UK Toddlers will have jabs for SIX diseases at once. By DAVID DERBYSHIRE

Toddlers are to be inoculated against six diseases at once in a bid to boost vaccination rates, the Government revealed yesterday.
The chief medical officer has told GPs to give the vaccines – including the MMR jab – during a single surgery visit once a baby has passed his or her first birthday.

The ‘super-vaccination’ day will involve three injections to protect against measles, mumps, rubella, two forms of meningitis and bacteria that can cause pneumonia.

Under the existing NHS timetable, a month normally separates the two meningitis jabs from the other vaccinations. The official advice was sent out to GPs in England and Wales last week.

The Government believes the change will simplify the complicated immunisation schedule and boost the uptake of vaccines after the MMR scare.

Yesterday the Department of Health said there was no risk to children from having all the jabs on the same day – and stressed that anxious parents would still be able to split the jabs over two visits.

Some parents will welcome one fewer visits to the doctor. Under the existing programme, parents have to make six appointments for a total of 13 injections before their child’s fourth birthday.

However, others will be concerned about the extra health risks and discomfort of having three jabs in one day.

A vaccine can trigger side effects including pain at the site of injection, fever, irritability, stomach upsets and headaches. In extremely rare cases, children can suffer allergic reactions.
In her letter, the chief medical officer Prof Dame Sally Davies called for the change to be introduced ‘as soon as practicable’ to simplify the system.

Doctors say the first super-vaccination day could be introduced by the start of next year.

The change was proposed by the joint committee on vaccination and immunisation after research found combining the jabs on one day would cause no health problems for babies.

The committee’s research – based on detailed interviews with a small number of mothers and fathers – also found that the change would be ‘acceptable to parents’.

Under the current schedule babies are given a combined booster jab for meningitis C and Hib – a bacterial infection that can cause meningitis or severe pneumonia in small children.

Four weeks later they are invited back for the MMR triple vaccine and a third booster for pneumococcal infection.
GPs will now give all three jabs at the same appointment.

The Department of Health said parents would not be forced to have all the jabs at the same time.

A spokesman said: ‘Independent scientific research has shown that this is completely safe and effective.’


Read more: http://www.dailymail.co.uk/health/article-1331738/MMR-1-6-inoculation-jabs-introduced-babies-super-vaccination-day.html#ixzz165K4OaBO

Must Watch! Fast food, fat profits - Fault Lines - Al Jazeera English

Fast food, fat profits - Fault Lines - Al Jazeera English

Glucose Monitoring Won't Save Your Life

Why Lowering Glucose Is a Mistake

Doctors believe that lowering blood sugar with drugs is the solution for Type 2 diabetes.

But this approach is a big mistake and can knock 20 years off your lifespan ... make you look 15 years older than your age ... and ultimately kill you. Here's the medical proof...

You Can Have "Perfect Glucose" and Die from Diabetes!

A shocking study in 2008 proved it...

A group of Type 2 patients were told to aggressively maintain their blood sugar levels at 6.0% or lower with medications. After four years, these patients suffered significantly more heart attacks and a higher rate of death compared to patients whose levels were between 7.0 and 7.9%.

In short, they were following their doctor's orders to a "T." But the results were so dismaying that the study had to be canceled early to protect the remaining patients. The medical community was stunned. No one had ever questioned the safety of driving down glucose levels like this. It was always "assumed" to be the right thing to do.

Glucose Monitoring Won't Save Your Life

Another shocker: Vigilant glucose monitoring does nothing to prevent diabetic complications -- and this is proven conclusively by two studies published in theBritish Medical Journal.

The first study split a group of newly-diagnosed Type 2 patients into equal self-monitoring and no-monitoring groups. After 12 months, the diabetes (as measured by A1C testing) was no better in the self-monitoring group.

The second study divided a separate population of Type 2 patients into three groups: No monitoring, moderate monitoring, and intense monitoring. Not only did SMBG fail to improve diabetes control, it also cost more. More importantly, monitoring actually decreased the patients' quality of life.

