Category: Health

Eye doctors have been warning us since last Sunday (March 6, 2022) that more people are suffering from glaucoma. They will be doing so  until March 12 under a World Health Organisation (WHO) programme. Their goal is to let us know that glaucoma is an eye disease which can cause blindness if it is not detected early and diligently attended to. This column is my widow’s mite contribution to their efforts.

According to a survey of the Nigeria National Blindness And Visual  Impairment: “… 1.1-1.4 million adults in Nigeria have glaucoma, most of whom are not aware that they have the disease. One in every 20 Nigerians aged 40 years and above have glaucoma, and one in five being blind.”

I have had glaucoma for 27 years with visual ups and downs since I was 45 in 1995. Aged about nine or 10, I watched my father’s mother in the village struggle with her vision. Now, about 60 years after, I cannot recall if her vision problem was caused by glaucoma. But I remember that, back in the city, my father never failed every month to include one or two bottles of marmite in her provision chest. Marmite is a brewer’s yeast nutritional product  rich in the B-complex vitamins and promoted as good for healthy vision. I do not recall when my father began to have night vision challenges. But I knew in 1974 that he disliked night driving. One day, I was alarmed when he could not easily pick his way around the house. He told me he had seen an eye doctor who diagnosed immature cataract of the eye lens which could not be surgically treated until it had matured. All through my university days, his condition worried me. I spent a great deal of time at the Nnamdi Azikwe library of the University of Nigeria, Nsukka, researching glaucoma and cataracts in encyclopedias.

My father made one mistake many health challenged persons make: they hardly research their condition or seek a second or third medical opinion. It was when I took him to the Lagos University Teaching Hospital(LUTH) Guinness eye centre and we met professor Bukunola Adefule-Oshitelu that we knew what was happening …cataract was in both eyes, had overmatured and become compounded with advanced glaucoma.

Several of the surgeons thought the eyes were better left alone. But Prof. Adefule-Oshitelu decided to take the bull by the horn. From the way her colleagues wrote off surgery, the success she made of it may be attributed to not her alone. Prof Oshitelu said afterwards that she would have followed normal procedure, and she may not have been successful, but for an idea which struck her on the eve of the operation and made her adopt a different procedure. A few weeks later, my father surprised my step mother when, from the balcony of their first floor apartment, he asked her to suspend the house chores she was attending to downstairs till the following day, because “the day has gone”. “How do you know”? she asked. “Because it is 6.45,” he replied.

She was speechless when she checked the time. The recovery of his vision was slow. In those days, the knowledge of eye antioxidants was poor. Opthalmologists did not appear to know of them or did not believe in them and, so, did not prescribe them. Cod liver oil, with its small doses of vitamin A, was about the only visible vision food supplement in the market. Our parents gave it to us when we were babies, and we, too, gave it to our babies. Everyone tended to forget about it when we grew older, used the eyes more, and stressed them more, without looking after them. Additionally, we hardly protected the eyes against the harsh  African sunshine, the blue spectrum of which may cause cataracts and glaucoma, whereas Europeans with little or no sunshine in their countries always wore protective eye glasses. Happily, just before the COVID-19 pandemic, quantum energy eye glasses arrived in Nigeria. They block dangerous sun rays and energise the eyes.    My horizon about nutritional supplements, especially for the eyes widened about 1994 when Gen Sanni Abacha, now of blessed memory, shut The Guardian newspaper for one year. I was the director of publications and editor-in-chief. The closure meant an income shortfall from a salary shortfall. My wife was a university lecturer and had not been paid for months because  Gen  Sanni Abacha could not stand university teachers being on strike, embarrassing his government and earning their pay at the same time. With children to look after and keep in school, I opened my first health food store at Illupeju Model Market on Town Planning Way, Lagos. This turned out to be a case of one door closing and another opening and of Gen. Abacha’s brutality being a blessing in disguise.

Jobelyn was our first product line. One by one, several stockists gave us food supplements on credit. Two of them were Lutein Eyes and Visual Eyes. I did not realise that I, too, would soon need them!.

