(NaturalNews) 2009 has been a crazy year for health and medicine. It was the year that Congress rammed through a mandatory health "reform" bill that violates the U.S. Constitution in forcing all Americans to buy government-mandated products and services from greedy corporations. Although it hasn't been signed into law yet, the very fact that it has been passed by both the House and the Senate is alarming: America is just one signature away from becoming a medical dictatorship.

But that's not the only big health news that happened in 2009. In all, 2009 was a year of corruption, scientific fraud and health freedom oppression. Here are some of the highlights:

The FDA

The FDA was hit hard in 2009 was accusations of corruption and criminal behavior. In January, the FDA's own scientists accused management of committing crimes (http://www.naturalnews.com/025298_t...). And in August, the FDA abandoned even the appearance of standing up for safety by declaring that mercury fillings are safe for everyone (http://www.naturalnews.com/026822_m...).

In order to protect its authority and boost Big Pharma's sales, the FDA also went after numerous natural health companies in 2009. Stephen Heuer was arrested by the FDA in January (http://www.naturalnews.com/025347_n...), and by June, the FDA had threatened to seize all natural products that boost immune health and protect against the swine flu (http://www.naturalnews.com/026473_t...).

The FTC also joined the tyranny bandwagon, engaged in a war of threatening tactics against a ministry selling anti-cancer herbs (http://www.naturalnews.com/025303_t...) and ultimately ordering them to lie to their customers about their products (http://www.naturalnews.com/026970_t...). The FTC even went after Dr. Weil, threatening him with arrest and imprisonment for daring to accurately describe the immune boosting effects of the astragalus herb (http://www.naturalnews.com/027303_t...).

Topping off the year of tyranny and oppression, in December the FDA staged an illegal kidnapping of herbal formulator Greg Caton who was threatening the cancer industry with his anti-cancer salve products made from Ecuadorian herbs (http://www.naturalnews.com/027750_G...).

Big Pharma corruption

2009 was also a bad year for Big Pharma. All kinds of new findings came out that show the dangers of pharmaceuticals. For example, did you know that HRT drugs shrink women's brains? (http://www.naturalnews.com/025354_d...)

The drug industry was also shown to be engaged in blatant scientific fraud. AstraZeneca, for starters, taught its sales reps how to lie to doctors (http://www.naturalnews.com/025744_d...), and throughout the pharmaceutical industry, many clinical trials were exposed as being entirely fraudulent (http://www.naturalnews.com/025833_B...).

On the researcher side, Big Pharma scientist Dr. Scott Reuben was caught fabricating 21 studies (http://www.naturalnews.com/025852_a...) -- most of which were widely quoted by other doctors to push dangerous pills onto children. Also in 2009, Pfizer actually admitted to committing felony crimes over its marketing of Bextra (http://www.naturalnews.com/026963_P...).

Merck was found to have created a "hit list" of doctors targeted for destruction -- doctors who were speaking out against the safety of the company's drugs (http://www.naturalnews.com/027116_M...). The company was also busted over its hiding of data about the dangers of Vioxx (http://www.naturalnews.com/027582_M...).

Not to be out-frauded by Merck, Pfizer paid a record $1.3 billion fine in 2009 for intentionally misbranding its drugs (http://www.naturalnews.com/027276_P...).

Similarly, the Dept. of Health and Human Services was caught backing a medical device "review board" that was actually led by a dead dog (http://www.naturalnews.com/025955_h...).

Big Pharma destroys the environment

Big Pharma was also caught destroying the environment throughout 2009. In India, for example, drug companies were caught dumping toxic pharmaceuticals into rivers (http://www.naturalnews.com/025415_w...).

Not surprisingly, lots of studies published in 2009 revealed that fish are contaminated with pharmaceutical chemicals (http://www.naturalnews.com/025933_p...).

Pharmaceuticals are even contaminated with chemicals themselves, we discovered. Some medications, for example, contain phthalates that "feminize" young boys (http://www.naturalnews.com/027514_p...).