Despite this well-published research, most doctors continue to recommend aggresive glucose self-monitoring. One has to wonder if the cost of test strips and glucose monitors has anything to do with this.

Complications Are What's Killing Diabetics

Diabetics aren't dying because doctors don't know how to lower glucose -- they're dying from complications. And they'll keep dying until we heal diabetes at the most fundamental level, using diet and increased physical activity. Drugs have consistently failed to protect diabetics against deadly complications.

Glucose-lowering drugs are rarely effective in the long term and do absolutely nothing to reverse the underlying cause of diabetes: insulin resistance in your cells. Yet that's exactly where all the horrible complications of diabetes begin -- and no amount of drugs or surgery will stop them.

In truth, no glucose-lowering drug has ever been shown to produce a reliable reduction in diabetic complications. Neither has aggressive glucose monitoring.

DISCLAIMER

The posting of stories, commentaries, reports, documents and links (embedded or otherwise) on this site does not in any way, shape or form, implied or otherwise, necessarily express or suggest endorsement or support of any of such posted material or parts therein.

How TB vaccine destroys

http://www.freemalaysiatoday.com/fmt-english/news/general/12684-cured-of-tb-but-left-blind-and-unable-to-walk-

Aspartame To Be Added To Following Foods -- Dr. Betty Martini, D.Hum

Here is the Confidential Secret Trade Information on aspartame.

http://www.wnho.net/trade_secret_information_on_aspartame.htm

Please note that Searle admitted that aspartame could not be used for everything. Even the FDA mentioned you could not use it to bake because it breaks down. Yet they approved it in dry products to begin with and when you put Equal in such things as hot coffee you just heated it. Then in 1993 they approved it for baking against their own instructions. In 1996 Dr. David Kessler granted blanket approval for it to be used in everything. How did they do it? Dr. Kessler said if the complaints went down they could do it. So the FDA stopped taking complaints and many people called and asked why they would not take the complaint. But then I couldn't understand how they could reduce the existing complaints even if they didn't add more. On the report in 1995 they stated they had to change their bookkeeping records and had to throw away hundreds of aspartame complaints. In Congress it was admitted in 1985 in the Senate that the FDA had so many complaints that they were sending them to the AIDS Hotline.

The National Soft Drink Assn wrote a 33 page protest on aspartame because it breaks down and decomposes. It violates adulteration laws, and therefore interstate commerce laws. http://www.laleva.org/eng/2007/03/open_letter_to_dr_dick_adamson_of_american_
beverage_regarding_protest_of_using_aspartame_in_carbonated_beverages.html

Everything is a matter of public record. Aspartame needs to be banned, period, but also with Codex.

Dr. Betty Martini, D.Hum, Founder

Mission Possible International

9270 River Club Parkway

Duluth. Georgia 30097

770 242-2599

www.mpwhi.com, www.dorway.com, www.wnho.net

Aspartame Toxicity Center, www.holisticmed.com/aspartame

ASPARTAME... list of foods it has been approved for

Found this on the codex website under "current official standards list" one of the many .pdf listed for our food standards.

http://www.codexalimentarius.net/web...ist.do?lang=en

ASPARTAME: It starts on page 74 of a 259 .pdf listing food additives and how much can go into a product. Cheese, bread, veggies, fruits, fish, coffee...... beer

General Standard for Food Additives

http://www.codexalimentarius.net/web...o.jsp?id_sta=4

ASPARTAME

INS 951 Aspartame Functional Class: Flavour enhancer, Sweetener

FoodCatNo... FoodCategory... MaxLevel... Notes... Year Adopted

01.1.2 Dairy-based drinks, flavoured and/or fermented (e.g., chocolate milk, cocoa, eggnog, drinking yoghurt, wheybased drinks) 600 mg/kg 161 & 191 2007

