This week, seven activists in Los Angeles had their homes raided in connection with a campaign against the POM Wonderful juice company, makers of POM pomegranate juice and Evian water.
POM has funded $10 million in research into the health effects of its juice, including conducting numerous studies on animals which included inducing erectile disfunction and depriving newborn mice
of oxygen to the brain. The raids are yet another transparent attempt by the government to stifle free speech at the request of large corporations (POM is based in Santa Monica, CA, the town whose police carried out the raids) - and another sign of just how scared these animal-abusing companies are of being picketed, protested, and exposed for what they do. POM executives have stated in
court filings that they have left their homes for up to a week at a time for fear of being demonstrated against, and the LA Times recently covered the campaign and mentioned POM's cruel torture of animals.

Please support activists (many of whom lost computers and other items) and the campaign against POM. Visit www.PomKills.com for more info on POM, and email factogether (at) gmail.com to contact the POM Kills campaign. Meanwhile, contact POM and let them know just how disgusted you are with their company's treatment of
animals, and make sure to tell them you will be encouraging everyone you know to boycott their products.

POM contacts

POM Wonderful, LLC
11444 West Olympic Blvd.
Los Angeles, CA 90064
310/966-5800
310/966-5863 (Customer Service)
310/312-2818 (Sales)

Lynda and Stewart Resnick (billionaires) - Owners
Matthew Tupper - CEO
Harley Liker - Medial Advisor
John Regal - VP, Marketing
Denise Bonder - Director of Human Resources
Fiona Posell - Public Relations
Mike L Dreher - VP, Scientific and Regulatory Affairs

customerservice@pomwonderful.com
sales@pomwonderful.com
PR@pomwonderful.com
izdev@pomwonderful.com
advertising@pomwonderful.com
foodservice@pomwonderful.com
orders@pomwonderful.com,
pomblogger@pomwonderful.com
medicaloutreach@pomwonderful.com
legalinfo@pomwonderful.com
fposell@pomwonderful.com
mdreher@pomwonderful.com
mtupper@pomwonderful.com
hliker@pomwonderful.com
jregal@pomwonderful.com
dbonder@pomwonderful.com

Did Pom wonderful finance this research? Is that the problem?

Pomegranate Juice Helps Keep PSA Levels Stable In Men With Prostate Cancer

The study involved 50 men who had undergone surgery or radiation but quickly experienced increases in prostate-specific antigen or PSA, a biomarker that indicates the presence of cancer. UCLA researchers measured "doubling time," how long it takes for PSA levels to double, a signal that the cancer is progressing, said Dr. Allan Pantuck, an associate professor of urology, a Jonsson Cancer Center researcher and lead author of the study.

Doubling time is crucial in prostate cancer, Pantuck said, because patients who have short doubling times are more likely to die from their cancer. The average doubling time is about 15 months. In the UCLA study, Pantuck and his team observed increases in doubling times from 15 months to 54 months, an almost four-fold increase.

"That's a big increase. I was surprised when I saw such an improvement in PSA numbers," Pantuck said. "In older men 65 to 70 who have been treated for prostate cancer, we can give them pomegranate juice and it may be possible for them to outlive their risk of dying from their cancer. We're hoping we may be able to prevent or delay the need for other therapies usually used in this population such as hormone treatment or chemotherapy, both of which bring with them harmful side effects."

The study appears in the July 1 issue of Clinical Cancer Research, the peer-reviewed journal of the American Association of Cancer Research.

"This is not a cure, but we may be able to change the way prostate cancer grows," Pantuck said. "We don't know yet the specific factors behind this response - that's our next step in this research. We want to find out what cell signaling pathways might be affected, what is happening to keep PSA levels stable."

Pomegranate juice is known to have anti-inflammatory effects and high levels of anti-oxidants, which are believed to protect the body from free-radical damage. It also contains poly-phenols, natural antioxidant compounds found in green tea, as well as isoflavones commonly found in soy, and ellagic acid, which is believed to play a role in cancer cell death.

"There are many substances in pomegranate juice that may be prompting this response," Pantuck said. "We don't know if it's one magic bullet or the combination of everything we know is in this juice. My guess is that it's probably a combination of elements, rather than a single component."

The levels of PSA in men immediately following treatement should be undetectable, Pantuck said. If PSA can be detected, it's an indication of an aggressive cancer that is likely to progress. The men in Pantuck's study all had detectable PSA following treatment. Of the 50 men enrolled, more than 80 percent experienced improvement in doubling times.

Conventional treatment for men with recurrent prostate cancer includes hormonal therapy, a chemical castration which removes testosterone from the system. Men treated with hormonal therapy can experience hot flashes, osteoporosis, fatigue, depression, muscle wasting, loss of libido and erectile dysfunction. If drinking pomegranate juice can delay or prevent the need for hormonal therapy, patients would experience a better quality of life for a longer time, Pantuck said.

The patients in Pantuck's study experienced no side effects and none of the participants had cancers that metastasized during the study.

Pantuck, along with UCLA colleagues including Dr. Arie Belldegrun, professor and chief of urologic oncology, and Dr. David Heber, professor and director of the Center for Human Nutrition, first began research on pomegranate juice in prostate cancer about six years ago, conducting preclinical research in cell cultures and in animals. Those studies showed pomegranate juice slowed the growth of prostate cancer, Pantuck said.

>>>>>"There are many substances in pomegranate juice that may be prompting this response," Pantuck said. "We don't know if it's one magic bullet or the combination of everything we know is in this juice. My guess is that it's probably a combination of elements, rather than a single component."

This study would have been more useful if they isolated groups of substances and tested them. As it is, the study has value only to companies like POM that sell pomegranate juice.

