26 Tax-Saving Moves

Applicable to Malaysian tax-payers only.

The deadline for submission of Income Tax returns is end of April, i.e., April 30. Most of us would have submitted the forms but for those who have yet to, here are some tax-saving tips you might be able to benefit from.

I have no idea who compiled these but it's stated that these are legal and permitted by Inland Revenue Board (IRB). In fact, if you have a copy of the guideline booklet issued by the IRB, you'd also be able to make your own deductions on permitted and effective ways to save on your taxes.


(Legal and permitted by Inland Revenue Board (IRB))

1) Save for your Child’s Education

Since 2007, any amount that is deposited into a savings account for your child under National Education Savings Scheme ( Skim Simpanan Pendidikan Nasional ) allows you to claim tax deductions.

There is a limit of RM 3,000 for this deduction but spouse who file separate tax returns can each claim this amount.

..Tax Deduction : RM 3,000 per individual.

..For Mr. A : As he falls in the 24% tax bracket, this deduction translates to a tax saving of RM 720 ( RM 3,000@24%).

2) File separate tax returns

A separate assessment allow each spouse to claim personal tax relief of RM 8,000 while a joint tax return allows one spouse to claim a wife or husband relief of RM 3,000.

..Tax Deduction :
Each spouse earning taxable income can claim personal tax relief of RM 8,000 by filling separate tax returns.

3) Ask your employer to increase your EPF contributions

Contributions to the employees Provident Fund (EPF) by employers are tax-exempt for the employees.

To reduce your taxable income, ask your employer to reduce your EPF monthly salary but increase your EPF contributions by the same amount.

Tax Deduction :
The deductible amount from your taxable income is dependent on the arrangement between you and your employer.

..For Mr. A : Mr. A agrees to take monthly pay cut of RM 1,000 for an equivalent increase in his EPF contributions by his employer. At the end of the year, he receives an additional RM 12,000 in his pension fund but his taxable income is reduced by the same amount.

..The tax saving that he makes is RM 2,880 ( RM12,000@24%)

4) Change your cash remuneration to cash reimbursement

Fixed allowances given by your employer each month for entertainment and housing or parking fees are taxable at your tax bracket.

Change this to a “ reimbursement “ based on receipt and you are not taxed on the amount received.

..Tax Deduction :
The deductible amount from your taxable income is dependent on the arrangement between you and your employer

For Mr. A : By changing a yearly fixed allowance of RM 6,000 to a reimbursement of the same amount and supported by receipts, Mr. A makes a tax saving of RM1,440 ( RM 6,000@24%)


5) Ask for a company car

A car given by your employer is regarded as a benefit-in-kind ( BIK ) and taxable.
However, a company car is advantageous for taxpayers because the preset tax scale for cars is much lower than the actual cost of buying and maintaining a car.

According to the Public ruling for BIKs , the tax payer must pay RM 3,600 in taxes every year, for a car worth RM 75,000

If the employer pays for fuel, the tax payer is taxed an additional RM 1,200 for this BIK

..Tax deduction :
Whether you benefit from a company car depends on the value of the car and your current tax bracket. Do the calculations to ascertain your tax deduction.

6) Make charitable contributions

A gift of money to an approved charitable organisation entitles you to a tax deduction for the amount given.

From 2008 onward, this amount cannot exceed 7% of your aggregate income.
However charitable donations that were made in 2007 are not subject to this limit.

..Tax deduction :

..Up to 7% of your aggregate taxable income can be reduced with this deduction.
For Mr. A : With his taxable income of RM 90,000, Mr. A can make a donation of RM 6,300 .This deduction results in a saving of RM 1,512 ( RM 6,300@24%)

7) Take up postgraduate studies

A relief of RM 5,000 per year for any course of study at the Master’s or doctorate level, the government announced in 2007 Budget the widening of the scope to all postgraduate studies.

The course does not have to be done full time, but “ must be in an institution or professional body in Malaysia recognised by the government or approved by Minister of Finance

..Tax Deduction :
RM 5,000 per individual

..For Mr. A : As he completes his master’s degree, Mr. A can enjoy tax saving RM 1,200 from his taxable income ( RM 5,000@24%)


8) Read , Read , Read

Starting from YA 2007, taxpayers can claim a personal tax deduction to RM 1,000 for purchase of books, journals , magazines and other publications.

To maximise this generous deduction, consider giving books as gifts.

..Tax Deduction : RM 1,000 per individual
For Mr. A : With book purchases of RM 1,000, Mr. A saves RM 240 ( RM 1,000@24%)


9) Get Sporty

You will get a deduction of RM 300 for each year of assessment for the purchase of sports and exercise equipment for any sports activities defined under the Sport Development Act 1997

..Tax Deduction : RM 300 per individual
For Mr. A : By buying RM 300 worth of sports equipment , Mr. A makes a saving of RM 71 ( RM 300@24%)

10) Buy Life Insurance

The maximum tax relief is RM 6,000 a year for premiums paid to an insurance company for life insurance or deferred annuity plans.

This limit is shared with your contributions to the EPF, other employer schemes and contributions under any written law relating to widows or orphan pensions

Tax deduction : RM 6,000 per individual ( shared with your EPF contributions )


11) Take out a Medical or Education policy

You can claim deductions of up to RM 3,000 a year for education and medical insurance ( combined limit for both )

This includes medical coverage that is part of life insurance policy( the limit for life insurance is in Move 10 )

A policy of this kind can be written for you , your spouse or your child.

..Tax deduction :
RM 3,000 per individual

For Mr. A : After acquiring an education policy for his children , Mr. A makes a saving of RM 720 ( RM 3,000@ 24%)


12) Pay your parents’ medical bills

You are able to claim up to RM 5,000 for payments towards your parents’ medical bills.

..Tax deduction :
RM 5,000 per individual

..For Mr. A : By paying his parents’ medical bills, Mr. A makes a saving of RM 1,200 (RM5,000@ 24%)

13) Medical

Claim a deduction of up to RM 500 per tax year for a full medical examination and RM 5,000 for medical expenses for yourself, spouse or child for serious disease.

If you have also spent money on full medical in the same year, your claim will be reduced to the RM 5,000 available for serious disease.

A separate tax reduction of up to RM 5,000 a year is given for necessary basic supporting equipment for disabilities suffered by yourself ,spouse, children or parent

..Tax Deduction :
RM 500 per individual for full medical check-up.
RM 5,000 for serious diseases or basic supporting equipment

For Mr. A : He claimed for a full medical check-up. The deduction give him of RM 120 (RM 500@24%)

14) Pay Zakat

If you are a Muslim, paying any amount in Zakat , Fitrah or other obligation Islamic dues will entitle you to a tax rebate.

..Tax deduction :
The amount of Zakat that you pay.


15) Buy a Computer

A deduction of up to RM 3,000 can be claimed once every three years for the purchase of computers, printers and bundled software .

The similar incentive given previously in the form of a tax rebate was withdrawn with effect from 2007.

..Tax deduction : RM 3000 once every three years.
For Mr. A : Getting a computer for RM3,000 gives him a saving of RM 720 ( RM 3,000@24%).

16) Hire a Tax Consultant

Consider hiring a tax consultant to explore ways your remuneration package can be structured to maximise your tax savings.

Those who are earning at least RM 5,000 every month should be able to justify the cost of hiring a tax adviser with their tax savings.

Tax saving : this is dependent on your personal circumstances and the deal that you negotiate with your employer.

Tax – Savvy Investments

You may be looking at some investment this year.
There are savings to be made from certain investments , from a tax point of view.
However, some moves may be advantageous if you fall into a higher tax bracket .
Besides looking for tax-exempt investment, here are four investment moves to explore


17) Buy property valued below or at RM250,000

Stamp duty must be paid on all property transactions that involve a change of legal ownership.

Last year’s budget ( 2008 ) announced a 50% stamp duty exemption for the purchase of houses that do not exceed RM 250,000.

The maximum tax savings that can be found here is RM 2,000 ( for a house worth RM 250,000 ).

This exemption is only given for one house per individual and applies to sale and purchase agreement signed between September 2007 and December 2010.

18) Buy similar property

Similar property can be grouped together for income tax purposes.
The IRB has indentified categories such as residential, commercial and vacant land.
If you own two property in the same category, you can reduce the taxable profit made from one property with the loss, if any incurred from the other.

Property investors are also exempt from real property gains tax for all disposals on or after 1st April 2007.

However, taxpayers who are trading property – buying and selling in order to generate income – are liable to income tax.

“This exemption is meant for taxpayers who invest in property for a passive income ”.

..Tax deduction :
Taxable income received from renting out a property in a particular grouping such as residential can be reduced if a loss was incurred by another property in the same group.

19) Buy shares (page1)

Invest in dividend-yielding shares if your tax bracket is above 26%.
A new single-tier system was established under the national Budget for dividends received by shareholders.