I had no need for reading glasses until I was 45. Work slow down in the Abacha closure year may have toned down my work rhythm and weakened my eyes. I was returning home on Saturday evening from a speech I went to give somewhere in Lagos when, suddenly, the windshield was covered with rainbow colours. I knew that was a sign of glaucoma. Fluid had built behind the lens of the eyes and, like a looking glass smeared with water, it couldn’t faithfully transmite light to the light- sensitive  retina which would take the visual images to the brain for interpretation. The following day, what looked like  harmattan haze fogged my vision. I went to Prof Adefule – Oshitelu. She asked if I was on any pharmaceutical medication. I had been on NSAIDs (Non steroidal anti-inflammatory drugs) for brewing rheumatoid arthritis (RA) and, when they didn’t bring down my shoulder pains, on corticosteroids, their stronger cousins. This smacked of genetic heredity. But the drugs could have hastened  glaucoma onset. I went on Visual Eyes and Lutein Eyes in rotation as an addition to pharmaceutical beta blockers and other drugs such as Diamox.

I hated the pharmaceuticals. Beta blocker eye drop crashed my regular 110 /70 blood pressure to about 80/55. Once or twice , I fainted. Once, I was writing my column and the pen fell. As  I tried to pick it up, the muscles of my chest pulled, and I was out. Next, I was pulling out the gills of a fish head in the kitchen. I was hungry and wished to quickly fix a meal. I came around only to find my son lifting me up on my feet. I learned to bring my blood pressure up before I made water or emptied my bowels. My doctor was understanding, sympathetic, took me off those drugs and replaced them with Adefuleson (Bitter kola eye drops). Just about then, I studied Lutein eyes and visual eyes.The contents were similar. My interest in them were Lutein and Zezanthin, two carotenoid antioxidants which protect the eyes against oxidative damage from the blue spectrum of the sun. As they were commercially extracted from Marigold flower, I planted this flower in my garden, consuming it as salad in food or as tea.  So, my symptoms became so clear that I clearly saw the white roads markings at night and even ventured, stupidly maybe to look, straight on, the full head lamps of big trucks, for assurance that I was doing well with visual eyes and Lutein eyes. Stupidly, too, I did not kick the bottle. I was not a hard drinker. Just one or two bottles with friends. But I noticed that the first glass almost simultaneously impacted a sharp “warning” pain in the right and 20/20 vision eye.I would soon try Maxi  Vision. Opthalmologists in Nigeria had begun to prescribe Maxi Vision. From then on, many eye food supplements began to pour into the market. Some people said Spectra Green improved their vision. Others praised Spectra Red, a warehouse of many berries. Asthazanthin joined lutein and Zezanthin, being their family member. Later, some supplements paraded as many as 24 nutrients which the eyes are said to require on a daily basis. Some of these are vitamin A, vitamin B-complex, vitamin C, vitamin D, vitamin E, selenium, zinc, manganese, alpha lipoic acid, N-Acetyl cysteine (NAC), magnesium, Gingko biloba, Co enzyme Q10 or Ubiquinol and rutin.

When these nutrients are comprehensive in one formula, their dosages are often low. I do not mind them, though, because I do highlight some of them as singlet food supplements. For example, I never fail on 400mg of magnesium everyday and about 3,000mg of buffered (Alkaline) vitamin C. Two times Nobel Prize winner Dr Linus Pauling proved that high dosages of vitamin C lower eyes Pressure. Magnesium may make beta blocker drugs unecessary. Beta blockers block  excess calcium infiltration of eye muscles  which  open drainage channel.Calcification hardens them. Calcium turns up in excess amounts because of magnesium deficiency. Calcium and magnesium are antagonists. Calcium combines with magnesium in about ratio 2:1. At ratio 6:2, two units of Calcium will become free to cause riots. My first choice of multiple-nutrients antioxidants was eye max plus with about 24 nutrients for the eyes. The dosages were small. But they provided cellular nutrition which I could upgrade with singlet antioxidants such as zinc or alpha lipoic acid, as the need may arise.

