Murder, Inc.: One of the Most Brutal Death Squads in American History

Nine of the most important goons in Murder, Inc. stand side-by-side in a police line-up. While this photo was being taken, mobster Jacob ‘Gurrah’ Shapiro was snarling at the police, ‘You can’t do nuttin’ to us.’ PHOTO: Allthatsinteresting.com/New York City, 1942 Los Angeles Public Library

Starting with the Prohibition era in cities like New York and Chicago, alliances formed between Italians and Jewish gangsters. These groups understood the power of cross-ethnic mergers and were willing to put aside ethnic differences in pursuit of more lucrative business practices.

In Chicago, Al Capone’s right hand man was Jake “Greasy Thumb” Guzik, a Jew. Bugs Moran, the target of the St. Valentine’s Day Massacre, headed a virtual rainbow coalition of gangsters with members who had names like O’Banion, Weiss and Drucci.

Meyer Lansky and Lucky Luciano, legends of organized crime who grew up in the Lower East Side and Little Italy respectively, were such close friends and business partners that, according to Luciano, they “didn’t even have to explain things to each other” as they considered each other “blood brothers.”

At the beginning of Prohibition, southern Italians Luciano and Joe Adonis along with Jews Lansky and Bugsy Siegel started a bootlegging operation in Brooklyn. This operation soon began supplying large amounts of alcohol to the show-business community in the Broadway district of Manhattan.

Murder, Inc.

Three members of Murder, Inc.: Harry ‘Pittsburgh Phil’ Strauss, Harry ‘Happy’ Maione and Frank Abbandando.

A mixed group of Jewish and Italian gangsters were operating out of the Brownsville and neighboring Ocean Hill sections of Brooklyn. These men included notorious killers Harry “Happy” Maione (Italian), Frank “The Dasher” Abbandando (Italian), Louis Capone (Italian), Harry “Pittsburgh Phil” Strauss (Jewish), Abe Reles (Jewish), Allie “Tic Toc” Tannenbaum (Jewish), Seymour “Blue Jaw” Magoon (Jewish) and Martin “Bugsy” Goldstein (Jewish).

These goons formed the core of the group dubbed Murder, Inc. and became the nationwide execution arm of what was known as The Syndicate, whose leadership included at various times Lucky LucianoMeyer LanskyBenjamin “Bugsy” SiegelDutch Schultz and Joe Adonis.

Soon the group expanded to include Lepke Buchalter’s (Jewish) and Albert Anastasia’s (Italian) personal killers, Charlie Workman and Emmanuel “Mendy” Weiss. It’s proven that Workman has been responsible for more than 20 murders. Workman and hitman Weiss shot Dutch Schultz and three of his men on Oct. 23, 1935. Schultz had angered the Syndicate by ordering a hit on his prosecutor, Thomas Dewey.

It’s believed that the group of about nine principal goons were responsible for at least 1,000 murders, including one war of extermination waged on behalf of Buchalter, who was attempting to eliminate any witnesses who could possibly testify against him.

Harry Strauss’ handiwork

Harry Strauss was the most prolific and was frequently sent on out-of-town hit jobs for regional crime organizations; who correctly reasoned that, since he was not affiliated with those hiring him and a stranger to the local police, the hit man and his hires would not be linked to the killings.

Detroit Purple Gang mob leader Harry Millman after encounter with Murder Inc.

One such job was the 1937 execution of the Purple Gang’s Harry Millman (Jewish) in a crowded diner in Detroit. Strauss and another man had entered the establishment with pistols blasting and, along with killing their target, wounded five other diners.

Strauss purportedly killed over 100 men, but some historians put the number as high as 500. He used a creative variety of methods, including shooting, stabbing with ice picks, drowning, live burial and strangulation.

Abe Reles turned informant and began to reveal the inner workings of Murder, Inc. to Brooklyn Assistant District Attorney Burton Kaplan. With his testimony and his amazing recollection for details, the police were able to close the book on 85 murders in Brooklyn alone. He also testified at trials in Los Angeles and Newark, New Jersey.

Seymour “Blue Jaw” Magoon, another cooperating witness, disappeared, but his remains were recovered in the desert outside of Las Vegas in 2003.

Along with members of his own gang, Reles implicated Buchalter and Albert Anastasia in countless homicides and detailed the inner workings and structure of the murder organization. Until then, the authorities had been unaware of the mafia’s streamlined contract killing system, let alone its scope and extent.

Abe ‘Kid Twist’ Reles in life and after his fatal fall from a 6th-floor window.

In the early morning of Nov. 12, 1941, with police guarding the door, Reles “fell” to his death from a window of Room 623 at the Half Moon Hotel. The newspapers dubbed him “The Canary Who Could Sing, But Couldn’t Fly.”

Reles had shown no inclination to escape from protective custody, and indeed had demonstrated a fear of even being out of earshot of the police. On the day of his death, he was to have testified against Anastasia, a high-ranking member of the Cosa Nostra, and the trial was based solely on Reles’ testimony.

His testimony sent most of his associates to the electric chair. They included Lepke Buchalter, Harry Strauss, Emanuel Weiss, Louis Capone, Harry “Happy” Maione and Frank Abbandando.

Smiling convicted killers, Emanuel “Mendy” Weiss (right) and Louis Capone, surrounded by detectives, ride the New York Central railroad ‘up the river’ to the Sing Sing prison death house.
Murder inc’s Lepke Buchalter awaits death sentence

Targets of assassinations were informants, those who stole from the mob, other gang members or those who crossed Murder, Inc.’s members at the wrong time.

