Unbekoming: you know I am your biggest fan. I submit this critique with utmost respect. I know you are a reporter here, and not the author of these ideas.
This article is filled with circumstantial data and ideas about ultrasound dangers that are loosely related but unpersuasive. I have not reviewed the AMD article. Notably:
Ultrasound is not an electromagnetic field (EMF), nor is it a microwave. Bringing these in are straw-man arguments.
Medicalization of the birth process is unfortunate, but there is no evidence of ultrasound damage.
The midwife-physician divide has nothing to do with this issue. No midwife can claim a mid-double-digit decrease in patient and maternal mortality. Physician obstetricians did this in the 1950s.
The Chinese studies were on fetuses to be aborted and showed no evidence of damage that was later evident on birth.
You showed me the Control Group Study. Given its proof that all chronic illnesses were primarily determined by vaccination status, I refuse to believe that ultrasounds are anything but window dressing on the overall autism disaster. Ditto SIDS. Articles like this one distract from the primary issue. We should be beating the drums about THAT.
Home birth gives up the double-digit mortality advantage of physician-supervised birth.
This is the same sort of “evidence” that inhabits this article, but I find it hard to believe that with all the focus on ultrasounds, the hardest evidence of harm we have is “tissue damage” reported in Chinese studies without any reported fetal outcome issue.
I could say lots more nasty things about OB-GYNs, but I will leave it at: I have little sympathy for them. Their high C-section and hysterectomy rates alone convict them as one of the most careless specialties. However, they are no match for pediatricians, dentists, oncologists, psychiatrists, or even cardiac surgeons or cardiologists.
Thank you for this information, I'm seeing a lot more about the dangers popping up on the internet, would be good to do a deeper dive and have some links/studies that apparently demonstrate the safety profile of ultrasound.
I want to believe that an ultrasound is safe. That there are some things known. Unfortunately, so many procedures and pharmaceutical products have been revealed dangerous, it is difficult to not be skeptical.
Have you read Jim West's book on Chinese ultrasound research? Thanks to this book, I shudder every time I hear an unwitting parent eagerly anticipating their ultrasound. From the description:
"These studies were previously unknown to the Western realm and little known even in the East. These represent a limited period of new, optimistic research, circa 1988 to 2011. These were pushed aside by a tremendous continual flood of studies that promote ultrasound medical and therapeutic innovations." https://www.amazon.com/Studies-Conducted-Indicate-Prenatal-Ultrasound-ebook/dp/B00X06QDYS
Your series on woman and babies is so important! I was born in 1974. They did an x-ray on me. :-( Who knows what that did to me. I also had tongue tie, which no one diagnosed and so as an adult I have a narrow jaw, TMJ and breathing problems. Due to undiagnosed tongue tie, breast feeding "was weird" and my mother gave up. She wanted me to be healthy (70s version) so she gave me *soy* formula. We now know giving soy as baby food is like giving 5x dose of the birth control pill to a baby. Not surprisingly, my periods started at 11 and they were horrific floods. I went to one gynecologist, who said "everything is normal" so I just suffered.
I don't think I ever could have gotten pregnant. Bleeding off and on. With the blood type diet and homeopathy, my periods stablized. Then, something was wrong. I was diagnosed with uterine cancer at age 40, stage 3B. I submitted to surgery, which was brutal because they took my healthy ovaries, "just in case". I had enough experience not to do chemo or radiation. I spend a lot of money on hormone replacement, which is not the same as my ovaries.
Back when I thought I could have a baby, a friend had a c-section because the baby was breech. That really upset me, that a baby could die because it did not turn. So I started reading mid wife journals. Over 10 years, I read mid wife journals monthly.
I found out that babies can sucessfully be born - head first, bum first and foot first. The female body is designed for birth. Pretty much everything a doctor does, with a pregnant woman, interferes with the birthing process. It is no wonder liability rates are so high and outcomes are so low.
