Fox TV and synthetic hormonal milk, part 2

“We paid $3billion for these stations.  We’ll decide what the news is.  The news is what we tell you it is.”  That’s what Jane Akre reports David Boylan, then station manager of Fox TV’s channel 13 in Tampa, Florida told her during their ongoing struggle over which story on rBGH would air- the report she and her investigative partner Steve Wilson wrote, or the one that Fox wanted them to present on air…. a fabrication of the imagination of Fox’s lawyers with probably plenty of input from Monsanto (and the dairy and grocery industries which were also interested in hiding the information from the public).

 After the report failed to air the first two times it was scheduled, the two reporters agreed to re-work the series, changing the wording so that they could live with the story as well as Fox.  After a series of 83 re-writes (!!!) (Do you think they were being played?) demanded by Fox and after six scheduled and cancelled airdates, the story still wasn’t broadcast.  Finally David Boylan, the station manager, told the pair that the station would find another reporter to rewrite the story according to Fox’s demands if they wouldn’t toe the line.   When Akre and Wilson threatened to file a formal complaint with the FCC, the station manager offered them two hundred thousand dollars to go away, keep quiet about the story, and not disclose how Fox had handled the whole affair.  (They have it in writing.) They turned down the offer.  They were ultimately fired in December, 1997.  Eventually they instituted a suit against Fox and won a “landmark whistleblower suit” wherein they were awarded $425,000 in damages by a jury.  Fox unsuccessfully appealed the case three times.  Finally they hit pay dirt after three appeals failed and six judges turned down hearing it.  They ultimately found a judge who would hear the appeal.  On February 14, 2003, the jury decision was overturned on a “technicality.”  The “technicality”?  The Florida whistleblower law protected employees whose employer required them to break a law.  This was the basis for Akre and Wilson winning the original suit.  The “technicality” is this:  Fox argued and WON that there is no FCC law that requires a tv station to broadcast the truth.  Telling the truth on the air is only a policy and because WTVT did not ask the reporters to break a law by broadcasting lies, there was no basis for the suit!  Jury award vacated!  Case closed!  Fox did not violate any law, the appellate judge said because a television station is not bound by law to tell the truth.  “We paid $3 billion for these stations.  We’ll decide what the news is.  The news is what we tell you it is.”  Guess Boylan was right!  It should be noted that news editors do have the legitimate right to not air or publish a story, but not to demand it be falsified.  

Tomorrow’s post will talk about how the FDA protects biotech industries, not you.

Fox TV and synthetic hormonal milk, part 1

The investigative team of Jane Akre and Steve Wilson had been hired expressly by the television station WTVT in Tampa to do just that…. conduct investigative reporting.  In fact Wilson had received 4 Emmies for his reporting, and Akre had received an Associated Press award for her work.  Shortly after the husband and wife team was hired on, the station was sold to new owners- Fox TV, owned by Rupert Murdoch, and thus begins our story.  Akre and Wilson had been writing an in-depth report on Florida’s dairy industry and were turning up all sorts of negative information relating to the use of rBGH in milk cows and that gave them great concern.  They had conducted lots of interviews, had shot a lot of footage, and had done plenty of investigative digging into the subject.  This was going to be a BIG story.  It was scheduled to air in four parts beginning on February 24, 1997, and in anticipation of its airing during that sweeps week Fox was paying for ads on radio as well to stimulate public interest.  Just before it was to be aired the Fox News Chairman received what could be viewed as a threatening letter from a powerful New York attorney representing Monsanto.  “There is a lot at stake in what is going on in Florida, not only for Monsanto but also for Fox News and its owner,” concluded the New York attorney John J. Walsh in that letter.  It was received virtually on the eve of the scheduled broadcast of the first segment of the report.  Walsh asked for a week for Monsanto to prepare material to defend itself from what they perceived as an attack on their product, Posilac. The investigative series was postponed while attorneys and reporters poured over the material but found no inaccuracies.  The reporters offered to interview a rep of Monsanto to explain their side of the story.  Walsh then ridiculed that idea.  The series was postponed again.  Over a period of months Fox tried all sorts of means to get Akre and Wilson to drop the story entirely or to change it to the extent that it would have ultimately been completely false.   How did it turn out?  Did the truth win out?  Check it out tomorrow.

The media- watch dog or lapdog?

How much have you read or heard of hormones in your food?  or antibiotics in your food?  how about genetically modified food?  Most people have a passing acquaintance with these subjects. “Oh yeah!  I heard something about that a while ago.  What’s that all about?”  I feel that real dangers exist.  I am convinced that not enough research has been done and not enough is known about the effects of hormones in our food and genetically modified products.  The jury is definitely in with regard to the dangers antibiotics pose.