27 years on

Over 27 years, I heard and learned many things about glaucoma from professional and unconventional sources. I cannot address them all here so, I will mention only a few. Many eye specialists believe glaucoma is unconquerable. I have followed the lead of a glaucoma challenged former Nigerian diplomat in South Africa to the Japanese embassy in Abuja for a link to Nobel Prize winner professor Shinya Yamanaka. He won the Nobel prize for teaching the world how to turn mature stem cells to baby stem cells and using them to regenerate damaged organs. Prof Yamanaka has now gone beyond this to using natural substances in patches placed over the eyes, and is reported , through this effort, to have helped about half a million of his country -men and women with ailing vision to regain healthy vision. I guess there is an element of colour therapy in his work which is linked to sixth chakra energy medicine. Professor Yamanaka is so busy that he is unable to honour all country invitations. I sought to reach him through the Japanese embassy in Nigeria on behalf of Nigerians who may benefit from his work. The embassy has not been able to get him to make a Nigerian commitment.

Blood, oxygen  starvation

The eye is a small, yet complex organ which consumes large amounts of blood. But, in many eyes,  blood vessels which supply fresh, oxygenated blood or take used blood away have become so congested or blocked or leaky that the eye does not receive enough fresh blood  and oxygen, while evacuation delays depress and poison tissue. Rutin and bioflavonoids may firm up weak or leaking vessels while Cayenne, Vitamin E and Grape Seed Extract may decogest and improve circulation.

Emotional blockages

Sorrowful people are said to bottle up a lot of pressure. Some doctors would rather have grieving persons cry their hearts out. I have tried to test this suggestion on every case of glaucoma I encounter but cannot  as yet say yes or no. My father’s mother was widowed early in life. My father, her beloved child, defied her appeals to grow up in the village. He went to Zaria. Was my grandma depressed? Between 1979 and 1982, I experienced emotional turmoil over a failed childhood relationship. I lost appetite and suffered insomnia. But work and a strivings for higher aims blocked the way to grief. Did I bottle any stress?

Liver and Kidneys

Many Nigerian eye doctors dislike conversations that subnormal liver and kidneys may have hands in glaucoma. Yet, this is an area doctors in Asia do not ignore. Chinese acupuncture and acupressure believe these organs and the eyes sit on the same energy meridians or “lanes”. If these meridians are blocked, etheric or , if you like, spiritual energy from the overself cannot efficiently and effectively flow to maintain them. Thus, the freeing of these blockages and holistic care of the liver, kidneys and the eyes, is the approach to glaucoma therapies in these countries. Paradoxically, our doctors believe that some pregnancies do impact the kidneys and bladder well enough to cause blurry vision which clears on its own soon after child birth.

Pressure paradox

Several challenged persons believe they have glaucoma only because their intra occular Pressure (IOP) is high. Thus, people who have normal and low IOP  believe they are safe. How wrong they are. There must, then, be other disposing factors. An abundance of free radicals and insufficiency of antioxidants is one of those possibilities. Besides, the eyes are not only organs which collect light waves and pass visual messages to the brain for reconstruction into intelligible interpretation of the images. They are also organs for gathering and directing light energy into the pineal gland and the hypothalamus, both in the brain, partly for hormone making and balancing . GisellaI Reiners explained in Germany decades ago that this was why children who excessively watch television grew abnormally and were like hot house plants…like broiler chickens. Disturbances in the pineal gland and in the hypothalamus may, therefore, impact vision. Some eye clinics abroad nowadays add colour therapies to their regimen. This is why I still have a great deal of respect for marigold. It is said to be a sun plant. The sun is about light and colours!

Karma

I do not discountenance spiritual effects in material life. In the 1970s, I met a woman in Lagos whose cause of blindness was glaucoma. She believed she was one of the priestesses of the sun God in ancient Egypt. Non believers in this god were forced to  look directly at the sun until their eyes weakened and developed problems or went blind. Re-incarnation may afford such sun God disciples the opportunity to experience blindness in another earth life to pay off their karmaic debt. When I heard this, I thought of the various executions carried out on the orders of Yoruba monarchs before colonisation modernised the judicial process. The executioner plunged a sword into the eyes of the condemned person until the deadly metal appeared at the back of the head . What gory deaths they were! In a universe where there is  a Ruler, order and justice, will such persons get away with such brutal killings? Re-incarnation and karma may enable us to understand some cases of  glaucoma and such other diseases as rewards for earlier misdeeds.