Companies pay tax of 26% (YA2008) and shareholders receive a net dividend that is exempt from tax and does not need to be filed with the IRB “Shareholders who fall into higher tax brackets [higher than 26%] are essentially [getting a] saving on the difference.

“The single-tier dividends is intended to simplify the tax filing process for individuals,” says Chua Tia Guan, executive director and head of tax and financial planning at Great Vision Wealth Management Sdn. Bhd.

“In the past, refunds had been slow. From now on, there is no need to declare or apply for a refund. And as corporate taxes are falling, companies will be able to pass on more profits to their shareholders [in the form of dividends],” he says.

19) Buy shares (page2)

However, not all companies will go under the single-tier system immediately as some of them might have imputation tax credits left, which they can use till 2013.

Shareholders who receive dividends from companies using the imputation system will have to report the amount received and claim a tax refund if his personal tax rate is lower than the company’s tax rate (27% in YA2007, 26% in YA2006).

Shareholders can identify the system used by the company as it is stated in the dividend vouchers.

..Tax Deduction
Your tax saving is the difference between your tax bracket and 26% (the corporate tax rate). This is only applicable to dividends given out by companies using the single-tier system.

20) Invest in REITs

You can go into real estate investment trusts ( REITS )if your tax bracket above 15%.
There are 11 REITs listed on the Main Board.
The tax on dividends given out by these property-related investments are taxed at 15% as compared to tax on dividend at 26% ( under the new single–tier dividend system ).

Only tax brackets exceeding 15% would enjoy some tax savings by investing in REITs.
Since the distributions received by individual taxpayers have been subject to that 15% , the taxpayers are not required to declare the amount in their tax return.

..Tax deduction:
Your tax saving is the difference between your personal tax bracket and 15%.

Moves for Business Owners

The first rule that small-business owners should implement with regards to their taxes is to take it seriously.

Spend some time strategising for your business activities to save hundreds or thousands ringgit.

Here are six :

21) Maintain books and records from Day 1

Keep separate bank accounts for personal and business transactions and establish a basic accounting system.

The Inland Revenue Board recognises business income on an accrual basis.

This means that as long as a transaction is completed, either a sale of goods or a provision of service, its value is immediately treated as business income and is taxable.

However, unpaid transaction can be reduced your taxable income.
Any expenses made from the business can be deducted from the business income.
The general rule is that expenses can be deducted if it is wholly and exclusively incurred in earning your business income.

So keep the receipts for all supplies that you buy for your business.
However there is no deduction for capital expenditure although some assets will qualify for tax relief by way of capital allowances.


22) Time the purchase and use of your fixed assets

Capital allowances are permitted for certain business assets such as equipment, machinery, vehicles computers and software.

The amount of allowances permitted each year depends on the category that asset falls into ( refer to Public Ruling No 2/2001 for the deductible rate of your assets.

The first capital allowance is given for the accounting year in which the asset was purchased and used by the business.
nIf you are contemplating a purchase, try to do it before the end of the accounting year, instead of just after, to claim the capital allowance against your business income.

If you are buying the asset with a hire-purchase loan, allowance can only be claimed as and when repayments are made to the lender.


23. Buys a company car

If you are a sole trader or a partner in a business, any car or vehicle that is used for business purposes can bring about tax deductions.

“The business income is reduced by the car’s financing cost if you buy the car on hire-purchase.

You can also deduct a certain amount for capital allowances every year.

Before implementing this tax-saving technique, business owners must identify a percentage of the car’s use that is for private activities.

As there is no definite ruling on how to determine this proportion for private use, business owners must apply a fair and reasonable figure that can withstand scrutiny.

Estimating private mileage is an exercise that must be undertaken in accordance to the facts on your actual usage.

And remember to record all running expenses to make these deductions, ” says Thornton.


24. Hire your spouse or family member

An effective tax-saving strategy is to hire a spouse or family member.
For example, a husband who is a business owner can hire his wife. The wife’s salary is tax-deductible but you must be able to show that she is doing something to earn it,

In this situation, you would have to contribute to your wife’s Employee’s Provident Fund (EPF) savings and that amount entitles her to tax relief.

Another option is to make your spouse or family member a partner in your business.

This allows you to divide the income made by the business between the both of you.

As a partnership has no tax liability, both partners are liable for tax for the respective portion of business income that each earns.

“By opting for separate tax assessments, a husband and wife who are partners in a business can each claim individual tax relief.


25. Implement a process to ‘chase after’ unpaid debts

Unfortunately, small business owners can complete a sale or service but might not receive payment, in full or in part.

At the end of an accounting year, a debt, which is estimated to be wholly or partly irrecoverable, can be deducted from your business income and this lowers your tax bill.

Tax authorities tend to look closely at bad-debt write-offs and provisions (for debts that are expected to be partly recoverable).

So put in some effort to recover the debt before deeming it irrecoverable and you must evaluate each debt separately.

The process that you put in place to recover your unpaid debts should be documented and any conclusion that you make should be supported with documentation as well.

For example, you must show why it is not cost effective to take legal action against a customer.

However, if you eventually recover bad debts that have been written off or partially written off, you must include this amount in your taxable income for the year that you received payment.


26. Dedicate a space in your home office

Working in your own house can result in tax deductions for the costs related to your “home office”.

This includes electricity, telephone bills, quit rent and service charges of apartments.

The best way to claim for these deductions is to dedicate a room or place as the working environment.

A dedicated area helps to identify expenses that are specifically for business purposes and can be claimed in full.

Items that are used by the business as well as personal use, such as electricity, must be apportioned.

One way to do so is on the basis of floor area.

If the business owner pays rent for the working area, this expense can be deducted from the business income.

This applies to rent that is paid to a spouse who owns the home but is not involved in the business.

However, this is strategy is only effective if the spouse who is not involved in the business is taxed at a low tax rate as rental received must be declared as taxable income.

If this is an appropriate strategy for the business owner, a tenancy agreement that specifies rental for a specific part of the house at the prevailing market rate.

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Source unknown

The Beatles - A Biography

So much has been said and written about the Beatles -- and their story is so mythic in its sweep -- that it's difficult to summarize their career without restating clichés that have already been digested by tens of millions of rock fans. To start with the obvious, they were the greatest and most influential act of the rock era, and introduced more innovations into popular music than any other rock band of the 20th century. Moreover, they were among the few artists of any discipline that were simultaneously the best at what they did and the most popular at what they did. Relentlessly imaginative and experimental, the Beatles grabbed a hold of the international mass consciousness in 1964 and never let go for the next six years, always staying ahead of the pack in terms of creativity but never losing their ability to communicate their increasingly sophisticated ideas to a mass audience. Their supremacy as rock icons remains unchallenged to this day, decades after their breakup in 1970.
Even when couching praise in specific terms, it's hard to convey the scope of the Beatles' achievements in a mere paragraph or two. They synthesized all that was good about early rock & roll, and changed it into something original and even more exciting. They established the prototype for the self-contained rock group that wrote and performed its own material. As composers, their craft and melodic inventiveness were second to none, and key to the evolution of rock from its blues/R&B-based forms into a style that was far more eclectic, but equally visceral. As singers, both John Lennon and Paul McCartney were among the best and most expressive vocalists in rock; the group's harmonies were intricate and exhilarating. As performers, they were (at least until touring had ground them down) exciting and photogenic; when they retreated into the studio, they were instrumental in pioneering advanced techniques and multi-layered arrangements. They were also the first British rock group to achieve worldwide prominence, launching a British Invasion that made rock truly an international phenomenon.

More than any other top group, the Beatles' success was very much a case of the whole being greater than the sum of its parts. Their phenomenal cohesion was due in large degree to most of the group having known each other and played together in Liverpool for about five years before they began to have hit records. Guitarist and teenage rebel John Lennon got hooked on rock & roll in the mid-'50s, and formed a band, the Quarrymen, at his high school. Around mid-1957, the Quarrymen were joined by another guitarist, Paul McCartney, nearly two years Lennon's junior. A bit later they were joined by another guitarist, George Harrison, a friend of McCartney. The Quarrymen would change lineups constantly in the late '50s, eventually reducing to the core trio of guitarists, who'd proven themselves to be the best musicians and most personally compatible individuals within the band.

The Quarrymen changed their name to the Silver Beatles in 1960, quickly dropping the "Silver" to become just the Beatles. Lennon's art college friend Stuart Sutcliffe joined on bass, but finding a permanent drummer was a vexing problem until Pete Best joined in the summer of 1960. He successfully auditioned for the combo just before they left for a several-month stint in Hamburg, Germany.

Hamburg was the Beatles' baptism by fire. Playing grueling sessions for hours on end in one of the most notorious red-light districts in the world, the group was forced to expand its repertoire, tighten up its chops, and invest its show with enough manic energy to keep the rowdy crowds satisfied. When they returned to Liverpool at the end of 1960, the band -- formerly also-rans on the exploding Liverpudlian "beat" scene -- were suddenly the most exciting act on the local circuit. They consolidated their following in 1961 with constant gigging in the Merseyside area, most often at the legendary Cavern Club, the incubator of the Merseybeat sound.

