Month: April 2020

US doctors incentivized to diagnose everything as COVID-19

gettingwell4 Just me

To follow up Lowering US pneumonia death counts to increase COVID-19 death counts:

“Dr. Scott Jensen, a Minnesota physician and Republican state senator, told a local station he received a 7-page document coaching him to fill out death certificates with a COVID-19 diagnosis without a lab test to confirm the patient actually had the virus.

‘It’s ridiculous. The determination of cause of death is a big deal. The idea that we’re going to allow people to massage and game the numbers is a real issue because we’re going to undermine trust.

I would never put down influenza as the cause of death. Yet that’s what we’re being asked to do here.’

Dr. Jensen also disclosed that hospitals are paid more if they list patients with a COVID-19 diagnosis.

Senator Dr. Scott Jensen: ‘Right now Medicare is determining that if you have a COVID-19 admission to the hospital you get $13,000. If that COVID-19 patient goes on a ventilator you get $39,000, three times as much. Nobody can tell me after 35 years in the world of medicine that sometimes those kinds of things impact on what we do.'”

https://thespectator.info/2020/04/09/hospitals-get-paid-more-to-list-patients-as-covid-19-and-three-times-as-much-if-the-patient-goes-on-ventilator-video/

And the public has been told many times with prosecuted examples that Medicaid / Medicare fraud is a crime. On the plus side, COVID-19 must be the ultimate cure for deadly medical conditions, if no one dies of anything else anymore.

Cui bono questions as John Hopkins will be herding the US public toward the cliff April 6-10, 2020 draws to a close for the week:

  1. This change in medical reporting has had / will have what effects on the headlines we’ve seen and will see?
  2. Who has benefited / will benefit from (medical, economic, social, and political) reports on and actions taken with the change in medical reporting to: “COVID-19 being the underlying cause more often than not.”
  3. Who has suffered and will suffer from these reports and actions?

Do early experiences of hunger affect our behavior, thoughts, and feelings today?

gettingwell4 5+ stars Premium, Epigenetics, Primal Therapy , , , , , , ,

Reposted from five years ago.

A 2015 worldwide human study Hunger promotes acquisition of nonfood objects found that people’s current degree of hungriness affected their propensity to acquire nonfood items.

The researchers admitted that they didn’t demonstrate cause and effect with the five experiments they performed, although the findings had merit. News articles poked good-natured fun at the findings with headlines such as “Why Hungry People Want More Binder Clips.”

The research caught my eye with these statements:

“Hunger’s influence extends beyond food consumption to the acquisition of nonfood items that cannot satisfy the underlying need.

We conclude that a basic biologically based motivation can affect substantively unrelated behaviors that cannot satisfy the motivation.“

The concept of the quotes relates to a principle of Dr. Arthur Janov’s Primal Therapy – symbolic satisfaction of needs. Two fundamentals of Primal Therapy:

  1. The physiological impacts of our early unmet needs drive our behavior, thoughts, and feelings.
  2. The painful impacts of our unfulfilled needs impel us to be constantly vigilant for some way to fulfill them.

Corollary principles of Primal Therapy:

  • Our present efforts to fulfill our early unmet needs will seldom be satisfying. It’s too late.
  • We acquire substitutes now for what we really needed back then.
  • Acquiring these symbols of our early unmet needs may – at best – temporarily satisfy derivative needs.

But the symbolic satisfaction of derived needs – the symptoms – never resolves the impacts of early unfulfilled needs – the motivating causes:

  • We repeat the acquisition behavior, and get caught in a circle of acting out our feelings and impulses driven by these conditions.
  • The unconscious act-outs become sources of misery both to us and to the people around us.

As this study’s findings showed, there’s every reason for us to want researchers to provide a factual blueprint of causes for our hunger sensation effects, such as “unrelated behaviors that cannot satisfy the motivation.“

Hunger research objectives could include answering:

  • What enduring physiological changes occurred as a result of past hunger?
  • How do these changes affect the subjects’ present behaviors, thoughts, and feelings?