Colour therapy

Colour therapy is tied to the knowledge of the Seven Chakras. Dimness of the chakra colours is believed to cause diseases in the organs they govern. The first chakra which governs the lower limbs and the pelvis  profits from Red. The second governs organs from below the navel to the pelvic girdle and profits from Orange. The third, from above the navel to underneath the breast bone profits from Yellow.  Green, for the fourth, awakens the heart, lungs and the immune system. Blue, for the thyroid gland (fifth) normalises metabolism. Indigo works well for the Third Eye (sixth), and the eyes. Indigo eye lenses are scarce in Nigeria. So are clothing and paper filters to make indigo solarised water for drinking or for use as eye drops. Balanced metabolism is crucial for vision. Hypothyroidism or low thyroid is believed to cause many diseases. Some Eye doctors use Iodode formulas, dangerous as they are, to stimulate metabolism in sluggish eyes.

Six years ago...

I was roused from deep sleep on the sitting couch in the dead of the night by gun shots too near for comfort. I hit the right eye ball hard against the sharp edge of wall tiles, as I made for safety upstairs. And that threw upon me another challenge to normalise IOP without beta blockers and to save the nerves. One day last year, one IOP read 48, the other 37. I returned home from the doctor to, over three days, use bitter kola eye drops almost 10 times a day… Within two weeks, the pressure fell to near normal.

Gratitude

If you wonder how I write this column when Iam unable to follow my writing on paper, I will say it all has to do with the Abiding Grace of the Most High and the helping love of such persons around me as Seun Kusa, Udeme Edet James, Better Effiong Happiness, who will be 15 on March 23 and Joy John who has just left us for nursing school.

 

WHENEVER Dr. George Ubeng calls me nowadays, Iam right on the mark about his intentions. He is a former senior State Security Service (SSS) operative who went back to school for a doctorate in Political Science, at Uyo, making trade deficits in African trade with the United States between 1999 and 2019 his concerns.

Dr. Ubeng is a health market adventurer always searching for what is cooking, what is new on the shelves. Ahead of his call today, I decided as I began to write this column, to tell him as I predicted last month in one of the 2022 Outlook series, that there are already rumbles in the jungle.  Aim Global, one of the toasts of the networking business, has pushed registration fee up from N50,000 to N80,000.

Live Pure, which broke the spines of its wholesalers recently by abolishing wholeselling in its business, has taken registration fee from N77,000 to N92,340.

NG4 (Nature’s Gift for Life), has just restocked about 12 lines of products. Two of these are Robust Roots for erectile dysfunction and Fibroid Away. I highlight these products for special reasons. I use robust root not because I have erectile dysfunction challenges. It is also not because I am still in the “market” and, therefore, still on the road. I have long hung my boots. Rather, I use robust roots, among other reasons, for prostrate gland health and because I always like to see the effects on me of what food supplements I would like to suggest that other people try. As I once stated in this column, erectile dysfunction is hitting epidemic proportions, perhaps because of physical and psychological stress nowadays. It was in a similar adventurous habit that I discovered Mychoco tea, from Aim Global. Alone or combined with unsweetened cocoa powder as night cap tea, Mychoco tea offers great possibilities for restful sleep. What about Fibroid Away? I have not checked the nutritional facts to be certain that this new product is not just an old wine in a new bottle. What I mean is that : Is Fibroid Away another name for a collection of herbs for the female reproductive system questions or a brand new addition or replacement for Fibroid Clear and NS Fibrin in the same stable?