They also returned for engagements in Hamburg during 1961, although Sutcliffe dropped out of the band that year to concentrate on his art school studies there. McCartney took over on bass, Harrison settled in as lead guitarist, and Lennon had rhythm guitar; everyone sang. In mid-1961, the Beatles (minus Sutcliffe) made their first recordings in Germany, as a backup group to a British rock guitarist/singer based in Hamburg, Tony Sheridan. The Beatles hadn't fully developed at this point, and these recordings -- many of which (including a couple of Sheridan-less tracks) were issued only after the band's rise to fame -- found their talents in a most embryonic state. The Hamburg stint was also notable for gaining the Beatles sophisticated, artistic fans such as Sutcliffe's girlfriend, Astrid Kirchherr, who influenced all of them (except Best) to restyle their quiffs in the moptops that gave the musicians their most distinctive visual trademark. (Sutcliffe, tragically, would die of a brain hemorrhage in April 1962).

Near the end of 1961, the Beatles' exploding local popularity caught the attention of local record store manager Brian Epstein, who was soon managing the band as well. He used his contacts to swiftly acquire a January 1, 1962, audition at Decca Records that has been heavily bootlegged (some tracks were officially released in 1995). After weeks of deliberation, Decca turned them down as did several other British labels. Epstein's perseverance was finally rewarded with an audition for producer George Martin at Parlophone, an EMI subsidiary; Martin signed the Beatles in mid-1962. By this time, Epstein was assiduously grooming his charges for national success by influencing them to smarten up their appearance, dispensing with their leather jackets and trousers in favor of tailored suits and ties.

One more major change was in the offing before the Beatles made their Parlophone debut. In August 1962, drummer Pete Best was kicked out of the group, a controversial decision that has been the cause of much speculation since. There is still no solid consensus as to whether it was because of his solitary, moody nature; the other Beatles' jealousy of his popularity with the fans; his musical shortcomings (George Martin had already told Epstein that Best wasn't good enough to drum on recordings); or his refusal to wear his hair in bangs. What seems most likely was that the Beatles simply found his personality incompatible, preferring to enlist Ringo Starr (born Richard Starkey), a drummer with another popular Merseyside outfit, Rory Storm & the Hurricanes. Starr had been in the Beatles for a few weeks when they recorded their first single, "Love Me Do"/"P.S. I Love You," in September 1962. Both sides of the 45 were Lennon-McCartney originals, and the songwriting team would be credited with most of the group's material throughout the Beatles' career.

The single, a promising but fairly rudimentary effort, hovered around the lower reaches of the British Top 20. The Beatles phenomenon didn't truly kick in until "Please Please Me," which topped the British charts in early 1963. This was the prototype British Invasion single: an infectious melody, charging guitars, and positively exuberant harmonies. The same traits were evident on their third 45, "From Me to You" (a British number one), and their debut LP, Please Please Me. Although it was mostly recorded in a single day, Please Please Me topped the British charts for an astonishing 30 weeks, establishing the group as the most popular rock & roll act ever seen in the U.K.

What the Beatles had done was take the best elements of the rock and pop they loved and make them their own. Since the Quarrymen days, they had been steeped in the classic early rock of Elvis, Buddy Holly, Chuck Berry, Little Richard, Carl Perkins, and the Everly Brothers; they'd also kept an ear open to the early '60s sounds of Motown, Phil Spector, and the girl groups. What they added was an unmatched songwriting savvy (inspired by Brill Building teams such as Gerry Goffin and Carole King), a brash guitar-oriented attack, wildly enthusiastic vocals, and the embodiment of the youthful flair of their generation, ready to dispense with postwar austerity and claim a culture of their own. They were also unsurpassed in their eclecticism, willing to borrow from blues, popular standards, gospel, folk, or whatever seemed suitable for their musical vision. Producer George Martin was the perfect foil for the group, refining their ideas without tinkering with their cores; during the last half of their career, he was indispensable for his ability to translate their concepts into arrangements that required complex orchestration, innovative applications of recording technology, and an ever-widening array of instruments.

Just as crucially, the Beatles were never ones to stand still and milk formulas. All of their subsequent albums and singles would show remarkable artistic progression (though never at the expense of a damn catchy tune). Even on their second LP, With the Beatles (1963), it was evident that their talents as composers and instrumentalists were expanding furiously, as they devised ever more inventive melodies and harmonies, and boosted the fullness of their arrangements. "She Loves You" and "I Want to Hold Your Hand" established the group not just as a popular music act, but as a phenomenon never before seen in the British entertainment business, as each single sold over a million copies in the U.K. After some celebrated national TV appearances, Beatlemania broke out across the British Isles in late 1963, and the group generating screams and hysteria at all of their public appearances, musical or otherwise.

Capitol, which had first refusal of the Beatles' recordings in the United States, had declined to issue the group's first few singles, which ended up appearing on relatively small American independents. Capitol took up its option on "I Want to Hold Your Hand," which stormed to the top of the U.S. charts within weeks of its release on December 26, 1963. The Beatles' television appearances on The Ed Sullivan Show in February of 1964 launched Beatlemania (and the entire British Invasion) on an even bigger scale than it had reached in Britain. In the first week of April 1964, the Beatles had the Top Five best-selling singles in the U.S.; they also had the first two slots on the album charts, as well as other entries throughout the Billboard Top 100. No one had ever dominated the market for popular music so heavily; it's doubtful that anyone ever will again. The Beatles themselves would continue to reach number one with most of their singles and albums until their 1970 breakup.

Hard as it may be to believe today, the Beatles were often dismissed by cultural commentators of the time as nothing more than a fad that would vanish within months as the novelty wore off. The group ensured this wouldn't happen by making A Hard Day's Night in early 1964, a cinéma vérité-style motion picture comedy/musical that cemented their image as "the Fab Four": happy-go-lucky, individualistic, cheeky, funny lads with nonstop energy. The soundtrack was also a triumph, consisting entirely of Lennon-McCartney tunes, including such standards as the title tune, "And I Love Her," "If I Fell," "Can't Buy Me Love," and "Things We Said Today." George Harrison's resonant 12-string electric guitar leads were hugely influential; the movie helped persuade the Byrds, then folksingers, to plunge all out into rock & roll, and the Beatles (along with Bob Dylan) would be hugely influential on the folk-rock explosion of 1965. The Beatles' success, too, had begun to open the U.S. market for fellow Brits like the Rolling Stones, the Animals, and the Kinks, and inspired young American groups like the Beau Brummels, Lovin' Spoonful, and others to mount a challenge of their own with self-penned material that owed a great debt to Lennon-McCartney.

Between riotous international tours in 1964 and 1965, the Beatles continued to squeeze out more chart-topping albums and singles. (Until 1967, the group's British albums were often truncated for release in the States; when their catalog was transferred to CD, the albums were released worldwide in their British configurations.) In retrospect, critics have judged Beatles for Sale (late 1964) and Help! (mid-1965) as the band's least impressive efforts. To some degree, that's true. Touring and an insatiable market placed heavy demands upon their songwriting, and some of the originals and covers on these records, while brilliant by many group's standards, were filler in the context of the Beatles' best work.

But when at the top of their game, the group was continuing to push forward. "I Feel Fine" had feedback and brilliant guitar leads; "Ticket to Ride" showed the band beginning to incorporate the ringing, metallic, circular guitar lines that would be appropriated by bands like the Byrds; "Help!" was their first burst of confessional lyricism; "Yesterday" employed a string quartet. John Lennon in particular was beginning to exhibit a Dylanesque influence in his songwriting on such folky, downbeat numbers as "I'm a Loser" and "You've Got to Hide Your Love Away." And tracks like "I Don't Want to Spoil the Party" and "I've Just Seen a Face" had a strong country flavor.

Although the Beatles' second film, Help!, was a much sillier and less sophisticated affair than their first feature, it too was a huge commercial success. By this time, though, the Beatles had nothing to prove in commercial terms; the remaining frontiers were artistic challenges that could only be met in the studio. They rose to the occasion at the end of 1965 with Rubber Soul, one of the classic folk-rock records. Lyrically, Lennon, McCartney, and even Harrison (who was now writing some tunes on his own) were evolving beyond boy-girl scenarios into complex, personal feelings. They were also pushing the limits of studio rock by devising new guitar and bass textures, experimenting with distortion and multi-tracking, and using unconventional (for rock) instruments like the sitar.