Hunger research causal evidence for the effect of why people acquire “items that cannot satisfy the underlying need” may include studying where to start the timelines for the impacts of hunger. The impacts potentially go back at least to infancy when we were completely dependent on our caregivers.

Infants can’t get up to go to the refrigerator to satisfy their hunger. All a hungry infant can do is call attention to their need, and feel pain from the deprivation of their need.

Is infancy far back enough, though, to understand the beginnings of potential impacts of hunger?

Lowering US pneumonia death counts to increase COVID-19 death counts

gettingwell4 4-5 stars Advanced knowledge, Immune system

To follow up CDC directs the US to attribute deaths from other causes to COVID-19, my sending its information to Tucker Carlson yesterday morning may have contributed to the information being broadcast nationally yesterday evening. The transcript at Tucker Carlson: Possible That Doctors Are Classifying Conventional Pneumonia Deaths As COVID Deaths, Increasing The Count included:

“For many years, the CDC has tracked the total number of Americans who die each week from pneumonia. For the last few weeks, that number has come in far lower than at the same moment in previous years.

How could that be? It seems entirely possible that doctors are classifying conventional pneumonia deaths as COVID-19 deaths. This would mean the epidemic is being credited for thousands of deaths that would have occurred if the virus never arrived here.”

Not sure where to find the information supporting “For the last few weeks, that number has come in far lower than at the same moment in previous years.”

Cui bono questions midway through John Hopkins will be herding the US public toward the cliff April 6-10, 2020:

  1. This change in medical reporting has had / will have what effects on the headlines we’ve seen and will see?
  2. Who has benefited / will benefit from (medical, economic, social, and political) reports on and actions taken with the change in medical reporting to: “COVID-19 being the underlying cause more often than not.”
  3. Who has suffered and will suffer from these reports and actions?

Sea Level

gettingwell4 Just me

Walked on the beach

sea level

remembering the last time I lived here 40+ years ago, experiencing Sea Level in concert back then, still listening to their instrumentals now, along with these:

It’s a lot like being little
And wanting a brand new toy
It’s a lot like being little
And wanting a baby boy
To call brother
And it hurts when you want it so bad

It’s a lot like being a young boy
Cannot make the team
It’s a lot like being a young girl
Cannot help but dream
Of a best friend’s brother
And it hurts when you want it so bad

When it’s love that you have lost
Baby that’s the worst hurt
That you’ll ever hurt
Waiting for a new love to come along
Maybe it’s just as bad

It’s a lot like being a man
With no one to call your own
It’s a lot like being a woman
Wanting a house and a home
To be a mother
And it hurts when you want it so bad

In the dreary world
That we’re living in
It’s fashionable to let nothing faze you

Yeah, you’re above it all
You’re fooling, fooling yourself
You’re living in a dream

So you close the door
You let nothing in
And yet you’re moving and not caring where you’ve been

Yeah, you’re above it all
And you remind me of myself
You’re living in a dream
Living in a dream

Young sports fans can end the COVID-19 herding of the population

gettingwell4 Just me

Let’s put together a few items:

  • Football / soccer is the most popular sport in the world.
  • People are passionate about their sports.
  • We are connected like never before.
  • Very few young people are at risk for COVID-19 complications.
  • Suppressing people’s physical movement causes resentment.
  • From the 1776 US Declaration of Independence: “Governments are instituted among men, deriving their just powers from the consent of the governed.”

Image from the US Library of Congress

Who will be first?

 

CDC directs the US to attribute deaths from other causes to COVID-19

gettingwell4 4-5 stars Advanced knowledge, Immune system

To follow up the If people don’t stand up for their rights, their rights will be forgotten point, which YouTube has taken down:

“We don’t die of the virus. We die of pneumonia.”