Eventually, I saw that mid wifery have been taken over my the medical system. From my experience and readings, I have come full circle. I am no longer terified of birth, like I was years ago. Instead, I am in awe of how wonderful the body is. I came to this understanding by reading and watching Yolanda Norris-Clark. Bauhauswife on Instagram.. Her book is "Portal" is on Amazon. She does "free birth". The more a person learns about the medical system and how destructive it is, the more free birth makes sense. Of course, I no longer have the parts and I do not have a baby, but I think knowledge and truth are essential.
And ultra sounds... of babies?? Of course it is wrong! Just like everything else they do. For those who argue that the medical system "saves" babies, you don't know what you are saying. It is only due to interferance that they need saving. Like pouring gasoline on your house and lighting a match, and then bringing a fire truck to save you. Wow, maybe just don't burn things? Don't destroy the birthing process, risking the health and life of both mother and child, just to justify your existance.
Magdalena Maria Woźniak*Department of Paediatric Radiology, Medical University of Lublin, Al. Raclawickie 1, 20–059 Lublin, Poland -Thermally induced teratogenesis has been shown in many animal studies, as well as a few controlled human studies. Ultrasound increases temperature in the focal area of the beam and, therefore, has the potential to cause thermal changes in tissue. Hyperthermia may cause a wide range of structural and functional defects; it is a recognized teratogen in mammalian laboratory animals and is a suspected teratogen for humans. The human embryo and fetus may be especially vulnerable to elevated temperatures. ..Using a pulsed spectral Doppler may result in local temperature increase, because exposure to pulsed spectral Doppler ultrasound can generate much higher levels of acoustic energy than B-mode, and thus significantly heat biologic tissue. ..Nonthermal adverse effects of ultrasound include acoustic cavitation, radiation force and acoustic streaming, and may be more significant in early gestation.
Fetal Thermal Effects of Diagnostic Ultrasound-Jacques S. Abramowicz MD, et al. First published: 01 April 2008 A number of epidemiologic studies of possible developmental effects of obstetric ultrasound were performed before 1992, when exposures of the fetus, if anything, were lower on average than they are today. The results overall were negative. Around 1992, the maximum permitted acoustic output of clinical ultrasound instruments operating in the obstetric mode was allowed to increase by a factor of almost 8... Today, ultrasound is so much a part of obstetric care that it would be very difficult to design an ethically acceptable epidemiologic study.
In my opinion, the medicalizing of child birth has a lot to do with women leaving it too late to have babies. 40 years ago you were considered an "old" mother if you were over 30 years having the first pregnancy. Now it's normal. There's a lot more anxiety around getting pregnant and getting to full term when the Mum to be is older. This increases the desire to "do more" to make sure.
Also have you done an article on the weight charts for babies? I believe Nestle or another formula company started the mainstream charts. Your baby has to be fat to be healthy. Not fat? Drink formula. Is your kid happy and thriving? Well, they aren’t, because they’re under 0 on this chart which is about other kids. It wasn’t until 2004 I think that they updated them to include breastfed babies based on the below WHO data.
If the Trust the Science™️ pediatricians can’t scare moms into compliance enough with disease, they scare them with weight. You have to pay to see the whole study but here are the links I found from the WHO: https://apps.who.int/gb/archive/pdf_files/EB105/eeid1.pdf?ua=1
They studied kids in Brazil, Ghana, Norway, Oman, the US, India. I personally think it sounds like a strange mix. No Chinese or Pacific Islander babies, no Central American babies, etc. A study by race by country makes more sense to me since different local foods/health policies play a huge role, as well as ethnicity (eg Norwegians are super tall! Surely that skewed some things?). The whole “your baby’s curve” didn’t use data from most of what my kid is.
Unbekoming: you know I am your biggest fan. I submit this critique with utmost respect. I know you are a reporter here, and not the author of these ideas.
