Access to all articles, new health classes, discounts in our store, and more!
Parents for Better Nutrition presents Dr. Granville F. Knight, MD
A summary of two lectures given by Dr. Knight on October 13, 1978: “Chemical Hazards in Our Daily Living” and “Nutrition and Physical Degeneration”. Published in Parents for Better Nutrition, Inc. Newsletter, No. 10, October 1978. Author: Parents for Better Nutrition.
* * *
Dr. Granville F. Knight, M.D.
Parents for Better Nutrition was delighted to present two public lectures by Dr. Granville F. Knight, M.D. Friday October 13, 1978. His first lecture, “Chemical Hazards in our Daily Living,” was held in the Mary Norbert Hall, Providence Hospital, Medford. A second lecture, “Nutrition and Physical Degeneration” was held in Grants Pass co-sponsored by the Josephine County Council on Drug Abuse. Both lectures were preceded by two films from the Price-Pottenger Nutrition Foundation titled “The Pottenger Cat Studies” and “The Other Side of the Fence.”
Dr. Knight was born in New York City in 1904. He received his medical degree from Columbia, 1930; Internship, Presbyterian Hospital, New York City, 1930-32; Bellevue Hospital, New York City, 1933-35; private practice, medicine, specializing in allergy and ENT, White Plains, New York, 1935-48; Santa Barbara, California, 1948-63, specializing in allergy and nutrition. Dr. Knight’s professional career includes being Commissioner of L.A. County Medical Milk Commission, 1968 to present; Fellow, American College of Allergists; Member American Medical Association; President, Pure Water Association of America, 1960 to present; Director, Institute of Nutritional Research; Fellow, Inter. Academy of Preventive Medicine; Member, Environmental Health & Light Research Institute; Fellow, Association of American Physicians and Surgeons; Founder member of West Coast Allergy Society and Price-Pottenger Nutrition Foundation; Author of articles in professional journals and lay magazines. Lecturer.
The primary interest of the Price-Pottenger Nutrition Foundation lies in spreading the knowledge of the interrelationship of the physical, mental, emotional and nutritional aspects of man as these relate to animals, plants, minerals, and living soil and make known as widely as possible these important total life processes.
Parents for Better Nutrition would like to share with you the excellent accurate article in the Medford Mail Tribune on Sunday October 15, 1978 by Mail Tribune staff writer, Stu Watson. He entitled his article, “Resistance to Chemical Hazards Urged by Physician”.
Faced with an onslaught of pesticides, herbicides, preservatives, smog, antiseptics, anti-biotics, additives, deficiencies, odorizers, deodorizers, solvents, extenders, pretenders, emulsifiers, and solidifiers, anyone with half a wit left would choose to fall back and punt.
There are other alternatives. “More and more people have got to wake up and take an active part,” said Dr. Granville F. Knight. “Nothing is going to happen until people take a stand. You have to get mad.” He didn’t say it, but Dr. Knight might have completed his admonition by urging people to tell the world they’re not going to take it anymore. Dr. Knight, a Santa Monica, California resident and well-known authority on preventive medicine, made his plea for public resistance to environmental chemical hazards in a speech at Providence Hospital Friday afternoon.
“We’re exposed to chemicals which are thought to be innocuous (harmless) and then they’re found to be exceedingly hazardous,” Dr. Knight said in referring to several substances now banned but which once were widely used. DDT was thought safe and so was hexachlorophene. DDT was banned after it was tied to various human health symptoms.
Hexachlorophene, once touted for its antiseptic properties, was axed after several infants died. Their deaths were connected to something commonly known as dioxin, a component which still is found in herbicides used in forests, farming, weed control and around the home.
Seven years ago, the chemical PBB was introduced accidently into animal feed in Michigan. Hundreds of people suffered debilitating illness from meat and dairy products contaminated with the chemicals, Knight said. Even now, he said, many residents of the state still have the chemical in their blood.
At one time, Americans were able to wash pesticides from their fruit. Not anymore. “Now the pesticides penetrate to the pulp,” said Knight. Chemical hazards are all around. Bathroom and kitchen products, yard and garden products, the food consumed and the air people breathe, even purified tap water is contaminated, he said.
President of the Price-Pottenger Nutrition Foundation Inc. and a staff physician at three Los Angeles area hospitals, Dr. Knight advised nearly 30 listeners to drink distilled water or filtered tap water through charcoal. He said American agriculture is heading down a dead end road as long as it relies on pesticides. A few insects survive each new, stronger pesticide and reproduce a resistant breed of bug, Dr. Knight said. He said some farmers are abandoning pesticides and going to “eco-agriculture.” They develop healthy plant varieties by stopping the use [of] synthetic fertilizers. Healthy plants resist insects, he said.
“It’s the only sane approach, the only approach which is going to save our country and the world if we have sense enough to do it,” he said. “The question is, do we?”
Addressing a herbicide issue controversial in Oregon, Dr. Knight said residents should be concerned about 2,4-D as well as the more publicized dioxin herbicides, 2,4,5-T and Silvex. He said tests of 2,4-D performed in France showed male pigeon squab with female sex organs after eggs were sprayed with an average environmental dose of 2,4-D. He said more concern has shown the effects of 2,4,5-T, but he said 500 times as much 2,4-D is used each year in California. Dr. Knight said he has treated people who complain of illness after exposure to herbicides.
“People in Oregon should be concerned about it because a number of people are getting sick from it,” he said. He also criticized government regulation of medical treatments available to the profession. Talking about laetrile…the controversial apricot extract believed by some to cure cancer…Dr. Knight said use of the substance should be a matter of personal choice. He said it is a dictatorship when government can tell doctors and patients what they can and can’t use.
While he recommends use of vitamins, Dr. Knight says they alone won’t cure malnutrition. They must be used only to supplement a good diet, he said. He advised people to avoid white sugar, to eat whole grain flour and cereal soaked overnight in water to release calcium and magnesium, to supplement B-complex intake with yeast, liver or rice polishings, to peel fruit, and to take vitamin C and E as detoxifiers…especially for smog. Many people who suffer symptoms from chemical poisoning aren’t treated as if they had been, Dr. Knight said. “The average doctor doesn’t think of it,” he said, “most instead treating patients for bacteria or virus.” Persons suspecting illness from chemical exposure usually can find out through the blood or urine test conducted within a short time after the exposure, said Dr. Knight. All in all, he said, a good diet is the best start toward protecting an individual against environmental pollutants.