While other American-Jewish gangsters worked within cross-ethnic alliances, the Jewish Purple Gang dominated Detroit entirely on its own. Like its criminally minded contemporaries, the Purple Gang was engaged in various criminal enterprises, including bootlegging, hijackings, gambling operations, narcotics and kidnappings. And plenty of homicides were committed along the way.

For further reading and insights:

Green Gang Secret Society Ruled Kuomintang China Through Narco Trade

Celine Dion was disabled from a KNOWN SIDE EFFECT of the COVID vaccine (99.6% certainty)

Celine Dion - Courage - World Tour

Celine Dion finally revealed she has stiff person syndrome, which is so rare, it’s only found in 1 in a million people. Did she just get unlucky? Nope. She got vaccinated.

You will never, not in a million years, guess what is a known listed side effect of the Pfizer COVID vaccine?

Give up?

Answer below:

Pfizer knew about this potential side effect likely before Celine Dion was vaccinated, but they have no duty to disclose that because hey, it’s a safe and effective vaccine with only mild side effects. The FDA simply looks the other way for safety issues. That’s the way science is done.

Pfizer knew about SPS in February 2021 and the FDA knew about it on Aprile 2021. But the FDA isn’t going to warn anyone about all these side effects because that would create vaccine hesitancy.

Thanks to Amy Kelly of dailyclout.io, we know that SPS was reported in Pfizer’s postmarketing documents on page 37, which is also page 8 of Appendix 1. Being in this document indicates that Pfizer was aware of it no later than 2/28/21, and the FDA knew about it no later than April 2021.

So the FDA and Pfizer clearly know and told the public nothing. They aren’t liable for any damages even if they didn’t give anyone informed consent by revealing all the side effects.

I don’t know if Celine got the Pfizer vaccine or not, but the side effect profile of the other vaccines is even worse, so my arguments apply no matter what vaccine Celine got.

Now lets’ look at VAERS. Guess what? If you get SPS post-vax, there is a 99.6% chance it was from the vaccine.

The numbers for SPS over 30 years only implicate the COVID and HPV vaccines.

Note: You should read the Turtles All the Way Down book about the HPV vaccine (starting on page 112) and how they covered up the safety signal there; they used the exact same gaslighting techniques they perfected with the HPV vaccine on the COVID vaccines).

So for a “safe” vaccine like the flu vaccine (which I’m not conceding is safe, but just for the sake of argument), we’d get 1 report in 30 years (.03/yr). For COVID, we get 17 reports in 2 years (8.5/yr). So the relative rate increase is 8.5/.03 = 283.

In other words, math says that the chance that Celine Dion got SPS from the vaccine is 99.6%.

In short, it is almost certain that Celine Dion is vaccine injured.

If you think that’s not causality, then explain the VAERS report below. It shows SPS can start IMMEDIATELY after vaccination. This is likely because it is causal, because the chance this would happen by “bad luck” is very small. Remember, there was just 1 report for the flu vaccine in 32 years. What do you think the chance is of a spontaneous SPS happening on the same day as a vaccination with the COVID vaccine? Very close to zero.

How do you explain this? It happened right after the shot, on the same day. Of course, this person could have been “unlucky” but when you look at the other reports, they occur in close proximity to the vaccine.

Here is the Reuters “fact check” for you to compare how THEY interpreted the VAERS data.

Well…. they didn’t. Can you believe that? VAERS is the official US government adverse event reporting system that they spend $100M or more a year to maintain and the experts don’t even look at it?!?!

According to the experts contacted by Reuters there is absolutely no evidence that the COVID vaccines cause SPS:

Newsome, also Associate Professor of Neurology at the Johns Hopkins Hospital, echoed this: “The short answer is, there is no data or evidence to suggest that the COVID-19 vaccine causes Stiff Person Syndrome. This is also the case for other vaccines.”

Wow. Contradicted by the evidence in plain sight. These experts cannot explain the data above. They don’t even mention it. If they had mentioned it and gave a reason to dismiss it, I’d listen to their reason. But to gaslight Reuters with false statements about data “not existing” when it is in plain sight, that’s downright unethical. Newsome should avoid commenting in areas where he lacks competency.

Reuters never contacted me on their fact check because THEY NEVER CONTACT ANYONE on our side to dispute their experts.

So these “fact checks” are ALWAYS one-sided (at least all the ones I’ve ever read). Have you noticed that? They are propaganda pieces. They should be researching the evidence on both sides and then presenting a conclusion. Instead they only call experts who agree with the government narrative. That’s NOT fact checking.

One other thing. The fact check said that SPS was an auto-immune disease:

The exact cause of this rare condition, which affects “only about one or two in a million people” according to John Hopkins Medicine (here), remains unknown, but it has been commonly associated with an autoimmune reaction…

Hello…..!!!! There is GOBS of evidence COVID vaccines cause auto-immune diseases. How do you think the people died in the Schwab study for example? It’s crystal clear. Those patients died because the immune system attacked their heart. That’s called auto-immunity. I can’t believe the “experts” Reuters contacts are so brain-dead that they don’t even understand the basics about the COVID vaccine. Willful blindness as Dr. Aseem Malhotra would say.

The COVID vaccines CAUSE SPS as well as hundreds of other severe adverse events which I documented LONG ago. There is simply no other way to explain the numbers in VAERS. Nobody will debate me on this.