The CDC at https://www.cdc.gov/nchs/nvss/covid-19.htm has been issuing guidance to merge deaths from other causes into a WHO code U07.1 that assigns COVID-19 as the primary cause of death. For example, click the March 24, 2020 “Notification of new ICD code introduced for COVID-19” guidance to see:

“The underlying cause depends upon what and where conditions are reported on the death certificate. However, the rules for coding and selection of the underlying cause of death are expected to result in COVID-19 being the underlying cause more often than not.“

Click the April 2, 2020 “New Releases: Final Guidance and Provisional Death Counts” guidance to see:

“Provisional counts for COVID-19 deaths are based on a current flow of mortality data in the National Vital Statistics System (NVSS), and will include:

  • A weekly provisional count of deaths in the United States due to COVID-19
  • A provisional count of deaths from all causes
  • Percent of previous year’s deaths (the number of deaths received compared to the number of deaths expected based on data from previous years)
  • Pneumonia deaths (excluding pneumonia deaths involving influenza)

Pneumonia deaths are included in the provisional counts because deaths due to COVID-19 may be misclassified as pneumonia deaths in the absence of positive test results, and pneumonia may appear on death certificates as a comorbid condition. Thus, increases in pneumonia deaths may be an indicator of excess COVID-19-related mortality.”

  1. How probable is it now that US deaths from pneumonia will NOT be attributed to COVID-19?
  2. This change in medical reporting has had / will have what effects on the headlines we’ve seen and will see?
  3. Who has benefited / will benefit from (medical, economic, social, and political) reports on and actions taken with the change in medical reporting to: “COVID-19 being the underlying cause more often than not.”
  4. Who has suffered and will suffer from these reports and actions?

If people don’t stand up for their rights, their rights will be forgotten

gettingwell4 4-5 stars Advanced knowledge, Beliefs, Epigenetics, Immune system, Memory, Stress

YouTube took down this interview and a follow-on interview It was known to everybody that the lockdown would cause a catastrophe.

Here’s an interview last week with a German epidemiologist, Professor Wittkowski, who isn’t on a government payroll:

“First of all the elderly and fragile should be separated from the population where the virus is circulating. Everyone else, especially the children, should keep going to school, because they will be the primary impetus for herd immunity.

Flattening the curve prolongs the time a virus stays in the population. People staying indoors keeps the virus healthy.

Like every other respiratory disease, without government intervention, the pandemic would already be over like it’s over in China and South Korea. Except, both in China and South Korea, social distancing started very close to the peak. By keeping the virus from running its course, they are now having a second wave of cases. It will keep on if we don’t let it complete.

There’s nothing to be scared about. This is a flu epidemic like others, maybe more severe. What’s changed is the internet. People get their information in a few seconds, rather than a week.

Tracking a respiratory disease is impossible. Even in times of social distancing. Nature has ways to make sure we survive.

The standard for AIDS reporting, i.e., the date of infection separated from the date of reporting, is not being followed.

If we had herd immunity now, we wouldn’t have a second wave in the fall. Herd immunity typically lasts for a couple of years. If we prevent herd immunity, it is certain that a second wave will occur.

Testing doesn’t stop anything. Antibody testing will give us estimates of herd immunity, which would be useful.

We don’t die of the virus. We die of pneumonia.

The downside of starting containment is that we should not believe that we are more intelligent than mother nature when we were evolving. Mother nature was pretty good at making sure we were a good match for the diseases that we happened to see virtually every year.

I think people, especially in the United States, are more docile than they should be. People should talk with their politicians, question them, ask them to explain. Because if people don’t stand up to their rights, their rights will be forgotten.”

In the name of COVID-19: Digital currencies with government surveillance

gettingwell4 Just me

To follow up Waiting to be officially denied, the UK Financial Times published Rushing out untested digital finance fixes for Covid-19 is folly (requires a subscription) on March 31, 2020:

“Due to the protracted nature of the 2008 global financial crisis, the world’s most powerful money-printing institutions were already at the limits of unconventional policy when this crisis struck.

Democratic Congresswoman Rashida Tlaib proposed a permanent Treasury-managed digital public currency wallet system. An early version of the alternative $2tn Coronavirus Aid Relief and Economic Security (CARES) act, which passed last week, considered rolling out Fed-managed digital dollar wallets to all US residents, citizens and businesses to facilitate cash distributions.

Government surveillance is a real concern. Apple’s digital dominance already makes it hard for consumers to decline privacy compromises terms in exchange for access to its products.