01.3.2 Beverage whiteners 6000 mg/kg 161 & 191 2008

01.4.4 Cream analogues 1000 mg/kg 161 & 191 2008

01.5.2 Milk and cream powder analogues 2000 mg/kg 161 & 191 2007

01.6.1 Unripened cheese 1000 mg/kg 161 & 191 2008

01.6.5 Cheese analogues 1000 mg/kg 161 & 191 2008

01.7 Dairy-based desserts (e.g., pudding, fruit or flavoured yoghurt) 1000 mg/kg 161 & 191 2007

02.3 Fat emulsions mainly of type oil-in-water, including mixed and/or flavoured products based on fat emulsions 1000 mg/kg 161 & 191 2008

02.4 Fat-based desserts excluding dairy-based dessert products of food category 01.7 1000 mg/kg 161 & 191 2007

03.0 Edible ices, including sherbet and sorbet 1000 mg/kg 161 & 191 2007

04.1.2.1 Frozen fruit 2000 mg/kg 161 & 191 2008

04.1.2.2 Dried fruit 2000 mg/kg 161 & 191 2008

04.1.2.3 Fruit in vinegar, oil, or brine 300 mg/kg 144 & 191 2007

04.1.2.4 Canned or bottled (pasteurized) fruit 1000 mg/kg 161 & 191 2007

04.1.2.5 Jams, jellies, marmelades 1000 mg/kg 161 & 191 2007

04.1.2.6 Fruit-based spreads (e.g., chutney) excluding products of food category 04.1.2.5 1000 mg/kg 161 & 191 2007

04.1.2.7 Candied fruit 2000 mg/kg 161 & 191 2007

ASPARTAME

CODEX STAN 192-1995 75

Table One

FoodCatNo FoodCategory MaxLevel Notes Year Adopted

04.1.2.8 Fruit preparations, including pulp, purees, fruit toppings and coconut milk 1000 mg/kg 161 & 191 2007

04.1.2.9 Fruit-based desserts, including fruit-flavoured water-based desserts 1000 mg/kg 161 & 191 2007

04.1.2.10 Fermented fruit products 1000 mg/kg 161 & 191 2007

04.1.2.11 Fruit fillings for pastries 1000 mg/kg 161 & 191 2007

04.1.2.12 Cooked fruit 1000 mg/kg 161 & 191 2007

04.2.2.1 Frozen vegetables (including mushrooms and fungi, roots and tubers, pulses and legumes, and aloe vera), seaweeds, and nuts and seeds 1000 mg/kg 161 & 191 2008

04.2.2.2 Dried vegetables (including mushrooms and fungi, roots and tubers, pulses and legumes, and aloe vera), seaweeds, and nuts and seeds 1000 mg/kg 161 & 191 2008

04.2.2.3 Vegetables (including mushrooms and fungi, roots and tubers, pulses

and legumes, and aloe vera), and seaweeds in vinegar, oil, brine, or soybean sauce 300 mg/kg 144 & 191 2007

04.2.2.4 Canned or bottled (pasteurized) or retort pouch vegetables (including mushrooms and fungi, roots and tubers, pulses and legumes, and aloe vera), and seaweeds 1000 mg/kg 161 & 191 2008

04.2.2.5 Vegetable (including mushrooms and fungi, roots and tubers, pulses and legumes, and aloe vera), seaweed, and nut and seed purees and spreads (e.g., peanut butter) 1000 mg/kg 161 & 191 2008

04.2.2.6 Vegetable (including mushrooms and fungi, roots and tubers, pulses and legumes, and aloe vera), seaweed, and nut and seed pulps and preparations (e.g., vegetable desserts and sauces, candied vegetables) other than food

category 04.2.2.5 1000 mg/kg 161 & 191 2008

04.2.2.7 Fermented vegetable (including mushrooms and fungi, roots and tubers, pulses and legumes, and aloe vera) and seaweed products, excluding fermented soybean products of food categories 06.8.6, 06.8.7, 12.9.1, 12.9.2.1 and 12.9.2.3 2500 mg/kg 161 & 191 2008

04.2.2.8 Cooked or fried vegetables (including mushrooms and fungi, roots and tubers, pulses and legumes, and aloe vera), and seaweeds 1000 mg/kg 161 & 191 2008

