Chuck Norris Reveals The Sad Reason For His Absence From The Spotlight

For a while, Chuck Norris seemed to pop up everywhere…

The conservative action star has been noticeable absent from the limelight recently.

He reveals the sad reason his acting career has come to a screeching halt: his whole life has become about keeping his ailing wife alive.

According to this:

Broken — that’s how Gena Norris, wife of American action hero and martial arts expert Chuck Norris, describes herself now.

The 54-year-old suffers from burning nerve pain and kidney problems and at one stage, four years ago, feared she would die.
Today, the couple are convinced her problems are down to an injection she was given before a magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) scan to check for rheumatoid arthritis.

Chuck now cares for his wife full time.

Chuck, who is campaigning with his wife to highlight the dangers, has devoted himself to caring for Gena. He told Good Health: ‘I’ve given up my film career to concentrate on Gena, my whole life right now is about keeping her alive. I believe this issue is so important.’

I had no idea something like this could happen. I’ve personally never heard of these sorts of complications…

The injection in question is what’s known as a contrast agent — basically a dye used to improve the clarity of the scan —highlighting specific organs, blood vessels, or tissues to make them easier for the radiologist to determine the extent of disease or injury.

Crucially, in Gena’s case, this dye contained a heavy metal called gadolinium, which has magnetic properties. Used with MRI scans, this chemical accumulates in abnormal tissue providing a greater image contrast.

Yet far from helping her, Gena maintains the injections have wrecked her health and fears many others like her have suffered the terrible side-effects of these injections.

Gadolinium contrast agents are estimated to be used with around a third of the 60 million MRI scans performed worldwide annually. And while Gena had her injections in the U.S., similar injections containing gadolinium are also used in the UK.

The NHS carried out three million MRI scans last year — hundreds of thousands of them with a gadolinium contrast agent, according to the Medicines and Healthcare products Regulatory Agency (MHRA).

Gadolinium has been used in contrast agents since the Eighties and was thought to pass out through urine within hours. But recent research suggests it can be deposited in areas of the body, including the brain, and there are serious concerns about one specific group of gadolinium injections, called linear agents.

Because of the way the heavy metal is bound with other ingredients in these jabs, they are thought to be more likely to release gadolinium in the body. Other types, called macrocyclic agents, are believed to be safer as they wrap the metal in a cage-like structure more tightly so it is less likely to be deposited in the body.

Linear agents — the type of injection Gena had — are used in the UK, according to the MHRA. They are, it says, particularly useful when it comes to liver scans.

However, earlier this year, the European Medicines Agency recommended restricting the use of some linear gadolinium agents used in MRI scans and suspending the use of others — though the decision has not yet been ratified.

The agency said although there is currently ‘no evidence that gadolinium deposition in the brain has caused any harm to patients’, it was recommending restrictions to prevent any risks that could potentially be associated with it.

According to the MHRA, the jabs recommended for suspension account for around 5 per cent of gadolinium injections in the UK.

It’s known that linear agents are unsuitable for patients with chronic kidney disease, as they can cause serious side-effects such as scarring and thickening of the skin, joints and internal organs.

However, a growing body of research suggests gadolinium can accumulate in the tissues, brain, bones and kidneys of healthy people, too.

So the jury’s out on whether this is safe… but it sounds like there’s mounting evidence against it.

Definitely enough for there to be concern…

‘Within hours after the first jab I felt like my whole body was on fire — as if acid had been passed through it,’ says Gena.

‘The burning was isolated at first, but it just kept spreading.’

In the space of a few weeks she was rushed to hospital six times with excruciating rib pain,

breathing difficulties, full-body tremors, muscle weakness, and joint pain — but doctors were baffled.

While desperately trying to find an explanation for her symptoms on the internet, Gena came across cases of gadolinium poisoning.

The symptoms — nerve pain, brain fog and musculoskeletal problems such as muscle weakness — were worryingly familiar, and she became convinced there was a link. ‘I asked about the injections at the time, but was told they were perfectly safe and I just had to drink water and the contrast agent would be out of my system in a few hours,’ she says.

But on arriving in hospital for the sixth time and telling doctors her fears, they said it was impossible she had gadolinium toxicity.

Desperate, Chuck contacted medical clinics but when they were unable to help, he turned instead to an integrative medicine clinic in Reno, Nevada, which recognized gadolinium toxicity.’

By the time I reached the clinic — weeks after I had the injections — I had lost 15lb and was finding it hard to swallow — I had to be fed baby food,’ recalls Gena.
There, she was given an intravenous (IV) treatment called calcium EDTA, a chemical salt which separates heavy metals from dyes. It is used to treat lead poisoning and works by binding to metal ions and drawing them out.

‘I just lay in bed on an IV for five months and had to have round-the-clock nursing care,’ says Gena.

‘Chuck slept beside me on the couch and never left. I prayed that I would live to raise my children.’

While she is no longer bedridden, Gena still receives regular treatments, and has not fully recovered.

She has spent over $2 million on these treatments.

Last week, the couple filed a lawsuit against a number of drugs companies that make linear contrast agents, alleging that Gena had been poisoned by gadolinium contrast agents and is suffering from gadolinium deposition disease.

I just lay in bed on an IV for five months and had to have round-the-clock nursing care. Chuck slept beside me on the couch and never left. I prayed that I would live to raise my children.

Growing numbers of people in the U.S. and UK are reporting adverse side-effects from the injections, many of the 1,700 members exchanging stories through the MRI Gadolinium Toxicity Illnesses group on Facebook.

I legitimately had no idea this was an issue… but it may be a good thing to know about.