This article is filled with circumstantial data and ideas about ultrasound dangers that are loosely related but unpersuasive. I have not reviewed the AMD article. Notably:
Ultrasound is not an electromagnetic field (EMF), nor is it a microwave. Bringing these in are straw-man arguments.
Medicalization of the birth process is unfortunate, but there is no evidence of ultrasound damage.
The midwife-physician divide has nothing to do with this issue. No midwife can claim a mid-double-digit decrease in patient and maternal mortality. Physician obstetricians did this in the 1950s.
The Chinese studies were on fetuses to be aborted and showed no evidence of damage that was later evident on birth.
You showed me the Control Group Study. Given its proof that all chronic illnesses were primarily determined by vaccination status, I refuse to believe that ultrasounds are anything but window dressing on the overall autism disaster. Ditto SIDS. Articles like this one distract from the primary issue. We should be beating the drums about THAT.
Home birth gives up the double-digit mortality advantage of physician-supervised birth.
This is the same sort of “evidence” that inhabits this article, but I find it hard to believe that with all the focus on ultrasounds, the hardest evidence of harm we have is “tissue damage” reported in Chinese studies without any reported fetal outcome issue.
I could say lots more nasty things about OB-GYNs, but I will leave it at: I have little sympathy for them. Their high C-section and hysterectomy rates alone convict them as one of the most careless specialties. However, they are no match for pediatricians, dentists, oncologists, psychiatrists, or even cardiac surgeons or cardiologists.
Thank you for this information, I'm seeing a lot more about the dangers popping up on the internet, would be good to do a deeper dive and have some links/studies that apparently demonstrate the safety profile of ultrasound.
I want to believe that an ultrasound is safe. That there are some things known. Unfortunately, so many procedures and pharmaceutical products have been revealed dangerous, it is difficult to not be skeptical.
Have you read Jim West's book on Chinese ultrasound research? Thanks to this book, I shudder every time I hear an unwitting parent eagerly anticipating their ultrasound. From the description:
"These studies were previously unknown to the Western realm and little known even in the East. These represent a limited period of new, optimistic research, circa 1988 to 2011. These were pushed aside by a tremendous continual flood of studies that promote ultrasound medical and therapeutic innovations." https://www.amazon.com/Studies-Conducted-Indicate-Prenatal-Ultrasound-ebook/dp/B00X06QDYS
Thanks for this info. The extreme dangers of ultrasound were also exposed in a book by Jim West some years ago, in which he reviewed a lot of little-known Chinese research on ultrasound. https://www.amazon.com/Studies-Conducted-Indicate-Prenatal-Ultrasound-ebook/dp/B00X06QDYS
Disturbing!
Your series on woman and babies is so important! I was born in 1974. They did an x-ray on me. :-( Who knows what that did to me. I also had tongue tie, which no one diagnosed and so as an adult I have a narrow jaw, TMJ and breathing problems. Due to undiagnosed tongue tie, breast feeding "was weird" and my mother gave up. She wanted me to be healthy (70s version) so she gave me *soy* formula. We now know giving soy as baby food is like giving 5x dose of the birth control pill to a baby. Not surprisingly, my periods started at 11 and they were horrific floods. I went to one gynecologist, who said "everything is normal" so I just suffered.
I don't think I ever could have gotten pregnant. Bleeding off and on. With the blood type diet and homeopathy, my periods stablized. Then, something was wrong. I was diagnosed with uterine cancer at age 40, stage 3B. I submitted to surgery, which was brutal because they took my healthy ovaries, "just in case". I had enough experience not to do chemo or radiation. I spend a lot of money on hormone replacement, which is not the same as my ovaries.
Back when I thought I could have a baby, a friend had a c-section because the baby was breech. That really upset me, that a baby could die because it did not turn. So I started reading mid wife journals. Over 10 years, I read mid wife journals monthly.
I found out that babies can sucessfully be born - head first, bum first and foot first. The female body is designed for birth. Pretty much everything a doctor does, with a pregnant woman, interferes with the birthing process. It is no wonder liability rates are so high and outcomes are so low.