Celine Dion developed SPS after COVID vaccination.

The chances she got it from the vaccine is 99.6%.

Will she go to a doctor who specializes in treating the vaccine injured? Nope. It’s highly likely she was told it wasn’t the vaccine by her doctor. Which means unfortunately, she will likely never recover since in general, the sooner you are treated properly, the greater the chance of making a recovery. To get proper treatment, you need to see a doctor who understands the cause.

Will Celine’s doctors ever tell her about this article? Nope. What a shame.

Celine Dion could be a powerful voice to warn people not to take the vaccine if she has the courage to speak the truth.

Share

AFL exposes CDC, Twitter's censorship of posts that go against the official COVID-19 narrative

Image: AFL exposes CDC, Twitter’s censorship of posts that go against the official COVID-19 narrative

(Natural News) The non-profit America First Legal (AFL) has made available the fourth batch of disclosure on the Wuhan coronavirus (COVID-19) Big Tech censorship. The documents revealed that Twitter set up a website for the government and stakeholders to submit posts that allegedly contained COVID-19 “misinformation.”

According to the nearly 600-page release, Twitter bigwigs used the gateway to track online posts and review them. They then invited Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) officials to access the files.

“In recent months, millions of Americans have witnessed the peeling of the ‘misinformation’ onion. Beneath each layer of shocking details about a partnership between the federal government and Big Tech is yet another layer of connections, conspiracy, and collaboration between power centers that seek to suppress information from the American people,” Gene Hamilton, America First Legal vice-president and general counsel, said in a press release. “We are proud to play a leading role in fighting for the rights of all Americans and revealing this vital information to the American people.”

Documents showed that Twitter’s Public Policy Senior Manager Todd O’Boyle apparently enrolled CDC’s Digital Media Branch Chief Carol Crawford in the gateway when the latter sent an email titled “COVID Misinformation,” which contained links to various tweets regarding microchips and vaccine shedding in May 2021.

Crawford later told O’Boyle via email on September 2 that a CDC “Lab alert” concerning polymerase chain reaction (PCR) testing had been “misinterpreted and was shared via social media.” She then noted the hashtag “pcrtest” for “monitoring.”

Brighteon.TV

The CDC media chief also requested that representatives from the Census Bureau be permitted to report COVID-19 misinformation using the Twitter portal and inquired on May 24 whether “there would be any issues or complications stemming from flagging COVID misinformation on the portal using the existing census.gov accounts that have access.”

According to the AFL press release, the other sets of disclosures “contain more details regarding how the government censored information about the COVID-19 pandemic; built the evidentiary record showing that CDC specifically sent Facebook and Twitter-specific posts to take down, throttle, censor, or flag; and associated the CDC’s regulations on in-school mask mandates to “political polling by liberal dark money group The Kaiser Family Foundation (KFF).”

AFL’s first release of documents revealed the explicit collusion between the CDC and Big Tech to censor what the Biden Administration deemed “misinformation” and push covert COVID-19 propaganda. AFL’s second release built the evidentiary record showing that CDC specifically sent Facebook and Twitter-specific posts to take down, throttle, censor or flag. The third release revealed that the CDC’s mask guidance policies for school children were driven by political polling by KFF rather than science. (Related: Smoking gun: U.S. government, CDC colluded with Google, Twitter, Facebook to censor important information about experimental covid vaccines.)

Second installment of “Twitter Files” reveals secret blacklists

The second installment of Twitter Files released on December 15 appeared to confirm that the social media platform played a significant role in censoring posts that go against the official COVID-19 narrative espoused by the government. The release of “Twitter Files” fulfills Musk’s promise to show how Twitter engaged in the suppression of free speech under the previous management.

The files were shared with two independent journalists, Matt Taibbi and Bari Weiss. The first installment was released by Taibbi via Twitter on December 2 and covered details surrounding Twitter’s suppression of the Hunter Biden laptop scandal.

This second installment, meanwhile, revealed that Twitter employees put together their own blacklists to suppress and “shadow ban” the reach of certain accounts.

One of the blacklisted accounts was that of Stanford University Professor Dr. Jay Bhattacharya’s, who argued that COVID lockdowns were incredibly detrimental to young children. His argument later turned out to be 100 percent correct.

Because Bhattacharya was included in the “Trends Blacklist,” the reach of his tweets was controlled and this essentially prevented him from ever trending.

This recent installment of “Twitter Files” also revealed that conservative talk show host Dan Bongino had been placed on a “Search Blacklist” and conservative activist Charlie Kirk had been placed on a “Do Not Amplify” blacklist.

According to reports, Twitter employees had a number of censorship labels they could press for each account. Bhattacharya’s account received the labels “Recent Abuse Strike” and “Trends Blacklist.” Bongino’s account received the labels “NSFW View,” “Strike Count,” “Notifications Spike” and “Search Blacklist.”

Visit Censorship.news for more news related to the government’s censorship collusion with Twitter and other social media platforms.

Watch the video below that talks about the CDC’s censorship of posts about COVID coverups.

This video is from the GalacticStorm channel on Brighteon.com.

More related stories:

Not again: Musk to reinstate Twitter censorship tools after a meeting with leftist groups.

Apple threatens to KICK OUT Twitter from its App Store unless the social media platform ramps up censorship.

Twitter’s “tricky” timing problem: Lawsuit reveals back channel with CDC to coordinate censorship.

Three doctors sue Twitter over censorship of COVID-related posts.

