Dr Jenny Goodman

David Montgomery’s excellent first book (well, it was the first one I read, anyway) is called “Dirt: The Erosion of Civilisations”. I learnt a lot from it about everything from soil structure to how agricultural practices have affected our history and culture over the centuries. Now he has written a new book: “ReGen – A New Future for Farming, Food and Health”. Also highly recommended.

His wife, Anne Biklé, is also an agricultural expert, author and speaker, and co-authored with him a fascinating and important book called “What Your Food Ate”. I was lucky enough to meet her briefly at Groundswell a couple of years ago and hear her speak. Check them both out!

Read David Montgomery's Five Policy Changes to Save Agriculture from Itself here: civileats.com/2026/09/09/op-ed-five-policy-changes-to-save-agriculture-from-itself/

The Pope’s garden at the Vatican is 800 years old. Like all gardens, it would, of course, have been totally organic until 80-100 years ago max. And the good news is, it’s now organic again!

They are growing all sorts of seasonal vegetables and herbs, and using no chemicals at all. This is one of many impressive initiatives from the present incumbent. I am not a Roman Catholic, but over 1.4 billion people are, worldwide, so I hope this information filters through to all of them, so that more and more people realise that organic gardening/farming is not just viable, but totally essential for our health, and for all life on this planet. Thank you, Pope Leo!

Read the full story here: www.vaticannews.va/en/vatican-city/news/2026-08/the-pope-s-garden-in-the-vatican-gardens-becomes-100-organic.html

I’m delighted to be speaking at Growing Hope Together at the Sidmouth Science Festival on Friday 9 October.

We’ll be exploring the connections between food, farming, our health and the natural world, alongside Andy Gray and Dr Michael Brooke.

I’ll be talking about “Farmers Save More Lives Than Pharma”, and why the way we farm and eat matters so much for our health and our future.

It’s a free event, but booking is essential as places are limited. Hope to see you there!

Book your free place here: www.sidmouthsciencefestival.org/events/growing-hope-together

I’m pleased to see that the problems associated with synthetic soft furnishings are finally getting more attention in the mainstream press.

Many sofas, carpets, cushions and curtains are made from synthetic materials such as nylon and viscose. These materials are essentially petrochemicals in textile form, and because they can be highly flammable, flame retardants are often added.

I’m particularly concerned about brominated flame retardants. Bromine can interfere with iodine in the body, which may affect the thyroid and other organs that depend on iodine.

When buying new furniture or soft furnishings, I recommend choosing natural materials such as wool and cotton where possible.

If that isn’t possible, buying second-hand can be a better option because older synthetic furnishings will already have released some of their chemicals.

And if you do buy something new, buying it in spring rather than autumn gives you several months when you can keep the windows open and ventilate your home.

Learn more here: www.theguardian.com/lifeandstyle/2026/jul/17/toxic-chemicals-home-how-to-avoid-them-pfas

I’ve just come across a truly shocking story about miners in Ontario, Canada.

For more than 30 years, miners were deliberately forced to inhale aluminium oxide powder before their shifts. They were told it would protect them from silicosis, but instead they were being exposed to another potentially harmful substance. Aluminium is toxic, and exposure can affect both the lungs and the nervous system. In these workers, it was associated with neurological disease, including Parkinson’s disease.

The story is particularly disturbing because this wasn’t simply an unavoidable occupational exposure. The workers were deliberately made to inhale the powder because their employers mistakenly believed it would protect them. Possibly the employers knew that aluminium and silica do compete with each other in the body, but the lung is different from the rest of the body. To imagine that inhaling aluminium would protect the workers from silicosis is naïve in the extreme; it would simply mean that their lungs would get damaged by two substances rather than one, AND they’d get aluminium poisoning as well.

We are all exposed to aluminium in everyday life, although obviously not in anything like the extreme way these miners were. And aluminium is both neurotoxic and carcinogenic. Ironically, silica, used correctly, can indeed help the body detox aluminium (see pages 61-63 of my book Getting Healthy In Toxic Times for sources and effects of aluminium and how to detox it).

Sources of silica include certain supplements, silica-rich spring water and the herb horsetail. Silica and aluminium do compete in the body, so increasing intake of oral silica may help reduce aluminium levels. But swallowing silica is very, very different from inhaling it. Inhaling it is dangerous, as the mining company knew full well; it’s just that their ‘cure’ was even worse than the disease. There are many substances that are perfectly safe to swallow but would not be remotely safe to inhale; the lungs want nothing but oxygen in contact with their incredibly delicate surface.

Read the full story: www.cbc.ca/news/canada/sudbury/mcintyre-powder-apology-1.6669730

Why are sunsets good for us?

I don’t think we appreciate just how good sunsets can be for us.

The sunset isn’t only beautiful; the quality of the light is also incredibly beneficial. That soft, orange light contains a high amount of infrared, which I believe can be deeply healing for our cells as well as uplifting for our souls.

