Washington D.C., Jan 3, 2016 / 04:26 pm (CNA).- Imagine being woken up in the middle of the night by a dark figure in your room. He presses a gun to your head and demands that you get up. You and your family are dragged out of bed and led to a mining field, where you are forced to dig for hours on end. They may be the proverbial “girl’s best friend,” but diamonds are far from friendly for many of those involved in the mining process. With abuses ranging from forced labor to the funding of child soldiers, many diamonds still carry the shadow of blood and conflict, even decades after the first attempts to address some of the more troubling practices in getting the stones from their rocky deposits to a glittering setting. What – if anything – can Catholics do to counter the immense human cost still attached to some of these gems? Plenty, according to Max Torres, business professor and Director of the Management Department at The Catholic University of America. “In this economy, the consumer is king,” he told CNA. “The day that consumers want to get worked up over diamonds, this will stop, whatever abuse it is we’re trying to eradicate, it will stop.” While there are many steps in the process and levels of moral responsibility from consumers to the diamond exporters themselves, Torres maintained that ordinary people can still work to change large-scale moral problems in the industry. “Do not underestimate the power of the consumer to move supply-chain decisions throughout the economy,” he stressed.Clear stones; Blood-red controversies Despite the 2006 hit film “Blood Diamond,” starring Leonardo DiCaprio, many consumers are still unaware of the controversy surrounding the diamond industry. Meanwhile, the need for accountability and higher ethical standards is still sorely felt by many working to mine the precious gems. In recent decades, the conversation surrounding diamond mining has focused on the so-called “blood diamonds” – those mined in conflict areas whose profits are used to fund the bloody war efforts.  Also called “conflict diamonds,” these previous stones are most associated with the illicit industries backing of civil wars in Angola, Sierra Leone, the Ivory Coast, Democratic Republic of Congo, Republic of Congo, Central African Republic and Liberia. These countries all now have, at least in theory, legitimate diamond mining industries subject to international standards. The most well-known international standard, the Kimberley Process, was set up in 2003 following a United Nations resolution against the sale of blood diamonds, to ensure that any given shipment of diamonds does not finance rebel groups. Certified shipments of rough diamonds must be transported in tamper-resistant containers and must be accompanied by a government certificate verifying their compliance. But many advocates say the process is inadequate at addressing the problems underlying the diamond industry. For starters, there is no guarantee beside the exporting government’s assurance that a given shipment of diamonds is, in fact, conflict-free. Issues of corruption and bribery surrounding some governments’ certification, and a lack of transparency has led some key groups to pull out of the process altogether. The 2003 National Geographic special “Diamonds of War” found that despite the early efforts of the Kimberley Process to regulate the industry, illegal transactions at the time were still rampant in some areas. A Sierra Leone official said that some 60 percent of the diamonds exported from the country were smuggled rather than going through officially regulated channels. One expert in the documentary estimated that 20-40 percent of the global rough diamond trade at the time was done illicitly. Another complaint about the Kimberley Process is that while it works to combat funding of conflicts, it does not deal with other issues in the diamond industry, including forced labor and violence against workers, substandard and exploitative working conditions, the use of child labor and environmental concerns. These problems show that the current definition of “conflict-free” is “far too limited in scope,” said Jaimie Herrmann, director of marketing for Brilliant Earth, a San Francisco-based jeweler that focuses specifically on providing ethically-sourced diamonds, gemstones and metals. What the Kimberley Process “doesn’t include is human rights abuses, violence, sexual abuses, and severe environmental degradation, as well as corruption,” Herrmann continued. “For that reason, we go above and beyond the Kimberley Process’s definition of conflict free,” she said. Brilliant Earth gets its diamonds from select sources in Canada, Namibia, Botswana, South Africa and Russia. “We feel like those diamonds really do go above and beyond that guarantee and they are untainted by human rights abuses.” The chance to establish a legitimate and ethical source of diamonds has also been an economic opportunity for some countries. In Botsawna, the government and DeBeers diamond company each own half of the Debswana mining company, and the nation has seen a rapidly growing economy and increasing economic freedom thanks in part to its booming mining industry and trusted industry standards. Canada too has invested heavily in its mining infrastructure and increased production, quickly becoming a key diamond-producing country since the discovery of large diamond deposits in the 1990s. Synthetic diamonds too offer promise for more ethically-produced diamonds, though currently the lab-produced stones comprise only two percent of the diamond gemstone market, with the remainder of the synthetic stones used in industrial settings.The Ethics of Luxury and Necessity Dr. Christopher Brugger, professor of moral theology at St. John Vianney Theological Seminary in Denver, Colorado, told CNA that in the diamond industry, as in any other work, Catholic social teaching instructs employers that “people come before profit.” For businesses, he said, this means “pay employees a fair wage; respect the integrity of the marriages and families of employees; respect the faith of employees; permit labor to organize in socially constructive ways; work for fair