ShineWay

This is another Chinese flag already fluttering in the Lagos skyline while new Age, hooked down in South Africa headquarters, delays its presence in Nigeria. I understand the chief executive officer (CEO) is a Nigerian woman formidable in networking marketing of food and nutritional supplements. She tore away from one of the top shot companies to partner with Shineway Healthcare. The company has placed no fewer than eight products on the market. Three of them are in the bath soap, dishwashing and laundry categories. I wondered how these could survive in a Nigerian market where the giant labels of my days as a boy and as a young man have been pushed under the bushel by younger and aggressively marketed labels. My market guide informed me they are health friendly. I have neither sighted nor tried them out. Nevertheless, I believe there may be space for them in the Nigerian firmament if, indeed, they are not offensive to the nose or irritate, squeeze and damage the skin with harsh chemicals as many of the screaming brands do. Two weeks ago, I tried to wash three boxers I soaked overnight with detergent water. I remembered that my wife never touched these detergents without wearing plastic hand gloves. When the skin of my hands and wrists were all terrorised, I rinsed the detergent off and used a popular, softer bath soap instead. For a long time, I had been urging Sam Ayeni to get his Sea Duck company to seal a planned deal with Alafia in the United States. The company is owned by some African Americans who import palm oil, coconut oil, palm kernel oil, among other ingredients from Benin Republic and Cote d’ivoire to produce nature friendly hair creams and shampoos for women in addition to health friendly laundry soaps. But his experiences with Nigerian “factors” in respect of two products he brought to Nigeria, Bragg’s Apple cider vinegar(with mother) and Kyolic garlic, makes him tread with caution.

So, how is Shineway (China way) taking the market head on? For as young people say in Nigeria Ko s’ere ni Moscow (There is no fooling around in Moscow). Who fools around in a terribly cold or terribly hot country and economy? The starter bonuses are similar to those of Bell Nigeria, very friendly to the marketer. There is no compulsory autoship until the networker has sum very far afield. In Longrich, Aim Global and other companies, for example, a distributor begins to earn bonuses only after he or she has pushed a certain volume of business, which may be humongous in Naira terms. If the distributor delays in meeting periodic targets, Live Pure as an example, would flush out or cancel the bonus points for cash generated by such a distributor. This was an Archilles heel of Foreever Living Products (FLP) from the United States, which Tianshi from China resolved for the market. FLP operates on case mode. Every two months, the distributor is weighed on a “promotion” scale. If in January and February, the  company expects N5000 worth of goods moved, and N4500 is moved in January but N200 is moved in February, the “promotion” bid would fail. The next opportunity for an upgrade would be February and March. The company will flush the N4,500 score for January and weigh the distributor on N300 in February and N4,700 in March. Tianshi introduced the cumulative score point which the networking industry considered a fairer deal.

In shineway, there is no point or bonus flushing. Bonuses are paid on every product purchased from the onset and autoship or a semblance of it is reserved for only distributors at the Apex rank. The registration fee is N60,000 but the referral bonus would appear little at N4000 compared with N20000 for Aim Global against a registration fee of N80,000 for a minimum package. Aim Global also stands shoulder high in the comparison of their second registration options. For where shineway takes N120,000 and gives away N8,000 AIM global gives N40,000 for taking N130000. But shineway beats AimGlobal   L for not putting hurdles on the way for distributors.

As I said earlier, Shineway has come to the market with eight products: Golden Six, Isk Clear, Pearl Bloom Menstrual Care, Evening Primrose Oil Plus Vitamin E, Astreelife, Neuro Booster, Feminine Gel, Peptide Ginseng Oyster, Body Wash, Laundy Detergent and Dish Washing Liquid.

Golden six

This is a leader proprietary formula in Japanese Kampo medicine which is widely used in Asia. I believe Kedi was the first multi level marketing company to market it in Nigeria for kidney, liver and female fertility questions, among others. The formula is made of six herbs. The first is common yam rhizome. It addresses kidney and liver damage conditions.

Rehmannia Root

Is suggested for diabetis melitus, atopic dermatitis, tired blood (anaemia), bone weakness(osteoporosis), fever and allergies. Many people use it as a prophylactic and general tonic. Tree Peony has a wide application which, according to an authority include “viral hepatitis, liver cirrhosis, upset stomach, muscle cramps, hardening of the arteries(arteriosclerosis) and to cause vommitting”. The same goes for “spasms, whooping cough, epilepsy, nerve pain, migraine, headache, and chronic fatigue syndrome”.

