INFACT-Urgent Action!!

My Friends, Nestle is at it again, and this time it's truly disgusting!!!!  Haul out your computers and fire up your emails!!!

Urgent Action

No honour for Nestlé!

INFACT Canada is deeply concerned that the University of Alberta is planning to award Mr. Peter Brabeck-Latmathlé, the Chair and former Chief Executive Officer of Nestlé, an honorary degree for contributing to “the preservation, distribution and management of one of humanity’s most vital resources: water.”

Protests are coming on from all over the world. Nestlé, which has been designated as the “Least Ethical Company” globally, is infamous for practices including destruction of water resources; aggressive marketing of infant formula and other baby foods in violation of the World Health Organization’s International Code of Marketing of Breastmilk Substitutes and subsequent WHA resolutions; trade union busting and infiltrating public interest organizations critical of Nestlé’s predatory practices.

INFACT Canada joins the Council of Canadians in condemning University of Alberta’s plans to award Mr. Peter Brabeck-Latmathlé an honorary degree. Instead, the University should criticize Nestlé’s destructive business practices and inform the company that there is no honour for the CEO!

Swiss journalist Robert James Parsons has been writting about Nestlé since 1997. Read his brilliant letterto the University of Alberta heads.

Read Robert James Parsons’ letter: 
http://www.infactcanada.ca/whatsnew/rjparsons-letter-u-of-a.doc

Send your message today to:

• University of Alberta President, Indira Samarasekera: uofapres@ualberta.ca
• University of Alberta Chancellor, Linda Hughes: senate.office@ualberta.ca

Copy to:

• INFACT Canada: esterken@infactcanada.ca
• Baby Milk Action: prundall@babymilkaction.org and mikebrady@babymilkaction.org

Council of Canadians’ online form

You can also use the Council of Canadians’ online form to send a message to the University of Alberta President and Chancellor.

Use the Council of Canadians’ online form: 
http://canadians.org/action/2012/nestle.html

Elisabeth Sterken
Director INFACT Canada/IBFAN North America
esterken@infactcanada.ca

A Conflict of Interest

We are suppose to be able to trust our governments.  Trust the medical professionals that give us information and recommendations about our health and trust the major associations that advise the public and our governing bodies when they are making decisions and statements.  I know that the vast majority of the John and Jane Doe's are perfectly happy to blindly follow the professionals that supposedly have our best interests at heart, but there are still a few thinking humans out there and we are seriously concerned.  


When you read the fine print and do your homework it becomes blatantly clear that such faith in the assumed omnipotence of these professionals and their associations is questionable at best.  "Conflict of  Interest" is rife in our governments and professional associations.  So much so that the question becomes "Who do you trust?"


CBC and other news agencies have spent months tracking down the truth about Tamiflu, the Be-all, End-all for dealing with the H1N1 flu virus..... or so they tried to convince us. The Canadian government stockpiled nearly $180 MILLION dollars worth of anti-viral drugs (mostly Tamiflu), and now a good portion of it is about to expire. Yep, Millions of dollars are about to be thrown out.  Why do we have these stockpiles of drugs and are they even worth it is the question the CBC and other media reporters are asking.  Why? Because the truth is that there is a HUGE conflict of interest that is deeply rooted at the centre of all this.


The CBC reports:

A CBC documentary, which was broadcast on The National on Monday night, reports that certain other researchers in Canada, Italy, Britain and the U.S. are now challenging the claims by Roche that Tamiflu can significantly reduce complications or hospitalizations due to the flu.
The documentary also raises concerns about possible side effects surrounding the drug — strange behaviours and psychiatric delusions — that some countries, Japan in particular, have reported.
Using freedom of information requests, the investigation found hundreds of similar cases in Canada and the U.S., which were reported to health authorities but have not been made public.
It’s often difficult to establish a clear causal link between a drug and rare adverse reactions. Roche says its research suggests that these side effects result from the flu itself and high fevers, not the medication.
In the course of the CBC investigation, Zalac also reported that three of Canada's most prominent flu experts — Dr. Donald Low and Dr. Allison McGeer of Mount Sinai Hospital in Toronto, and Dr. Fred Aoki of the University of Manitoba — had received research funding or acted as a consultant or speaker for Roche during the period when Tamiflu was being promoted....
...But these relationships were rarely reported in broader public forums, in the media or even when some of these individuals would appear in marketing videos or flu-warning commercials on television produced by Roche.

