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Someone Has Poisoned Me - BY: NITYANANDA DAS
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The Facts About Srila Prabhupada's Poisoning by Arsenic
"So as Krishna was attempted to be killed... And Lord Jesus Christ was killed.
So they may kill me also." (Srila Prabhupada, May 3, l976, Honolulu)
"my only request is , that at the last stage don't torture me, and put me to death"
(from SPC Vol. 36, November 3, 1977 tape recorded Room Conversation)
[PLEASE NOTE: ADDRESSES, EMAILS, PHONE NUMBERS ETC. MIGHT NO LONGER BE CORRECT!]
Hair mineral analysis has been used in forensics for decades. Today, hair analysis is gaining widespread recognition as an analytical tool for receiving information about mineral patterns and drug abuse. Hair analysis is a valid analytical technique that provides important answers to puzzling historical questions, including Beethoven's habits. Nearly 170 years ago, an admirer, grieving the death of Ludwig van Beethoven, snipped a lock of the great composer's hair for a keepsake and kept it in a locket. It is this strand of hair that is expected to provide key answers. Did the deaf composer use drugs? Was he suffering from syphilis? Did he die of arsenic poisoning or was his health affected by mineral deficiencies? Today's sophisticated analytical methods can provide these and other answers, and explanations are often unexpectedly simple. For instance, during Beethoven's time, mercurial drugs were used to treat syphilis and arsenic was used to kill rodents. In minute doses, arsenic was deliberately taken to increase virility and physical strength. Other toxins such as lead were ingested by drinking lead-containing water, causing a host of neurological and behavioral problems such as Beethoven's feared moodiness and ill-tempered conduct. The 582 strands of hair recently auctioned off at Sotheby's are expected to provide important information on Beethoven's biochemical makeup and its link to behavior.
Researchers William Walsh and Ronald Ishaacson have been studying the relationship between body chemistry and behavior for decades. They have published an impressive amount of data, including the relations between toxic elements and hyperactivity. They recognized that heavy metal exposure is higher in people prone to violent behavior and that a specific pattern of toxic exposure and mineral deficiencies is seen among death-row inmates. The researchers also noticed what they considered a "genius pattern," characterized by extraordinarily high levels of copper and sodium but low zinc levels in hair. Individuals with this type of hair mineral pattern are often highly intelligent and a bit eccentric, Walsh said. The scientists documented that hair mineral analysis is a valid test of body mineral concentration when used appropriately. "Hair is a diary of what is going on in your body," Ishaacson said. After decades of studying chemicals in hair and associating mineral patterns with behavior, the researchers opened the HRI Pfeiffer Treatment Center seven years ago. It aims at treating biochemical problems, and a strand of hair often reveals the cause of psychiatric ailments that did not respond to other more conventional treatment.
Hair analysis is an ideal complement to serum and urine as a diagnostic tool. Hair is collected without trauma, an important point when it comes to the toxic screening of children or the frail. In many cases when mineral deficiencies have been noted, the individual's inadequate mineral status may not be solely due to a mineral deficient diet, but also be compounded by digestive problems that cause inadequate mineral absorption.
A review of over 1400 articles indicate that hair is the prime tissue to be utilized when analyzing for heavy metal and other trace mineral concentrations. Most notable results have been obtained on heavy metal pollutants such as lead, arsenic, cadmium and mercury. Scientists in the United States, Canada, Germany, Japan and Sweden have all shown that elemental concentrations in hair provide a relatively permanent record of exposure and that there is good correlation between concentrations in human hair and certain organs.
* Dr. Chatt of Dalhousie University reported during the Second Human Hair Symposium in Atlanta, Georgia, that concentrations of lead in hair were lowest in rural population groups, higher in urban groups and highest in individuals who live close to lead smelters. (This is the same Dr. Chatt who analyzed this reporter's hair sample)
* Trace Minerals International, Inc. of Boulder, Colorado compared the toxic content of hair in American, German and Mexican children and found that concentrations were highest in Mexican children, lower in American and lowest in German children.
* Harry Shwachman of the Children's Hospital Medical Center in Boston along with Kopito of the Massachusetts Institute of Technology have shown that children with cystic fibrosis have as much as five times the normal concentration of sodium in their hair, but only about ten percent of the normal concentrations of tightly-bound calcium.
* Shwachman and Kopito have also found low concentrations of sodium and potassium in the hair of patients with celiac disease ( disorder in the digestion and utilization of fat) and that there is generally three to four times as much sodium and potassium in the hair of healthy individuals.