access for all to goods and services necessary to living a dignified life.” “Do producers who use their profits to fund conflicts or who use forced labor fulfill those duties?” he asked. “Emphatically no.” Sustained abuses ranging from the funding of bloody conflicts to mining practices that exploit and demean workers not only fail to fulfill the moral duties of employers, Brugger said. The unjust practices also affirm that the high profits coupled with neglect for moral obligations have been “attracting scoundrels” to the industry. But business leaders are not the only people with moral stakes in the diamond industry, he continued. “It seems to me that morally conscientious people have an increasing responsibility to ‘shop ethically,’ i.e., to keep in mind where things come from, the conditions of those who supply things, the processes by which they are supplied,” Brugger suggested. While it may not be possible to know the sourcing behind every product in every store, he said, it could be easier to find information on larger suppliers and specific industries. Furthermore, he elaborated, there is a “greater responsibility on a person who is buying luxury items not to cooperate in the immoral actions of suppliers than there is on persons who are purchasing products for basic subsistence.” “Ordinarily I do not need diamonds or chocolate,” Brugger said. “If we are dealing with luxuries, I think our obligations are still pretty strong to avoid purchasing from sources that do really bad things.” “As one becomes aware of the ethical conditions surrounding an industry, one's duty to factor that knowledge into one's moral decision making becomes greater,” he added, noting that not everyone has the same access to the facts on abuses in a given industry. “As knowledge of the ethical deficiencies become more widely known and the knowledge becomes easily available, our responsibility to use that knowledge in our shopping becomes greater,” he said. Knowledgeable customers should “inquire into the origins of the diamond they purchase; if shopkeepers are coy and not forthcoming about their sources, consumers ordinarily should look elsewhere.”A Good Place to Start Lack of information is “a big part of the problem,” according to Herrmann. She recommended that jewelers seek to trace the origin of their diamonds to countries and mines known for more ethical practices. “Most jewelers know that their diamond is certified as conflict-free by the Kimberley Process, but do not know any more information about where their diamond is coming from,” she said. Stephen Hilbert, a foreign policy adviser specializing in Africa and Global Development for the U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops, seconded the suggestion that people looking at diamonds ask where they come from. He added that customers should also ask electronics dealers to check for conflict minerals, which face many of the same concerns as the diamond mining industry.   “Dealers may not be able to tell you whether their devices have been checked, but at least this raises the profile of the issue and this may trickle up,” he told CNA. Consumer instance could be the force that leads to tighter standards and improved processes aimed at preventing abuse. Still, Torres insisted, “no process is perfect.” The Kimberley Process is a reputable starting point that could “be broadened and be brought more into line with human rights,” he said, and asking about the origin of diamonds “seems to be a rather painless method of at least garnering some amount of accountability.” But in the end, the moral issues surrounding the industry are fundamentally a problem of human sin, which no process or regulations can erase. “The only thing that can ensure moral behavior is the heart is human beings,” Torres said. Ultimately, “Jesus Christ is the answer.” Photo credit: shutterstuck.comThis article was originally published on CNA July 5, 2015. Read more

Denver, Colo., Jan 3, 2016 / 08:49 am (CNA).- One of music artist John Mayer's most signature songs is “Daughters,” a sweet and simple tribute to the importance of parents' influence on their little girls. Here's the refrain: “So fathers, be good to your daughters, Daughters will love like you do. Girls become lovers who turn into mothers, So mothers, be good to your daughters too.” But when John Mayer isn't crooning about your beautiful daughters, he's looking at naked pictures of them, sometimes hundreds at a time before he gets out of bed in the morning. In fact, he often prefers that to an actual human being, according to his wildly controversial 2010 interview with Playboy magazine. “You wake up in the morning, open a thumbnail page, and it leads to a Pandora's box of visuals. There have probably been days when I saw 300 (naked women) before I got out of bed,” he told the magazine. Unfortunately, Mayer's morning routine is not unique to him. Studies show that easy access to free internet pornography is having devastating effects on real-life relationships.Preferring pixels to people “For many individuals, the more porn they consume, the more likely it is that they can end up preferring the fantasy to reality, they can end up preferring the pixels to a person, and that's really messing up relationships, as you can imagine,” said Clay Olsen, co-founder of the internet movement “Fight the New Drug” (FTND). The FTND movement, so named because of porn's addictive properties, aims to raise awareness of the harmful effects of pornography through creative mediums such as blogs, videos and infographics. The website includes personal stories as well as scientific studies to illustrate pornography's effects on the brain, the heart (relationships), and ultimately on the world. “Our goal is to change the conversation from 'Dude, check this out,' to 'Dude, that's messed up,'” Olsen told CNA. The longstanding, pervasive cultural narrative surrounding pornography is that it is a healthy sexual outlet and can improve sex lives. However, science begs to differ. Several studies cited in FTND's article, “Porn Ruins Your Sex Life,” found that pornography not only leads to dissatisfying sex, it can lead to less sex with actual human beings.    