Conflict of Interest is a disease that riddles our entire government and the decision makers that we presume are looking out for the best interests of the people they are advising: Us. I have written several articles about the various xxxx that have been reported in the media, yet ignored by the public for the most part:

- "Conflict of Interest Much? Here a swine, there a swine"

-"WHO "Mr Swine Flu" investigated for gross Conflict of interest"

-"WHO warns of corruption in Pharmaceutical companies"

But Conflict of Interest isn't just about the flu, it happens in all aspects of the health industry!  WHO and UNICEF have both been targeted as having undisclosed conflicts of interest. As a matter of fact just recently  Ann Veneman, Unicef executive director from 2005 to 2010, joined forces with the evil Nestlé board of directors. This LINK  shows the implications of her shocking career move from an organisation that supports breastfeeding to one that undermines breastfeeding.

And then there is the recent call for submissions from the Health Canada Committee in charge of rewriting the guidelines "Nutrition for Healthy Term Infants: Birth to Six Months". Appalled by the fact that Health Canada left us with less than one month for the public and stakeholder groups to write their response to their draft document, we scrambled to gather our information and to petition HC for an extension of the deadline (which we did successfully).  While writing their response, Elizabeth Sterkin of INFACT Canada uncovered the committees dirty laundry: 3 of the members of the committee have ties to Infant formula and infant food companies.  Yet nowhere in their draft document or the information about the members of the committee does Health Canada reveal these conflicts of interest to the public or to stakeholder groups.  To not disclose this information when HC tries to make statements that if a mother is unable to breastfeed, commercial infant formula is her only option: ""Commercial infant formulas are the only acceptable alternative to breastmilk.".... hmmmmm.... no mention of donor milk or banked breastmilk.  Just formula.  Still think that conflicts of interest like this don't shape policies?

We need to stand up for our rights to have full disclosure and to have access to information to make informed choices that are not influenced by people that are motivated by financial gain.  We need to tell our governments that these conflicts of interest need to be fully disclosed to the public so that they KNOW where the information  is coming from and how commercialism and the mighty dollar might be twisting that information for their own gain.  

Accountability is not just an empty word.  It must be followed by action. 

Former Executive Director of Unicef, joins Nestlé Board

I just received this update from Elizabeth at INFACT and thought that many of you would be interested to read this little bomb.

Sweet move:

Ann Veneman, controversial former Executive Director of Unicef, joins Nestlé Board

Ann Veneman, Unicef executive director from 2005 to 2010, will join the Nestlé board of directors next month. In the articles below understand the implications of her shocking career move from an organisation that supports breastfeeding to one that undermines breastfeeding.

From India Today - http://indiatoday.intoday.in/site/Story/131314/columns/a-sweet-move-from-unicef-to-nestle.html

A ‘sweet’ move from Unicef to Nestle

DINESH C. SHARMA

March 3, 2011

The United Nations Children’s Fund (Unicef) has just released a glossy report on the state of the world’s children. Senior officials of the UN body made the right noises about children, the need to improve their nutritional status and so on, at media dos in several important capitals across the globe.

At a similar occasion a couple of years ago, Ann Veneman - who was Executive Director of the agency till April 2010 - had articulated Unicef’s position on how exclusive breastfeeding for toddlers is critical to combat hunger and promote child survival. Post-retirement the UN official has undergone a change of mind.

She will now be on the board of a company which has been accused of subverting efforts to promote breastfeeding by flouting laws in order to market its formula foods. Yes, Veneman is joining the Board of Directors of Switzerland-based food giant - Nestlé.