Psych drugs and shootings

The psych drug industry received yet more bad news in 2009 as its drugs were shown to be even more dangerous than previously thought. ADHD drugs, in particular, were found to cause all sorts of bizarre side effects including making children hallucinate (http://www.naturalnews.com/025433_d...). Speaking of children, the FDA went out of its way to actually approve antipsychotic drugs for children (http://www.naturalnews.com/026429_h...), opening the doors to even more mass drugging of our nation's youth.

Thanks to the psych drug industry, there were of course more shootings in 2009 (http://www.naturalnews.com/025826_a...) and more sudden deaths from Ritalin (http://www.naturalnews.com/026459_a...). Both the Orlando and the Ft. Hood shooters were also linked to psychiatric drugs (http://www.naturalnews.com/027425_d...).

Food dangers

2009 was also a huge year for findings about the contamination of the food supply. High Fructose Corn Syrup ("liquid Satan") was found to be contaminated with mercury (http://www.naturalnews.com/025442_m...), and "natural" soy protein was found to be bathed in toxic hexane solvents (http://www.naturalnews.com/026303_h...).

Infant formula was routinely found to be dangerous to infants, including a finding that infant formula was contaminated with hexane (http://www.naturalnews.com/026315_h...). It was also revealed in 2009 that the USDA openly allows e.coli-contaminated meat to be sold as hamburgers (http://www.naturalnews.com/027414_d...). (They can also legally be made with beef from cows that are fed chicken feces.)

Also in 2009, the "Smart Choices" food labeling gimmick was revealed as a total fraud (http://www.naturalnews.com/027077_n...), discrediting Tufts University and its hilarious nutritionist who thinks processed sugary cereals are good for you.

Celebrity news

On the celebrity side, in 2009 Michael Phelps got caught smoking a bong (http://www.naturalnews.com/025489_s...), Oprah stirred up trouble by recommending KFC chicken dinners (http://www.naturalnews.com/026234_O...), Michael Jackson was killed by FDA-approved pharmaceuticals (http://www.naturalnews.com/026511_c...), and Patrick Swayze was killed by chemotherapy (http://www.naturalnews.com/027030_c...).

Actress Brittany Murphy was killed by "acute pharmaceutical toxicity" after taking a lethal combination of FDA-approved prescription drugs that nobody thought to test in combination (http://www.naturalnews.com/027781_B...).

Dr. Mehmet Oz, a very visible vaccine promoter, was also scrutinized for his financial relationship with a vaccine technology company that hilariously denied having anything to do with vaccines (http://www.naturalnews.com/027451_D...). NaturalNews readers conducted research on the company in question (SIGA Technologies) and found a huge amount of evidence linking the company to vaccines (including patents). (http://www.naturalnews.com/027483_S...)

On the bright side, I was fortunate to be able to conduct interviews with several courageous, outspoken celebrities including Jane Goodall (http://www.naturalnews.com/027714_J...) and Suzanne Somers (http://www.naturalnews.com/027526_S...).

Health freedom

Health freedom was under a major assault this year as sellers of raw milk found themselves targeted in state-run sting operations (http://www.naturalnews.com/027675_r...).

In order to try to enhance health freedom, I worked with the Life Extension Foundation (and other groups) to create the Health Revolution Petition (www.HealthRevolutionPetition.org), which offers a freedom-based health care reform system that restores health freedom and even would help save America from financial destruction by sharply reducing sick-care costs. It has so far been signed by over 35,000 people.

The H1N1 swine flu

Of course, no overview of 2009 would be complete without covering the Swine Flu scam and the ensuing mass vaccination con. We covered this in numerous articles: Why vaccines harm children (http://www.naturalnews.com/025595_v...), 10 things you're not supposed to know about vaccines (http://www.naturalnews.com/026717_s...), and how tissue from diseased African monkeys is used to manufacture vaccines (http://www.naturalnews.com/026779_s...).