In a series of studies examining pornography use, “The Social Costs of Pornography: A Collection of Papers” published by the Witherspoon Institute, researchers found that those who viewed pornography became less satisfied with their sex lives, and that viewing porn just once can lead to feelings of dissatisfaction towards a human partner. According to an article in Psychology Today by clinical psychologist Tyger Latham, Psy.D, erectile dysfunction, while once considered an issue plaguing old men, is cropping up more in young men who rely heavily on pornography to become sexually aroused. A study by the Italian Society of Andrology and Sexual Medicine surveyed 28,000 men on their internet porn habits, and found that porn use over time led to a lower sex drive and an eventual inability to become aroused at all. “As soon as they try to actually get close to someone and commit to somebody and have an intimate relationship with somebody, it's in those moments that the harms of pornography show their full colors and truly manifest themselves,” Olsen said. “The unrealistic expectations are completely exposed… And we now see people in their 20s having porn-induced erectile dysfunction because they cannot get excited or aroused without the presence of pornography.”A decline in marriage rates Not only is pornography use destroying the physical sexual life, it may be impacting the number of people pursuing marriage or committed sexual relationships. In the fall of 2013, an article in The Guardian sounded the alarm that fewer people in Japan were having sex, citing as evidence numerous statistics on the country's declining birth rate, marriage rate, and even rates of young people who are dating or who are interested in dating. A follow-up article on Slate found that while the actual number of people having or not having sex might not be definitively pinpointed, the statistics on falling marriage and birth rates only mean Japan is leading a world-wide trend, rather than bucking one. While it's not clear whether porn is directly influencing these numbers, many have speculated that it is. Researchers with The Institute for the Study of Labor (IZA) in Germany found an increase in free Internet pornography is at least correlated with a significant decrease in the percentage of young married men, and it may even be contributing to the trend. A 2013 Pew study found that 71 percent of single Americans were not looking for a committed relationship. Another study found that nearly 40 percent of American women had never been married.   “The results in this paper suggest that such an association exists, and that it is potentially quite large,” the study notes, as reported in the Washington Post. The study used General Social Survey (GSS), a comprehensive, nationally representative survey which analyzed internet use of 1,500 men ages 18-to-35, between the years 2000 and 2004. The researchers studied the number of hours spent on the internet per week, how often internet pornography was used in the past 30 days, as well as other activities such as use of religious sites. Even when adjusted for variables such as age, income, education, religion and employment, the study found that generally, the more a person used the internet, the less likely they were to be married. Additionally, it found that the more a person used internet pornography, the less likely they were to be married. On the other hand, the use of religious websites was positively correlated with marriage.   Mark Regnerus, an associate professor of sociology at the University of Texas at Austin and a Catholic who has studied religion and sexual behavior, cautioned against assuming that correlation equals causation in such studies – but said that pornography use is likely part of a more complex reason for dropping marriage rates. “We know that both things are occurring, but it's difficult to establish a causal connection,” he told CNA in an e-mail interview. “A variety of things are contributing to the declining marriage rate.” “I don't think porn use necessarily causes that, but contributes to it (together with diminished earnings power, diminished confidence, etc.),” he added. “To be sure, porn use doesn't help build confidence in men, something that's pretty necessary (but not sufficient) to be considered marriageable. So I'd say porn use is a suspect here, but connecting the dots is hardly straightforward.”Increasing awareness Only in the past few years and months has a conversation countering the “it's healthy, it's normal” narrative been emerging in mainstream media about pornography. Several celebrities are speaking up, and there are an increasing number of websites dedicated to helping people fight pornography addictions. A few months ago, the release of the controversial “50 Shades of Grey” movie sparked a conversation on social media about sexual violence against women in media, with the hashtag #50dollarsnot50shades encouraging people to forgo the movie and instead donate to places that help victimized women. The movie sparked a response from an unlikely source – British comedian Russel Brand, whose short video about the problems with pornography went viral, generating over 500,000 views on his YouTube channel and over 2 million views on FTND's website. Joseph Gordon-Levitt is another celebrity who has been outspoken about the negative impact of pornography, most notably in his 2013 movie “Don Jon,” which he wrote, directed and co-starred in along with Scarlett Johansson. The film explores the unrealistic expectations of love and relationships that come from pornography addictions and from the media at large. “I think that there's not a substantial difference between a lot of main-stream culture and pornography. They're equally simplistic, reductionist,” Gordon-Levitt said in an interview with NPR about the film. “Whether it's rated X or 'approved by the FCC for general viewing audiences,' the message is the same. We have a tendency in our culture to take people and treat them like things.” But the internet has been around for decades now – why has it taken society so long to catch on to the fact that pornography is harmful? “Science