Imagine how much harder that choice would be if the consumer had to sign up for a data-tracking CBDC [central bank digital currency], or waive her right to a government-funded handout or vaccine?”

We see news stories about Michigan’s congressional representative, other people rushing agendas in the US, Thailand, South Korea, Singapore, China, Taiwan, EU, IMF, UK, or any number of people desperate to create panic to grab even more power.

John Hopkins will be herding the US public toward the cliff April 6-10, 2020

gettingwell4 Just me

Let’s predict this coming week in the US using the methodology of COVID-19 in Italy Part II:

  1. Click Italy on the left menu of the John Hopkins map.
  2. Click the Active Cases tab at the bottom center.
  3. Click the Daily Increase tab at the bottom right.
  4. Hover your mouse over the longest chart bar.
  5. Observe that March 20, 2020 – 17 days ago – was the peak of Italy’s daily increases in COVID-19 cases.


Have you seen this reported anywhere or investigated? I heard on the April 5th coronavirus task force briefing that Italy’s daily deaths had gone down. Even non-health professionals knew that should have happened – with a lag time – since March 20th.

Can you find daily deaths or daily recoveries on the map? No, John Hopkins has those daily numbers but doesn’t display them. It’s not a difficult programming task to put two more tabs at the bottom right and display daily deaths and daily recoveries.

Let’s find the US numbers using similar steps:

  1. Click US on the left menu of the John Hopkins map.
  2. Click the Active Cases tab at the bottom center.
  3. Click the Daily Increase tab at the bottom right.
  4. Hover your mouse over the longest chart bar.
  5. Observe that April 3rd – two days ago – had been the peak of the US daily increases in COVID-19 cases todate.

No daily deaths or daily recoveries to inform us of trends such as daily recoveries compared to new cases. Instead, John Hopkins’ user interface features cumulative deaths that panic the public.

I’ll guess the US public isn’t John Hopkins’ customer, regardless of who pays them. John Hopkins is one of the herders – acting on behalf of their real customer(s) waiting at the bottom of the cliff for the herd’s demise.

All that’s missing to complete the picture is giving John Hopkins horses and torches.

Changing an inflammatory phenotype with broccoli sprouts

gettingwell4 4-5 stars Advanced knowledge, Epigenetics, Immune system, Memory, Stress ,

This follow up to Growing a broccoli sprouts Victory Garden is what’s gone on during Week 1 of starting to grow broccoli sprouts for a “30 60 grams of fresh broccoli sprouts incorporated daily into the diet” [1] program. See Week 2 of Changing an inflammatory phenotype with broccoli sprouts for changes.

Day 0 – I’ve tried many things to cure chronic inflammation over the years, basing most of my actions on what’s proven to work for other people. These treatments have helped but haven’t completely worked for me. I’ve continued them with the hypothesis that they may have positive synergistic interactions with daily eating 60 grams of 3-day-old broccoli sprouts that yield 27 mg of sulforaphane after microwaving.

Day 0 treatments included two dozen supplements I’ve taken since turning 50, a diet low in advanced glycation end products started last year [2], and naproxen (a nonsteroidal anti-inflammatory drug). The chronically inflamed spots are the left thumb base (arthritis), tendons outside the left ankle (peroneal tendinosis), and left knee tendonitis, all probably consequences of playing golf for 40+ years.

Day 1 – The vertical farming equipment is a Deluxe Kitchen Crop 4-Tray Seed Sprouter Model VKP1200 made by VICTORIO Kitchen Products. I soak one tablespoon of organic broccoli seeds for 12 hours. Take them out of the stackable trays for a twice-daily rinsing, which is counter to directions of pouring water into the tower top. Microwave the Day 3 broccoli sprouts daily per [3]. Run its tray through the dishwasher (but no heat cycle). Put the tray back in rotation for Day 0.

Day 2 – Threw away one of my crutches, naproxen, as taking it had become more of a habit than a necessity. I’d been taking 220 mg twice daily for years until two weeks ago, when I switched to once daily.

