Articles by Jo Hartley:

Nutrasweet - the History of this Toxic Chemical and Its Promotion (Part 1) (NewsTarget) In December of 1965, while James Schlatter, a chemist for G.D. Searle & Company, was working on an anti-ulcer drug candidate he accidentally discovered aspartame. He was recrystallizing aspartame from ethanol when the mixture spilled onto...

CDC Withdraws Study on Impacts of Chemical Pollution (NewsTarget) The Center for Public Integrity is a public interest investigative journalism organization. This group has recently obtained copies of a Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) study of environmental and health data in eight states...

Medical Mix Ups Are All Too Common for Children (NewsTarget) Medicine mix-ups, accidental overdoses and bad drug reactions hurt approximately one out of 15 hospitalized children. This is information according to the first scientific test of a new detection method. That number is much higher than...

Who and What Is the Monsanto Chemical Corporation? (NewsTarget) Who and what is the Monsanto Corporation? The Monsanto Chemical Company has a diverse and interesting history. Monsanto is the leading chemical producer for agricultural products. They manufacture the best-selling herbicide RoundUp (as well...

The Amazing Health Benefits of Raw Milk (NewsTarget) Most people are unaware that clean, raw milk from grass-fed cows was actually used as a medicine in the early part of the 20th century. Raw milk - straight from the cow - has been called the "stem cell" of foods. It was used as medicine...

Global Cooling or Global Warming - Which Is It and How Can We Know? (NewsTarget) There is huge disagreement in the scientific community about global warming. Researchers on either side have no trouble finding data to support their chosen theory. Recent climatic events highlight the importance of not over interpreting...

Protecting Our Children From Toxic Toys (NewsTarget) Protecting one’s children is of utmost important to parents. Unfortunately, it is now necessary to educate ourselves about how to keep our children safe from potentially harmful chemicals in their toys. Parents should be striving to limit...

Minorities Are Not Satisfied With Their Health Care (NewsTarget) Minority patients are more likely than white patients to rate their received health care as fair to poor. This is particularly true of Chinese-Americans, blacks born in Africa, and Vietnamese-American patients. Researchers at Harvard...

America's Soldiers Need Support on the War Front (NewsTarget) Our American soldiers on the war front are finding it increasingly difficult to get the mental health care they need. As violence rose in Afghanistan, new tactics have been employed, which in turn pushed our troops there farther away from...

The Facts About Pasteurization and Homogenization of Dairy Products (NewsTarget) The popular milk campaign has been very successful in reversing declining milk sales in America over recent years. Common teaching is that milk is a “perfect food,” for building strong bodies in children and preventing osteoporosis as we...

A Look Inside a Baghdad Hospital (NewsTarget) Instead of being a safe refuge, city hospitals are some of the most dangerous places in Baghdad. Iraqi filmmaker and former physician, Omer Salih Mahdi recently spent six weeks filming daily life inside of the hospital Al Yarmouk. He also...

Explaining Monsanto's Desire to Ban Current Milk Labeling (NewsTarget) Over the past century, Monsanto has dabbled in many projects – Agent Orange, Terminator seeds, PCBs, and now “recombined” milk. Monsanto’s latest obsession is milk labels. Specifically, those that are labeled “rBST-free” or “rBGH-free”....

Mammograms Don't Help, They Harm Women (NewsTarget) Breast cancer kills women. In fact, breast cancer is the second leading cause of cancer deaths in women. Lung cancer is number one. It is estimated that 211,240 women were diagnosed with breast cancer in 2005. 40,410 have since died from...

MS Patients to Participate in an Experiment by Ingesting Worm Eggs (NewsTarget) Researchers are now suspecting that all of the products available to us from vaccinations to anti-bacterial soap to bottled water are beginning to take their toll on our health. Our immune systems are in a state of confusion and they are...

The Lifelong Ravages of Poverty (NewsTarget) There is a new reason to feel ashamed about America’s failure to fight poverty. Neuroscientists have recently discovered that children who grow up in poor families with a low social status are prone to experiencing unhealthy stress levels,...

Compact Fluorescent Light Bulbs May Be Hazardous to Your Health (NewsTarget) There is a congressional mandate in place banning sales of regular incandescent light bulbs by the year 2012. Recently however, the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) has warned that the use of compact fluorescent light bulbs (CFLs) is...

Understanding the Transition From Seed Corn to Biofuels (NewsTarget) We are about to witness and experience the greatest sustained rise in grain prices seen in the last 30 years. This rise will include wheat, rice, and maize; these three comprising over 90% of all grains cultivated on the planet. Let’s do...

Nevada Clinic's Unsafe Practices Lead to 6 Confirmed Hepatitis C Cases (NewsTarget) An outbreak of six cases of hepatitis C was announced last week. The Endoscopy Center of Nevada is being investigated for the spread of hepatitis C from unsafe practices. The surgical center, as well as five other affiliated clinics, is...

Dispelling Common Myths About Genetically Engineered Seeds (NewsTarget) Is biotechnology the miracle solution necessary to fix the many problems we face in the world today - world hunger, suffering third world economies, toxic pesticides, and the damaged environment to name a few? The big seed companies are...

Insurance Company Ordered to Pay $9 Million for Cancelling Patient's Policy (NewsTarget) A precedent-setting ruling was handed down recently in which a large California insurance company was ordered to pay more than $9 million to a breast cancer patient it dropped during chemotherapy treatment. California’s Health Net has since...

Illness Affecting Meat Packing Employees Stump Medical Experts (NewsTarget) It is a mystery. Unusual symptoms have begun affecting some citizens of the small city in the Midwest. Patients all complain of the same symptoms: fatigue, weakness, pain, and numbness and tingling in the lower extremities. As the symptoms...

Stem Cells Discovered in Human Breast Milk (NewsTarget) The latest indicator that there is more to breast milk than providing food for a baby’s physical needs came recently when Dr. Mark Cregan, a molecular biologist with The University of Western Australia, discovered stem cells in breast milk....

Investors Behind Doomsday Seed Vault May Provide Clues to Its Purpose (Part 2) (NewsTarget) It’s got all the exciting elements of a science fiction novel. A seed bank as strong as a fortress built into the side of a mountain in the remote arctic wilderness built for the purpose of preserving food sources in the event of a disaster....

Toxic Soup of Plastic Debris, Twice the Size of US, Forms in the Pacific Ocean (NewsTarget) It is twice the size of the continental United States, yet you cannot set foot on it. Scientists have named it “Plastic Soup”, and appropriately so. Floating in the Northern Pacific Ocean lays a huge expanse of plastic refuse. This garbage...

Doomsday Vault Ready for Business on the Island of Spitsbergen (Part 1) (NewsTarget) It’s got all the exciting elements of a science fiction novel. A seed bank as strong as a fortress built into the side of a mountain in the remote arctic wilderness built for the purpose of preserving food sources in the event of disaster....