has caught up with the fact that pornography's harmful,” Olsen said, “but society is still catching up.” It often takes years for something that was once culturally accepted as true to be flipped on its head as science proves otherwise, Olsen said, so Fight the New Drug knows they still have a lot of work ahead of them. “We're very excited to see some of this progress and some of these mainstream media outlets kind of following suit and starting to talk about the negative impacts, we couldn't be more excited about it, but we still have a long way ahead of us.” Some other websites that are also trying to raise awareness and give help to those struggling with pornography include The Porn Effect and Covenant Eyes, and internet filtering and accountability system. The best way to kick a porn habit? Keep fighting it and lean on the sacraments, Regnerus said. “(My) advice: don't give up hope; pursue confession regularly; recognize and avoid the contexts which give rise to temptation. That's a start.”This article was originally published on CNA April 16, 2015. Read more

Denver, Colo., Jan 2, 2016 / 03:09 pm (CNA).- If you’re a Catholic on Facebook, or the internet in general, chances are SC Naoum has made you laugh. Or he’s made you angry. If he’s done his job the way he wants, he’s done both. Naoum is the man, the myth, the legend behind the Catholic satire site, Eye of the Tiber. Catholic News Agency had a chance to sit down with the Californian writer and professional smart aleck to talk inspiration, excommunication (well, his nightmares of it), and of course all those people who think it’s actual news.   1: What first inspired you to start writing Eye of the Tiber? I've loved satire for as long as I can remember. Unfortunately, anyone who loves the Church can recognizes that satire, like most everything else that's good in this world, like literature, poetry, music, the sciences and so on has been secularized. Heck, even Judeo-Christian symbols like the rainbow and the thunderbolt were taken by those typically most hostile to the Church. The rainbow, of course, represents God's covenant with Noah. The world now sees it as a symbol representing man's covenant with another man. The thunderbolt, I understand, never really represented anything for the Church, but I kinda wish it did, because thunderbolts are pretty awesome, and I'd love an excuse to get one of them tattooed on me. Where the heck was I? Ah yes, what inspired me? Love for the Church and love for good satire. The Onion is wonderful. Their ability to poke fun and to reveal truths with sometimes subtle, sometimes absurd headlines is breathtaking. But there was so many times I thought, and still do think, that they could tone down the sacrilege a notch or ten. And so, cue light bulb, and the idea of a Catholic satire site was born.2: What is your goal for Eye of the Tiber? To piss off every Catholic at least once. If you're not happy with that answer, please delete and insert this: to shed light on the absurdity of some of the things going on in the Church while giving people an opportunity to laugh at themselves. And also not getting excommunicated. You think the last part's a joke, but it's not. I've literally had nightmares of being excommunicated because of an article. But the nightmare's always followed by a happy dream about me being handcuffed and led to a tribunal during the Spanish Inquisition, and realizing that Toquemada is the Grand Inquisitor for my case, and he sets me free because Torqumada wasn't as bad as he's been made out to be. Anyhow, that's my goal for EOTT. Not the weird dream part per se, but letting readers know about random Catholic facts that I find interesting, while poking fun on important things like liturgical dancing and the other 7 Deadly Sins.       3: Are you a one-man team? Do you take submissions? I've written most of the articles on the site. I've had a couple submissions from readers, and about ten to fifteen from friends. I don't really accept articles from readers anymore because I found it difficult to deny someone when I didn't think their article was a good fit for the site. It always made me feel bad to say no. It especially made me feel bad when that one guy I denied told me to shove it. I didn't want to shove it, that's the thing. I wasn't telling him that it wasn't funny...just that it simply wasn't a good fit. I remember that I had had a long work week, and I was tired and had so many things going on, and shoving it was seriously the last thing on my mind. So I didn't. I just decided that I'd no longer take submissions.4. Where does your inspiration for articles come from? Whiskey.5. When you're not running EOTT, what do you do? I love hanging out with my family. I love reading, writing, praying, and working out. That last part was a lie. I hate working out. I have no idea what I was trying to pull off with that lie.6. What has been the most popular EOTT article? Peter Jackson Announces Plans For 72-Part Movie Series of the Silmarillion is the most popular EOTT article written. It got like 100k+ Facebook likes, 600+ Twitter reposts or whatever you call them, and a bunch of other relatively impressive stats as well. Actually, there was a while there where if you googled "Silmarillion" it was the top post in Google News. That was kinda awesome. Best part about the article, though, is that it wasn't even written by me. It was written by a priest friend, Fr. Andy Younan (Twitter: @Jonah_3001). The thing with many of these articles, as Fr. Andy (Twitter: @Jonah_3001) would agree with is that the ones you think are gold will typically suck and the ones you think will suck, will typically turn gold. It's an odd thing that neither I (Twitter: @SCNaoum), nor Fr. Andy (Twitter: @Jonah_3001) can figure out. So if you ever see an article that just absolutely sucks, it's because I (Twitter: @SCNaoum) thought it was genius. Don't be frustrated. It was an honest mistake.7. Which EOTT article has cause the most controversy? I can't remember exactly which article caused the most controversy, but I know that the ones written about the Mass typically get the most heated. If I write an article