As much of a progression as Rubber Soul was relative to their previous records, it was but a taster for the boundary-shattering outings of the next few years. The "Paperback Writer"/"Rain" single found the group abandoning romantic themes entirely, boosting the bass to previously unknown levels, and fooling around with psychedelic imagery and backward tapes on the B-side. Drugs (psychedelic and otherwise) were fueling their already fertile imaginations, but they felt creatively hindered by their touring obligations. Revolver, released in the summer of 1966, proved what the group could be capable of when allotted months of time in the studio. Hazy hard guitars and thicker vocal arrangements formed the bed of these increasingly imagistic, ambitious lyrics; the group's eclecticism now encompassed everything from singalong novelties ("Yellow Submarine") and string quartet-backed character sketches ("Eleanor Rigby") to Indian-influenced swirls of echo and backward tapes ("Tomorrow Never Knows"). Some would complain that the Beatles had abandoned the earthy rock of their roots for clever mannerism. But Revolver, like virtually all of the group's singles and albums from "She Loves You" on, would be a worldwide chart-topper.

For the past couple of years, live performance had become a rote exercise for the group, tired of competing with thousands of screaming fans that drowned out most of their voices and instruments. A 1966 summer worldwide tour was particularly grueling: the group's entourage was physically attacked in the Philippines after a perceived snub of the country's queen, and a casual remark by John Lennon about the Beatles being bigger than Jesus Christ was picked up in the States, resulting in the burning of Beatle records in the Bible belt and demands for a repentant apology. Their final concert of that American tour (in San Francisco on August 29, 1966) would be their last in front of a paying audience, as the group decided to stop playing live in order to concentrate on their studio recordings.

This was a radical (indeed, unprecedented) step in 1966, and the media was rife with speculation that the act was breaking up, especially after all four spent late 1966 engaged in separate personal and artistic pursuits. The appearance of the "Penny Lane"/"Strawberry Fields Forever" single in February 1967 squelched these concerns. Frequently cited as the strongest double A-side ever, the Beatles were now pushing forward into unabashedly psychedelic territory in their use of orchestral arrangements and Mellotron, without abandoning their grasp of memorable melody and immediately accessible lyrical messages.

Sgt. Pepper, released in June 1967 as the Summer of Love dawned, was the definitive psychedelic soundtrack. Or, at least, so it was perceived at the time: subsequent critics have painted the album as an uneven affair, given a conceptual unity via its brilliant multi-tracked overdubs, singalong melodies, and fairy tale-ish lyrics. Others remain convinced, as millions did at the time, that it represented pop's greatest triumph, or indeed an evolution of pop into art with a capital A. In addition to mining all manner of roots influences, the musicians were also picking up vibes from Indian music, avant-garde electronics, classical, music hall, and more. When the Beatles premiered their hippie anthem "All You Need Is Love" as part of a worldwide TV broadcast, they had been truly anointed as spokespersons for their generation (a role they had not actively sought), and it seemed they could do no wrong.

Musically, that would usually continue to be the case, but the group's strength began to unravel at a surprisingly quick pace. In August 1967, Brian Epstein -- prone to suicidal depression over the past year -- died of a drug overdose, leaving them without a manager. They pressed on with their next film project, Magical Mystery Tour, directed by themselves; lacking focus or even basic professionalism, the picture bombed when it was premiered on BBC television in December 1967, giving the media the first real chance they'd ever had to roast the Beatles over a flame. (Another film, the animated feature Yellow Submarine, would appear in 1968, although the Beatles had little involvement with the project, either in terms of the movie or the soundtrack.) In early 1968, the Beatles decamped to India for a course in transcendental meditation with the Maharishi; this too became something of a media embarrassment as each of the four would eventually depart the course before its completion.

The Beatles did use their unaccustomed peace in India to compose a wealth of new material. Judged solely on musical merit, The White Album, a double LP released in late 1968, was a triumph. While largely abandoning their psychedelic instruments to return to guitar-based rock, they maintained their whimsical eclecticism, proving themselves masters of everything from blues-rock to vaudeville. As individual songwriters, too, it contains some of their finest work (as does the brilliant non-LP single from this era, "Hey Jude"/"Revolution").

The problem, at least in terms of the group's long-term health, was that these were very much individual songs, as opposed to collective ones. Lennon and McCartney had long composed most of their tunes separately (you can almost always tell the composer by the lead vocalist). But they had always fed off of each other not only to supply missing bits and pieces that would bring a song to completion, but to provide a competitive edge that would bring out the best in the other. McCartney's romantic melodicism and Lennon's more acidic, gritty wit were perfect complements for one another. By The White Album, it was clear (if only in retrospect) that each member was more concerned with his own expression than that of the collective group: a natural impulse, but one that was bound to lead to difficulties.

In addition, George Harrison was becoming a more prolific and skilled composer as well, imbuing his own melodies (which were nearly the equal of those of his more celebrated colleagues) with a cosmic lightness. Harrison was beginning to resent his junior status, and the group began to bicker more openly in the studio. Ringo Starr, whose solid drumming and good nature could usually be counted upon (as was evident in his infrequent lead vocals), actually quit for a couple of weeks in the midst of the White Album sessions (though the media was unaware of this at the time). Personal interests were coming into play as well: Lennon's devotion to romantic and artistic pursuits with his new girlfriend (and soon-to-be wife) Yoko Ono was diverting his attentions from the Beatles. Apple Records, started by the group earlier in 1968 as a sort of utopian commercial enterprise, was becoming a financial and organizational nightmare.

These weren't the ideal conditions under which to record a new album in January 1969, especially when McCartney was pushing the group to return to live performing, although none of the others seemed especially keen on the idea. They did agree to try and record a "back-to-basics," live-in-the-studio-type LP, the sessions being filmed for a television special. That plan almost blew up when Harrison, in the midst of tense arguments, left the group for a few days. Although he returned, the idea of playing live concerts was put on the back burner; Harrison enlisted American soul keyboardist Billy Preston as kind of a fifth member on the sessions, both to beef up the arrangements and to alleviate the uncomfortable atmosphere. Exacerbating the problem was that the Beatles didn't have a great deal of first-class new songs to work with, although some were excellent. In order to provide a suitable concert-like experience for the film, the group did climb the roof of their Apple headquarters in London to deliver an impromptu performance on January 30, 1969, before the police stopped it; this was their last live concert of any sort.

Generally dissatisfied with these early-1969 sessions, the album and film -- at first titled Get Back, and later to emerge as Let It Be -- remained in the can as the group tried to figure out how the projects should be mixed, packaged, and distributed. A couple of the best tracks, "Get Back"/"Don't Let Me Down," were issued as a single in the spring of 1969. By this time, the Beatles' quarrels were intensifying in a dispute over management: McCartney wanted their affairs to be handled by his new father-in-law, Lee Eastman, while the other members of the group favored a tough American businessman, Allen Klein.

It was something of a miracle, then, that the final album recorded by the group, Abbey Road, was one of their most unified efforts (even if, by this time, the musicians were recording many of their parts separately). It certainly boasted some of their most intricate melodies, harmonies, and instrumental arrangements; it also heralded the arrival of Harrison as a composer of equal talent to Lennon and McCartney, as George wrote the album's two most popular tunes, "Something" and "Here Comes the Sun." The Beatles were still progressing, but it turned out to be the end of the road, as their business disputes continued to magnify. Lennon, who had begun releasing solo singles and performing with friends as the Plastic Ono Band, threatened to resign in late 1969, although he was dissuaded from making a public announcement.

Most of the early-1969 tapes remained unreleased, partially because the footage for the planned television broadcast of these sessions was now going to be produced as a documentary movie. The accompanying soundtrack album, Let It Be, was delayed so that its release could coincide with that of the film. Lennon, Harrison, and Allen Klein decided to have celebrated American producer Phil Spector record some additional instrumentation and do some mixing. Thus the confusion that persists among most rock listeners to this day: Let It Be, although the last Beatles album to be released, was not the last one to be recorded. Abbey Road should actually be considered as the Beatles' last album; most of the material on Let It Be, including the title track (which would be the last single released while the group was still together), was recorded several months before the Abbey Road sessions began in earnest, and a good 15 months or so before its May 1970 release.

By that time, the Beatles were no more. In fact, there had been no recording done by the group as a unit since August 1969, and each member of the band had begun to pursue serious outside professional interests independently via the Plastic Ono Band, Harrison's tour with Delaney & Bonnie, Starr's starring role in the Magic Christian film, or McCartney's first solo album. The outside world for the most part remained almost wholly unaware of the seriousness of the group's friction, making it a devastating shock for much of the world's youth when McCartney announced that he was leaving the Beatles on April 10, 1970. (The "announcement" was actually contained in a press release for his new album, in which his declaration of his intention to work on his own effectively served as a notice of his departure.)

The final blow, apparently, was the conflict between the release dates of Let It Be and McCartney's debut solo album. The rest of the group asked McCartney to delay his release until after Let It Be; McCartney refused and, for good measure, was distressed by Spector's post-production work on Let It Be, particularly the string overdubs on "The Long and Winding Road," which became a posthumous Beatles single that spring. Although McCartney received much of the blame for the split, it should be remembered that he had done more than any other member to keep the group going since Epstein's death, and that each of the other Beatles had threatened to leave well before McCartney's departure. With hindsight, the breakup seemed inevitable in view of their serious business disagreements and the growth of their individual interests.

