Meditation Becoming Part of Some Psychotherapy Practices
"Meditation Becoming Part of Some Psychotherapy Practices
By Christine Junge, U.S. Newswire, April 2005
Meditation is now being incorporated into psychotherapeutic practice and combined in surprising ways with other healing traditions, the April issue of the Harvard Mental Health Letter reports.
The focused attention of meditation may change attitudes and behavior by decreasing preoccupation with one�s own suffering and fostering self-understanding. 'Professionals of both traditions are beginning to realize that the resemblance to the aims of psychotherapy is no accident,' says Harvard Mental Health Letter editor Dr. Michael Miller.
To the surprise of some, the psychotherapeutic tradition now taking meditation most seriously is cognitive behavioral therapy, the article reports. Behavioral therapy in its original form was concerned only with stimulus and response and tangible rewards and punishments. Eventually behavior therapists recognized the need to take account of thoughts and feelings, and they incorporated cognitive techniques into therapy. Now some therapists have gone further, merging cognitive techniques and meditation in something they call the 'third wave' of cognitive behavioral therapy.
Approaches to the new technique include dialectical behavior therapy, acceptance and commitment therapy, and mindfulness-based cognitive therapy. All three incorporate meditation and mindfulness into therapy in a slightly different way. In mindfulness-based cognitive therapy, for example, instead of struggling against depressive thoughts, patients are taught to notice when their mood begins to change, and to break the chain of depressive thinking by observing thoughts, feelings, and physical sensations dispassionately as they come and go.
The Harvard Mental Health Letter concludes that different types of psychotherapy are starting to borrow ideas and techniques from one another, and therapists may use several different approaches with a single patient. 'The introduction of meditation practice into cognitive behavioral therapy may represent a further stage in the historical evolution of psychotherapy,' says Dr. Miller."
Read the entire article
Friday, June 24, 2005
Religious faith has big impact on reducing depression among African Americans
Religious faith has big impact on reducing depression among African Americans
"University of Chicago, April 13, 2005
Religious faith has big impact on reducing depression among African Americans, University of Chicago research shows.
A strong belief in God can have a powerful impact on reducing depression, particularly among African Americans, according to a preliminary analysis of data gathered in the study of aging and social relations on health at the University of Chicago.
Among the researchers’ initial discoveries is that African Americans who say they have a strong relationship with God were significantly less likely to report depressive symptoms than those who did not. Among white participants in the study, there was very little impact of religious belief and reported depression. The data were gathered as part of the University’s Chicago Health, Aging and Social Environment and Relations Study, funded by the National Institute on Aging, and analyzed with support from a new project on faith and health funded by the John Templeton Foundation.
Both projects are headed by John Cacioppo, one of the nation’s leading experts on the impact of loneliness on health. Cacioppo is the Tiffany and Margaret Blake Distinguished Service Professor in Psychology at the University."
Read the entire article
"University of Chicago, April 13, 2005
Religious faith has big impact on reducing depression among African Americans, University of Chicago research shows.
A strong belief in God can have a powerful impact on reducing depression, particularly among African Americans, according to a preliminary analysis of data gathered in the study of aging and social relations on health at the University of Chicago.
Among the researchers’ initial discoveries is that African Americans who say they have a strong relationship with God were significantly less likely to report depressive symptoms than those who did not. Among white participants in the study, there was very little impact of religious belief and reported depression. The data were gathered as part of the University’s Chicago Health, Aging and Social Environment and Relations Study, funded by the National Institute on Aging, and analyzed with support from a new project on faith and health funded by the John Templeton Foundation.
Both projects are headed by John Cacioppo, one of the nation’s leading experts on the impact of loneliness on health. Cacioppo is the Tiffany and Margaret Blake Distinguished Service Professor in Psychology at the University."
Read the entire article
About 70 Percent of Older Adults Use Alternative Medicine
About 70 Percent of Older Adults Use Alternative Medicine
"ABOUT 70 PERCENT OF OLDER ADULTS USE ALTERNATIVE MEDICINE
By Professor Gong-Soog Hong, Ohio State University, April 9, 2005
Nearly three out of every four adults over age 50 use some kind of alternative medicine, such as acupuncture and herbal medicine, according to a new study.
While previous research has been limited, this appears to be a higher rate than occurs within the general population.
This study found that 71 percent of older adults used some form of alternative medicine in 2000. A study done in 2002, found a lower rate -- about 62 percent – among all adults.
The survey asked about the use of six types of alternative medicine: chiropractor, acupuncture, massage therapy, breathing exercises, herbal medicine, and meditation.
The most commonly used form of alternative medicine was chiropractor, which about 43 percent of respondents had used. Acupuncture was the least used.
Respondents were more likely to use alternative medicine if they said they were in poor health and if they reported more problems with daily activities, such as carrying groceries, eating or bathing.
Of those who described their health as poor, 65 percent said they used some form of alternative medicine they considered preventive or curative – a higher percentage than among any other group. And about 63 percent of respondents who said they were not satisfied with their health care also tried alternative therapies classified as preventive or curative.
“Older adults tend to have more chronic illnesses, and conventional medicine doesn’t always solve their problems,” Hong said.
The aches and pains that often come with age may also send more older adults to search for different kinds of treatments.
“Treatment of chronic pain is very difficult,” she said. “People who are living with pain will try everything possible to alleviate it. Those taking a holistic approach toward life may try something else such as alternative medicine.”