Sources include:

GreatGameIndia.com

AFLegal.org

WesternJournal.com

Brighteon.com

US lawmakers unveil bipartisan bill to ban TikTok

Image: US lawmakers unveil bipartisan bill to ban TikTok

(Natural News) A group of U.S. lawmakers recently announced bipartisan legislation to ban the Chinese video app TikTok. The bill’s announcement came amid fears of the app collecting American users’ data and sending them to the Chinese government in Beijing.

If it passes, the bill would block all transactions from any social media company based in or under the influence of China and Russia. A companion bill in the House of Representatives has been sponsored by Rep. Mike Gallagher (R-WI) and Rep. Raja Krishnamoorthi (D-IL).

“It is troubling that rather than encouraging the administration to conclude its national security review of TikTok, some members of Congress have decided to push for a politically-motivated ban that will do nothing to advance the national security of the U.S.,” a TikTok spokesperson said in a statement.

The spokesperson added that the company would continue to brief members of Congress on the plans that are “well underway [to] further secure [TikTok] in the United States.”

During a Congressional hearing last month, Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) Director Christopher Wray said TikTok’s U.S. operations raise national security concerns. He warned that the Chinese government could use the app to influence users or control their devices.

“I would say that we do have national security concerns, at least from the FBI’s [perspective], about TikTok,” Wray told members of the House Homeland Security Committee.

“They include the possibility that the Chinese government could use it to control data collection on millions of users or control the recommendation algorithm, which could be used for influence operations if they so chose, or to control software on millions of devices which give it opportunity to potentially technically compromise personal devices.” (Related: Experts warns TikTok is spyware for the Chinese regime.)

Brighteon.TV

He concluded: “As to what is actually happening, actually being done, that’s probably something that would be better addressed in a closed, classified setting. It is certainly something that is on our radar.”

States ban TikTok from government-owned devices

While the federal legislation introduced by Sen. Marco Rubio (R-FL) may take some time before it becomes law, some states have gone ahead and banned the app from devices owned by their respective state governments.

South Dakota led the way, with Gov. Kristi Noem signing an executive order prohibiting state employees and contractors from accessing the app via state-owned devices. She said in a statement that “South Dakota will have no part in the intelligence gathering operations of nations who hate us.”

Alabama Gov. Kay Ivey also announced her state’s prohibition of TikTok. Her directive also ordered agencies under the executive branch to take all necessary steps to prevent TikTok from accessing sensitive state data.

“Disturbingly, TikTok harvests vast amounts of data, much of which has no legitimate connection to the app’s supposed purpose of video sharing,” said the governor of the Yellowhammer State. “Use of TikTok involving state IT infrastructure thus creates an unacceptable vulnerability to Chinese infiltration operations.”

Utah Gov. Spencer Cox has announced a similar ban on the Chinese video app. According to his order – which applies to all executive branch agencies in Utah – state employees may not download or use the TikTok app, or visit any TikTok website, on any state-owned devices.

“China’s access to data collected by TikTok presents a threat to our cybersecurity,” Cox said in a statement. His press release also noted how Chinese national security laws allow Beijing to obtain data from U.S. users through companies based in China.

“As a result, we’ve deleted our TikTok account and ordered the same on all state-owned devices. We must protect Utahns and make sure that the people of Utah can trust the state’s security systems.”

TechGiants.news has more stories about the push to ban TikTok.

Watch this video that talks about FBI Director Christopher Wray’s remarks about TikTok being a national security threat.

This video is from the Chinese taking down EVIL CCP channel on Brighteon.com.

More related stories:

Indiana sues Tiktok over consumer data access and sexual content.

Alabama, Utah ban TikTok on state-owned devices over security concerns.

Taiwan bans TikTok from government devices, mulls nationwide prohibition.

South Dakota Governor Kristi Noem bans TikTok on state-owned devices, citing app’s intelligence gathering operations.

Sources include:

Reuters.com 1

TheEpochTimes.com

BusinessInsider.com

Reuters.com 2

MSN.com

Brighteon.com

Are Late Dinners Wrecking Your Health?

late night eating

  • Fasting is an ancient health intervention embraced for its rejuvenating effects. In more recent years, researchers have demonstrated that less challenging forms of fasting, such as time-restricted eating (TRE), are just as effective as longer water fasts, helping your body repair cellular damage, reduce inflammation, improve brain function and much more

  • 90% of people eat across a span of 12 hours a day, and many across even longer timespans, which is a recipe for metabolic disaster. I believe this is part of why more than 93% of Americans are metabolically unfit

  • Most TRE regimens call for eating during four to eight hours of the day and fasting for the remaining 16 to 20 hours. The sweet-spot is probably six hours of eating and 18 hours of fasting

  • An often-overlooked caveat with regard to this timing is that you want to eat your last meal at least three hours or more before bedtime. This is important, as it helps protect your mitochondrial function

  • Cellular repair begins approximately six hours after you’ve ingested your last calories, so if you’re eating across 15 hours a day, your body only has three hours in which to repair itself. If you eat for only eight hours and fast the remaining 16, your body will have a solid 10 hours in repair mode

Visit Mercola Market

Advertisement

Fasting is an ancient1 health intervention embraced through the ages for its rejuvenating effects.2 In more recent years, researchers have demonstrated that less challenging forms of fasting, such as intermittent fasting and time-restricted eating (TRE), are just as effective as longer water fasts, helping your body repair cellular damage, reduce inflammation, improve brain function and much more.3 4 5

According to Satchin Panda, Ph.D., who has conducted important research into the impact of meal timing on circadian rhythm, 90% of people eat across a span of 12 hours a day, and many across even longer timespans, which is a recipe for metabolic disaster.