* Hambidge has tested children in Denver's Head Start Program and found that both their hair and blood serum contain significantly lower concentrations of zinc than specimens from children of middle-income families. The researcher picked six children with the lowest hair zinc concentrations for further testing and found that taste perception was impaired in five. Zinc supplementation restored taste perception and increased zinc concentrations in both blood and hair.
* Both Hambidge and Walter Mertz of the U.S. Department of Agriculture in Beltsville, Maryland, have each demonstrated the below-normal hair concentrations of chromium in victims of juvenile onset diabetes.
* Gordus of the University of Michigan reported that the hair of students with high academic marks contained substantially more copper and less iodine, lead and cadmium than the hair of students with low marks.
* Robert Pihl and colleagues of McGill University in Montreal, Canada, report that based on hair mineral results, they can distinguish with 98% accuracy normal children and those with learning disabilities.
* Brain and hair tissues of Alzheimer patients were found to contain substantially-elevated aluminum content. Researchers at National Institute of Health (Bethseda, Maryland) and at Elizabeth Hospitals in Washington, D.C. noticed an improvement in symptoms after hair aluminum decreased.
Elemental concentrations in organs are not identical, but certain elements are more densely concentrated in specific organs. Hair mineral analysis evaluates tissue storage and is many times the best choice when chronic exposures and deficiencies are suspected. "HMA is an excellent, simple, and accurate test to establish mineral and trace element concentrations. Since the structure of hair remains unchanged, the minerals and trace elements are fixed, whether a sample is tested now or in a few years time. The levels are not subject to change." (M. Laker)
Nail Mineral Analysis (NMA)
Nail analysis has been used in forensics for the evaluation of severe arsenic poisoning when hair loss prohibited hair mineral analysis. Nail analysis is also used when untreated hair is not available in sufficient quantity. Finger or toenails may be used as a testing material. but nails must be free of varnish or polish. A minimum of 200 mg of nails is needed.
Definition of Normal
In medicine. the definition "normal" has several meanings. It used to distinguish a "normal" or healthy person from the abnormal or unhealthy individual, and in this context, we refer to "normal" iron levels as values that reflect good health, in fact "normal" iron concentrations can be found in the presence of disease. In the absence of disease or disease symptoms, a person is medically and legally considered normal or healthy. However, a person without symptoms of disease does not necessarily enjoy even optimal health. In the laboratory, "normal" is used to describe a set of laboratory results that is based on statistics. For many analytes such as serum iron or aluminum, whole blood lead or urine mercury, reference levels have been established by the Center for Disease Control (CDC). For other analytes less known in conventional medicine, including the important blood chromium or urine nickel, reference values have not been standardized. This applies for most elemental reference ranges in hair, with arsenic being one exception.
NEUTRON ACTIVATION ANALYSIS
The analysis of sequential sections of hair provides reliable correlation to the pattern of arsenic exposure. In the hair follicle, arsenic circulating in the blood is deposited in the germinal cell matrix from blood vessels of the papilla. As the germinal matrix differentiates into keratin, the arsenic is trapped and carried up the follicle in the growing hair. The germinal cells are in relatively close equilibrium with the circulating arsenic, and as arsenic concentrations in blood increase or decrease, so does the amount of arsenic deposited in the growing hair vary accordingly.
Hair analysis by neutron activation not only provides precise quantitation of arsenic concentration but also allows segmental analysis to determine when arsenic was ingested and the number of episodes. The analysis requires only a few hairs, which grows at a rate of approximately 0.4 to 0.5 mm per day. Therefore, analysis of 1 centimeter, or about a half inch, segments provides a pattern of monthly exposure. In some cases, the concentration of arsenic along the length of the hair is measured to obtain information about exposure over an extended period of time.
Neutron activation is used either non-destructively or destructively. (The tests performed by Balavanta Prabhu and this author with Dr. Morris and Dr. Chatt respectively employed the non-destructive method.)
Until a few decades ago the only available methods for analyzing arsenic, such as Reinsch's method, Marsh's test, and Grutzeit's test, were qualitative rather quantitative in nature. Because of this limitation, results of studies based on these methods must be evaluated with caution.
Arsenic originally present in the sample at very low concentrations must often be preconcentrated before it can be measured. If the sample is a solution, the arsenic can be coprecipitated on metallic hydroxides or precipitated with organic reagents. It can also be isolated from its original matrix by liquid-liquid extraction or by volatilization as a trihalide or as arsine.