05.1.1 Cocoa mixes (powders) and cocoa mass/cake 3000 mg/kg 97 & 191 2007

05.1.2 Cocoa mixes (syrups) 1000 mg/kg 161 & 191 2007

05.1.3 Cocoa-based spreads, including fillings 3000 mg/kg 161 & 191 2008

05.1.4 Cocoa and chocolate products 3000 mg/kg 161 & 191 2008

05.1.5 Imitation chocolate, chocolate substitute products 3000 mg/kg 161 & 191 2008

05.2.1 Hard candy 3000 mg/kg 161 & 148 2008

05.2.2 Soft candy 3000 mg/kg 161 & 148 2008

05.2.3 Nougats and marzipans 3000 mg/kg 161 & 191 2008

05.3 Chewing gum 10000 mg/kg 161 & 191 2007

05.4 Decorations (e.g., for fine bakery wares), toppings (nonfruit) and sweet sauces 1000 mg/kg 161 & 191 2007

06.3 Breakfast cereals, including rolled oats 1000 mg/kg 161 & 191 2007

06.5 Cereal and starch based desserts (e.g., rice pudding, tapioca pudding) 1000 mg/kg 161 & 191 2007

ASPARTAME

CODEX STAN 192-1995 76

Table One

FoodCatNo FoodCategory MaxLevel Notes Year Adopted

07.1 Bread and ordinary bakery wares 4000 mg/kg 161 & 191 2008

07.2 Fine bakery wares (sweet, salty, savoury) and mixes 1700 mg/kg 165 & 191 2007

09.2 Processed fish and fish products, including mollusks, crustaceans, and echinoderms 300 mg/kg 144 & 191 2007

09.3 Semi-preserved fish and fish products, including mollusks, crustaceans, and echinoderms 300 mg/kg 144 & 191 2007

09.4 Fully preserved, including canned or fermented fish and fish products, including mollusks, crustaceans, and echinoderms 300 mg/kg 144 & 191 2007

10.4 Egg-based desserts (e.g., custard) 1000 mg/kg 161 & 191 2007

11.4 Other sugars and syrups (e.g., xylose, maple syrup, sugar toppings) 3000 mg/kg 159 & 191 2007

11.6 Table-top sweeteners, including those containing highintensity sweeteners GMP 191 2007

12.2.2 Seasonings and condiments 2000 mg/kg 161 & 191 2008

12.3 Vinegars 3000 mg/kg 161 & 191 2008

12.4 Mustards 350 mg/kg 191 2007

12.5 Soups and broths 1200 mg/kg 161 & 188 2009

12.6 Sauces and like products 350 mg/kg 191 2007

12.7 Salads (e.g., macaroni salad, potato salad) and sandwich spreads excluding cocoa- and nut-based spreads of food categories 04.2.2.5 and 05.1.3 350 mg/kg 161 & 166 2007

13.3 Dietetic foods intended for special medical purposes (excluding products of food category 13.1) 1000 mg/kg 191 2007

13.4 Dietetic formulae for slimming purposes and weight reduction 800 mg/kg 191 2007

13.5 Dietetic foods (e.g., supplementary foods for dietary use) excluding products of food categories 13.1 - 13.4 and 13.6 1000 mg/kg 191 2007

13.6 Food supplements 5500 mg/kg 191 2007

14.1.3.1 Fruit nectar 600 mg/kg 191 2005

14.1.3.2 Vegetable nectar 600 mg/kg 161 & 191 2007

14.1.3.3 Concentrates for fruit nectar 600 mg/kg 127 & 191 2005

14.1.3.4 Concentrates for vegetable nectar 600 mg/kg 127 & 161 2007

14.1.4 Water-based flavoured drinks, including "sport," "energy," or "electrolyte" drinks and particulated drinks 600 mg/kg 161 & 191 2007

14.1.5 Coffee, coffee substitutes, tea, herbal infusions, and other hot cereal and grain beverages, excluding cocoa 600 mg/kg 160 & 161 2007