I believe this is part of why more than 93% of Americans are metabolically unfit. In July 2022, the Journal of the American College of Cardiology6 posted an update on the metabolic fitness or flexibility of the American population. In 2016, approximately 88% were metabolically unfit.7 As of 2018, it’s over 93%.

Metabolic fitness includes things like blood glucose and blood sugar, blood pressure and weight. This means 14 out of 15 Americans could benefit from improving their metabolic health, and TRE is one of the easiest yet most powerful interventions for reducing insulin resistance, restoring metabolic flexibility and losing excess body fat.

For most people, TRE is the easiest to implement as you get to eat every day, albeit only within a certain window of time. Most TRE regimens call for eating during four to eight hours of the day and fasting for the remaining 16 to 20 hours. The sweet-spot is probably six hours of eating and 18 hours of fasting.

As explained by Steve Hendricks, author of “The Oldest Cure in the World: Adventures in the Art and Science of Fasting”8 in a Salon article:9

“As researchers explored the mechanisms, they found that longer fasting periods gave the body time to make more repairs. Our bodies are constantly repairing and replacing damaged cellular parts — patching up faulty DNA, recycling worn-out organelles — which, if not taken care of, can result in disease.

But these repairs usually occur at a very low rate because the body is so busy doing all the other tasks that make up our lives, including the immense work of digesting our meals, processing the nutrients from those meals, and putting the nutrients to work in cells all over the body.

But when we stop eating for long enough, the body takes advantage of the break from all that heavy work, and our cells use the downtime to supercharge their repairs.”

Intermittent Fasting

An often-overlooked caveat with regard to this timing is that you want to eat your last meal at least three hours or more before bedtime. This is important, as it helps protect your mitochondrial function, which in turn helps protect against any number of chronic ailments and diseases. But leaving only a two-hour gap is still on the riskier side. As explained by Hendricks:10

“It’s a lot of work for the body to switch from its daytime mode of digesting and processing nutrients to its nighttime mode of making repairs, so the body doesn’t start those repairs in earnest until it’s absolutely sure we’re done eating.

About 6 hours after we eat or drink our last calories the repairs start, and they ratchet up slowly, hour by hour, until they reach a kind of repair overdrive after another 6 hours, which is to say 12 hours after our last consumed calorie.”

This means that if you’re eating across 15 hours a day, you’re only fasting nine hours at night, and since cellular repair doesn’t kick in for six hours, your body only has three hours in which to repair itself. Is it any wonder then that degeneration sets in?

“If you eat for only eight hours and fast the remaining 16, your body will have a solid 10 hours in repair mode. With that in mind, set your eating window early in the day so that your last meal is around 3 p.m.”

If you eat for only eight hours and fast the remaining 16, your body will have a solid 10 hours in repair mode. With that in mind, Hendricks recommends setting your eating window early in the day so that your last meal is around 3 p.m. Many who recommend TRE typically recommend simply skipping either skip breakfast or dinner, but skipping dinner would be the better choice.

Research also suggests making your earliest meal the largest and subsequent ones increasingly smaller allows your body to work better. As suggested by Hendricks, “Follow the adage ‘Eat breakfast like a king, lunch like a prince, and dinner like a pauper.’” The reason for this is because your circadian rhythm is hardwired to process food most efficiently early in the day. Hendricks explains:11

“Take our body’s management of the hormone insulin, for example. Insulin’s job is to move glucose (the sugar from our meals) out of our arteries and into the cells that use the glucose for fuel. Cued to a circadian rhythm, our pancreases make a lot of insulin in the morning and early afternoon, but production wanes by mid-afternoon.

When we eat in the late afternoon or at night, there’s less insulin in our bloodstream, so glucose lingers longer in our arteries, where it dings up the arterial walls. Over time, the arteries can harden, putting us at risk of heart attacks, strokes, dementia, and other calamities.

This rhythm of insulin is so potent that you can feed prediabetics the same meal at 7 a.m. and again at 7 p.m., and although their blood sugar will hardly rise after the morning meal, after the evening meal the sugar lingers so long in their blood that some of them will test fully diabetic … Evidently, we just weren’t made to process nutrients late in the day.”

A rather macabre illustration of this came out of a 2012 analysis12 of 15,000 people in Sri Lanka who had attempted suicide by drinking pesticide. Those who drank the poison in the evening died half as frequently as those who poisoned themselves in the morning.

The mechanism that helps explain this discrepancy is that the digestive tract absorbs poisons more rapidly and distributes them throughout the body more efficiently when consumed in the morning.

The same principle applies to chemotherapy.13 As noted by Hendricks, “Against some cancers, chemo can be up to five times less toxic to the patient and twice as effective against the cancer when delivered at the right hour.”

As reported by MedicalXpress,14 recent research has confirmed that eating earlier in the day provides added benefits, over and beyond the practice of only eating within a limited time window.

One study,15 published in the October 4, 2022, issue of Cell Metabolism, showed that even when everything else is equal, simply shifting the eating window by four hours, so that volunteers ate their meals later in the day (eating between 1 p.m. and 9 p.m. rather than 9 a.m. through 5 p.m.), doubled the likelihood of being hungry and increased fat accumulation. As noted in the abstract:

“In this randomized crossover trial that rigorously controlled for nutrient intake, physical activity and sleep, Vujovic et. al. found that late eating increased hunger, modified appetite-regulating hormones, decreased daytime energy expenditure, and altered adipose gene expression consistent with increased adipogenesis/decreased lipolysis. Together, these findings may explain the increased obesity risk in late eaters.”