“Sulforaphane increases several endogenous antioxidant compounds via the transcription factor Nrf2 [nuclear factor erythroid 2-related factor 2, discovered in 1994]. Of the phytochemicals with Nrf2 inducer capacity, Brassica-derived SFN [sulforaphane] is the most potent naturally occurring biomolecule known at this time.

Another transcription factor, NF-κB, which is associated with inflammatory pathways is downregulated by SFN. This dual action of SFN is especially intriguing in that Nrf2 and NF-κB interact via their own ‘cross talk’.” [4]

Day 3 – Stopped taking 2 mg of sulforaphane in the form of a broccoli sprout extract capsule, and 200 mg of a diindolylmethane (DIM) capsule daily. DIM was raised 195% from Day 0 to Day 70 after daily intake of broccoli sprouts in [1], noting:

“The anti-inflammatory effects observed with broccoli sprouts intake are likely due to the combined effects of all the hydrolysis products of glucosinolates.”

Don’t need either supplement when broccoli sprouts supply them.

The next supplement I’ll drop is N-acetyl-cysteine (NAC), the precursor to our endogenous antioxidant glutathione. I’ve taken a 600 mg capsule twice daily for fifteen years.

[4] goes on and on about sulforaphane / glutathione interactions. For example: “Several well-studied Nrf2-dependent target genes of possible relevance are those encoding synthesis of glutathione (GSH)” in Section 5.2. SFN as a Redox Modulator that included Figure 6 below, and in Section 6. SFN: Its Redox-Modulating Effects:

Day 4 – I’d seen studies of broccoli sprouts that ranged from 3-days old (the most frequent age) to 8-days old. Before [5], I hadn’t found analyses of broccoli sprout age differences in sulforaphane contents, and only a few studies of sulforaphane differences among broccoli sprout cultivated varieties.

Day 5 – I’ve eaten sprouts at 3 – 5 days old, and haven’t noticed a taste difference after microwaving per [3]. Here’s what they look like at Days 0, 1, 2, and 3:

Day 6 – Are you ready to change your phenotype?

References in order of citation:

[1] 2018 Effects of long-term consumption of broccoli sprouts on inflammatory markers in overweight subjects

[2] 2016 Dr. Vlassara’s AGE-Less Diet: How a Chemical in the Foods We Eat Promotes Disease, Obesity, and Aging and the Steps We Can Take to Stop It

[3] 2020 Microwave cooking increases sulforaphane level in broccoli curated in Microwave broccoli to increase sulforaphane levels and Growing a broccoli sprouts Victory Garden

[4] 2019 Sulforaphane: Its “Coming of Age” as a Clinically Relevant Nutraceutical in the Prevention and Treatment of Chronic Disease

[5] 2020 3-day-old broccoli sprouts have the optimal yields

Using COVID-19 as a cover story Part II

gettingwell4 Just me

To follow up Using COVID-19 as a cover story, what other previously unacceptable agendas are now in play?

1. The United Nations is using COVID-19 to advocate a global 10% tax. From the March 27, 2020, document at https://www.un.org/sites/un2.un.org/files/sg_report_socio-economic_impact_of_covid19.pdf:

“A large-scale, coordinated and comprehensive multilateral response amounting to at least 10 per cent of global GDP is needed now more than ever.”

Sound familiar? What happened to using climate change as the cover story to take away money and property? That hasn’t gone away – just add another 10% to the price of the power grab.

2. Here’s one report of likely consequences from “nonessential” businesses being shut down in a county where the state hadn’t yet taken that action:

More People Died From Suicide Than Coronavirus In Tennessee This Week

“Knox County, Tennessee saw nine deaths by suicide within 48 hours this week as doomsday predictions over the novel Wuhan coronavirus panics an already anxious public and leaves millions unemployed and isolated. As of this writing, [March 27] more people have died from suicide in Knox County than people have from the virus in the entire state, where there have been 6 fatalities from the disease.

The county’s suicides over the span of two days this week equates to about 10 percent of last year’s total where 83 lives were lost to suicide.”

Have there been other reports comparing suicide numbers with COVID-19 numbers?