Fructus corni, another ingredient, is active as in liver and kidney nourishment, immune boosting, anti oxidation, cancer fighting and longevity promotion. Yet another ingredient is Poria, a mushroom, which is used for memory loss, anxiety, fatigue, restlessness, nervous tension, fluid retention and urination challenges, insomnia, enlargement of the spleen, cough, tumours and sundry health issues. This product appears to Target the brain,the stomach, the kidneys, liver, immune system and the skeletal system.The golden six are like the generals of a herbal medicine army ready for action with their troops for the prevention of health problems and their management and cure.

ISK Clear

ISK is another way of saying ischemic. That, also, is another way of saying the supplement is designed for heart health care. As noted, Isk in oak clear is derived from ischemia, a condition in which blood, nutrient and oxygen supply is insufficient for any organ of the body. The term is more commonly used in heart and brain blood and oxygen starvations. The ingredients of isk clear include safflower oil, borncolum syntheticum, vitamin E and vitamin B6. While vitamin B6, working with folic acid and vitamin B12, rids the blood vessels of homocysteine, a dangerous greasy material which may block them and cause ischemia particularly in the heart, B6 alone may help to rid the body of excess fluid which, in hypertension conditions may support heart health. VItamin E is an antioxidant, a blood thinner and helps the body maximise little oxygen stocks, a good servant in ischemia. Safflower oil may help to improve blood sugar levels, lower blood cholesterol and check inflammation and pain.

Feminine Gel

When I listened to a discussion of this gel, my memory raced to the days of TUSIN with us in the struggle to reposition traditional and alternative medicine in Nigeria. He was an engineer. His wife had a bad vaginal infection after child birth in a Lagos Hospital. She had to be isolated in a side ward because of the smell. Tusin went to his village and returned with a local formula with which she cleaned up when all hospital medications seemed to fail . In no time, the odour was gone. Encouraged by many of his friends including Mr Olajuwon Okubena who makes Jobelyn, Tusin partnered a retired pilot and put the formula in a tube which I named Pure Virgin. This was because many women I gave it to said it so tightened them up, their men would have thought they were still virgins. Pure virgin disappeared from the market with the physical demise of Tusin.

There are six gels in one pack of feminine gel. To use it, a woman is advised:

“Wash hands properly, take out the gel and pull out the sterile top cover. Lie down and put the sterile top cap into the back of the pusher. Insert six centimeters and inject the gel into the vagina and wait for the gel to absorb”.

One of the benefits of using this product is that it helps to maintain a favourable vaginal PH which is believed to be between 3.8 and 4.5. Anything below 3.8 may make the vault become too acidic that it may kill sperm cell deposits. Anything above 4.5m may tilt to alkalinity over seven and this may give rise to infections as the vagina is unable to defend itself. Older women have a tendency towards abnormal vaginal pH and infections. Besides, it relieves itchiness, promotes elasticity, moisturises and cleans the vagina. Women who use it are unlikely to experience vaginal dryness, said a woman who has tried the product. Vaginal dryness is a problem of many women as they approach menopause and estrogen blood levels drop. Overnight Insertion of vitamin A or vitamin E soft gels helps some cases.

Two of the seven ingredients which immediately caught my attention were Propolis and Olibanum (frankincense). Propolis is anti microbial while Olibanum,  also anti-bacterial is anti- inflammatory and refrigerant.