Read the full article online at: http://indiatoday.intoday.in/site/Story/131314/columns/a-sweet-move-from-unicef-to-nestle.html

From World Public Health Nutrition Association - http://www.wphna.org/2011_mar_hp0_news.htm

Ann Veneman. USDA. UNICEF. SCN. Nestlé Public-private partnerships personified

March, 2011

Ann Veneman, UNICEF executive director 2005-2010, is to become a member of the main board of Nestlé, effective next month. This news has shocked some in our profession, and has confirmed the cynical opinion of others. Her appointment in 2005 to head UNICEF as its executive director was at the time welcomed by some senior UNICEF staff, who saw her as a political heavy-hitter, able to lever support on behalf of the world’s children at the highest level. Between 2006 and 2009 she was also chair of the UN System Standing Committee on Nutrition (SCN), with which many Association members are or have been associated.

In December 2009, when she was about to step down from the UNICEF post, UN Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon said: “She has fulfilled her mandate with immense dedication, and I have been impressed by her extraordinary energy and determination to improve children’s health, education and well-being around the world. Under her leadership, UNICEF has become a catalyst for global action to help children reach their full potential, promoting collaborations that deliver the best possible results for children based on expert knowledge, sound evidence and data... Her legacy is an organization that is financially and intellectually strong and well-equipped to meet the challenges children face in the twenty-first century”.

Dr Ban might not be quite as fulsome now, knowing that she will now be playing a leading part in the policies and strategies of the world’s biggest manufacturer of artificial baby formula. There again, as a fervent supporter of public-private partnerships, maybe he would not cool any of his warm words.

Read the full article online at: http://www.wphna.org/2011_mar_hp0_news.htm

Elisabeth Sterken
Director INFACT Canada

Who do you trust?

In the news this week: A Doctor accused of falsifying medical research and being paid off by Big Pharma. Dr. Scott Reuben, was accused of faking medical research studies, including many that were published in medical journals, has been charged with health care fraud Thursday in federal court. This so called medical professional accepted money from mega-pharmaceutical giants Pfizer and Merck to do "Studies" on some of their major medications (Celebrex, Vioxx, Bextra), yet not one of these studies was actually done- not one patient was enrolled in any study.

"He's accused of accepting a $75,000 grant from Pfizer to research the effectiveness of the pain medication Celebrex for a 2005 study, the Day reports.

His research, which the Day reports was pioneering at the the time, indicated that there are post-surgery benefits from painkillers. But no patients were actually enrolled in the study, according to a U.S. Department of Justice news release.

The Wall Street Journal reports that he also falsified information about Pfizer's Bextra and on Merck's Vioxx.

“Anesthesia & Analgesia” had to retract 10 papers Reuben wrote and medical experts say at least 21 journal articles by the anesthesiologist appear to be fabricated, the Day reports.

Reuben was the chief of acute pain at Baystate Medical Center in Springfield, Massachusetts, and The Day reports that the hospital let him go last March, after an audit revealed he had been inventing data for as many as 13 years."

...Still believe what you read?

While the medical community is tsk tsking this incident, it begs the question: If this doctor was able to get away with this fraudulent activity for 13 years, who else is writing themselves their own retirement fund? Only an ostrich would believe that this is a one-off incident.

Writing false articles and making up imaginary studies is not limited to the realm of Big Pharma either. Mega Corporate Giant Nestle has been caught with their hand in the false research cookie jar before as well. Canadian scientist, Dr Ranjit Chandra, created extensive falsified research that was used by Nestlé to promote its infant formulas.
http://www.babymilkaction.org/press/press3feb06.html
http://www.infactcanada.ca/INFACTWinter2006NLfinalcommercial.pdf

The time has come my friends, to really start doing your OWN research into products and claims made by these mega corporations that are only interested in earning a big buck, because apparently dollars and cents mean more to them than the health of their consumers.

Oh What a shock!!!!

HERE to read the entire NBC article