Why don’t we hear about this danger?  Why don’t we know that the FDA is NOT protecting our health?  Why is the media so silent on the subject?  There are quite a few possible answers:  These stories don’t create enough of a splash to hold people’s attention.  People don’t want to hear “bad” things about the food they eat.  Big industry pays to avoid negative attention.  The media in our country is increasingly owned and operated by fewer and fewer people- thus there’s a lack of diversity of opinion, less competition to get the scoop; fewer newspapers are employing fewer reporters.  (So many newspapers are going out of business!)  Fewer and fewer editors and news writers are generating the information you get.  “They” are controlling what you hear, read and ultimately know.   

What would you say about a TV station that chose to NOT present a story about a danger in our food supply?  That chose NOT to act in the best interest of the public?  That caved to pressure from some big players?  What would you say about a major TV network pressuring their investigative reporters to air falsehoods to cover up some scary practices?  The latter scenario actually happened in Tampa, Florida at a Fox TV station.  The whole thing played out over the course of six or so years and it makes for a VERY interesting read.    I’ll tell you more about it next week.

Food fad: good or bad?

The May/June issue of Foreign Policy magazine, dubbed The Food Issue, found its way into my hands.  The issue is chock full of very interesting information.  The reporters conducted several interesting polls.  Long about the last page of the issue, they queried the fifty-eight poll participants who are “some of the world’s leading experts” on food, its distribution, and the world’s hunger problems. The survey asked participants to fill in the blanks on specific topics related to food, such as:  "The best way to feed the world in 50 years is…;” and “Organic is....”    I found many of the responses thought provoking and interesting, some rather glib, a couple silly.   But a respondent named Sallie James floored me when she filled in some blanks thusly:  “The stupidest food fad is.... “the ‘locavore’ and ‘slow food’ movement”, said Sallie, and she elaborated- “snobbish, condescending, indulgent, misguided, and thoroughly unrealistic.”  Gee, sounds like Sallie really enjoys her Mickey D’s and is unwilling to give them up!*  Well, Sallie, it’s not that many years ago- in this country- that we ate what we grew or what we bought from our local markets which retailed food grown in the community.  As a matter of fact a lot of people still do that today!  Some folks are lucky enough to have farmers’ markets in their communities or nearby towns.  Some people eat the produce from their own gardens.  Some people buy shares from CSAs (Community Supported Agriculture- local farms where you can buy a "share" of the crops being grown); some buy their produce at farmstands.  Some people even preserve some of their food!  These small farms are more likely to use good sustainable methods in their farming than huge factory farms.  If you get to know the people you buy from, you can actually ask questions of them.  If you’re lucky you’ll run into folks using sustainable or organic methods.  Buying directly from the grower can save not only you, but him/her money as well.  (It is estimated that the farmer gets under 12 cents of every dollar we spend on food at the market.)  Food that is grown and eaten locally is fresher, tastier and higher in nutrients than food that’s been shipped long distances.  Eating locally keeps dollars in the community, and increases the security and resiliency of the community.  A farmer being able to hold onto a small farm keeps jobs in the community and the natural beauty of the land is preserved.  That’s all part of being a locavore, right?  -eating what’s grown locally, or nearby. (I don’t think there is a hard and fast definition, at least no one spells out the radius for locavore eating.)  Check further here.  Slow food- the opposite of fast food- is the consumption of food cooked at home (or in a restaurant where no one yells through a microphone upon your order “want fries with that?”).  In much of this country people still sit down to slow cooked meals, as they do all over Canada, Europe, Asia, South America and in fact just about everywhere!  I guess they’re all too snobbish and misguided to realize that a fast alternative exists, that is if they'd be willing to sacrifice taste and nutrition on the altar of saved time.  Yeah, Sallie, what a great alternative!  I realize fast food is here to stay.  It’s a convenience.  It’s a necessary “evil,” but that doesn’t mean the alternative is indulgent, misguided and unrealistic.  And I realize we’re exporting our fast food industry to other countries, too, where it’s gobbled up- not exactly a good example of American culture.  When you cook at home you know where your ingredients come from… you know what you’re getting.   Slow food means fresher ingredients, less processing, better taste, more nutrition, better all round bang for your buck.  

*I was trying to be facetious, - imagining Sallie pounding down fast food.  Sallie’s a trade policy analyst for the Cato Institute, a conservative “think tank.”  Sallie’s no more getting her chow from a fast food chain than I’m getting carry-out from a five star restaurant.  I think it’s Sallie who’s being snobbish.  She doesn’t realize that little people like me don’t prefer to eat food that’s had the heck processed out of it and/or that’s traveled across oceans and continents before it’s reached my table.      