A leaked memo, never covered in the mainstream media, even revealed that the swine flu vaccine was linked to paralysis (http://www.naturalnews.com/026866_s...). It wasn't long before the vaccine was linked to other dangerous side effects, too, and it eventually put one young athlete in a wheelchair (http://www.naturalnews.com/027473_G...).

The vaccine propaganda relied on a barrage of false and misleading statistics, so I published a popular story exposing the statistical fraud used to promote these vaccines (http://www.naturalnews.com/026955_s...).

Swine Flu propaganda was nothing short of astonishing in 2009, and part of that propaganda included information urging consumers to avoid using herbs, vitamins or natural products to protect themselves. Remarkably, even the Natural Products Association got in on the disinformation campaign (http://www.naturalnews.com/026215_n...). The mainstream media, of course, pushed the pro-vaccine hype to new levels by lying to their viewers and readers on a regular basis (http://www.naturalnews.com/027055_s...).

By mid-October, it was obvious that swine flu vaccines were outright quackery (http://www.naturalnews.com/027239_v...). Further supporting the idea that vaccines are based on total fraud, doctors, journalists and health authorities refused to answer ten commonsense questions about flu vaccines (http://www.naturalnews.com/027258_v...) -- questions that remain unanswered today. And nobody -- including the CDC or WHO -- dared recommend vitamin D as a way for people to prevent swine flu infections (http://www.naturalnews.com/027385_V...).

The FDA did, however, allow Cocoa Krispies cereals to make claims for boosting immunity. (http://www.naturalnews.com/027387_C...)

At the same time, the public soon learned that the conventional drug being pushed for swine flu -- Roche's Tamiflu drug -- was complete quackery too (http://www.naturalnews.com/027734_T...).

The fizzling out of H1N1 swine flu didn't stop President Obama from declaring a national emergency by late October (http://www.naturalnews.com/027323_s...). This "emergency" was entirely fabricated, of course. The only real emergency taking place was the loss of money by drug companies who were unable to sell their swine flu vaccines as profitably as they had hoped.

Deadly Merck vaccines

On the vaccine front, Merck was under extreme fire for its Gardasil cervical cancer vaccines. We promoted a petition to investigate Gardasil-related deaths (http://www.naturalnews.com/025646_G...), and we published stories about young girls who died after receiving Merck vaccines (http://www.naturalnews.com/027151_c...). One girl suffered permanent brain damage after a Gardasil injection (http://www.naturalnews.com/027188_N...).

In October, 2009, a top Gardasil researcher went public with information warning about the dangers of the vaccine (http://www.naturalnews.com/027196_c...), but she immediately retracted her story after being pressured by... guess who?

By the end of 2009, it was revealed that long-time head of the CDC, Dr. Julie Gerberding, had been in discussions with Merck about taking the job of president of Merck's vaccine division. She soon accepted that job and now works at Merck. (http://www.naturalnews.com/027789_D...)

This leap of such a high-profile government executive to a top position in Big Pharma underscored the ongoing "revolving door" between industry and government.

Making the vaccine topic even more convoluted in 2009, Baxter shipped vaccines materials containing live avian flu virus to 18 countries (http://www.naturalnews.com/025760_B...).

New information came out in 2009 about the link between autism and vaccines (http://www.naturalnews.com/027178_v...), and autism rates continued to skyrocket even while the conventional scientific community denied any and all links to pharmaceuticals or vaccines (http://www.naturalnews.com/027175_v...).

The mammogram scam exposed

2009 was also a terrible year for the mammogram industry, which found itself unable to hide the truth about its "detection" scam any longer. The world learned that mammograms cause cancer and actually harm more women than they help. (http://www.naturalnews.com/027742_m...)

Suzanne Somers bravely spoke out in an exclusive NaturalNews interview where she told the full truth about the dangers of mammograms and the fraud of the cancer industry (http://www.naturalnews.com/027526_S...).

