Dear Healthy Friend,

We pass laws to keep child molesters away from schools and playgrounds... We lock peadophiles in prisons... All to keep our children and grandchildren safe. But what about doctors? We trust them with our little ones... But there's a possibility that we might had to start keeping psychiatrists at bay too.

Keep reading to see what Dr Douglass has to say about children and psychiatrists...

In the name of good health,

Taryn Strugnell
Managing Editor of Nutrition & Healing

P.S. Dr Wright talks about the anticoagulant properties of fish oil versus those of pharmaceutical drugs....

New push to medicate infants
Dr Douglass

Psychiatrits are out to diagnose newborn babies with schizophrenia based on some obtuse brain measurement - but let's call this what it really is: A sad and desperate attempt to create more patients and sell more meds.

Researchers took MRI and ultrasound measurements of the brains of 26 newborn babies born to schizophrenic mothers and found that boys had larger brains and larger lateral ventricles (those are the brain's fluid-filled spaces).

Impressed? Me neither. Never mind the little fact that no brain measurement or test has ever been able to diagnose schizophrenia - these researchers are so excited their prescription pads are quivering.

"It allows us to start thinking about how we can identify kids at risk for schizophrenia very early and whether there are things that we can do very early on to lessen the risk," lead study author John H. Gilmore, director of the UNC Schizophrenia Research Centre, wrote in a press release.

Give you one guess what those "things" are. Hint: It rhymes with bugs. And it bugs the hell out of me, especially when you consider how badly flawed this study is.

First, there's the little matter of the little girls. Their brains had no differences at all, according to the study in the American Journal of Psychiatry. The researchers tried to write that off by saying women have less severe and fewer cases of schizophrenia, but that's a convenient copout. At the end of the day, just as many women ultimately come down with schizophrenia as men.

Then, there's the ridiculous notion that a baby born to a schizophrenic is doomed to the disease. Simple math - too hard for a shrink, apparently - shows that 90% of children born to schizophrenics don't come down with the condition.

That means big brains or not, nearly all of the kids in this study will never suffer from schizophrenia.

Finally, there's the simple fact that ZERO kids in this study actually developed schizophrenia, because they're all still babies.

Talk about jumping to conclusions!

But the researchers are threatening to correct that last oversight - they ominously wrote that "this is just the very beginning... We're following these children through childhood."

Poor kids. Better pass those laws soon!

Fish oil for "slippery" blood

Q: I am wary of taking Coumadin (an anticoagulant that helps prevent blood clots from forming) because of all the side effects I've heard about. What natural options do I have?

Dr. Wright: Cod liver oil (or any other fish oil) is a very effective natural alternative to Coumadin. It works by making blood platelets so slippery that they can't stick together to form a clot. And, unlike Coumadin, the worst "side effects" associated with fish oil are its taste (although there are more pleasant-tasting varieties available) and potential gastrointestinal upset if the whole dose is taken all at once.

I usually recommend 2 to 3 tablespoons of fish oil per day. And any time I recommend fish oil, I also recommend extra vitamin E (as mixed tocopherols), to prevent the oils from oxidising too rapidly in the body. Take 800-1,000IU of vitamin E along with the other fish oil each day. The total daily amount can be split up into two or three doses, to avoid the possibility of the gastrointestinal upset I mentioned above.

But before switching over to cod liver oil, it's important to consult a physician skilled and knowledgeable in nutritional and natural medicine to develop a plan that is best for your particular needs.