Until recently, total arsenic was usually determined colorimetrically, by either the molybdenum blue method or the silver diethyldithiocarbamate method. Arsenic is now usually determined by atomic absorption, with the sample solution introduced into a flame as an aerosol or deposited as a droplet inside a tube or on a metallic strip, which is then strongly heated. Greater sensitivity has been achieved with atomic absorption, however, by converting the arsenic to arsine and introducing this gas into a heated tube. Equal sensitivity can be achieved by introducing the arsine into an arc in helium and measuring the resulting spectral emission. Low detection limits for arsenic can also be reached by neutron-activation analysis (often without chemical treatment). Electrochemical methods, such as differential pulse polarography, can achieve comparable sensitivity in the presence of natural pollutants (e.g., sludge).
Neutron-activation analysis has the advantages of being nondestructive (in the many cases in which postirradiation radiochemical separations are not necessary) and of being immune from any danger of contamination during post-irradiation handling. Its absolute sensitivity is 0.1 ng for a thermal-neutron flux of 1012 neutrons/cm2-s. In tissue and mineral samples, however, this sensitivity can seldom be reached. The activity induced is the 599-keV photopeak of arsenic-76. A relatively great amount of sodium-24 activity is induced in the sodium present in such samples, and, although the decay of sodium-24 (half-life, 14.96 h) is faster than that of arsenic-76 (half-life, 26.5 h), the sodium-24 activity must be allowed to decay for several days before the arsenic-76 activity can be counted. This delay does not seriously interfere with the determination of arsenic at concentrations above a few parts per million, and the elimination of all chemical treatment of the sample compensates for the inconvenience. If greater sensitivity is needed or if radiochemical interferences appear (e.g., bromine or antimony activities), chemical-group separations can still be performed to isolate the arsenic-76 activity.
Electrochemical Methods
In the electrochemical methods that have been proposed for determining traces of arsenic, the arsenic is usually first isolated by volatilization or extraction, then converted to the trivalent form and determined polarographically. The most sensitive such technique is differential pulse polarography, which has a detection limit of about 0.3 ng of arsenic per milliliter and can be used in the presence of natural pollutants, such as unfiltered sludge.
Gas Chromatography
Total arsenic can be determined by gas chromatography if the arsenic is first collected and converted to triphenylarsine. The collection-conversion procedure is somewhat long, but the absolute limit of detection is quite low (20 pg) when an atomic-emission detector is used.
Other Methods
There are other valid methods of determining traces of arsenic, such as coulombmetry, X-ray fluorescence, atomic optical fluorescence, and ordinary and isotope-dilution mass spectrometry. (Arsenic)
AUTHENTICATION OF HAIR SPECIMENS
Hair absorbs minerals and compounds externally and thus external contaminants can and do change the chemical composition of hair. Someone using shampoo and hair cremes, or bathing in contaminated water, can conceivably alter the natural amounts of compounds in the hair that are deposited there internally from the blood. However, toxins contacting the hair would also be absorbed through the skin, and any serious amounts of toxins would thus create a health hazard and reaction immediately. For the most part, whenever hair analysis is undertaken, it is only common sense to check on the life style and any possible contaminants that may have been encountered. In the case of Srila Prabhupada, bath water, massage oils, chalk powders, etc cannot explain the elevated level of arsenic in His hair.
A method of ascertaining whether hair was externally tainted by toxins is the use neutron activation analysis on separate, consecutive segments of hair. This was done with the tests on Napoleon's hair, revealing great variances over time in the amounts of arsenic content. External contamination would produce a uniform, consistent level of toxins throughout the length of the hair. This is an important proof of internal poisoning, but hair specimens of sufficient length are required. Srila Prabhupada's hair specimen from Hari Sauri was about half an inch long only, about a month's growth, and sectional readings are not possible.
In lieu of the discovery of irregular depositions of toxins from the blood in hair of sufficient length, several short hair specimens that were cut at different times could also reveal varying amounts of toxins and thus establish a more solid proof of ingested and intermittent arsenic poisonings. We have Srila Prabhupada's hair from October 1977 as the first reading of arsenic levels. If now we could obtain hair from February, or May, or September, etc, then further testing would reveal differing levels of arsenic. Therefore it is urgent that further hair specimens of Srila Prabhupada be located so that verification and further discovery may occur.
Srila Prabhupada left this mortal world on November 14, 1977.
But He lives forever in His instructions, and His followers will always live with Him.
"He reasons ill who tells that Vaishnavas die
While thou art living still in sound!
The Vaishnavas die to live, and living try
To spread the Holy Name around"
(Śrīla Bhaktivinoda Thākura)
HARE KṚṢṆA HARE KṚṢṆA KṚṢṆA KṚṢṆA HARE HARE
HARE RĀMA HARE RĀMA RĀMA RĀMA HARE HARE