Coffee

Asians have made Nigerians coffee drinking, like themselves.Their companies in the natural health sector never seem to mind that their kindred here are locked down in coffee competition. I guess Edmark blazed the trail in a battle with Nescafe. Nescafe was  caffeinated coffee. High school (and I guess university, too) students of the 1960s were its unfailing patrons because it kept their heads awake for night reading especially at the approach of examinations. Edmark’s Ginseng Coffee was a knock out with many people, although the caffeine, milk and sugar irritated many others. Edmark was too slow to respond to criticisms. One of the winning secrets of this coffee was its aroma which, hyperbolically speaking, could diffuse to over a kilometer away. Another was the energy building potential.But the caffeine! Dynapharm tried to solve that problem with several brands in which sugar and dairy were subsumed with highlights of other medicinal components. For example, Dynapharm unleashed GI instant coffee with Tongkat Ali, GI Instant coffee mixture with Ganoderma and green tree extract, Red coffee mixture with ginseng and DI instant cappuccino coffee mixture. The Ganoderma Coffee brand addressed immunity with Ganoderma mushroom while Lapacino Coffee was an anti-microbial variant. Meanwhile, Edmark introduced a sugar free Ginseng Coffee. The market is a funny place with hosannah praises for a product today and howls of “crucify it” tomorrow. Customers who wanted no sugar, got “no sugar”  but then thought coffee was dull without sugar! I lost touch with the coffee market until Aim Global sprang its Liven Alkaline Coffee on the market, claiming it was the world’s first alkaline coffee. I waited for this claim to be disputed before I stretched forth my hand and took its first sips. To my surprise, the coffee didn’t keep me awake beyond whenever I wished to sleep. Then, it must be truly alkaline, I reasoned, wondering if Dr. Don Colbert heard about it. He is a Christian doctor and author of health books which preach a return to the Creation Diet. A fastidious lover of coffee, caffeinated or not, he solves his caffeine problem, he says, by drinking his coffee with alkaline food supplements such as magnesium, calcium and zinc, which, he believes, takes away the acidity. Since he adds plenty of vitamin C, I often wonder if he recognises that, when not well buffered, large amounts of ascorbic acid, too, is acid. In Liven Alkaline Coffee, these fears were eliminated by completely taking out the caffeine and replacing it with about 20,000 alkaline substances, including antioxidants and phenolic compounds. These alkaline Aim global  liven coffee brands are Liven Alkaline coffee original, Liven Alkaline Coffee Cappuccino, Liven Alkaline coffee latte and Liven Alkaline Coffee sugar free.

The coffee brand I would hear of almost soon after was trim and burn green coffee from LEIMALL. LEI stands for Life evergreen International of Delaware state in the United States. Trim and burn green coffee is targeted at cholesterol mishaps in the body, including obesity, hypertension, heart disease and heart attacks, and stroke. One of the key ingredients is green tea. But I have also heard some of the distributors talk about Malaysian white coffee and donkat Ali, the anti malarial and male virility herb. I do not know why trim and burn green coffee has been domesticated by its distributors in Nigeria as Manpower coffee. The distributors who push “manpower” to market the product are probably referring to Peruvian Macca, a possible component, which is known for improving productiion of sex hormones in men and women. It targets male virility with herbs which are tonics for the male reproductive system.

It is against this background that I view Shineway’s coffee brand as diving into a tumultuous sea to swim in rough weather as it were. We can guess its target market from its composition, a suggestion that the sky is wide enough for all manner of birds to comfortably fly.

In its Peptide Ginseng and Oyster Coffee Arabica, shineway is trying to say it’s ginseng is natural, not synthesised and the best quality. For there are many ginseng variants in the ginseng market, some mountain grown, others synthesised , yet more cultivated for commercialism. Ginseng peptide fractionalisation tells which kinds of ginseng proteins are available in the product. As for the oyster, this sea animal has for long been associated with make libido enhancement. With its rich resources of zinc, copper , manganese, phosphorus, selenium, vitamin D and several trace minerals.Oysters are also seen as good for preventing osteoporosis or weakening of the bones, especially in menopausal women. As a rich source of vitamin B12, oysters are good for brain health. VItamin B12 deficiency in the brain has been linked to depression and suicidal thoughts. And also high selenium content makes it good for immunity, especially to prevent or to manage HIV.

Apologies Dr. Ubeng, if I do not visit all the shelves. I cannot depart, though without mentioning Neuro Booster from Shineway. There are seven plant ingredients in the formula. It is prescribed for brain nutrition, prevention of neuro degeneration, improvement of memory focus and recall, improvement for interest in, and capacity for learning, anti oxidant work, energy production, healthy blood circulation, anti stress activity, nervous system health, clearance of the brain among other uses.

It is a herb worth remembering in several situations, none the least of which are strokes, Alzheimer’s, Parkinson’s, depression, insomnia, nervous system insufficiency and the problems they cause. So, Dr. Ubeng, the coast is clear…!