Eventually, I saw that mid wifery have been taken over my the medical system. From my experience and readings, I have come full circle. I am no longer terified of birth, like I was years ago. Instead, I am in awe of how wonderful the body is. I came to this understanding by reading and watching Yolanda Norris-Clark. Bauhauswife on Instagram.. Her book is "Portal" is on Amazon. She does "free birth". The more a person learns about the medical system and how destructive it is, the more free birth makes sense. Of course, I no longer have the parts and I do not have a baby, but I think knowledge and truth are essential.
And ultra sounds... of babies?? Of course it is wrong! Just like everything else they do. For those who argue that the medical system "saves" babies, you don't know what you are saying. It is only due to interferance that they need saving. Like pouring gasoline on your house and lighting a match, and then bringing a fire truck to save you. Wow, maybe just don't burn things? Don't destroy the birthing process, risking the health and life of both mother and child, just to justify your existance.
Magdalena Maria Woźniak*Department of Paediatric Radiology, Medical University of Lublin, Al. Raclawickie 1, 20–059 Lublin, Poland -Thermally induced teratogenesis has been shown in many animal studies, as well as a few controlled human studies. Ultrasound increases temperature in the focal area of the beam and, therefore, has the potential to cause thermal changes in tissue. Hyperthermia may cause a wide range of structural and functional defects; it is a recognized teratogen in mammalian laboratory animals and is a suspected teratogen for humans. The human embryo and fetus may be especially vulnerable to elevated temperatures. ..Using a pulsed spectral Doppler may result in local temperature increase, because exposure to pulsed spectral Doppler ultrasound can generate much higher levels of acoustic energy than B-mode, and thus significantly heat biologic tissue. ..Nonthermal adverse effects of ultrasound include acoustic cavitation, radiation force and acoustic streaming, and may be more significant in early gestation.
Fetal Thermal Effects of Diagnostic Ultrasound-Jacques S. Abramowicz MD, et al. First published: 01 April 2008 A number of epidemiologic studies of possible developmental effects of obstetric ultrasound were performed before 1992, when exposures of the fetus, if anything, were lower on average than they are today. The results overall were negative. Around 1992, the maximum permitted acoustic output of clinical ultrasound instruments operating in the obstetric mode was allowed to increase by a factor of almost 8... Today, ultrasound is so much a part of obstetric care that it would be very difficult to design an ethically acceptable epidemiologic study.
In my opinion, the medicalizing of child birth has a lot to do with women leaving it too late to have babies. 40 years ago you were considered an "old" mother if you were over 30 years having the first pregnancy. Now it's normal. There's a lot more anxiety around getting pregnant and getting to full term when the Mum to be is older. This increases the desire to "do more" to make sure.
Please interview Dr Stu! http://www.birthinginstincts.com/
Also have you done an article on the weight charts for babies? I believe Nestle or another formula company started the mainstream charts. Your baby has to be fat to be healthy. Not fat? Drink formula. Is your kid happy and thriving? Well, they aren’t, because they’re under 0 on this chart which is about other kids. It wasn’t until 2004 I think that they updated them to include breastfed babies based on the below WHO data.
If the Trust the Science™️ pediatricians can’t scare moms into compliance enough with disease, they scare them with weight. You have to pay to see the whole study but here are the links I found from the WHO: https://apps.who.int/gb/archive/pdf_files/EB105/eeid1.pdf?ua=1
https://www.who.int/tools/child-growth-standards/who-multicentre-growth-reference-study
They studied kids in Brazil, Ghana, Norway, Oman, the US, India. I personally think it sounds like a strange mix. No Chinese or Pacific Islander babies, no Central American babies, etc. A study by race by country makes more sense to me since different local foods/health policies play a huge role, as well as ethnicity (eg Norwegians are super tall! Surely that skewed some things?). The whole “your baby’s curve” didn’t use data from most of what my kid is.