14.2.7 Aromatized alcoholic beverages (e.g., beer, wine and spirituous cooler-type beverages, low alcoholic refreshers) 600 mg/kg 191 2007

15.0 Ready-to-eat savouries 500 mg/kg 191 2008

ASPARTAME-ACESULFAME SALT

INS 962 Aspartame-acesulfame salt Functional Class: Sweetener

FoodCatNo FoodCategory MaxLevel Notes Year Adopted

ASPARTAME-ACESULFAME SALT

CODEX STAN 192-1995 77

Table One

FoodCatNo FoodCategory MaxLevel Notes Year Adopted

01.1.2 Dairy-based drinks, flavoured and/or fermented (e.g., chocolate milk, cocoa, eggnog, drinking yoghurt, wheybased drinks) 350 mg/kg 113 & 161 2009

01.7 Dairy-based desserts (e.g., pudding, fruit or flavoured yoghurt) 350 mg/kg 113 & 161 2009

02.4 Fat-based desserts excluding dairy-based dessert products of food category 01.7 350 mg/kg 113 & 161 2009

04.1.2.4 Canned or bottled (pasteurized) fruit 350 mg/kg 113 & 161 2009

04.1.2.5 Jams, jellies, marmelades 1000 mg/kg 119 & 161 2009

04.1.2.8 Fruit preparations, including pulp, purees, fruit toppings and coconut milk 350 mg/kg 113 & 161 2009

04.1.2.9 Fruit-based desserts, including fruit-flavoured water-based desserts 350 mg/kg 113 & 161 2009

04.2.2.3 Vegetables (including mushrooms and fungi, roots and tubers, pulses and legumes, and aloe vera), and seaweeds in vinegar, oil, brine, or soybean sauce 200 mg/kg 113 & 161 2009

04.2.2.6 Vegetable (including mushrooms and fungi, roots and tubers, pulses and legumes, and aloe vera), seaweed, and nut and seed pulps and preparations (e.g., vegetable desserts and sauces, candied vegetables) other than food category 04.2.2.5 350 mg/kg 113 & 161 2009

05.1.5 Imitation chocolate, chocolate substitute products 500 mg/kg 113 & 161 2009

07.2 Fine bakery wares (sweet, salty, savoury) and mixes 1000 mg/kg 77 & 113 2009

09.3 Semi-preserved fish and fish products, including mollusks, crustaceans, and echinoderms 200 mg/kg 113 2009

09.4 Fully preserved, including canned or fermented fish and fish products, including mollusks, crustaceans, and echinoderms 200 mg/kg 113 2009

13.4 Dietetic formulae for slimming purposes and weight reduction 450 mg/kg 113 2009

13.5 Dietetic foods (e.g., supplementary foods for dietary use) excluding products of food categories 13.1 - 13.4 and 13.6 450 mg/kg 113 2009

14.2.7 Aromatized alcoholic beverages (e.g., beer, wine and spirituous cooler-type beverages, low alcoholic refreshers) 350 mg/kg 113 2010

If they don't get this deadly chemical poison off the market soon,

who will be left standing?

Betty

http://www.mpwhi.com, www.dorway.com, http://www.wnho.net

Aspartame Toxicity Center, http://www.holisticmed.com/aspartamewww.holisticmed.com/aspartame

This is unbelievableyou would not even think they would just add Aspartame in high levels to some of these foods!!!

http://www.timebomb2000.com/vb/showthread.php?t=372434Aspartame

Approved to be Added to Following Foodstuff

A few samples of all the many kinds of food products they are with this carcinogen:

"Vegetable (including mushrooms and fungi, roots and tubers, pulses and legumes, and aloe vera), seaweed, and nut and seed pulps and preparations (e.g., vegetable desserts and sauces, candied vegetables) other than food category 04.2.2.5 1000 mg/kg 161 & 191 2008

04.2.2.7 Fermented vegetable (including mushrooms and fungi, roots and tubers, pulses and legumes, and aloe vera) and seaweed products, excluding fermented soybean products of food categories 06.8.6, 06.8.7, 12.9.1, 12.9.2.1 and 12.9.2.3 2500 mg/kg 161 & 191 2008