As bitter as the initial headlines were to swallow, the feuding would grow much worse over the next few years. At the end of 1970, McCartney sued the rest of the Beatles in order to dissolve their partnership; the battle dragged through the courts for years, scotching any prospects of a group reunion. In any case, each member of the band quickly established a viable solo career. In fact, at the outset it could have been argued that the artistic effects of the split were in some ways beneficial, freeing Lennon and Harrison to make their most uncompromising artistic statements (Plastic Ono Band and All Things Must Pass). George's individual talents in particular received acclaim that had always eluded him when he was overshadowed by Lennon-McCartney. Paul had a much rougher time with the critics, but continued to issue a stream of hit singles, hitting a commercial and critical jackpot at the end of 1973 with the massively successful Band on the Run. Ringo did not have the songwriting acumen to compete on the same level as the others, yet he too had quite a few big hit singles in the early '70s, often benefiting from the assistance of his former bandmates.

Yet within a short time, it became apparent both that the Beatles were not going to settle their differences and reunite, and that their solo work could not compare with what they were capable of creating together. The stereotype has it that the split allowed each of them to indulge in their worst tendencies to their extremes: Lennon in agitprop, Harrison in holier-than-thou mysticism, McCartney in cutesy pop, Starr in easy listening rock. There's a good deal of truth in this, but it's also important to bear in mind that what was most missing was a sense of group interaction. The critical party line often champions Lennon as the angry, realist rocker, and McCartney as the melodic balladeer, but this is a fallacy: each of them was capable, in roughly equal measures, of ballsy all-out rock and sweet romanticism. What is not in dispute is that they sparked each other to reach heights that they could not attain on their own.

Despite periodic rumors of reunions throughout the 1970s, no group projects came close to materializing. It should be added that the Beatles themselves continued to feud to some degree, and from all evidence weren't seriously interested in working together as a unit. Any hopes of a reunion vanished when Lennon was assassinated in New York City in December 1980. The Beatles continued their solo careers throughout the 1980s, but their releases became less frequent, and their commercial success gradually diminished as listeners without first-hand memories of the combo created their own idols.

The popularity of the Beatles-as-unit, however, proved eternal. In part, this is because the group's 1970 split effectively short-circuited the prospects of artistic decline; the body of work that was preserved was uniformly strong. However, it's also because, like any great works of art, the Beatles' records carried an ageless magnificence that continues to captivate new generations of listeners. So it is that Beatles records continue to be heard on radio in heavy rotation, continue to sell in massive quantities, and continue to be covered and quoted by rock and pop artists through the present day.

Legal wrangles at Apple prevented the official issue of previously unreleased Beatle material for over two decades (although much of it was frequently bootlegged). The situation finally changed in the 1990s, after McCartney, Harrison, Starr, and Lennon's widow, Yoko Ono, settled their principal business disagreements. In 1994, this resulted in a double CD of BBC sessions from the early and mid-'60s. The following year, a much more ambitious project was undertaken: a multi-part film documentary, broadcast on network television in 1995, and then released (with double the length) for the home video market in 1996, with the active participation of the surviving Beatles.

To coincide with the Anthology documentary, three double CDs of previously unreleased/rare material were issued in 1995 and 1996. Additionally, McCartney, Harrison, and Starr (with some assistance from Jeff Lynne) embellished a couple of John Lennon demos from the 1970s with overdubs to create two new tracks ("Free as a Bird" and "Real Love") that were billed as actual Beatles recordings. Whether this constitutes the actual long-awaited "reunion" is the subject of much debate. Certainly these cuts were hardly classics on par with the music the group made in the 1960s. Some fans, even diehards, were inclined to view the whole Anthology project as a distinctly 1990s marketing exercise that maximized the mileage of whatever could be squeezed from the Beatles' vaults. If nothing else, though, the massive commercial success of outtakes that had, after all, been recorded 25 to 30 years ago, spoke volumes about the unabated appeal and fascination the Beatles continue to exert worldwide. ~ Richie Unterberger, All Music Guide

Source: MSN

Go Bra-free for Better Health

This is an article from a lady doctor encouraging ladies to go bra-free. Read on...

Dear Ladies,

Do you wear bra for the whole day and even at home?
I think we should go bra-free after reading these articles. It's a message to your health. Please pass this to all female friends you know. I think it's important to be aware.

For years, a lot of articles with regards to the causes of breast cancer point to an unhealthy diet and lack of exercise as the major links to this disease which happens to be the biggest killer among women during these last two decades.

These studies would have been almost credible if it were not for the fact that several women including Linda McCartney who have been religious vegetarians and exercise-freaks have also been unfortunate in suffering breast cancer. Perhaps the most convincing article I have ever read with regards to this matter is one which links breast cancer to the wearing of bras in the "Bra and Breast Cancer Study" in the United States. It was discovered that women with breast cancer had a history of sporting tighter and longer bra-wearing than did the women who had not (yet) developed the disease. In fact, virtually all of the cancer group wore bras over 12 hours. When a woman wears a tight bra, she subjects her breasts to pressure, closing off the lymphatic pathway from the breast to the nodes. This causes fluid build-up, swelling, tenderness and cyst formation. Toxins must be flushed out via the lymphatic. However, a bra-constricted breast cannot adequately perform this cleansing process, resulting in toxin accumulation in the breast. Truthfully, bras are creating droopy, weak breasts...the breast relies on the bra for artificial support, the body loses its ability to support the breast by itself. This is why many women feel uncomfortable without a bra. Whatis the solution to breast cancer then?

DON'T WEAR A TIGHT BRA! And SLEEP WITHOUT THEM.
There is a remarkable success rate for recovery from fibrocystic breast disease within 10 days to two weeks of going bra-free. Many women have tried going bra-less and recorded a miraculous improvement in their health!

Bra-burning is no longer a feminist issue...it is now a battle between life and death. We should make others more aware of the hazards of wearing...please pass this e-mail on to everyone you know!

Dr Miriam Laker Opwonya MB ChB, DTM&H, TMIH(LSHTM)

How to Develop Your Personal Authority

How to develop your Personal Authority
By Susan Dun


Dear EQ Expert:

In general, I like to think of myself as someone with high emotional intelligence, but lately I have had the same type of problem that has left me feeling emotionally stupid.


I am a college instructor. I try to show my students respect my listening to them, honoring their experiences and opinions, and preparing for class and staying on topic. In general, I have found that students respond to this positively.

Lately, however, I have had some problems with young adults of the opposite sex who are, in my perception, very rude. They think it is their right to treat me like a television while I conduct a class: reading a paper when they feel bored, putting their feet up on the chair in front of them, eating full meals, coming 15 or 20 minutes tardy, returning from the break late, yawning loudly, and talking among themselves are all behaviors I have had to deal with.

In one instance, a young man cursed at me when I asked him and his friend to leave the room and come back when they were finished with their conversation (this was after several polite requests by me that they stop talking). In general, I don't like to confront students about their rudeness, but when I don't say or do anything, the other students then lose respect for me and are demoralized. Do you have any advice about how one can deal with a subordinate's rudeness? I am hurt and offended by these people's behavior.

"Respectfully" yours,
Jane Doe Instructor

Dear Jane Doe Instructor,

Nothing I am going to say here excuses the students who are rude (and your perceptions are correct) but that’s a topic for another time. That having been said, I proceed.

The teacher is a leader, not a manager, and situations like this become extremely difficult to manage if they aren’t nipped in the bud.

When I read your email I thought, “Students are allowed to eat full meals in college classes these days?” I pictured a bag of KFC with a handywipe. What’s next, a Miller Light, a Marlboro red, intercourse?

You see, “What ARE the rules today?” is what no one knows. And young males are always ready to test the limits. It’s their nature. They should be feeling bad, not you. Don't take that monkey on your back.

Here is what you must do.

1) Don’t waste time trying to earn your leadership position. Impose it. Don’t be tentative.

2) Don’t be afraid to confront. Be absolutely clear with them and confront the problem head-on. Bill Parcells (football coach) frequently tells players, “It’s in your best interest that you succeed, and it’s in my best interest that you succeed. We really want the same thing.” Then tell them how they can succeed in your class (and by extension in college, and by extension in life.) You’ll be doing them a favor.

3) Make up a list of the Rules of Conduct for your class that is direct and specific. Print it up and pass it out on the first day. Then stand up there and read over each rule, one by one, slowly and carefully, pausing at important points, enunciating all points clearly and unemotionally, i.e., don't laugh and don't back off.