The full list of benefits associated with TRE and other intermittent fasting regimens is a long one. Without attempting to create an exhaustive list, here’s a sampling of what intermittent fasting can do for your health:16 17 18

  • Promote insulin sensitivity, which is crucial for your health. Insulin resistance or poor insulin sensitivity contributes to nearly all chronic diseases

  • Promote leptin sensitivity and normalize ghrelin levels, also known as the “hunger hormone,” resulting in lowered hunger

  • Improve blood sugar management by increasing insulin-mediated glucose uptake rates19

  • Lower triglyceride levels

  • Increase human growth hormone production (HGH) — Commonly referred to as “the fitness hormone,” HGH plays an important role in maintaining health, fitness and longevity, including promotion of muscle growth, and boosting fat loss by revving up your metabolism. Research20 shows fasting can raise HGH by as much as 1,300% in women and 2,000% in men.

    The fact that it helps build muscle while simultaneously promoting fat loss explains why HGH helps you lose weight without sacrificing muscle mass, and why even athletes can benefit from intermittent fasting

  • Suppress inflammation and reduce oxidative damage21

  • Upregulate autophagy and mitophagy, natural cleansing processes necessary for optimal cellular renewal and function

  • Boost fat burning and improve metabolic efficiency and body composition, including significant reductions in visceral fat and body weight in obese individuals 

  • Prevent or reverse Type 2 diabetes, as well as slow its progression

  • Improve immune function22

  • Lower blood pressure

  • Reduce your risk of heart disease23 — One study24 found those who fasted regularly had a 58% lower risk of coronary disease compared to those who never fasted

  • Reproduce some of the cardiovascular benefits associated with physical exercise

  • Boost mitochondrial energy efficiency and biosynthesis

  • Shift stem cells from a dormant state to a state of self-renewal

  • Reduce your risk of cancer

  • Increase longevity — There are a number of mechanisms contributing to this effect. Normalizing insulin sensitivity is a major one, but fasting also inhibits the mTOR pathway, which plays an important part in driving the aging process

  • Regenerate the pancreas25 and improve pancreatic function

  • Improve cognitive function, thanks to rising ketone levels

  • Protect against neurological diseases such as dementia, Alzheimer’s disease26 and Parkinson’s disease,27 28 thanks to the production of ketone bodies (byproducts of fatty acid breakdown, which are a healthy and preferred fuel for your brain) and brain-derived neurotrophic factor (BDNF, which activates brain stem cells to convert into new neurons, and triggers numerous other chemicals that promote neural health)

  • Eliminate sugar cravings as your body adapts to burning fat instead of sugar

Remember, 95% of the US is metabolically inflexible and insulin resistant. For them TRE is an amazingly powerful strategy to regain metabolic flexibility. However, I recently learned from Dr. Ray Peat’s work, that if you are in the 5% of the population that is metabolically flexible and not insulin resistant, then TRE could be counterproductive. I now have extended my eating window to 8 to 10 hours and occasionally 12 hours in the summer.

In closing, a large and growing body of medical research supports the use of intermittent fasting strategies such as TRE. As noted by Hendricks:29

“Early time-restricted eating (eTRE), as the practice is known, has been declared safe in study after study, and scientists in the field now recommend nearly all adults eat in a narrowed window, starting an hour or two after waking and ideally closing 6 to 8 hours later, although windows up to 12 hours will deliver health benefits.

For those who wish to eat dinner at the normal time, scientists advise keeping it light and earlyish and stacking most of the day’s calories before mid-afternoon: breakfast like a king, lunch like a prince, dinner like a pauper … Scientists also say adolescents can safely practice a TRE of about 12 hours, but the verdict is still out for younger children …”

Subscribe to Mercola Newsletter

Disclaimer: The entire contents of this website are based upon the opinions of Dr. Mercola, unless otherwise noted. Individual articles are based upon the opinions of the respective author, who retains copyright as marked.

The information on this website is not intended to replace a one-on-one relationship with a qualified health care professional and is not intended as medical advice. It is intended as a sharing of knowledge and information from the research and experience of Dr. Mercola and his community. Dr. Mercola encourages you to make your own health care decisions based upon your research and in partnership with a qualified health care professional. The subscription fee being requested is for access to the articles and information posted on this site, and is not being paid for any individual medical advice.

If you are pregnant, nursing, taking medication, or have a medical condition, consult your health care professional before using products based on this content.

Can You Pass the 10-Second Balance Test?

10 second balance test

  • Research confirms past studies showing that the ability to perform a 10-second, one-leg stand is independently linked to all-cause mortality

  • Falls increase the risk of death in older adults and are the No. 1 cause of death and injuries in older Americans. The number of deaths from falling rose from 8,613 in 2000 to 25,189 in 2016

  • Factors that increase the risk of falling are poor balance, some medications, using multiple medications simultaneously, loss of muscle mass, vitamin D deficiency and inner ear problems such as Meniere’s disease and benign paroxysmal positional vertigo

  • After addressing underlying medical problems that affect balance, you can improve balance using yoga, improving core strength, and doing exercises like heel-to-toe standing and walking or high-knee marching

Visit Mercola Market

Advertisement

Research1 published in August 2022, confirms that the ability to perform a 10-second, one-leg stand is independently linked to all-cause mortality. During the pandemic, an already largely sedentary American population began moving even less.2 Lockdowns and transitioning to working from home increased the tendency to sit at the computer for long hours.