04.2.2.8 Cooked or fried vegetables (including mushrooms and fungi, roots and tubers, pulses and legumes, and aloe vera), and seaweeds 1000 mg/kg 161 & 191 2008

05.1.1 Cocoa mixes (powders) and cocoa mass/cake 3000 mg/kg 97 & 191 2007"

Vaccination rates fall among better educated families

(NaturalNews)
This trend infuriates the vaccine industry and all the shills who push vaccines, of course. Despite all their high-dollar propaganda, expensive advertising and vaccine booths, more and more people are coming to realize that many vaccines are dangerous for childrenand the seasonal flu vaccines in particular offer absolutely no scientifically-validated benefit whatsoever. They are pure quackery and nothing more.

The really interesting thing about this trend is that parents with a higher education are consciously choosing to protect their children from vaccines. Remarkably, the vaccineindustry insists that "they're the stupid ones" because they don't believe the vaccine propaganda. But as it turns out, people are smarter than the vaccine industry thinks, and as they're learning the truth about seasonal flu vaccines, they're making informed, intelligent decisions to protect their children from such vaccines.

Seasonal flu vaccines simply do not work

It's a scientific fact: Seasonal flu vaccines don't work on at least 99% of the population (http://www.naturalnews.com/029641_v...). You have to vaccinate 100 people, in other words, just to avoid flu symptoms in ONE person -- and that's if you believe the drug company's own clinical trial data! (Which is almost certainly biased in favor of the vaccines.)

The second scientific fact the flu industry conveniently avoids talking about is that vitamin D offers far better protection against flu infections, and it's cheaper, safer and easier to take! Children will gladly chew vitamin D tablets if it means avoiding a jab with a sharp needle.

Vitamin D makes the immune system work

Vitamin D, you see, activates the immune response to flu infections. Virtually everyone who suffers from the flu in the winter is vitamin D deficient. That's why flu season is the winter, by the way: Because that's when everybody is deficient in vitamin D! (http://www.naturalnews.com/029333_v...)

Most likely, the four percent of families who are choosing to avoid flu shots are supplementing their children's diets with vitamin D and other immune-boosting nutrients. So they're actually better off with vitamin D than they would have been with the vaccine!

Vitamin D, by the way, also prevents tuberculosis (http://www.naturalnews.com/021855.html), asthma, cancer, kidney disease and nearly a hundred other serious health conditions, including autoimmune disorders. (http://www.naturalnews.com/029605_v...)

Vaccines are only chosen by ignorant people

The vaccine industry is terrified of vitamin D because it knows if the truth about vitamin D becomes widely known, people will stop taking seasonal flu shots and the drug companies will lose billions of dollars.

It has already begun, in fact. In one year, natural health websites like NaturalNews have helped educate the public and reduce dangerous vaccination rates by an astonishing four percent. This is why the vaccine industry is in a panic this year, paying celebrities and TV doctors to appear on posters and television ads, trying to push more seasonal flu vaccines on a population that is increasingly rejecting them for good reason.

It's all going to end up as follows: Within a few years, only the most ignorant people will even consider getting a seasonal flu shot. These are the same people who drink diet soda (a scam), who take diabetes drugs (another scam), who raise money for pink ribbon breast cancer events (an even bigger scam) and who eat processed junk food at every meal. They are the ones who will suffer from conventional medicine while the better informed individuals and families will increasingly reject conventional medicine and seek out healthier, more natural alternatives.

Your immune system is a nanotechnology miracle that already knows how to block viruses and stop the flu. All it needs is to be activated with the right nutrition. Vitamin D does for your immune system what vaccines can never do -- it unleashes a biological miracle that can hunt down and eliminate invading microorganisms and viral fragments, protecting you from all the germs the drug industry wants you to be terrified of.

Don't believe the vaccine quackery and fear mongering. Join the educated crowd that's consciously and intelligently choosing alternatives to vaccines -- alternatives that work better and safer at lower cost, too. With vaccines, remember that you always run the risk of being paralyzed or ending up in the hospital with a coma.