titled, Report: Some 2nd Century Roman Christians Hated Latin Mass Because It Was Said In The Vernacular, I know I'm gonna piss off liturgical traditionalists. If I write one titled, Clown At Circus Mass Reprimanded For Honking Sanctus Horn At Wrong Part Of Consecration, I know it's gonna piss off whatever the complete opposite of a liturgical traditionalist is. I think they're called Protestants, actually.8. How often do people think EOTT is a real news source? Very often. [Awkward silence]. Is there a follow up to the question?9. How can satire speak truth in ways that news sources or other media cannot? Satire is an interesting art form. It's not only the greatest form of passive aggression there is, but it is, at the same time, the most direct form of criticism and examination. While proper journalism takes the issue at hand and attempts to reveal the fact of the matter, proper satire takes that very same matter assumed to be factual, beats it to a pulp, dissects it, finds the inaccuracy in what the media is reporting, siphons off the inaccuracy, beats it to a pulp once more just for good measure, waterboards it to make sure it has all the details, and represents it in a way so that the average reader can truly understand the fact of the matter without the spin. It's in this way that satire is passive aggressive and at the same time direct. It takes a round about way of delivering direct truths. You know what I'm saying? Good, cause I sure as heck don't.10. What is your favorite liturgical dance? My top three are The Catholic Carlton, Walk Like an Egyptian Coptic, and of course The Cha Cha Slide, Stand, Sit, Stand, Kneel.  This article was originally published on CNA Sept. 4, 2015 with the headline, 'Who's behind the mysterious Eye of the Tiber?'   Read more

San Francisco, Calif., Jan 2, 2016 / 06:59 am (CNA).- Anyone who's familiar with “Portlandia” probably remembers Colin the chicken – a heritage-breed, woodland-raised fowl who was fed a diet of sheep's milk, soy and (local) hazelnuts and lived a happy life on a (local) 4-acre farm before succumbing to its fate on the plates of two insufferable hipsters. While the comedy show, based in and around Portland, Ore., takes cultural mores to hilarious extremes, the chicken sketch points to a truth in current culture: more and more people are eating organic, local, non-GMO foods and prefer the authentic over the artificially enhanced. And that's where the Archdiocese of San Francisco saw an opportunity to help low-income parishioners escape poverty. Father Larry Goode is the pastor of St. Francis of Assisi parish in East Palo Alto, a small and historically low-income city in the San Francisco Bay area. Recently, Fr. Goode watched as big tech companies – Facebook, Google, and Microsoft – bought up most of the land surrounding his neighborhood, driving rent prices up and St. Francis' low-income families out. “We're a community of low-income people, and we're trying to find a way to keep the community intact,” Fr. Goode said. He started brainstorming with St. Patrick's seminary professor Father George Schultze and Ignatius Press founder Jesuit Father Joseph Fessio to come up with a way to create sustainable income for the poor in the area. That's how the idea of NanoFarms USA, a worker-owned farming cooperative, was born. After receiving permission from Archbishop Salvatore J. Cordileone and St. Patrick's seminary rector Father Gladstone Stevens, Fr. Goode and St. Francis parishioners started using seminary grounds to plant produce, which they then started selling at local parishes and markets. To supplement the income from the produce, the co-op is also creating and selling NanoFarms, or miniature, already-started gardens that range in cost from $500 - $2,000, depending on the model. Those who purchase NanoFarms also have the option of hiring a worker to periodically maintain the garden. Brendon Ford, the West Coast Regional Manager for NanoFarms USA, said the co-ops are giving workers a more just wage than what they might earn in other lines of work in the area. “A lot of people, if they didn’t have this job, they would work for a gardener, or at a farm, or as a landscaper and they would be making very low wages,” he explained. “Here (at NanoFarms) they actually own the company, they run the company, they vote for their boss, they can decide the direction of the company,” he said. “They have a lot more control. They have a lot more responsibility, but they have a lot more ownership.” Ford, who didn't know much about farming when he got involved with the co-op, and had to take an eight-week course on bio-intensive farming practices in order to learn more, while another worker is finishing training in organic farming practices. “It's awesome because last year we didn't know anything about this stuff, and now we know so much,” Ford said. “We've literally seen the fruits of our labor.” The idea of fresh, organic produce is definitely trending in the Bay area right now, Ford said, which helps the appeal of their business. “Our culture, especially the millennial generation, is kind of rebelling against the unnatural stuff of the previous generation,” he said. “They really want to experience the authenticity of life, I think this applies with food.”   