CLAIMS FOR CURATIVE POWERS - NONE

The formula for StillPoint Tea is discussed in detail on the "StillPoint Tea - Bottle" page in the "Products" section. Basically, it's Canadian Nurse Rene Caisse's 4-herb formula for her Essiac Tea with the addition of Red Clover which is the main addition to her 8-herb formula. The same product has and/or is being sold under several different labels such as "Native American Tea," "Forticel," and "Four Plus One" as well as our own "StillPoint Tea."

Because of prior hype by others, we feel it is important to say more than the fact we don't, won't, and may not make any special health claims for this product, although it traces its Western Civilization origins back to 1922 and untold generations of Ojibwa medicine men before that. Some allege there's too much money -- as in vested long-term income and the building of corporate and personal fortunes -- being spent on research for cancer and other diseases for there ever to be cures found. Therefore, simple folk remedies and similar that have been around for centuries -- and that are still lauded in anecdotal-land -- will never see the light of day. Tests will be rigged in such a way to ensure failure as Rene Caisse claimed happened with her Essiac Tea. The reason: There's no money in herbal folk remedies. But that's what "some" say. For our part, we merely brew one such folk recipe and let others try it and decide for themselves. We make no claims.

And while we make no medical or curative claims for StillPoint Tea, you might discern from the ingredients that it nowhere near resembles Japanese Tea or English Tea or even Green Tea in content or use. We merely inform you that in 2001 the FDA sent a warning letter to Jean’s Greens regarding Forticel which reads in part:

“. . . your firm’s . . . catalog . . . and the pamphlet . . . suggest the products are useful for treating various disease conditions, as discussed below . . .

“* Forticel (pre-brewed tea) and Forticel Mix: “. . . cure . . . cancers and tumors,” “. . . treat ulcer and kidney disorders,” “. . . treat digestive and intestinal problems,” “headache reliever,” “. . . contain antibiotic, antimicrobial, and antitumor properties,” and “. . . chronic and degenerative conditions.””

[Full letter at: http://www.fda.gov/foi/warning_letters/g2020d.pdf]

In September of 2003 the FDA seized over $4,000 worth of Forticel bottles and mix from Jean’s Greens after determining the marketing of the products continued to violate the law. That's just the marketing that violated the law -- NOT the products themselves. Read on.

Specifically, the FDA announcement of September 18, 2003 reads, in part, that the seller: “. . . is making unapproved medical claims for these herbal products. Specifically, the products claim to treat and cure various life-threatening and serious illnesses such as cancer, although there is no scientific evidence to support these claims.”

( See FDA News Release at: http://www.fda.gov/bbs/topics/NEWS/2003/NEW00947.html).

Of course, it’s a matter of historical record that Rene Caisse made similar claims for her original Essiac Tea in Canada as long ago as the 1920’s and for decades thereafter. She died in the late 1970’s at the age of 90. It’s also a matter of record amongst numerous purveyors of Essiac Tea and its knock-offs that their combined customer base claims all sorts of wonderful things happening within their bodies as a result of drinking the tea.

However, and for obvious reasons, we do not make such claims for our StillPoint Tea. We merely inform you of what others have claimed, especially as reported in official watchdog agency documents of the U.S. Government. We do note that this product makes a good herbal tonic, some would allege “detoxifying” tonic, and that traditionally it has been used to stimulate the body’s self-healing capabilities. We emphasize the word “traditionally” as meaning “anecdotally” and lacking scientific evidence for back up, but such does include who-knows-how-many generations of Ojibwa medicine men.

YOUR FDA IN ACTION and DR. BRUSCH'S OPINION

FDA Commissioner Mark McClellan, M.D. Ph.D. is quoted in the Forticel-seizure news release as saying: “FDA is committed to rooting out modern purveyors of snake oil.” Well, we certainly don’t want to fall into that category. That’s why we leave claim-making to others and to the reams of anecdotal and other material surrounding the performance of Rene Caisse’s original Essiac Tea formulas (she had two, at least, and experimented with others) and other teas of similar constituency. Dr. Charles Brusch, personal physician to President J.F. Kennedy, who collaborated extensively in research with Rene Caisse in her later years and witnessed results of Essiac’s use at his clinic in Boston, flat-out stated on the radio in November of 1984 that Essiac is a cure for cancer. But even that testimony is merely anecdotal.