4) Claim your Personal Power, an EQ competency. Deliver it like Henry, or Catherine, with authority and without emotion:

EDICT OF NANTES: “Henry, By the Grace of God, King of France, and Navarre, To all Present, and to Come greeteth. Among the infinite Mercies that God hath pleased to bestow upon us, that most Signal and Remarkable is, his having given us Power and Strength not to yield to the dreadful Troubles, Confusions and Disorders…”

THE MANIFESTO OF THE EMPRESS CATHERINE II, OF RUSSIA

“By the Grace of God …

“We, Catherine the second, Empress and Autocrat of all the Russians at Moscow, Kiev, Vladimir, Novgorod, Czarina of Kasan, Czarina of Astrachan, Czarina of Siberia, Lady of Pleskow and Grand Duchess of Smolensko, Duchess of Esthonia and Livland, Carelial, Twer, Yugoria, Permia, Viatka and Bulgaria and others; Lady and Grand Duchess of Novgorod in the Netherland of Chernigov, Resan, Rostov, Yaroslav, Beloosrial, Udoria, Obdoria, Condinia, and Ruler of the entire North region and Lady of the Yurish, of the Cartalinian and Grusinian czars and the Cabardinian land, of the Cherkessian and Gorsian princes and the lady of the manor and sovereign of many others.” (That’s the first sentence!!! She has said nothing, but oh how we are listening. Got it?)

OK, REAL LIFE EXAMPLE: My client Edward’s Psych 101 professor at Baylor, a Southern Baptist Institution in Wacko, excuse me, Waco. He announced on the first day that he would be teaching “evolution” and if you put on a test something from the Bible contradicting evolution, you would flunk. He then gave a literal, concrete example, i.e., “If you say God created the world in one day…” I will flunk you. He asked if everyone understood what he had just said. He suggested that anyone who could not abandon their “unbelief” in evolution leave immediately or be prepared to flunk the class. Now this relieved a lot of people who were wondering how to behave and what to think. (Do not email me about this, this is an example.)

Edward asked me if I thought that was “fair.” Wrong question. Professor Edmondson determines what’s “fair” in that class, and that’s a life lesson Edward needs to learn. The question he should be asking is "Do I want to stay in this class or not?"

5) Include things on your list which point out how ridiculous things have gotten, but treat them absolutely seriously, i.e., "No burping, no swear words, no public displays of affection, no alcoholic beverages, no cell phones, no pets except for seeing eye dogs..." In the last class I attended -- a legal seminar, the professor wrote that arguments of a personal nature, and personal legal problems were not appropriate in a classroom setting.

6) Do NOT be subtle. Do NOT say oblique things like “appropriate conduct.” The people with manners already know that; the people without manners will never know that, at least in the lifetime of your course; and for those who like to go for the jugular, you will have extended the jugular.

7) Do NOT labor under the false conception that everyone will respond to being treated with respect by treating you with respect.

8) You owe no explanation, you owe no apology.

9) Everyone will relax once you make it clear what you will and will not tolerate. Nobody knows these days what to expect, and it's become a bit of a free-for-all. You, however, are there to teach, and they are there to learn, and if there’s some problem there, they are always free to leave, are they not? You hope they will remain, but to do so they must abide by your rules. They have a choice: “Would you like to leave so we can all learn, or would you like to stop talking?” Address only the specific behavior. Words like "impolite" and "rude" have no meaning. (Think of training a dog. Action, consequence, not a lot of words.) (In certain instances you may wish to address the person in private before or after class -- your judgment call.)

10) Giving warnings? Dr. Drake in my high school Latin class hummed along for a week and then someone spoke out of turn. Abruptly and without warning, he ejected the boy. That’s quite effective.

11) Don’t confuse “being nice” with EQ. You're being "nice" to them by teaching them well, with respect. This isn’t a committee meeting, they aren’t your colleagues, this isn’t a social event and it isn't group therapy. You are there to teach, and they are there to learn.

12) The test will be the first infraction of one of your rules (or one they invent, oh my), so be prepared. Label the behavior, repeat the rule, then ask them to leave in a firm but emotionally-neutral state.

13) Don’t let them baffle you with BS. I’m thinking of one of my sons who said to me, “But you never told me I couldn’t knock the chandelier down with a broomstick.”

You're in a bigtime "people field," so why not get some EQ training? Hire a coach for a month or two and save yourself some trial-and-error learning.

Good luck! Several teachers touched my life forever. Keep the torch going.

Warm regards,
Susan Dunn


--------------------------------------------------------------------------------

About the Author:
(C) Susan Dunn, The EQ Coach, brings emotional intelligence to the workplace with individual and executive coaching, workshops, presentations, Internet courses, the EQ Learning Lab and ebooks. Visit her on the web at http://www.susandunn.cc and sdunn@susandunn.cc for FREE EQ ezine. Please put "EQ ezine" for the subject line. EQ Alive! - http://www.eqcoach.net - the tools and training you need to coach emotional intelligence, for coaches, managers, therapists, counselors. Classes starting monthly.

Cure Breast Cancer By Avoiding All Milk Products

This is a long article but is really worth the read.


The Daily Mail - UK (5-27-00) 2-26-03

Why I believe that giving up milk is the key to beating
breast cancer... Professor Jane Plant is a wife, a mother,
and widely respected scientist, who was made a CBE for
her work in geochemistry. When she was struck by breast
cancer in 1987 at the age of 42, her happy and productive
existence seemed destined to fall apart. But despite the
disease recurring a further four times, Jane refused to
give in. As she describes in an inspiring new book,
[Your Life In Your Hands] serialised by the Mail this week,
she devised a revolutionary diet and lifestyle programme
that she believes saved her life and can cut the chances
of other women falling prey to the disease.

Her theory remains a controversial one - but every woman
should read it and make up her own mind. Today, she
explains her personal breakthrough...

I had no alternative but to die or to try to find a cure
for myself. I am a scientist - surely there was a rational
explanation for this cruel illness that affects one in
12 women in the UK?

I had suffered the loss of one breast, and undergone
radiotherapy. I was now receiving painful chemotherapy,
and had been seen by some of the country's most eminent
specialists. But, deep down, I felt certain I was
facing death.

I had a loving husband, a beautiful home and two young
children to care for. I desperately wanted to live.
Fortunately, this desire drove me to unearth the facts,
some of which were known only to a handful of scientists
at the time. Anyone who has come into contact with breast
cancer will know that certain risk factors - such as
increasing age, early onset of womanhood, late onset of
menopause and a family history of breast cancer - are
completely out of our control. But there are many risk
factors, which we can control easily. These 'controllable'
risk factors readily translate into simple changes that
we can all make in our day-to-day lives to help prevent or
treat breast cancer. My message is that even advanced
breast cancer can be overcome because I have done it.

The first clue to understanding what was promoting my breast
cancer came when my husband Peter, who was also a scientist,
arrived back from working in China while I was being plugged
in for a chemotherapy session.

He had brought with him cards and letters, as well as some
amazing herbal suppositories, sent by my friends and science
colleagues in China.

The suppositories were sent to me as a cure for breast cancer.
Despite the awfulness of the situation, we both had a good
belly laugh, and I remember saying that this was the treatment
for breast cancer in China, then it was little wonder that
Chinese women avoided getting the disease. Those words
echoed in my mind. Why didn't Chinese women get breast cancer?
I had collaborated once with Chinese colleagues on a study of
links between soil chemistry and disease, and I remembered
some of the statistics.

The disease was virtually non-existent throughout the whole
country. Only one in 10,000 women in China will die from it,
compared to that terrible figure of one in 12 in Britain and
the even grimmer average of one in 10 across most Western
countries.

It is not just a matter of China being a more rural country,
with less urban pollution. In highly urbanised Hong Kong,
the rate rises to 34 women in every 10,000 but still puts
the West to shame.

The Japanese cities of Hiroshima and Nagasaki have similar
rates. And remember, both cities were attacked with nuclear
weapons, so in addition to the usual pollution-related cancers,
one would also expect to find some radiation-related cases, too.
The conclusion we can draw from these statistics strikes you
with some force. If a Western woman were to move to
industrialized, irradiated Hiroshima, she would stash her risk
of contracting breast cancer by half.

Obviously this is absurd. It seemed obvious to me that some
lifestyle factor not related to pollution, urbanization or
the environment is seriously increasing the Western woman's
chance of contracting breast cancer.

I then discovered that whatever causes the huge differences
in breast cancer rates between oriental and Western countries,
it isn't genetic. Scientific research showed that when
Chinese or Japanese people move to the West, within one or
two generations their rates of breast cancer approach those
of their host community.

The same thing happens when oriental people adopt a completely
Western lifestyle in Hong Kong. In fact, the slang name for
breast cancer in China translates as 'Rich Woman's Disease'.
This is because, in China, only the better-off can afford to
eat what is termed 'Hong Kong food'.

The Chinese describe all Western food, including everything
from ice cream and chocolate bars to spaghetti and feta
cheese, as 'Hong Kong food', because of its availability
in the former British colony and its scarcity, in the past,
in mainland China.

So it made perfect sense to me that whatever was causing my
breast cancer and the shockingly high incidence in this
country generally, it was almost certainly something to do
with our better-off, middle-class, Western lifestyle.