Read the truth about what happened in Australia with seasonal flu vaccines earlier this year: Children suffered vomiting, fevers and seizures. Read it here:http://www.naturalnews.com/029586_A...

See What Ants Do To Aspartame

Using Aspartame for Ant & Cockroach Poison

by Stephanie Relfe B.Sc. (Sydney)
July 22 2010

Full Story

Metformin is considered a cornerstone in the treatment of diabetes - may cause patients to develop a steadily worsening vitamin B12 deficiency

(NaturalNews) Long-term use of the popular diabetes drug metformin (originally marketed as Glucophage) may cause patients to develop a steadily worsening vitamin B12 deficiency, Dutch scientists have found.

"Our study shows that this decrease is not a transitory phenomenon, but persists and grows over time," wrote the Maastricht University Medical Center researchers in the British Medical Journal.

This is an issue of particular concern given the prevalence of diabetes and the popularity of metformin as a treatment.

"Metformin is considered a cornerstone in the treatment of diabetes and is the most frequently prescribed first line therapy for individuals with type 2 diabetes," the researchers wrote. "In addition, it is one of a few ... associated with improvements in cardiovascular morbidity and mortality, which is a major cause of death in patients with type 2 diabetes."

Earlier, short-term studies had found that use of the drug might lead to insufficient levels of the vitamin in the body. The new study confirmed this trend over the long term.

"Metformin does ... induce vitamin B12 malabsorption, which may increase the risk of developing vitamin B12 deficiency -- a clinically important and treatable condition," the researchers wrote.

The researchers assigned 390 Type 2 diabetes patients at the outpatient clinics of three nonacademic hospitals to take either metformin or a placebo pill three times per day for more than four years. The average study participant had been diagnosed with diabetes 13 years prior and had been undergoing insulin treatment for seven years. Average participant age was 61.

Among those taking metformin, vitamin B12 levels began to steadily drop relative to those who were taking a placebo pill. The biggest drop occurred in the first few months, but the decrease continued over the course of the study.

After four years, participants in the metformin group had undergone a 19 percent relative reduction in their levels of the nutrient. They were 11.2 percent more likely than placebo participants to suffer from B12 insufficiency and 7.2 percent more likely to suffer from deficiency.

For every 8.9 patients treated with metformin, one would develop insufficient vitamin B12 levels. This increased risk remained after researchers adjusted for other risk factors including age, duration of diabetes, insulin dose, sex, smoking status and previous treatment with metformin.

"Our study shows that it is reasonable to assume harm will eventually occur in some patients with metformin-induced low vitamin B12 levels," the researchers wrote.

The researchers found that metformin seems to inhibit the intestine's absorption of vitamin B12. Fortunately, calcium supplements appear to reverse this effect.

Vitamin B12 is critical for maintaining nerve and red blood cell health. It can be found in animal products, nutritional yeast and fortified breakfast cereals. Symptoms of deficiency include anemia, fatigue, nerve damage and cognitive changes. Because similar symptomsoften occur in diabetics and the elderly, deficiency may be hard to detect in such populations. Yet while B12 deficiency can carry severe consequences, it is relatively easy to correct with supplementation.

The researchers suggested that all patients taking metformin have their vitamin B12 levels tested regularly to avoid potentially severe consequences.

"Vitamin B-12 deficiency is preventable; therefore, our findings suggest that regular measurement of vitamin B-12 concentrations during long-term metformin treatment should be strongly considered." the researchers wrote.

Nearly 11 percent of the U.S. population, or 24 million people, suffer from diabetes. Of these 5.7 million are undiagnosed. In addition, 57 million people in the United States alone are estimated to be pre-diabetic, or at imminent risk of developing the disease.

Worldwide, an estimated 246 million people suffer from the disease. Prevalence is only expected to increase as the spreading Western diet and lifestyle lead to increasing rates of obesity.

Sources for this story include: http://www.reuters.com/article/idUS...http://www.medscape.com/viewarticle... http://www.medpagetoday.com/Endocri....