So whenever you have the opportunity to watch the sunset, take it. It’s a simple, natural way to connect with the light around us.

There’s much more about how and why this works in Coherent Health by my brilliant colleague, Dr Damien Downing (will tag)

See more sunrises and sunsets! 🌅

Read more via here www.bbc.com/future/article/20260625-watching-the-sunset-the-free-daily-activity-that-gives-us-a-health-fix

Tattoos have become incredibly common, but I think we need to pay more attention to what is actually in tattoo inks.

Tattoo pigments can enter the lymphatic system and accumulate in the lymph nodes. This can trigger an immune response, and the risk may be greater when large areas of the body are covered in tattoos.

I’m particularly concerned about some of the bright synthetic dyes used in tattoos, especially pink, yellow and bright blue azo dyes. I’ve found these dyes in patients’ blood tests, and they can be toxic.

I’ve seen similar problems with brightly coloured hair dyes containing azo dyes, particularly when the dye comes into contact with the scalp (it's fine if you just dip the ends of the hair in the dye).

Some traditional tattooing methods use more natural pigments. For example, some Japanese black inks are carbon-based. However, even natural pigments can potentially irritate the immune system once they enter the body.

Read more via here: www.sciencealert.com/were-only-just-beginning-to-understand-how-tattoos-affect-the-immune-system

Part 2: On Surviving, Living and Giving

How does all this connect with my work exposing the links between pollution and human health? Here’s the connection: electric vehicles are being sold to us as the solution to petrochemical air pollution from cars. Well, they are, as I explain on p 109 of “Getting Healthy in Toxic Times”, certainly less polluting locally. But the price, in terms of other people’s lives, and indeed environmental pollution elsewhere on the planet, is too high. And anyway, there is an alternative: clean, green, cheap, efficient and pleasant public transport, as described on pp 108-111, which would mean fewer vehicles of any kind on the roads.

If you have any money to spare, even a fiver, consider giving it to Survival International , so Tribal Peoples can survive. They are our brothers and sisters. They are also, in a very real sense, our ancestors; we all began as tribal peoples in the forest, and we are all descended from them. There are so few of them left. Let’s help the survivors survive – and live. Let’s give. Thank you.

Learn more about Survival International here: www.survivalinternational.org/

Part 1: On Surviving, Living and Giving

There is so much that needs fixing in our world - and so many wonderful people working hard on doing the fixing. How do you talk to kids about all that is wrong in the world? By always emphasising that for every tragedy and injustice, there are groups of people committed to changing it, and that they are making a difference.
Of course, I get overwhelmed by all the good causes crying out to me. All of them vital, all of them urgent. So how to choose?

Firstly, I guess, by remembering that as a collective we can achieve great things, but as individuals only a little. So that whichever cause we choose to support, someone else has chosen another, so we shouldn’t feel bad that by choosing Good Cause X, we are neglecting Good Cause Y. We simply can’t do everything, so we have to choose whichever speaks loudest and clearest to our heart. My personal favourite cause, my favourite charity, is Survival International for Tribal Peoples .

Survival is the only charity fighting for the rights of uncontacted peoples, living in remote areas like the rainforest, of which they have been the stewards and guardians for tens of thousands of years. These people’s lands, livelihoods and lives are at risk from greedy, unscrupulous companies who want their land for logging or mining. In Indonesia, for example, on Halmahera Island, lives one of the last surviving uncontacted tribes, harming nobody. But there is nickel under their forests, and companies want it to put in batteries for electric vehicles.

The people are being evicted and killed by these mining companies - but Survival International is helping them fight back. (In D.R.Congo, similar companies are extracting cobalt for use in mobile phones. They are using forced child labour, and the kids have no protective gear).

Learn more about Survival International here: www.survivalinternational.org/

A recent review by the FarmingUK Team .uk confirms that organic farming is better for soil health (and therefore for plant health, and therefore for the health of humans and other animals who eat the plants that are grown in the soil). It is also better for “biodiversity”, a rather dry term for what I prefer to call “abundant life, infinite variety”.

Organic soil is alive, as soil is meant to be, teeming with living creatures of all sizes, from bacteria to earthworms, and full of friendly fungi that fix minerals into the roots of the crops. We often misunderstand Darwin, and think that biology is all about competition between species. But it’s more about co-operation; all these species in the soil form a team, and we need to remember that we are part of that team – that ecosystem - too.

The researchers also showed that organic farming involves a vastly reduced use of chemicals – well, that is the whole point of it, after all! Their research was based on over 300 peer-reviewed studies, so is stronger than any one individual study. I know, many of us knew all this already, but it’s good to see the evidence out there in the press, and to know that the message is finally getting through.

Learn more here: www.farminguk.com/news/organic-farming-leads-evidence-base-on-biodiversity-and-soil-health_68710.html