Many of you have purchased Dr. Gil Kaats' book, "Restructuring Body Composition" from our BookStore. Here is an important update for your files. You may print this out and place it in the back of your book. If you do not have a copy of this very informative book yet, please visit our BookStore and get your copy now! We appreciate so much your continued interest and support. Thanks, JC Spencer.

Update 7: Letter to Senator Tom Harkin on his Appointment as
Chairman of the Late Senator Kennedy�s Health Committee

Perhaps no time in our nation�s history have so many people been involved with issues of healthcare. Irrespective of one�s position on the multiple recent healthcare proposals and plans, it is clear that healthcare is a dominant political and social issue in contemporary America. Wellness and nutritional supplements are increasingly looked to as legitimate cost-saving healthcare options. Irrespective of the financial incentives provided through the marketing of dietary supplements, the incentive to play an important role in healthcare is a clarion call for the supplement industry and is an opportunity that should not be missed.

The support for the cost-saving and healthcare benefits of supplements is increasingly being endorsed at different levels of the U.S. government. In this, and future updates, I�ll provide examples and quotations from officials at all levels of government supporting the use of dietary supplements. For example, in our last update, we reported the interest shown in the U.S. House of Representatives by Congressman Dan Burton�s three HRs supporting nutritional supplements. In this update, I want to direct your attention to the U.S. Senate with our letter congratulating Senator Tom Harkin, an avid supporter of dietary supplements, for his appointment as chairman of the Senate�s Health Committee.

On September 10th 2009, Lorraine Heller reported in Nutra-Ingredients that �Supplement defender Harkin takes US health chair�

�A long-time friend of the supplements industry, Iowa Senator Tom Harkin, will replace the late Edward Kennedy as head of the Senate Health, Education, Labor and Pensions Committee (HELP). A champion of the supplements industry, Harkin has remained a primary defender of the much-criticized Dietary Supplements and Health Education Act (DSHEA). According to Daniel Fabricant, acting CEO of the supplements trade group Natural Products Association (NPA), Senator Harkin has always �looked at� prevention as a key to healthcare reform. The Senator has consistently looked � towards complementary, integrative, preventive and alternative forms of health care which sometimes includes supplements, to improve the nation's health.�

Although the Update 7 letter addresses some of the same points in our recent Update 6 letter to Congressman Burton, it extracts some key points from our CER manuscript that make it worthy of a separate update. One point is that the cornerstones of healthcare reform are going to involve the reframing of our definitions of mortality and morbidity. Instead of attributing premature deaths to a �disease� such as heart disease, the root causes of death are really modifiable lifestyle behaviors - the arena where wellness can play a major role. Another point is that even with genomic research suggesting our genes may set limits on our wellness, genomic advances should not divert us from the clear and present need to change lifestyles. There are numerous studies showing that even gene expression is modified by the power of lifestyle. The perennial debate of �nature versus nurture� describes a false dichotomy. With the knowledge we have already in hand, we can �nurture nature.� Therefore, I think you will find enough additional information in Senator Harkin�s letter to make it worth reading.

Dr. Gilbert R. Kaats, PhD
Health and Medical Research

Click here to print the Letter to Senator Harkin as a pdf file

Go to www.endowmentmed.org for more information about the science of glycomics.