There is an important point for men here, too. I have
observed in my research that much of the data about prostate
cancer leads to similar conclusions.

According to figures from the World Health Organization,
the number of men contracting prostate cancer in rural China
is negligible, only 0.5 men in every 100,000. In England,
Scotland and Wales, however, this figure is 70 times higher.

Like breast cancer, it is a middle-class disease that
primarily attacks the wealthier and higher socio-economic
groups - those that can afford to eat rich foods.

I remember saying to my husband-- 'Come on Peter, you have
just come back from China. What is it about the Chinese
way of life that is so different. Why don't they get
breast cancer?'

We decided to utilize our joint-scientific backgrounds and
approach it logically. We examined scientific data that
pointed us in the general direction of fats in diets.

Researchers had discovered in the 1980s that only l4% of
calories in the average Chinese diet were from fat, compared
to almost 36% in the West. But the diet I had been living
on for years before I contracted breast cancer was very low
in fat and high in fibre. Besides, I knew as a scientist
that fat intake in adults has not been shown to increase
risk for breast cancer in most investigations that have
followed large groups of women for up to a dozen years.

Then one day something rather special happened. Peter and
I have worked together so closely over the years that I am
not sure which one of us first said: 'The Chinese don't eat
dairy produce!'

It is hard to explain to a non-scientist the sudden mental
and emotional 'buzz' you get when you know you have had an
important insight.

It's as if you have had a lot of pieces of a jigsaw in your
mind, and suddenly, in a few seconds, they all fall into
place and the whole picture is clear.

Suddenly I recalled how many Chinese people were physically
unable to tolerate milk, how the Chinese people I had worked
with had always said that milk was only for babies, and how
one of my close friends, who is of Chinese origin, always
politely turned down the cheese course at dinner parties.
I knew of no Chinese people who lived a traditional Chinese
life who ever used cow or other dairy food to feed their
babies. The tradition was to use a wet nurse but never,
ever, dairy products.

Culturally, the Chinese find our Western preoccupation with
milk and milk products very strange. I remember entertaining
a large delegation of Chinese scientists shortly after the
ending of the Cultural Revolution in the 1980s.

On advice from the Foreign Office, we had asked the caterer
to provide a pudding that contained a lot of ice cream.
After inquiring what the pudding consisted of, all of the
Chinese, including their interpreter, politely but firmly
refused to eat it, and they could not be persuaded to change
their minds. At the time we were all delighted and ate
extra portions!

Milk, I discovered, is one of the most common causes of food
allergies.

Over 70% of the world's population are unable to digest the
milk sugar, lactose, which has led nutritionists to believe
that this is the normal condition for adults, not some sort
of deficiency. Perhaps nature is trying to tell us that we
are eating the wrong food.

Before I had breast cancer for the first time, I had eaten
a lot of dairy produce, such as skimmed milk, low-fat cheese
and yoghurt. I had used it as my main source of protein.
I also ate cheap but lean minced beef, which I now realized
was probably often ground-up dairy cow.

In order to cope with the chemotherapy I received for my
fifth case of cancer, I had been eating organic yoghurts
as a way of helping my digestive tract to recover and
repopulate my gut with 'good' bacteria.

Recently, I discovered that way back in 1989 yoghurt had
been implicated in ovarian cancer. Dr Daniel Cramer of
Harvard University studied hundreds of women with ovarian
cancer, and had them record in detail what they normally ate.
I wish I'd been made aware of his findings when he had
first discovered them.

Following Peter's and my insight into the Chinese diet,
I decided to give up not just yoghurt but all dairy produce
immediately. Cheese, butter, milk and yoghurt and anything
else that contained dairy produce - it went down the sink
or in the rubbish.

It is surprising how many products, including commercial
soups, biscuits and cakes, contain some form of dairy
produce. Even many proprietary brands of margarine
marketed as soya, sunflower or olive oil spreads can
contain dairy produce. I therefore became an avid
reader of the small print on food labels.

Up to this point, I had been steadfastly measuring the
progress of my fifth cancerous lump with callipers and
plotting the results. Despite all the encouraging
comments and positive feedback from my doctors and
nurses, my own precise observations told me the bitter
truth.

My first chemotherapy sessions had produced no effect
- the lump was still the same size. Then I eliminated
dairy products. Within days, the lump started to shrink.

About two weeks after my second chemotherapy session and
one week after giving up dairy produce, the lump in my
neck started to itch. Then it began to soften and to
reduce in size. The line on the graph, which had shown
no change, was now pointing downwards as the tumour got
smaller and smaller.

And, very significantly, I noted that instead of declining
exponentially (a graceful curve) as cancer is meant to do,
the tumour's decrease in size was plotted on a straight
line heading off the bottom of the graph, indicating a
cure, not suppression (or remission) of the tumour.

One Saturday afternoon after about six weeks of excluding
all dairy produce from my diet, I practised an hour of
meditation then felt for what was left of the lump.
I couldn't find it.

Yet I was very experienced at detecting cancerous lumps -
I had discovered all five cancers on my own. I went
downstairs and asked my husband to feel my neck.
He could not find any trace of the lump either.

On the following Thursday I was due to be seen by my
cancer specialist at Charing Cross Hospital in London.

He examined me thoroughly, especially my neck where the
tumour had been. He was initially bemused and then
delighted as he said, "I cannot find it." None of my
doctors, it appeared, had expected someone with my type
and stage of cancer (which had clearly spread to the
lymph system) to survive, let alone be so hale and hearty.

My specialist was as overjoyed as I was. When I first
discussed my ideas with him he was understandably
skeptical. But I understand that he now uses maps showing
cancer mortality in China in his lectures, and recommends
a non-dairy diet to his cancer patients.

I now believe that the link between dairy produce and
breast cancer is similar to the link between smoking and
lung cancer. I believe that identifying the link between
breast cancer and dairy produce, and then developing a
diet specifically targeted at maintaining the health of
my breast and hormone system, cured me.

It was difficult for me, as it may be for you, to accept
that a substance as 'natural' as milk might have such
ominous health implications. But I am a living proof
that it works and, starting from tomorrow, I shall reveal
the secrets of my revolutionary action plan.

Extracted from "Your Life in Your Hands", by Professor
Jane Plant, to be published by Virgin on June 8 at #16.99.)
Professor Jane Plant, 2000.
_____
Jane Plant's conviction that dairy products can cause
cancer arises from the complex chemical makeup of milk.
All mature breast milk, from humans or other mammals,
is a medium for transporting hundreds of chemical components.

It is a powerful biochemical solution, designed specifically
to provide for the individual needs of young mammals of the
same species. Jane says: "It is not that cow's milk isn't
a good food. It is a great food - for baby cows. It is not
intended by nature for consumption by any species other than
baby cows. It is nutritionally different from human breast
milk, containing three times as much protein and far more
calcium.'

Breast milk, like cow's milk, contains chemicals designed
to play an important rote in the development of young
cattle. One of these, insulin growth factor IGF-1,
causes cells to divide and reproduce.

IGF-1 is biologically active in humans, especially during
puberty, when growth is rapid. In young girls, it
stimulates breast tissue to grow and, while its levels are
high during pregnancy, the hormones prolactin and oestrogen
are also active, enlarging breast tissue and increasing the
production of milk ducts in preparation for breast-feeding.

Though the concentration and secretions of these hormones
in the blood are small, they exert a powerful effect on
the body. All these hormones are present in cow's milk.
IGF-1 is identical in make-up, whether in human or cow's
milk, but its levels are naturally higher in cow's milk.
It is also found in the meat of cows.

High levels of IGF-1 in humans are thought to be a risk
factor for breast and prostate cancer. A 1998 study of
pre-menopausal women revealed that those with the highest
levels of IGF-1 in their bloodstream ran almost three
times the risk of developing breast cancer compared with
women who had low levels. Among women younger than 50,
the risk was increased seven times.

Other studies have shown that high circulating levels
of IGF-1 in men are a strong indicator of prostate cancer.
Interestingly, recent measures to improve milk yields
have boosted IGF-1 levels in cows. Could IGF-1 from milk
and the meat of dairy animals cause a build-up in humans,
especially over a lifetime, leading to inappropriate cell
division? Though we produce our own IGF-1, could it be
that the extra amounts we ingest from dairy produce
actually cause cancer?

Jane Plant already knew that one way the high-profile
drug, tamoxifen, used in the treatment of breast cancer,
is thought to work by lowering circulating levels of IGF-1.

IGF-1 is not destroyed by pasteurization, but critics
argue that it is destroyed by digestion and rendered
harmless. Jane believes the main milk protein, casein,
prevents this from happening and that homogenization,
which prevents milk from separating into milk and cream,
could further increase the risk of cancer-promoting
hormones and other chemicals reaching the bloodstream.