3. What are other consequences of taking away people’s livelihoods by “essential” becoming defined by governments?

The place where I live has city jobs for mowing the grass – because only public employees can do that work? I saw a team of them mowing median strips last week while others with “nonessential” livelihoods were forced to stay inside by the state.

Were city and state income taxes, property taxes, food sales taxes, utility, petroleum, and other taxes suspended? No, regardless of whether the state had forced the loss of income. People who had “nonessential” jobs and businesses are still on the hook for state and city spending, and “essential” people’s salaries, benefits, and pensions.

4. Where’s the evidence that COVID-19 poses such a monumental threat that it warrants shutting down businesses and surrendering all our liberties? Is there any historical evidence that governments have completely relinquished powers of this magnitude?

Are these attempts to make most people dependent upon government and accept subjugation? Will Part II be governments granting themselves even more powers with a cover story such as they will restore the order that they destroyed?

How can we swat them away before they infect us with their diseases? Better yet, how can we act like my traveling companion’s picture of a praying mantis protecting her against blood-sucking pests?

COVID-19 in Italy Part II

gettingwell4 Just me

To follow up Deaths in Italy attributed to COVID-19:

  1. Click Italy on the left menu of the John Hopkins map.
  2. Click the Active Cases tab at the bottom center.
  3. Click the Daily Increase tab at the bottom right.
  4. Hover your mouse over the longest chart bar.
  5. Observe that March 20, 2020 – 17 days ago – was the peak of Italy’s daily increases in COVID-19 cases.

Italy COVID-19

Have you seen this reported anywhere or investigated? I heard on tonight’s coronavirus task force briefing that Italy’s daily deaths had gone down. Even non-health professionals knew that should have happened – with a lag time – since March 20th.

Can you find daily deaths or daily recoveries on the map? No, John Hopkins has those daily numbers but doesn’t display them. It’s not a difficult programming task to put two more tabs at the bottom right and display daily deaths and daily recoveries.

I’ll guess the public isn’t really their customer. John Hopkins is a herder – acting on behalf of their customer(s) waiting at the bottom of the cliff – because they display cumulative deaths that panic the public toward the cliff rather than inform us.

We also know there was some other-than-medical purpose for:

“All the people who die in hospitals with the coronavirus are deemed to be dying of the coronavirus.”

although

“Only 12 per cent of death certificates have shown a direct causality from coronavirus.”

What effect would such reporting have on the headlines we’ve seen over the past 17 days?

Who has benefited from (medical, economic, social, and political) reports on and actions taken with COVID-19 over the past three weeks? Who has suffered from these reports and actions?

3-day-old broccoli sprouts have the optimal yields

gettingwell4 4-5 stars Advanced knowledge, Epigenetics, Immune system

This 2020 Chinese study compared the contents of 3, 5, and 7-day-old broccoli sprouts:

“The objective of this study was:

  1. To optimize the extraction conditions of SF [sulforaphane] from seeds and sprouts at the same time to ensure the maximum SF yields from them;
  2. To compare the SF yields, total flavonoid (TF) contents, and total phenolic (TP) contents from broccoli seeds and sprouts (after 3, 5, and 7 days germination respectively) of six different cultivated varieties; and
  3. To evaluate and compare the the stability and bioaccessibility of SF, TF and TP from broccoli seeds and sprouts upon in vitro gastrointestinal digestion; total antioxidant activities of samples before and after digestion were also investigated in this section.

Most varieties obtained the maximum SF, TP and TF contents in sprouts on day 3. SF contents in sprouts were 46% – 97% of seeds, whereas TP and TF contents in sprouts were 1.12 – 3.58 times higher than seeds among varieties.

sprout ages 1B

After in vitro digestion, broccoli sprouts from MNL variety kept considerable SF, TF, and TP contents, as well as antioxidant capacities, with all values higher than seeds.

SF from seeds and sprouts both showed high bioaccessibility values of 0.91 and 1.00, respectively. The high bioaccessibility of SF in vitro experiments provide an additional evidence for its efficient utilization, as many previous researches have reported a high bioavailability of SF in vivo.”

This study provided higher measures of sulforaphane in vitro bioaccessibility compared with previous studies of in vivo bioavailability.