We add parenthetically that in some circles “FDA” is considered a euphemism for “Federal Death Administration.” Not long ago, the medical people at Johns Hopkins concluded through research that FDA-approved pharmaceutical drugs (as in “Food and DRUG Administration”) kill roughly 100,000 people each year, plus or minus (more likely plus since the top estimate is 120,000). It’s sadly ironic, yea pathetic, that while the FDA boasts of waging war against herbal products and dietary supplements, a massacre that is nearly triple the nations's annual highway death toll, and which falls under FDA's purview, takes place across the land.

According to a local pharmacist, 150,000 to 300,000 of those one million or more pharmaceutical drug-related deaths of the past decade can be attributed to drugs properly prescribed and taken. And still they died! Throughout that same decade the total death count from commercially-prepared herbal products may have reached 250 – tops, and probably less. Let’s see if we have this straight: 250 versus 250,000 deaths from properly prescribed and taken pharmaceutical drugs and 250 versus One Million deaths from all pharmaceutical drugs taken one way or another in the same ten year period. Wow! This, by the way, includes the recent flap over ephedra with allegations of as many as 200 deaths from it. Yet, the FDA chooses to focus resources against vitamin and herbal products, particularly where they make claims that are not backed by scientific proof. Congress should ask why? But that’s a whole ‘nother story. (Hint: look for the money that flows into campaign financing -- meaning such is unlikely.)

Personal opinion. The greater danger from herbal supplements involves the "rip-off effect" -- the fact that some companies don’t put the quantity of what they claim into each tablet or capsule. Some tests have revealed absolute zero of what’s claimed on the label. And there are plenty of those kind of companies, unfortunately, where quality control is non-existent or, worse, such actions are deliberate.

To further keep this 'fair and balanced' let us add that this writer would be either invalid, for sure, or dead, probably, were it not for the intervention of Western Medicine, including FDA-approved medicines, at various stages of his long life. Lance Armstrong (of Grand Prix Cycling fame) touts on TV a medicine that he claims cured his cancer. We know several locally through the Cancer Survivors group who make similar claims. Such, however, does not exclude a proper diet, nutrition, and other alternative treatments from achieving similar results. It's just that for the latter, there have been no multi-million scientific studies performed on them with intent to pass FDA's "rigid" (read "expensive") standards because there's no money in it at the end, no patentable product on which to reap billions in profits, for any pharmceutical company conducting such studies. Which leads to an obvious suggestion concerning government funding of its own, university, and/or hospital research labs, but we won't go there.

The FDA is also the agency that would lock people up as recently as 1986 for saying that certain fatty acids in fish oils were good for the heart. And they’re the people who maintain fluorine in the water is good for us in spite of many very learned dentists turning away from that theory. They let aspartame slip through and stay through in spite of formidable allegations it may be responsible for the Gulf War Syndrome and other debilitating effects that mysteriously occur in people who use it regularly. And lots more. They let another Canadian invention, Canola Oil, into our diets, and now it's being shown that Canola Oil, which is a processed food, can have a deleterious effect on our hearts. (Did somebody say "Snake Oil?") But let’s not go there -- at least not before uttering those heart-warming . . . er, make that heart-stopping . . . words: Vioxx, Celebrex, and Aleve. If the FDA Commissioner (or some uninformed lower level Public Relations puke who is putting words in the Commissioner's mouth) wants to be seen as protecting the public from snake oil, let him have his say – as dumb as it sounds considering the total picture surrounding the Forticel seizure. What total picture, you ask?

A TOUCH OF IRONY

In that same September 18, 2003 press release concerning the crack down on “purveyors of snake oil (Forticel),” a fascinating revelation appears as the very last sentence. It reads: “To date FDA has received no reports of illnesses associated with taking the products that were seized today.”

“Well, now!” to quote Dana Garvey’s Church-Lady character. “Isn’t that special!?” All the fuss and furor -- the huffing and puffing -- and the taxpayers’ money spent flailing against something that appears to be absolutely harmless. Compare that eye opening admission with the lengthy contra-indications spewed forth during a typical TV commercial hyping any pharmaceutical drug.

RECAP

FDA toots its horn for chasing down a so-called “snake oil” about which there are zero complaints while thousands of food and drug related deaths and debilitations abound in the land. Too bad Lewis Carroll isn’t here re-writing “Alice in Wonderland.” Maybe Tom Brokaw will include it in his series on “The Fleecing of America.”

BLAZING FINISH

Anyway, if you want a good genuine certified organic herbal tonic of the ‘Essiac Tea' genre that, according to the FDA, is NOT what it’s cracked up to be for the past 80 plus years as well as untold generations beyond that, you’ll find it here in StillPoint Tea.