The cancer industry, not surprisingly, still refuses to answer the 21 questions I posed in a widely-read article about the mammogram scam: http://www.naturalnews.com/027549_m...

The cancer industry was also pounded by new research showing that chemotherapy causes long-term neurological damage. (http://www.naturalnews.com/027600_c...)

Profiteering was a big theme in the cancer industry this year. One drug company announced it would start selling a new cancer drug that costs $30,000 a month (http://www.naturalnews.com/027705_c...).

CT scans and medical imaging procedures were also exposed in 2009 as Americans learned the truth about how dangerous they are to your health (http://www.naturalnews.com/025767_c...). It turns out that being subjected to multiple CT scans is a lot like standing in the blast radius of an atomic weapon (http://www.naturalnews.com/027648_C...).

Health care reform

The health care reform debate took a turn for the worse in 2009 as nutritionally illiterate lawmakers passed a health care reform bill that seemed designed to bankrupt America (http://www.naturalnews.com/026628_h...) and destroy U.S. jobs (http://www.naturalnews.com/026643_h...).

While there was lots of talk about how to reform health care, the entire debate turned out to be nothing but a scam to force Americans to buy into rip-off conventional medicine services and insurance scams. All the important conversations about real health care reform never took place (http://www.naturalnews.com/026887_h...).

The entire future of America looked rather bleak as accelerating national debt collided with increased sickness and disease. In assessing the situation, I published a widely-read article about the "New Mr. America" -- diseased and bankrupt. (http://www.naturalnews.com/026693_d...)

Following that, I posted a highly popular special report called Nutrition Can Save America! in which I laid out a plan for saving America by unleashing the healing power of food and natural remedies across the population. (http://www.naturalnews.com/027569_n...)

AIDS myths exposed

2009 was also the year in which the AIDS myth was exposed by a breakthrough documentary called House of Numbers (http://www.naturalnews.com/027355_A...).

It turns out that conventional AIDS theories are based on complete hogwash, and all a person really needs to prevent AIDS is a strong, healthy immune system (http://www.naturalnews.com/027354_A...).

The legal front

In 2009, Big Pharma sought to win blanket immunity for all drugs, but the U.S. Supreme Court surprisingly shot down the idea (http://www.naturalnews.com/025778_S...).

Throughout 2009, the courts continued to order parents to poison their children with chemotherapy (http://www.naturalnews.com/026283_c...). Young cancer patient Daniel Hauser was poisoned (virtually at gunpoint) by chemotherapy doctors acting on court orders (http://www.naturalnews.com/026305_m...).

Technology and DRM

On the technology front, Amazon.com pulled a huge Big Brother event by remotely deleting copies of the book 1984 from users' Kindle devices. NaturalNews responded by calling for a boycott on the Kindle (http://www.naturalnews.com/026804_D...).

We've since learned that the Kindle's security has been hacked, allowing users to copy off all their Amazon Kindle books as PDF files (yet another victory for the hackers over Big Brother).

Subatomic physics and the search for the God particle

In the realm of subatomic physics, 2009 was the year that people really started talking about the new Large Hadron Collider (a supercollider) and the search for the Higgs Boson particle. I wrote several important commentary pieces on this topic, explaining why there's no such thing as a Higgs Boson "particle" (http://www.naturalnews.com/025486_H...),

Also in the realm of science, 2009 was the year that U.S. Navy researchers finally admitted that cold fusion is, indeed, quite real, reversing decades of denials about this "free" energy technology which has been suppressed since 1989 (http://www.naturalnews.com/025925_c...).

Wake up, people!

In 2009, I also tried to educate people about the linguistic trickery used by modern medicine (http://www.naturalnews.com/025396_d...), but this topic turned out to be far too advanced and not many people "got it." This led to the publication of a very popular article asking why smart people are so stupid when it comes to issues like vaccines, nutrition and vitamin D (http://www.naturalnews.com/026843_h...).