It was good to read a definitive study that addressed both broccoli sprout age and cultivated variety for optimizing sulforaphane. The need was there. As the study authors put it:

“From the perspective of comparison methods, broccoli varieties, and germination processes, there is still lack of a systematic comparison of SF yields and other bioactive compounds contents between broccoli seeds and sprouts.”

https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0308814620300637 “Sulforaphane and its antioxidative effects in broccoli seeds and sprouts of different cultivars” (not freely available)

Growing a broccoli sprouts Victory Garden

gettingwell4 4-5 stars Advanced knowledge, Epigenetics, Immune system, Memory, Stress , , , , ,

To follow up How much sulforaphane is suitable for healthy people? I’ve started growing broccoli sprouts, and a “30 60 grams of fresh broccoli sprouts incorporated daily into the diet” [1] program. See Week 2 of Changing an inflammatory phenotype with broccoli sprouts for changes.

I loosely follow [2]‘s sprouting guidelines. One preparation difference is microwaving per [3]‘s findings as follows:

My current microwaving time for 60 grams of 3-day-old broccoli sprouts in 100 ml of water with a 1000 W microwave on full power is 35 seconds. The temperature gets up to 57°C. See Enhancing sulforaphane content for changes. I immediately dump the broccoli sprouts into a colander and spray with cold water to stop heating at the desired temperature.

The first batch of broccoli sprouts was a mild, cabbage-tasting side dish to the home-style chicken soup on page 238 of [4].

The a priori hypotheses:

    1. 30 grams of fresh broccoli sprouts will not have “51 mg (117 μmol)” of glucoraphanin [1] because they “Used the elicitor methyl jasmonate (MeJA) by priming the seeds as well as by spraying daily. MeJA at concentrations of 156 μM act as stressor in the plant and enhances the biosynthesis of the phytochemicals glucosinolates. Compared to control plants without MeJA treatment, the content of compounds as the aliphatic glucosinolate glucoraphanin was enhanced up to 70%.” 117 μmol / 1.70 = 69 μmol is the expected glucoraphanin amount in 30 grams weight of fresh broccoli sprouts. 69 x 2 = 138 μmol in 60 grams.
    2. One measurement [5] of how much sulforaphane is present in fresh broccoli sprouts before microwaving is 100 μmol / 111 g = .9 μmol / g. (.9 x 30 g) = 27 μmol is the expected sulforaphane amount in 30 grams of fresh broccoli sprouts. Changed assumption to 0 μmol sulforaphane due to 2013 Sulforaphane: translational research from laboratory bench to clinic “Broccoli sprouts are correctly described as releasing, generating, or yielding but not containing SFN [sulforaphane].”
    3. Last week a [3] coauthor agreed to make the data available to facilitate calculations. While I’m waiting… The study said the Figure 3 HL60 sulforaphane amount was 2.45 μmol / g. Eyeball estimate of the below Figure 3 control (raw broccoli florets) is a glucoraphanin amount of ~2.2 μmol / g. I assume that the broccoli florets and sprouts conversion would be the same at a 2.45 μmol / 2.2 μmol ≈ 1.11 ratio. I expect that microwaving the raw broccoli sprouts to 60°C will convert the 138 μmol of glucoraphanin to a 153 μmol amount of sulforaphane at this assumed 1.11 conversion ratio.
    4. The estimated sulforaphane weight per [6] would be (153 μmol / 5.64) = 27 mg which is comparable to clinical trial dosages listed in [7] and [8].
    5. I’ve been sitting around a lot since returning from Milano, Italy, on February 24, 2020, and probably weigh around 75 kg. The estimated dosage represents 153 μmol of sulforaphane / 75 kg = 2.04 μmol of sulforaphane / kg, compared to the 1.36 μmol of glucoraphanin / kg average of [1]. (The study provided the subjects’ mean weight in Table 1 as “85.8 ± 16.7 kg.” The average dosage per kg body weight was 117 μmol of glucoraphanin / 85.8 kg = 1.36 μmol of glucoraphanin / kg.)
    6. Don’t have a practical estimate of the amount of sulforaphane I metabolize from post-microwave glucoraphanin that would add to the calculated 153 μmol of sulforaphane. Both [7] and [8] cited a 2012 study that found: “Some conversion of GRN [glucoraphanin] to SFN can occur in response to metabolism by the gut microflora; however, the response is inefficient, having been shown to vary ‘from about 1% to more than 40% of the dose.’”
    7. Don’t have a practical estimate of the “internal dose” [8] that would result from 153+ μmol of sulforaphane.