This has taken a toll on physical and mental health. Although evidence is clear that regular exercise is vital to good health, researchers also recognize that even just standing makes a positive impact on your health. For this reason, many fitness trackers now have goal settings that include reaching a standing time goal.3

Sitting has a low energy expenditure and contributes to muscle atrophy from disuse. Both are associated with poor health outcomes. Prolonged, uninterrupted sedentary time also promotes cardiometabolic disorders, obesity, depression and all-cause mortality in adults.4

Researchers have also found that there are a higher number of musculoskeletal symptoms associated with individuals who sit for prolonged periods and it even appears to accelerate aging at the cellular level.5 It appears that older adults can impart a positive impact on all-cause mortality by improving their balance.6

The study7 published in the British Journal of Sports Medicine sought to evaluate if the ability to complete a 10-second, one-legged stance was associated with all-cause mortality. The researchers also looked to see if it was a relevant prognostic indicator for mortality.

They assessed 1,702 individuals, 68% of whom were men between 51 and 75 years of age. The assessments took place between 2008 and 2020. In this group, 20.4% of the individuals were unable to complete a 10-second, single-leg stance during testing.

The researchers then followed up roughly seven years later and found 7.2% of the 1,702 individuals had died. In the group that died, 4.6% had been able to perform a single-leg stance and 17.5% had not. Even after adjusting for age, sex, body mass index and other comorbidities, the risk of all-cause mortality continue to be higher in those who were unable to perform a single leg stance. The researchers concluded:8

“Within the limitations of uncontrolled variables such as recent history of falls and physical activity, the ability to successfully complete the 10-s OLS is independently associated with all-cause mortality and adds relevant prognostic information beyond age, sex and several other anthropometric and clinical variables.”

A 2014 study9 published in the journal Stroke evaluated the ability of 1,387 apparently healthy middle-aged to elderly individuals to stand on one leg for one minute. After the test, the participants underwent a brain MRI scan to assess the health of their small blood vessels.

The data showed that those who could not stay on one leg for 20 seconds or more had a higher rate of reduced cognitive function and micro bleeding in the brain with small lacunar infarctions, which sometimes go undetected. Dr. Shari Rosen-Schmidt, a neurologist who was not part of the study, said that although the test is far from definitive, it is a warning sign for someone who always had good balance to suddenly be unable to maintain their balance on one leg.10

Researchers have also found the balance-sensing systems in individuals with Alzheimer’s disease are more severely impaired than those with mild cognitive impairment.11 Brain imaging indicated that activity in the hippocampus was positively correlated with the index of postural stability.

The researchers believe that balance changes in the hippocampal pathway may be a marker that providers can use for the diagnosis of mild cognitive impairment versus the progression of mild cognitive impairment to Alzheimer’s disease.

Researchers in the featured study wrote that balance diminishes as individuals reach and exceed the mid-50s, which increases the risk for falls. In 2016, the CDC wrote that “Every second of every day in the United States an older adult falls, making falls the No. 1 cause of injuries and deaths from injury among older Americans.”12

In 2020, doctors at the Iowa Specialty Hospital wrote that falling kills more women every year than breast cancer.13 They believe that balance falls into the category of “use it or lose it.” And, if you lose it, it comes with significant consequences.

One 2019 study14 published in JAMA looked at the number of deaths resulting from falls in U.S. adults who were 75 years and older. They found the absolute number rose from 8,613 in 2000 to 25,189 in 2016. The crude mortality rate also increased, more than doubling from 51.6 per 100,000 persons in 2000 to 122.2 per 100,000 persons in 2016.

This data represented a rising age-adjusted trend in mortality from falls between 2000 and 2016, which was consistent with data from Europe during the same time. While these numbers are significant, this study did not evaluate the circumstances behind the rising numbers in mortality and suggested that further studies should focus on falls in the oldest age groups and potential interventions.

The CDC15 also recorded a rising rate of falls in adults aged 65 and older. From 2009 to 2018 the rate increased by roughly 30% and was observed in 30 states and the District of Columbia.

According to numbers from the CDC,16 34,000 adults aged 65 and over died in 2019 after falling. This made it the leading cause of death from injury in that group. Additionally, emergency rooms recorded 3 million visits after falls in older adults and medical costs that year reached $50 billion with three-quarters of the bill for falls paid by Medicare and Medicaid.

One of the more serious injuries an older adult can experience from a fall is a broken hip.17 After repair and recovery from a hip fractures, many people are unable to return to living independently. Evidence also shows a high mortality rate following hip fracture. One 2011 study18 showed the risk of mortality was three times higher than in the general population, including all major causes of death.