She also believes there are other chemicals in cow's
milk that may be responsible for sending muddied signals
to adult tissue. Could prolactin, released to stimulate
milk production in cows, have a similar effect on human
breast tissue, effectively triggering the same response
and causing cells to become confused, stressed and start
making mistakes in replicating their own DNA? Studies
have confirmed that prolactin promotes the growth of
prostate cancer cells in culture.

Another hormone, oestrogen, considered one of the main
risk factors for breast cancer, is present in milk in
minute quantities. But even low levels of hormones are
known to cause severe biological damage. Microscopic
quantities of oestrogen in our rivers are powerful
enough to cause the feminisation of many male species
of fish. While oestrogen in milk may not pose a direct
threat to tissues, it may stimulate the expression of
IGF-1, resulting in long-term tumour growth.

Jane, who has found growing support for her theories
from cancer specialists, stresses that she is not
setting out to attack more orthodox approaches. She
intends her dietary programme to complement the best
therapies available from conventional medicine, not
to replace them.
_____
Pure But Deadly - Is Milk Potentially Fatal?

http://www.ostomyinternational.org/June2000/1124.html
Dairy-free diet and breast/colon cancer
IOA Archived Discussion Forum May 2000
Posted By Leslie Dungan on June 19, 2000 at 17:40:01:
The following review appeared last week in the Irish Times.

Has anyone out there has opinions or experiences relevant
to Prof Plant's approach? British scientist Jane Plant,
who believes a dairy-free diet helped her recover from
breast cancer, talks to Katie Donovan Tempted by a cream
bun, you talk yourself out of it with thoughts of all that
unhealthy fat clogging up your arteries. You opt for a
low-fat yoghurt instead, with skimmed milk in your tea,
congratulating yourself on your sensible self-control.
Think again. According to a ground-breaking new book
about breast cancer (which kills over 600 women in Ireland
annually), dairy products, whether low-fat or full cream,
should be off everyone's menu overnight. (They are also
culpable with regard to prostate cancer, so that really
means everyone).

Prof Jane Plant CBE, author of Your Life in Your Hands,
was diagnosed with breast cancer 13 years ago. She was
42, a successful geochemist (she's now chief scientist
of the British Geological Survey), and led, she thought,
a healthy life. There was no history of breast cancer
in her family. She discovered that "only five to 10 per
cent of breast cancers are the result of inherited genes,
and the disease may not always develop, even in those
carrying the mutated gene."

Bamboozled by jargon and frozen with panic, she fell back
on her scientific training to try and figure out how she
had developed the disease, and how best to cure herself.

She went on the Bristol diet, she had a mastectomy, she
had radiotherapy, she had her ovaries irradiated (to
induce menopause and eliminate oestrogen), she asked
questions and did lots of research. To no avail.
By the time of the cancer's fifth recurrence (it spread
into the lymph), she was given a course of chemotherapy
and three months to live. She had an egg-sized tumour
on the side of her neck.

Brainstorming one night with her fellow scientist
husband about why, in the West, one in 10 women get
breast cancer (one in 14 in Ireland), while in China
it's only one woman in 10,000, the pair came up with
the simple answer: Chinese people don't eat dairy
products. Plant eliminated all dairy products
(including goat and sheep) from her diet. Six weeks
later, the tumour had disappeared.

When I meet her she is a youthful-looking woman in her
mid-fifties, quaffing mint tea and eating a tuna sandwich
(no butter or mayonnaise). She has stayed on her dairy-
free diet and has remained clear of cancer.

Giving up dairy products was only part of a healthy
regimen she had been following throughout her cancer,
including taking folic acid and zinc supplements,
drinking filtered water and never consuming anything
that had been packaged in plastic (phthalates, harmful
carcinogenic chemicals, leak from soft plastic into food).

In spite of her best efforts it was only after she gave
up all dairy products that the cancer disappeared.
Sixty-three other women who had breast cancer and who
came to her for advice, also recovered after giving up
dairy products.

So how, I ask, can dairy products-- beloved of both the
Irish and British alike, not to mention the Americans
whose diet is 40 per cent dairy-- have such a lethal
effect?

"Milk is designed as the perfect food for newborn animals.
They can't eat ordinary food, they are dependent on milk
to keep development and cell differentiation going. But
milk contains a chemical--insulin-like growth factor, or
IGF-1 -- which girls have naturally as teenagers to help
their breasts develop. This chemical-- which is designed
to stimulate cell growth-- can send the wrong signal to
adult breast tissue.

She quotes studies in the US and Canada in 1998 which
found that pre-menopausal women with the highest IGF-1
concentration in their blood had a far higher risk of
developing breast cancer (similar studies have found
a link between IGF-1 and prostate cancer). The drug,
Tamoxifen, prescribed for women with breast cancer,
is thought to work by reducing circulating IGF-1 levels.

"Over 70 per cent of the world's population are unable
to digest the milk sugar, lactose," she observes.
"Lactose intolerance may be nature's early warning
system: perhaps nature is trying to tell us that we're
eating the wrong food." Homogenization apparently only
enables cancer-producing chemicals to reach the bloodstream
quicker.

Plant has done her homework: "Epidemiological studies
have indicated a positive correlation between dairy
product consumption and breast cancer risk going back
two decades. Studies have found an increase in breast
cancer risk among women who consumed milk (especially
whole milk) and/or cheese."

In 1977 scientists examining the incidence of breast
cancer in Japan found "a significant increase in both
the consumption of dairy products and the occurrence
of breast cancer in urban areas".

She quotes more research to suggest that "free oestrogens"--
found in commercial pasteurized whole cow's milk and in
skimmed milk-- may stimulate expression of IGF-1 resulting
in "indirect long-term tumour growth".

She lists dioxins and other damaging environmental
chemicals, some of them carcinogenic, which are often
fat soluble and end up "particularly concentrated" in milk.

As for the argument that we need dairy products because
they contain calcium, Plant quotes the World Health
Organization's finding that countries which have low
intakes of calcium do not have an increased incidence
of osteoporosis: "Scientific studies into calcium
absorption have shown that only 18 to 36 per cent of
the calcium in milk is taken up by the body."

Now that we're convinced, what should we be eating
instead? Plant recommends soya milk, herbal tea, humous,
tofu, nuts and seeds, non-farmed fish, organic eggs and
lean meat (not minced beef, which tends to be dairy cow)
and plenty of fresh organic fruit and vegetables (in
salads, juiced, or lightly steamed). But how can the
average woman afford the time and energy it takes to
source and prepare such food?

"Your priority should be good food, not glop," she
stresses. "Put organic food first. Your health is more
important than a new car. Anyway, I don't find it too
costly-- after all, I don't buy any processed food,
which is very expensive."

Her husband and two children have no problem following
her diet. And although she travels a lot for her job,
she finds that she is able to get-- she includes many
tips in her book about what to bring with you on a trip
(dried soya milk, herbal tea bags, kelp tablets for
iodine, etc).

She is about to start writing a new book, a guide for
busy women who want to stay healthy.

She advocates thorough and frequent self-examination of
your breasts, and, if you do develop breast cancer,
self-empowerment by working with your doctor
"as a partner, not as a victim".

She is not a fan of the Louise Hay 'You Can Heal Your Life'
philosophy: I do believe in positive thinking, but I'm
also a scientist and I wanted a rational explanation.
I have friends with diseases like MS who have read Hay's
books and feel guilty because they can't adapt their mental
attitude; or, if they have adapted, and the disease doesn't
go away, they become distressed. Plant, who is an advocate
of acupuncture, has varying opinions of alternative
therapies. She is suspicious of aromatherapy, found
visualization didn't work, but took much comfort from
cognitive therapy and hypnotherapy (both of which helped
her to reduce the stress and anxiety caused by having
cancer).

Overall, however, it was her professional research as a
geochemist into the links between disease and trace
elements (such as selenium) in the environment in China
and Korea that led to her insight about the role of dairy
produce in her cancer. She finds the medical profession
particularly
shortsighted about the influence of environmental factors--
such as pollution and industrialization-- on disease:
"I think public health has done a lot for the elimination
of infectious diseases, but looking at the environment and
nutrition could do the same for a lot of degenerative
diseases."

Plant started writing "Your Life in Your Hands" for her
daughter, Emma (now 25). Emma's teen years were dominated
by the fear that her mother was going to die:

"The book's original title was "What I Want My Daughter
to Know," recalls Plant. "The 63 women with breast cancer
who followed my diet and survived their cancer encouraged
me to publish the book. I was reluctant at first-- I knew
I'd get flak for it, because science is an adversarial
process.

But morally, I felt if I had done the research and I had
the information, I should share it with others. Men and
women have the right to know what I know, and to draw
their own conclusions."

"Your Life in Your Hands" by Jane Plant is published by
Virgin at #16.99 in UK Leslie Dungan, Dublin
http://www.alkalizeforhealth.net/Lnotmilk6.htm
http://members.tripod.co.uk/AllThingsChildren/MilkCancer.htm
___________________________________________