But beyond providing authentic produce, NanoFarms is also helping tech workers and others in the area to recognize the value of every person in the community, Fr. Goode explained. “Low-income people provide innumerable services for the other side of town, which they’re not being acknowledged or recognized for, so as the cost of living goes up and these people have to leave, nobody’s filling in to do those jobs,” Fr. Goode said. “So this is partly to make ourselves more visible, so people can see that there’s a need here for people to wash their cars, to do their lawns, to cook their food. Then they can see that it’s not going to make it a better community to have just tech workers.” Fr. Goode said he is also reading Pope Francis' encyclical, “Evangelii Gaudium,” at the moment and believes that NanoFarms is responding to the Holy Father’s constant call to the Church to care for the poor. “It's not optional, it’s a required thing,” he said. “The Gospel requires that we become a Church of the poor.” Ford also said that NanoFarms USA is a model for how Church social teaching works. “We have to take care of the poorest among us,” he said. “And (one way) to do that is to tackle the issue: Why do people not have money? Why are they not having the jobs that they need? And I think what NanoFarms is doing, it’s finding a solution to people without jobs.” Ford said NanoFarms also appeals to people who like to support good causes in their own communities. “They see that this is actually helping people, this isn’t helping some big corporation,” he said. “But these are local people that are right here, the farmers are from their parishes, their communities. They like that idea of supporting each other.” There are already plans in the works for another NanoFarms co-op to start in the Archdiocese of Chicago, and Ford said he’d like to see the project spread further. “We're hoping other dioceses will catch on to this idea and start their own co-ops.” To learn more about the business, visit: http://nanofarms.com/This article was originally published on CNA May 31, 2015. Read more

Washington D.C., Dec 31, 2015 / 05:35 pm (CNA).- Perforated organs, metal coils lodged in colons, fetal disfigurement due to nickel poisoning. Chronic pain, exhaustion, bouts of depression and suicidal thoughts. It’s the stuff nightmares are made of. But these are real symptoms that are being blamed on a real medical device, one that is being protected by the FDA. The device, Essure, is a permanent type of birth control in the form of tiny metal coils inserted into women’s fallopian tubes. But while it’s been on the market since 2002 and has been touted as safe and effective, thousands of people are starting to come forward and question the device, including doctors very familiar with it. It started out as a standard procedure for Dr. Shawn Tassone, Ob/Gyn. He was inserting Essure coils into a patient. The 10 minute, in-office procedure was supposed to be quick, simple and painless, and it was one he had performed many times before. “I remember…I put the Essure in, exactly like how you were supposed to, and then as I sat there the tube started to spasm, and it pulled the Essure in,” he told CNA. “It disappeared, it coiled right into the tube.”   Unsure of how to proceed, he looked at the product manufacturer’s representative, who was in the room with him. The representative told him to just put another coil in the same tube, but Dr. Tassone knew that was against the product’s instructions.   “I told (the representative) that, and he was like, 'Nah, that’s not necessarily true',” Dr. Tassone said. “And you’re just being told this stuff by these reps who are college graduates, and I’m sure their hearts are in the right place, but they also want you to do the procedure because they get reimbursed more.” It was through personal experiences with patients, as well as hearing other women’s stories, that Dr. Tassone eventually stopped doing a procedure he’d once been so sure was safe and effective. He said that while he’s not a conspiracy theorist, he does believe there are a large number of women with severe complications from Essure that are not being acknowledged by the medical community at large.A Facebook group 24,000 strong A lot of these women can be found on the Facebook group, Essure Problems. Of the 24,000-plus members, the majority are women who share a strange kind of sisterly bond – almost all of them have had Essure, and almost all of them bitterly regret it.   When the Essure coils are implanted, they are supposed to stay in the fallopian tubes, where they create a chronic infection that will cause scar tissue to form around the coils, effectively closing the tubes and rendering the woman sterile. The device was first manufactured by the group Conceptus and pre-approved by the FDA before hitting the markets in 2002. In June 2014, Conceptus was bought by Bayer, which has continued to manufacture and distribute Essure. Some possible side effects after the Essure insertion procedure are listed on the product’s website and include: “mild to moderate pain and/or cramping, vaginal bleeding, and pelvic or back discomfort for a few days. Some women experienced nausea and/or vomiting or fainting. In rare instances, an Essure insert may be expelled from the body.” Angela Desa-Lynch, an administrator for the Essure Problems group, said the women in the group have experienced these problems to the extreme. “Whatever they’ve put on the label, multiply it by 200,” she said. “They say chronic pain, or they say mild cramping or abdomen pain, but they don’t tell you that it’s debilitating. They don’t tell you that it’s 'I can’t get out of bed and take care of my kids' kind of pain.” When Desa-Lynch had her Essure coils in, she said she felt like she had the flu constantly. She was 28 years old, and her youngest son was just three months old. “My little son…he had no idea the real parent I could be, because I was going through all these health problems,” she said. Desa-Lynch had to have a total hysterectomy to remove the coils, but she said the recovery process didn’t end with the removal.   “You’re mad,” she said. “This is not what I signed up for. I just wanted a birth control, I didn’t want a life time of health issues, and to remove my woman parts, that’s not ok.” Watching the posts on the page can be an emotional rollercoaster, Desa-Lynch said. She hears from women who’ve become depressed, suicidal, divorced, bankrupt, or a combination of those things after having complications from Essure.Moving coils and the difficulty of removal One of the most horrific complications is device migration, where the coil leaves the tube and becomes lodged in other parts of the body, usually the colon or somewhere in the pelvis. This can cause a blocked colon or other complications. It can be extremely difficult for women who want to have their Essure coils removed. Many doctors will deny that the Essure is the root of women’s problems, because the clinical trials they’ve seen from the FDA claim the risks of such complications are so low. Additionally, Medicare