Antibiotics in our milk and bovine health, Part 2

Let’s look at some of the effects of Posilac on bovine health.  How we treat our animals often reflects how we treat our fellow man and reveals our character.  As I mentioned in an earlier post, the warning insert that comes with the drug spells out just the problems that the manufacturer acknowledges.  Reproduction-wise the drug is associated with cystic ovaries, disorders of the uterus and retention of the placenta.  Mastitis is acknowledged as well as the increased frequency of medication for mastitis “and other health problems.” The drug increases digestive disorders such as indigestion, bloat and diarrhea.  Cows injected with the drug have increased cases of enlarged hocks as well as lacerations, enlargements and calluses of the knee.  Perhaps the size of the udders which are so out of proportion to the rest of the body distorts the pelvis and the attached musculature as well as the joints making it hard to walk?  Reductions in hematocrit and hemoglobin occur during treatment.  The manufacturer recommends discontinuing injecting cows that react with injection sites that repeatedly open and drain.  Good call!!  They go on to advise that no milk discard or pre-slaughter withdrawal period is required.  Hormones!  Fresh to your table!  You can check out the contents of the the warning insert here.  Summary:  Posilac increases milk production.  This fills a need for more milk for a thirsty calcium-craving public, right?  WRONG!  We already produce a surplus of milk in this country.  It’s not filling a need other than filling the wallets of the manufacturers of the drug and the producers of the milk, while emptying the wallets of the taxpayer because Uncle Sam is buying back the surplus.  Oh yeah, remember we can’t sell it to other countries because they don’t want milk tainted with synthetic hormones.  Their governments protect their health.  Our government protects big agribusiness. 

Antibiotics in our milk and bovine health, Part 1

As I noted before the manufacturer of Posilac (manufactured by Elanco Animal Health (Eli Lilly), developed by Monsanto) states on the label that among other risks associated with Posilac are clinical mastitis (visibly abnormal milk) and sub-clinical mastitis (invisibly abnormal milk).  Mastitis is a serious inflammation of breast, or in this case, udder tissue.  What is visibly abnormal milk?  It is milk that is discolored with blood and pus.  Blood and pus are not visible in the milk with sub-clinical levels of inflammation.  Does the dairyman always pick up on this?  The farmer is supposed to perform checks on the milk collected and I assume that if this is noted the milk is discarded.  If it goes undetected, I would hope it would be found out at the processing plant. Farmers do checks, so do processing plants.  Microscopic problems could escape checks.   When they do, pasteurization would take care of bacteria and virus.  The greater risk would be to drink raw milk.  I have and I probably will continue to drink raw milk.  The farmers I get this unprocessed milk from are guys (and gals) who are ethical, extremely vigilant of their animals (know the cows and can spot a problem early) and all round good animal husbandry folks…. Oh yeah! And they don’t drug their animals with synthetic hormones either.  Back to the milk of the cows which aren’t so fortunate: Federal inspectors check milk about four times a year.  They check for the presence of antibiotics in the penicillin class- the only drugs “permitted, hence legal” to treat mastitis.  If the federal inspectors find the presence of penicillin, the entire contents are dumped.  (While legal to use, the law states there must be a withdrawal period before the milk can be collected for consumption.)  Farmers can, and do, medicate their cows with antibiotics from outside the pcn class however.  Those antibiotics- since they’re not tested for- do escape detection.  Thus we have antibiotics in our milk as well as hormones.  Pasteurization destroys the bacteria, but not the drugs.  Without your knowledge or consent, you and your family are being dosed with drugs, rendering those potentially lifesaving drugs weak or impotent should you ever need them.  And remember that cows on rBGH have much higher incidence of mastitis than untreated cows.  Sick cows are given antibiotics, and if they don’t respond to treatment, they’re  slaughtered.  You could potentially be getting meat AND milk from an animal recently treated with antibiotics and hormones.  (Dairy cows are typically ground up into hamburger.)  Continued.

Monsanto's research

This would be a good place to note that the University of Florida did much of Monsanto’s research   which was presented to the FDA.  Note that Monsanto pays for the research done on its products.  When results don't meet with their approval they're called "unreliable".  Evidently the results of UF studies met with Monsanto’s approval because the university has received millions in gifts and grants from them.  As noted before in another post, biotech companies can squelch the career of a scientist and put him/her out of work by rescinding money, putting pressure on others to avoid him/her, and smearing the researcher’s name.  If a research lab wants dollars to do their work, it’s a strong temptation to play ball.  The FDA says rBGH is approved for human consumption-- case closed.  (I will talk more on the approval “process” in my post “The cover-up”- at a later time.)  Monsanto then argues there is no reason for further testing, the case for rBGH has been made and approved.  The FDA is owned by large corporations… it’s lost its credibility....  I will post on the love nest Monsanto and the FDA have made for themselves.  So- synthetic hormones in milk and cancer--what’s the bottomline? What do we know?  What does the research show?  It hasn’t played out yet.  Nothing long term has demonstrated the safety.  Where are the rats in this study?  Why, we are the rats… we and our children.