Another study19 found a mortality rate of 21.2% in the first year after a hip fracture. The risk of mortality at a one-year follow-up declined slightly to 16.6% of patients in a 2019 study published in Scientific Reports.20

Poor ability to balance is one factor that can increase the risk of falls in middle-aged and elderly individuals. Another factor is polypharmacy. This is the use of multiple medications at one time and is more commonly found in older adults. In people 65 and older, 89% take at least one prescription medication and 54% take four or more.21

This increases the risk of adverse effects, which can drive patients to look for drug treatments for side effects caused by an unsafe drug regimen. It’s a vicious cycle that has been perpetuated by a health care system that revolves around pharmaceutical-driven, fragmented care. These side effects can include dizziness and falls.22

Singular medications can also affect your balance. These include antianxiety drugs like benzodiazepines, SSRI antidepressants, blood pressure medications, pain relievers and sleep aids.23

As you age, it is crucial to maintain your muscle mass. Yet, as has been demonstrated during the pandemic years, activity has declined. Strong muscles are needed for mobility, balance and the ability to live independently. Muscle is also lost far more easily and quickly than it is built. So, it is vital to find ways to promote and maintain your muscle mass as you get older.

Brendan Egan, Ph.D., is an associate professor of sport and exercise physiology at the School of Health and Human Performance and the National Institute for Cellular Biotechnology at Dublin City University in Ireland. In his IHMC lecture,24 he reviewed the latest research on exercise training for aging adults, which places a significant focus on building and maintaining muscle, and the nutritional components that can help optimize training results.

Loss of balance is also an indicator of vitamin D deficiency. Evidence from animal models suggests that vitamin D is critical to the development of the inner ear, which affects balance and coordination.25 An analysis of people with vestibular neuritis, characterized by vertigo, showed lower serum vitamin D levels than in people without vestibular neuritis.26

Another cause for peripheral vertigo, which means that the dizziness stems from a problem in the inner ear and not in your brain, is benign paroxysmal positional vertigo (BPPV).27 This happens when calcium carbonate crystals deposited within the labyrinth of the inner ear, become dislodged and end up in the ear canal. The crystals disrupt the flow of fluid and confuse your balance organs, which results in vertigo.

Meniere’s disease is another condition that can trigger severe imbalance and vertigo.28 This is triggered by an abnormal production of fluid inside the inner ear that causes pressure to build. Other causes can include infection and inflammation or anxiety and stress as the vestibular system interacts with the brain in areas that are involved in anxiety.29

After addressing any underlying health conditions that may cause vertigo or loss of balance, there are strategies you can use to help improve your balance and stability and therefore reduce your risk of falling. Begin by taking a balance test to understand your baseline abilities.

This gives you a benchmark against which you can measure your progress. Stand next to a chair or wall so you can grab onto something stable if you feel yourself falling. Test your ability to stand on one leg on both sides. Measure how long it takes before you feel like you’re starting to fall. Use this as your baseline and begin incorporating some of these strategies into your daily exercise routine.

  1. Yoga — Angie Winn, Owner of Loft on Main in Florida, is a yoga instructor. She explains, “What yoga does is it calms you down and allows you to be more aware of your body and aware of your surroundings.”30

    She recommends a simple mountain stance as a good place to start. The tree pose is another yoga pose for beginners and the half-moon pose can help improve balance. She advises students to remember to breathe through their poses and to keep calm.

  2. Core strength — Your balance depends on core strength. This includes muscles in your abdomen, back, buttocks and hip flexors. Improving core strength can reduce problems with back pain and improve your functional ability. One of the simplest exercises that work most of your core muscles is planks.

    Select an area where you can extend your whole body on the floor, and in much the same position you would do a pushup. Begin with your forearms on the floor and your legs extended behind you. Your elbows should be directly under the shoulders and your hands and forearms facing forward.

    Look directly at the floor; do not try to hold your head up to look forward. Engage your abdominal muscles and raise your body to a pushup position, keeping your elbows on the floor. It’s important that your body be in a straight line from your ears to your toes with no sagging or bending. This keeps the spine in a neutral position. Hold this for 10 seconds and then release to the floor. Over time, work up to 60 seconds.

  3. Heel-to-toe standing or walking — You may be familiar with heel-toe walking as a neurological test you have done for your doctor. Practicing can help improve your balance. Begin by standing in place with one foot directly in front of the other so the heel of the front foot touches the toe of the back foot.

    Hold this position for up to 30 seconds. As you’re able to stand for 30 seconds, try taking steps using this heel-to-toe format, pretending you’re walking on a balance beam. Remember to do this near a stable piece of furniture or the wall for safety.

  4. High knee march — Walk forward as if you’re marching, bringing your knees to hip level so your legs are at 90° to your body. This requires good posture and engaging your core. Start slowly doing several marches a couple of times a day.

  5. Swiss ball — This is another way to incorporate balance exercises into your day. A Swiss exercise ball can be used as a chair while you’re sitting at your desk or watching TV in the evening. Sitting on the ball helps to engage and strengthen your core muscles.

  6. Wobble board — This piece of equipment gives you an unstable surface to practice balancing. The board has an air-filled ball beneath it. Stand on the board with your feet shoulder-width apart and try to balance. Do this near a wall and other stable furniture for support. Work up to standing on the board for up to two minutes.

Subscribe to Mercola Newsletter

Disclaimer: The entire contents of this website are based upon the opinions of Dr. Mercola, unless otherwise noted. Individual articles are based upon the opinions of the respective author, who retains copyright as marked.

The information on this website is not intended to replace a one-on-one relationship with a qualified health care professional and is not intended as medical advice. It is intended as a sharing of knowledge and information from the research and experience of Dr. Mercola and his community. Dr. Mercola encourages you to make your own health care decisions based upon your research and in partnership with a qualified health care professional. The subscription fee being requested is for access to the articles and information posted on this site, and is not being paid for any individual medical advice.

If you are pregnant, nursing, taking medication, or have a medical condition, consult your health care professional before using products based on this content.