and most insurance companies classify Essure removal as “cosmetic,” which further disincentivizes doctors to remove the coils and often puts women who require the removal into personal debt. “One woman had a coil in her colon, she went from a business owner to bankruptcy” after four surgeries to remove it, Desa-Lynch said. Physical removal of the coils can also be difficult because they are fragile and may break. “You have fragments now in your body, and we’ve had women where they come back after removal and they have these masses growing in their abdomen,” Desa-Lynch said. “Your body’s going to try to encapsulate whatever foreign object is there, and now you have all these little cysts growing everywhere.” Both she and Dr. Tassone said that from what they’ve seen, the only completely safe and secure way to make sure all of Essure is removed is a total hysterectomy.What happens if you get pregnant with Essure? Then there are the women who become pregnant while using Essure. No sterilization method is guaranteed to work 100 percent of the time, save for a total hysterectomy with removal of the fallopian tubes. According to Essure’s website, the device is 99 percent effective at preventing pregnancy, but that is with so-called perfect use. In the real world, doctors may misplace coils or a woman’s tubes can heal or push Essure out. Furthermore, women given Essure are told to use an alternative form of contraception for the first three months following the procedure until a second appointment which checks for proper coil placement – but many women fail to follow through on this step. Given these margins for error, a recent Yale School of Medicine study estimated 96 of every 1,000 women who undergo hysteroscopic sterilization, or Essure, would get pregnant within 10 years. For laparoscopic tubal ligations (known as 'having your tubes tied'), the pregnancy risks were significantly lower: 24 to 30 pregnancies per 1,000 women. In an e-mail interview, FDA representative Eric Pahon told CNA that clinical trials of women who became pregnant with Essure showed “no increased risk of neonatal or pregnancy complications, as long as the pregnancy is in the uterus. The FDA will continue to monitor the safety of Essure to make certain.” What the women of Essure Problems have found is that doctors will not remove the coils even if a woman becomes pregnant. Most will automatically recommend abortion, because they don’t know what to do. “They don’t know what can happen, because there is nickel in Essure and it can leach, and the device can move and perforate the sack and has done it, so because the doctors don’t know how to treat you, that’s the first thing they ask you to do is to terminate,” Desa-Lynch said. Should a woman with Essure choose to continue the pregnancy – and many of them do – she risks nickel poisoning and device migration to her baby, and a 55 percent chance of miscarriage, according to the numbers from the Facebook group.“Your baby isn’t growing” One Essure pregnancy story stood out to Desa-Lynch as particularly jarring. A young woman in the Facebook group, born and raised as a devout Catholic, became pregnant despite being on Essure. At 24 weeks of pregnancy, the doctors told her: “Your baby is not growing.” Her baby had gotten nickel poisoning, so the brain wasn’t developing and the limbs weren’t growing properly. The young woman was told her baby at best would be severely deformed at birth, if not completely brain dead. “When you’re Catholic, abortion is not something that crosses your mind, you just think 'ok, well, we’ll deal with this',” Desa-Lynch said. However, after the grim diagnosis, the young woman chose abortion. Desa-Lynch said the woman doesn’t even comment on the Facebook page because she is so haunted by her experience, but she’s there, and she watches the comments. “I can’t imagine being in her position,” Desa-Lynch said. “It puts you in a hard spot. Here you think you’re doing what’s right for you, what’s right for your family, and what’s right for your health, and now you’re facing these situations that you don’t even know how to handle and neither does your doctor, and you have to go against all of your morals and values…I don’t know what I would do.” “It goes against a lot of women’s morals,” she added, “and women get severely depressed. Someone posted just yesterday that one of her good friend’s daughters had (Essure) put in and she killed herself, because they go to a doctor and they don’t listen to you.” When the suicidal posts started popping up more frequently, the group administrators decided to set up a buddy system of sorts. They connected women in the group with other women who were close by, so that they’d always have someone they could go to who understood their situation. The administrators watch posts closely and alert the smaller state groups of concerning posts. “We work collectively and united,” Desa-Lynch said. “It’s amazing to see women pull together the way that they have and fight for each other.”False data and bad numbers As a medical device, Essure had a questionable start at best. When it was pre-approved by the FDA in 2002, the FDA used clinical trials from the device manufacturer, the company which would profit from the approval and sales of the device, to determine whether or not it was safe for women. When asked if this process created a conflict of interest, the FDA responded: “Although the manufacturer may submit any form of evidence to the FDA in an attempt to substantiate the safety and effectiveness of a device, the FDA relies upon only valid scientific evidence to determine whether there is reasonable assurance that the device is safe and effective.” Desa-Lynch and the administrators of Essure Problems have three full sets of records from the clinical trials that show complaints of abdomen pain in women in the trial being marked off as “unrelated.” Dr. Tassone has seen the clinical trials, and said there are times when the ages of women with complaints or complications are crossed off and altered in order to better fit the picture the manufacturer wanted to portray. “The clinical trials that they were basing their information on were falsified, and we’ve brought this to the FDA,” Desa-Lynch said. “They (the FDA) just say, 'upon their investigation they find everything to be safe, they find the benefits to outweigh the risks'.” In addition, it is basically impossible to track exactly what percentage of women with Essure have experienced severe complications. Although Bayer and the FDA know that 750,000 kits have been sold, there’s no one keeping track of how many women have had the procedure. Further complicating the numbers is the fact that multiple kits can be used for a single procedure. Dr. Tassone said he’s used up to three kits on a single woman, which happens if coils break before or during insertion.   “We have over 200 women who’ve had two kits used on them,” said Desa-Lynch of the Essure Problems group, “So it’s kind of hard to give a percentage on bad numbers.”Protected status and incentives But despite the thousands of complaints, Essure is classified as a Class III medical device, a category reserved for devices with PMA (premarket approval). These devices are pre-empted, which means people injured by the product cannot collect damages from the manufacturer. Typically, Class III medical devices are live-saving devices such as heart stints. The idea behind preemption is that by protecting companies from having to pay damages, it encourages them to continue creating better devices that are necessary for saving and sustaining lives. The only Class III, protected medical devices that do not save or sustain life? Essure coils and breast implants. “This is part of the problem,” Dr. Tassone explained. “When you are having studies being done by companies who are falling apart (Conceptus was bought out by Bayer), you have an inherent bias. If the (product) is revoked, then this multi-million dollar project was flawed somehow and they lose money.” “And you see that with other devices, there is a lot of money involved, and the FDA is not doing due diligence, because sometimes the FDA has people on it who are not necessarily getting paid, but who are affiliated with some of the big companies.” Doctors, too, receive incentives for using Essure. If they meet a certain implantation quota, the manufacturer gives them a $20,000 scope that can be used to perform multiple procedures. Doctors also are often paid to attend Essure trainings and conferences. But Dr. Tassone said he believes that most doctors originally implanted Essure because they were told, and truly believed, it was a safe and effective procedure. “We were told in the beginning that it doesn’t cause any pain and the initial studies that came out said that,” he said. “It makes it look like the doctors are getting greedy by putting Essure in because we get more money, but in reality, 99 percent of us actually believed it was a good procedure and was safer for the patients and it worked.” He said the procedure itself is still considered less risky than a tubal ligation, which is an involved surgery rather than an in-office procedure. Still, Dr. Tassone stopped implanting Essure about a year and a half ago, and he said it usually doesn’t take much to convince his patients to opt for a different procedure. “The way I counsel my patients now, I send them to what the Facebook group says,” he explained. “Usually I tell them Essure is a foreign body and it’s permanent - most women don’t want that, when you explain it that way.”  Lawsuits and Erin Brockovich There are only a few pending lawsuits involving Essure at the moment, Desa-Lynch said, because the PMA act goes all the way up to Congress. But the Essure Problems Facebook group intends to fight until Essure is off the market and the PMA act is changed. And they just might win, because of a certain famous legal clerk and environmental activist that has joined their fight. “It kind of started as a joke on the form, like, 'Let’s e-mail Erin Brockovich, haha',” Desa-Lynch said. But they did, “and she listened!” Made famous from a 2000 film about her life as a single mother and environmental activist, Brockovich has created a website, http://www.essureprocedure.net/, where women who’ve had Essure can share their stories and where she posts the latest news about the fight against the device. “That right there kicked off the empowerment, that kicked off the movement of 'Ok, we can do this',” Desa-Lynch said. Dr. Tassone said he’d like to see more acknowledgement from the medical community of the pain and suffering Essure is causing some women, as well as more transparency from the manufacturers. “Acknowledgement is the first step,” he said. “Like the company saying, 'Yeah, this is a foreign body and okay, let’s take a look at this.' That would go a million miles for some of these people, that maybe, it’s not all just in their head.” He also wonders whether a device that caused similar reactions in men would even be on the market. “If you have a coil and you said you were going to use it in men for vasectomies and you were going to insert it in to block the testicle from having sperm come out, would we be doing that or not? Because they could feel that implant,” he said. “But with tubes, and in women’s health – because everything is on the inside - I think it’s out of sight, out of mind.” Until the Essure Problems group can get their case pushed through in court, Desa-Lynch said it’s enough for them to keep informing women and to prevent them from getting Essure. “We’ve saved over 600!” Desa-Lynch said proudly. “We keep track of them. That right there is enough to know that this is the right thing to do.”Update: In June 2015, the FDA updated and expanded the risks associated with the device listed on the Essure product packaging. In September 2015, the FDA met with representatives of the “Essure Problems” women, and later announced that they will be releasing a new safety review of the product in February 2016. In November 2015, U.S. Representative Mike Fitzpatrick (R-PA) introduced a bi-partisan bill called the “E-Free act” to Congress that would pull the device from the market and put additional pressure on the FDA.An earlier version of this article was originally published on CNA Feb. 20, 2015. Read more