You might as well study if Chee-Tos have any nutritional value on children. The answer will be "yes", because they contain some good things.

Phase II study of pomegranate juice for men with rising prostate-specific antigen following surgery or radiation for prostate cancer.

Department of Urology, David Geffen School of Medicine, University of California at Los Angeles, Los Angeles, California 90095-1738, USA. apantuck@mednet.ucla.edu

PURPOSE: Phytochemicals in plants may have cancer preventive benefits through antioxidation and via gene-nutrient interactions. We sought to determine the effects of pomegranate juice (a major source of antioxidants) consumption on prostate-specific antigen (PSA) progression in men with a rising PSA following primary therapy. EXPERIMENTAL DESIGN: A phase II, Simon two-stage clinical trial for men with rising PSA after surgery or radiotherapy was conducted. Eligible patients had a detectable PSA > 0.2 and < 5 ng/mL and Gleason score < or = 7. Patients were treated with 8 ounces of pomegranate juice daily until disease progression. Clinical end points included safety and effect on serum PSA, serum-induced proliferation and apoptosis of LNCaP cells, serum lipid peroxidation, and serum nitric oxide levels. RESULTS: The study was fully accrued after efficacy criteria were met. There were no serious adverse events reported and the treatment was well tolerated. Mean PSA doubling time significantly increased with treatment from a mean of 15 months at baseline to 54 months posttreatment (P < 0.001). In vitro assays comparing pretreatment and posttreatment patient serum on the growth of LNCaP showed a 12% decrease in cell proliferation and a 17% increase in apoptosis (P = 0.0048 and 0.0004, respectively), a 23% increase in serum nitric oxide (P = 0.0085), and significant (P < 0.02) reductions in oxidative state and sensitivity to oxidation of serum lipids after versus before pomegranate juice consumption. CONCLUSIONS: We report the first clinical trial of pomegranate juice in patients with prostate cancer. The statistically significant prolongation of PSA doubling time, coupled with corresponding laboratory effects on prostate cancer in vitro cell proliferation and apoptosis as well as oxidative stress, warrant further testing in a placebo-controlled study.

>The statistically significant prolongation of PSA doubling time, coupled with corresponding laboratory effects on prostate cancer in vitro cell proliferation and apoptosis as well as oxidative stress, warrant further testing in a placebo-controlled study.

Presumably, they'd want to fund that too.

But will they fund research that tests subsets of chemicals in the juice?

Their interest is in selling the juice, not selling pomegranates, unless they also own pomegranate orchards. Even then, what if they find that the important compounds are in, say, red cabbage. Well, who would then pay $5 for a bottle of POM when they could get a head of cabbage for $1?

I guess they could appeal to the cabbage farmer board.

(PS - I'm not an animal-rights guy. It just seemed like the research was done for POM.)

(PS - I'm not an animal-rights guy. It just seemed like the research was done for POM.)

This is very likely. Without reading the full text of the article, you wouldn't know for sure. In recent years , all medical studies are required to disclosure any financial stake they have in their research. If Chevron employed industrial hygienists publish about the robust health of petroleum workers, they must mention that they are employed by Chevron. In the last few months articles in medical journals touting the miracle foods apples and spirulina were found to be paid for by the Apple Advisory Board, and the Spirulina Council.
"Medical researchers" are getting around this in an insidious way, however. Now there are clearinghouses of whore doctores that you can hire to do any research to want. Industry doesn't actually contract with the doctors- they contract with the clearinghouse- so there is no disclosure requirement.
Seems like a lot of science is getting bought and paid for nowadays.
Re: breaking down the juice into component parts: Its entirely possible it isn't a single substance in a food item that makes it healthy- its as likely its the inter-relationship between them. Thats why a healthy diet with whole foods, and not simply taking vitaimin supplements is the way to go.

POM Wonderful harms animals for the same reason everyone else does: somebody somewhere is profitting bigtime from it.

You claim that POM Wonderful is trying to help humankind by showing the beneficial effects their juice has for a variety of diseases; you pointed out prostate cancer.

But here's the rub with animal research: some animal, given some dosage of just about any chemical, will give you the result you want. Tobacco companies loved this fact because they could always point to dog studies (dogs don't get lung cancer from smoking) to say their product was safe despite the massive overwhelming epidemiological evidence to the contrary.

Here's a question: what if POM had tested its juice on rats and found that it increases the likelihood of breast cancer? Maybe this has already happened. Do you think we would know if it did? Would POM send out a press release stating "Our product is shown to increase breast cancer in mice" ??

Of course not. That research would never see the light of day and if people wanted to know the details of this study - POM Wonderful would pull their "this is proprietary research and none of your business" card. AMAZINGLY, even the FDA doesn't require all data to be disclosed!!!! Yes, you read right - a drug company (or in this case a juice manufacturer) - can test a given chemical on a dozen different species and cherry pick the data from 2 species that provide them with favorable results. The rest of the results are kept from the public and releasing that information is actually a violation of trade laws (as HLS says - your secret is our secret).

Why do you think POM was testing pomegranite juice and not, say, the toxicity or benefits of wine? Well, quite obviously, it doesn't behoove POM to show that wine is good for you. They don't sell wine. They do sell pomegranate juice - and they probably depend on spurious claims of preventing diseases to make their consumers buy their overpriced crappy juice.

In other words - you can't trust companies who have a financial vested interest in their product to make statements about the quality or condition of their product.

Quite the opposite - you should take everything they say with a grain of salt and always ask yourself: what isn't getting published?

There are now "medical journals" where the entire editorial board are industry apologists. Nothing gets published that isn't beneficial to their side. But its still set up as "peer reviewed"- so its admissible in a court of law as scientific evidence.