,” a term often used in the past to describe slaves.
One of the means the eugenics movement used was sterilization. Laws allowed
officials to sterilize people for reasons such as being unemployed for a certain length of time or for being “feeble-minded.”
In addition, being unmarried and pregnant was sometimes seen as a form of child neglect, and was considered grounds for sterilization.
Even children were sterilized at times, some as young as eight.
The government also threatened to discontinue people’s welfare if they chose not to be sterilized. Often these laws were targeted and enforced disproportionately upon blacks.
Aside from sterilization, some ideas of the eugenics movement included chemicals in food and drinking water to prevent people from having children. Others included applying for a permit to have a child.
As the American Birth Control League, now known as Planned Parenthood, grew,
contraceptive clinics spread in low-income areas where black populations were high, but not in equally poor neighborhoods where white populations were high.
The film touched on efforts throughout the 20th century to control populations labeled as “inferior” or “poor.”
Eventually, eugenics members recognized that while birth control was important for their mission, no country could control the population without abortion. < /span>
The film claims that without the eugenics movement propelling them, abortion and birth control would never have become legal.
Using powerful photos, testimonies from victims of the eugenics movement, written documents from eugenics leaders, and experts’ views, Maafa 21 contains many more eye-opening facts that will give you greater insight into the driving force behind the abortion movement and how it continues to push its agenda.
Racism is not dead; it is just a little more subtle.
To learn more about this topic, contact
HLA at 651-484-1040 or feedback@ humanlife.org and let us know you would
like a copy of this new documentary. For a donation of $20, HLA will send you Maafa 21 and a free sample of Did You Know?, HLA’s ground-breaking publication aboutabortion and its impact on the African American community.[Winter 2010, HLA Action News, humanlife.org]
Great News for Life in the 21 States that Currently Have the Choose Life Plate for Sale.
The Choose Life license plate was first approved in Florida and went on sale August 11, 2000. Since that humble beginning, 24 more states have approved the plate and 14 more have groups currently working to get the plate approved.
On April 2, 2010, in less than 10 years, the total reported plate sales in the US surpassed $12,000,000.00.
All these funds are distributed to “life affirming” Pregnancy Care Centers, Maternity Homes and non-profit adoption agencies in those states to support their life saving adoption efforts.
Much more information is available at www.choose-life.org under the Other States tab or the News tab.
Choose Life promotional products are available at: http://www.chooselifestore.org.
[12Apr10, www.choose-life.org e-letter]
Northwestern University students expose Planned Parenthood
A committed group of Northwestern University students stood in opposition to PP’s agenda, as former PPFA President Gloria Feldt made an appearance on campus as a part of Northwestern’s “Sex Week.”
Diana, who led the group of seven students, asked for advice and prayers beforehand, and followed up with an email that so beautifully states the resolve and intent of these college students to expose Planned Parenthood, that we wanted to share it with you.
We stood outside with three posters I made, one with a quote from [a former abortion industry worker] I found on the trailer for Blood Money in which she says they would give teens low-dose birth control pills and defective condoms in order to achieve their goal of 3-5 abortions from every girl aged 13 to 18.
Another addressed Margaret Sanger being a eugenicist, KKK speaker, and outright racist, and a quote of Gloria Feldt saying she looks to [Sanger] for inspiration, courage and hope.
The last poster addressed the misleading medical information PP gives to women in order to persuade them into aborting, with a quote from a PP [representative] telling a woman her 6 to 8 week-old preborn baby had no arms, legs, heart, or brain, and underneath I placed the truth, that at this stage, all parts have been developed…
Although all seven of us are pro-life, we were not there as pro-lifers. My intention was to expose Planned Parenthood as an institution, not to oppose abortion in general.
As Gloria Feldt walked in with her purple blouse and rolling bag, she quickly smiled but kept going. Once the event started, Katy went in to listen and take notes.
She said Gloria started off her talk briefly stating that "there are some who do not share our viewpoint, like our friends outside here," but proceeded with her speech. At the Q and A session, Katy asked what her opinion on celibacy and abstinence is. Gloria responded saying that she thinks celibacy "isn't the most healthy thing to do." Katy asked why, and she answered, referring to sex, "If you can do it, don't repress yourself."
People these days can say anything in a charismatic way, and people will eat it all up.
I don't even want to imagine what other ideas she was implanting into the girls' minds.
Planned Parenthood is truly a wolf in sheep's clothing. They not only support, but encourage, the type of lifestyle that creates a "need" for their services. It's such a corrupt business on so many levels…
We are all so proud of each other! If anything, we didn't let [Feldt’s] presence on our campus go unopposed.
The students who attended the talk, and those passing by, got to see us and read our provoking signs, hopefully spurring the "Is that true?" question in their minds. I hope they all went home and googled the truth behind PP and are educating themselves because of us seven, our three posters, and two hours of our time during busy midterms week. That, in addition to each of our personal feeling of self-fulfillment that came with acting on our beliefs, made our peaceful protest very successful. [5May10, STOPP Report]
PP is to Blame for the U.S. STD Epidemic
In the 1960s, gonorrhea and syphilis appeared to be the only well-known STDs and could be treated with penicillin, but today there are over twenty-five well-recognized STDs, some of which are incurable.
Planned Parenthood has been behind this STD epidemic since the beginning. From PP's early push to sexualize children in the United States, to the Griswold v. Connecticut decision in 1965, which decriminalized the use of the birth control pill in the United States, to its current push to defund authentic abstinence education and divert those funds for "family planning" money from the government so it can continue to encourage young people to participate in sexual activity at an early age, Planned Parenthood has brought about the STD epidemic.
As Planned Parenthood Federation of America advertises on its website, one in two sexually active people will get an STD before they reach the age of 25. PP is, in fact, actually helping this become a reality through its programs and products. Remember, 70% of PP’s customer base is under the age of 25. [Wednesday STOPP Report: April 14, 2010]