I don’t have a laboratory in my kitchen 🙂 and won’t have quantified results. See Grow a broccoli sprouts Victory Garden today! for August 2020 practices.

References in order of citation:

[1] 2018 Effects of long-term consumption of broccoli sprouts on inflammatory markers in overweight subjects

[2] 2017 You Need Sulforaphane – How and Why to Grow Broccoli Sprouts

[3] 2020 Microwave cooking increases sulforaphane level in broccoli curated in Microwave broccoli to increase sulforaphane levels

fsn31493-fig-0003-m

[4] 2016 Dr. Vlassara’s AGE-Less Diet: How a Chemical in the Foods We Eat Promotes Disease, Obesity, and Aging and the Steps We Can Take to Stop It

[5] 2016 Effect of Broccoli Sprouts and Live Attenuated Influenza Virus on Peripheral Blood Natural Killer Cells: A Randomized, Double-Blind Study

[6] 2020 https://pubchem.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/compound/sulforaphane lists sulforaphane’s molecular weight as 177.3 g / mol. A 1 mg weight of sulforaphane equals a 5.64 μmol sulforaphane amount (.001 / 177.3).

[7] 2019 Sulforaphane: Its “Coming of Age” as a Clinically Relevant Nutraceutical in the Prevention and Treatment of Chronic Disease

[8] 2019 Broccoli or Sulforaphane: Is It the Source or Dose That Matters? Note that a coauthor didn’t disclose their business’ conflict of interest for an effectively promoted commercial product.

Using COVID-19 as a cover story

gettingwell4 4-5 stars Advanced knowledge, Beliefs

One aspect of the coronavirus is how it’s being used for economic upheavals that weren’t previously acceptable. The view from a Hong Kong analyst:

From March 2020 MMT is now a reality:

“Under cover of the ‘coronacrisis’, we are now witnessing the introduction of Modern Monetary Theory (MMT), which isn’t modern and isn’t a theory.

The dollars that the government will inject into the Fed’s Special Purpose Vehicles (SPVs) were previously created out of nothing when the Fed monetised Treasury securities. So, the Fed creates money out of nothing. This money then goes to the government. The government then deposits some of this money into the Fed’s new SPVs, and based on this injection of ‘capital’ the Fed creates a lot more money out of nothing.

No longer will governments feel constrained by their abilities to tax the population and borrow from bond investors. From now on they will act like they have unrestricted access to a bottomless pool of money.”

The Coming Great Inflation from October 2019 showed that current developments were already in the works:

“The difference between money and every other economic good is that money is on one side of almost every economic transaction. Consequently, there is no single number that can accurately represent the price (purchasing power) of money, meaning that even the most honest and rigorous attempt to calculate the ‘general price level’ will fail. This doesn’t imply that changes in the supply of money have no effect on money purchasing power, but it does imply that the effects of changes in the money supply can’t be explained or understood via a simple equation.

The economic effects of a money-supply increase driven by commercial banks making loans to their customers will be very different from the economic effects of a money-supply increase driven by central banks monetising assets. ‘Main Street’ is the first receiver of the new money in the former case and ‘Wall Street’ is the first receiver of the new money in the latter case. This alone goes a long way towards explaining why the QE programs of Q4-2008 onward had a much greater effect on financial asset prices than on the prices that get added together to form the Consumer Price Index.

Due to the combination of the false belief that large increases in the supply of money have only a minor effect on the purchasing power of money and the equally false belief that the economy would benefit from a bit more ‘price inflation’, it’s a good bet that central banks and governments will devise ways to inject a lot more money into the economy in reaction to future economic weakness.”