Book Review: Empty Harvest: Understanding the Link Between Our Food, Our Immunity and our Planet

This book is excellent for people looking to dig deeper into how things are really working on this planet.  It was written by Dr. Bernard Jensen and Mark Anderson and although it is a bit older the message is still as true (in fact maybe even more true) today as when it was published.  This book covers a lot of ground but the part I found to be the most interesting was the information about our "empty harvest."  Today's modern agricultural practices produce food that is basically devoid of nutrients.  The topsoil, which is nutrient rich and nurtures the plants as they grow, has been eroded and degraded to such a state that the foods we eat today have only a fraction of the vitamins, minerals and other nutrients they did 100 years ago. 

It was very sad for me to read that, despite knowing this is occurring, our solution to this dilemma is to continue doing what we are doing and just add artificial fertilizer to the basically sterile soil.  The problem is that this practice does nothing to revitalize the soil or stop the erosion that one day will render even the most fabled land in America useless by turning it more or less into a dessert. 

The authors also underscore the importance of working with the land rather than using it was we will.  They liken the human body to the earth in that each has an immune system, a circulatory system, waste elimination abilities and the ability to be overwhelmed by practices that are ultimately self-destructive. 

It also brings up other important issues such as water fluoridation.  I did not know that numerous studies have shown the extremely detrimental effects of water fluoridation with sodium fluoride on human health and yet we add this toxic chemical to our water for reasons that are basically not founded on science and are based squarely on the almighty dollar.  This basically amounts to information suppression and is something people would likely not stand for if they knew the extent of the problem.  Given the recent admission of GlaxoSmithKline (Pharma Giant) to paying out bribes, paying doctors to push other doctors to prescribe certain medications and marketing drugs for unapproved purposes as well as other reports of other companies falsifying date and suppressing negative results of drug trials I guess we shouldn’t be surprised.  After reading this book you won’t be able to sit by and watch the world work the way it does without getting angry.   Rattle your cage and give this one a read!