In an effort to try to share natural health knowledge with the world, I personally built and launched the world's largest online encyclopedia of quotes from natural health authors, called NaturalPedia (http://www.naturalnews.com/026902_N...).

Positive news

Also on the good side, our non-profit Consumer Wellness Center (www.ConsumerWellness.org) handed out numerous grants to schools and education centers around the world that invested the money in teaching children (and some adults) about gardening, self-care, healing foods and more. Here are links to some of the awards we gave out:

http://www.naturalnews.com/025235_f...

http://www.naturalnews.com/025391_n...

And here are a few of the success stories from this grant effort:

http://consumerwellness.org/GrantSu...

Natural remedies revealed in 2009

We covered lots of news about natural remedies in 2009. Here are just a few of the ones we published on NaturalNews.com:

• Grapeseed extract kills leukemia cancer cells

http://www.naturalnews.com/025248_c...

• Vitamin D halts growth of breast cancer tumors (http://www.naturalnews.com/025495_c...)

• Blueberries lower cholesterol (http://www.naturalnews.com/025866_b...)

• Resveratrol prevents cancer and heart disease

http://www.naturalnews.com/025977_r...

• Astaxanthin is a natural anti-inflammatory nutrient

http://www.naturalnews.com/026325_a...

• Natural anti-viral remedies can protect you from swine flu

http://www.naturalnews.com/026378_a...

• Yellow pea protein lowers blood pressure

http://www.naturalnews.com/026406_b...

• Vitamin D lowers health care costs

http://www.naturalnews.com/026770_V...

• Selenium helps prevent cancer

http://www.naturalnews.com/027158_s...

• Cinnamon helps prevent diabetes

http://www.naturalnews.com/027168_c...

• Garlic treats high blood pressure

http://www.naturalnews.com/027195_g...

• Chaparral treats cancer

http://www.naturalnews.com/027247_c...

• Omega-3 oils beat depression

http://www.naturalnews.com/027285_o...

• Oregano oil eliminates parasites

http://www.naturalnews.com/027333_p...

• Magnesium prevents heart disease

http://www.naturalnews.com/027392_m...

• Cabbage stops stomach ulcers

http://www.naturalnews.com/027454_c...

• Acupuncture reverses infertility

http://www.naturalnews.com/027467_a...

• Colloidal silver works better than antibiotics

http://www.naturalnews.com/027474_c...

• Green tea prevents brain disorders

http://www.naturalnews.com/027757_g...

2009 in summary

Well, there you have it! Those are the highlights of what NaturalNews covered in 2009. It was a year of outrageous quackery, FDA tyranny, censorship and criminal acts on the part of the pharmaceutical industry.

At the same time, it was also a year when more people finally woke up to the dangers of mammograms and CT scans. NaturalNews readership climbed substantially through 2009 as more people got turned on to the truth about natural remedies and the healing power of nutrition.

The FDA and Big Pharma is now increasingly under fire as a result of the events of 2009, and I suspect that in 2010 and beyond, the pharmaceutical industry is going to find itself under increasing scrutiny as more and more of its criminal operations are exposed.

But don't expect the mainstream media to have anything to do with that. All the really smart reporting is now happening on blogs and independent news sites. The mainstream media continues to play its "Truman Show" game of broadcasting a fictional reality to the people, hoping no one will notice what's really going on.

Thank you for reading NaturalNews in 2009, and we have a lot more in store for you in 2010 and beyond! With your help, perhaps we can see some real breakthroughs in health freedom in 2010. One day, we might even get to witness the arrest and criminal prosecution of Big Pharma's top executives who are guilty of crimes against humanity for continuing to wage chemical warfare against the people (while poisoning the environment at the same time).

Stay tuned for more news from NaturalNews.com throughout 2010!

www.naturalnews.com/027851_health_news_Big_Pharma.html