My partner suffered 7 hours of violent vomiting, following food poisoning after eating a meat pie purchased from our local Supermarket. Their response was pathetically customer service reassurances that they take these incidents seriously, despite my several telephone calls, even when I returned the offending product for microbiological inspection. This was infuriating, in view of threats these days from pathological organisms – E. coli, MRSA, C. difficile, the H5N1 strain of avian flu. More on this another time.

Violent vomiting is one of the human body's natural detoxification mechanisms, i.e. getting rid of potentially life-threatening challenges. Thankfully, we don't have to regularly submit ourselves to such horrible experiences – there are many more gentle approaches to Detoxification, with the same objective of clearing out offending and harmful toxins.

Serious Detoxification – cleansing of the body on the physical and emotional and spiritual levels, as discussed in Nicki Woodward's column (see page 30), is a fairly ancient technique, as practised in Ayurvedic Medicine, by the Ancient Greek and Romans, the American Indians and more recently in a variety of European and American Naturopathic and Nutritional protocols.

And, as explored in depth by Dr Paula Baillie-Hamilton in Environmental Toxins and Weight Gain: The Link (please see Interview by Russ Mason page 32), there is an abundance of toxins in food and the environment, ranging from cancer-causing and hormone-disrupting chemicals, pesticides such as organophosphates, chemicals such as antibiotics, fungicides and growth promoters fed to livestock which enter the food chain, as well as contamination of fish and seafood from deadly toxins including mercury.

What is worse, there is an almost exponential relationship between the increase in the number of overweight and obese adults and the increase of synthetic chemicals used throughout the 20th Century. Thus, not only are we being poisoned in our water, soil, air and food by toxins; these chemicals including organophosphates, plastics, carbamates, steroids, and antibiotics, by altering our metabolism, can also cause us to gain weight.

Hence, just as there are bona fide medically and clinically accepted detoxification protocols for many poisons, including mercury and lead, there are similarly clinically effective dietary, herbal, nutritional and energetic methods, in addition to healthy food, pure water, sleep and exercise, to assist our bodies in eliminating or at least neutralizing harmful foods, drink, and chemicals. PH has explored this topic and many techniques in depth in previous issues, including Issue 107 January '05 (Detoxification, Deep Cleanse for a Radiant Shine by Mandy Eugeniou) and Issue 73 February '02 (Detoxifying with the Lemon Diet by Dr Janine Leach).

This issue of PH also publishes the authoritative article Complementary Therapies for Hormone Refractory Prostate Cancer by Prof Ben Pfeiffer MD PhD and Prof Bernhard Aeikens MD (please see pages 19-25) which explores numerous clinically effective immune, nutritional and herbal treatments for prostate cancer and presents extensive clinical evidence from the published literature (88 references) regarding the efficacy of such treatments. There is also a fully documented Case Study regarding the clinical progress of a 70-year old prostate cancer patient, whose PSA reading dramatically declined from 1000 ng/ml at the outset, to<0.1 ng/ml, following treatment with Prostasol, Curcumin, Biobran and Imupros.

Read also the inspiring feature Treatment of OsteoArthritis with Ayurveda (see pages 26-29), in which a variety of dietary, nutritional, herbal and physical treatments helped to alleviate the suffering of a 77-year old arthritis sufferer.

Being healthy doesn't just come naturally. It is the result of a strong constitutional (genetic) inheritance, healthy nutrition, plenty of exercise, as well as the least toxic and invasive of medical interventions necessary during our lives. An important part of the wellness equation is also the willingness and ability of people to eat healthy foods, engage in exercise, avoid destructive chemicals and damaging drugs and take a certain responsibility for the health and wellbeing of themselves and their families.

It is a matter of historical record that during World War II, when the UK population had to eat mainly root vegetables and whole grain breads, were deprived of meat, eggs and sweets, and other indulgences such as alcohol and tobacco were rationed, people were fitter and healthier than prior to and following the war. I am not suggesting that we need to invent a war to achieve health and fitness; is it surely not beyond our intelligence and common sense to adopt healthy lifestyles and choose natural treatment methods which will help to ensure us good health and happiness?