However, the exact reasons why these older adults used alternative medicine is not known from this research and needs further study, Hong said. The fact that those who were less satisfied with their health care were more likely to use alternative medicine does suggest some people have issues with the current state of conventional health care.
Hong said the medical establishment has begun studying alternative medicine and has begun to accept some forms of non-traditional medicine. But more study needs to be done before they are generally accepted."
Read the entire article
"ABOUT 70 PERCENT OF OLDER ADULTS USE ALTERNATIVE MEDICINE
By Professor Gong-Soog Hong, Ohio State University, April 9, 2005
Nearly three out of every four adults over age 50 use some kind of alternative medicine, such as acupuncture and herbal medicine, according to a new study.
While previous research has been limited, this appears to be a higher rate than occurs within the general population.
This study found that 71 percent of older adults used some form of alternative medicine in 2000. A study done in 2002, found a lower rate -- about 62 percent – among all adults.
The survey asked about the use of six types of alternative medicine: chiropractor, acupuncture, massage therapy, breathing exercises, herbal medicine, and meditation.
The most commonly used form of alternative medicine was chiropractor, which about 43 percent of respondents had used. Acupuncture was the least used.
Respondents were more likely to use alternative medicine if they said they were in poor health and if they reported more problems with daily activities, such as carrying groceries, eating or bathing.
Of those who described their health as poor, 65 percent said they used some form of alternative medicine they considered preventive or curative – a higher percentage than among any other group. And about 63 percent of respondents who said they were not satisfied with their health care also tried alternative therapies classified as preventive or curative.
“Older adults tend to have more chronic illnesses, and conventional medicine doesn’t always solve their problems,” Hong said.
The aches and pains that often come with age may also send more older adults to search for different kinds of treatments.
“Treatment of chronic pain is very difficult,” she said. “People who are living with pain will try everything possible to alleviate it. Those taking a holistic approach toward life may try something else such as alternative medicine.”
However, the exact reasons why these older adults used alternative medicine is not known from this research and needs further study, Hong said. The fact that those who were less satisfied with their health care were more likely to use alternative medicine does suggest some people have issues with the current state of conventional health care.
Hong said the medical establishment has begun studying alternative medicine and has begun to accept some forms of non-traditional medicine. But more study needs to be done before they are generally accepted."
Read the entire article
Realism and Responsibility
Realism and Responsibility
"Realism and Responsibility
Listen to some of the new wise men of Africa. They insist that unless Africans get their own house in order, aid will not fix anything.
By Fareed Zakaria, Newsweek, June 20, 2005
... it is American (and European) policy to deny Africa access to our markets. We subsidize a few hundred of the richest agricultural companies in the world, and prevent tens of millions of the world's poorest people from participating in free trade and capitalism. It is estimated that if Africa gained 1 percent more of the world's share of exports, it would be worth five times the total amount of foreign aid it receives. So America is correct: good government policies are key—but in this crucial case, it's our policies that need improving."
Read the entire article
"Realism and Responsibility
Listen to some of the new wise men of Africa. They insist that unless Africans get their own house in order, aid will not fix anything.
By Fareed Zakaria, Newsweek, June 20, 2005
... it is American (and European) policy to deny Africa access to our markets. We subsidize a few hundred of the richest agricultural companies in the world, and prevent tens of millions of the world's poorest people from participating in free trade and capitalism. It is estimated that if Africa gained 1 percent more of the world's share of exports, it would be worth five times the total amount of foreign aid it receives. So America is correct: good government policies are key—but in this crucial case, it's our policies that need improving."
Read the entire article
Governments have long been creating comparative advantages for their own economies
Why Asia Will Eat Our Lunch
"Businessweek, Book Review, June 20, 2005
Three Billion New Capitalists: The Great Shift of Wealth and Power to the East, are all too rational
By Clyde Prestowitz
Prestowitz has been mulling over America's competitiveness problems for 30 years, most recently as head of his own think tank -- the Economic Strategy Institute in Washington. Before that he was an international executive for U.S. multinationals, a trade negotiator in the Reagan Administration, and author of a ground-breaking, although ultimately alarmist, 1988 book about U.S.-Japan relations, Trading Places. Prestowitz writes with clarity, historical perspective, and an uncommon ability to extricate himself from the intellectual straitjackets that hobble so many Washington economic policymakers. Free trader or protectionist? Democrat or Republican? Keynesian or supply-sider? He doesn't fit in any of those boxes.
Governments have long been creating comparative advantages for their own economies, Prestowitz notes, but U.S. policymakers have apparently forgotten this. Despite today's fashionable disdain for industrial policy, Washington was once an active participant in boosting the gross domestic product. The federal government created Radio Corporation of America and established U.S. dominance in radio technology, launched Boeing (BA ) and nurtured it with government contracts, and created AT&T (T ) and its genius pool at Bell Laboratories (B ), cradle of microelectronics. Then there's the Internet. 'The apparently effortless technological supremacy Americans assume as a birthright...had nothing to do with market forces and everything to do with targeted policy decisions,' Prestowitz notes.
Prestowitz also challenges one of the most popular and soothing myths in Washington -- that U.S. workers can compete with any in the world if given 'a level playing field.' The truth: Western workers won't be able to compete without accepting wage cuts, since, in the area of labor costs, China enjoys a "fifteen to thirtyfold advantage" over the developed world.
China and India, which together accounted for 75% of the world's GDP before the discovery of America, are on a steep trajectory to regain their prominence. 'The potential size of their markets, their endless supply of low-cost labor, the unique combination of many highly skilled but low-paid professionals, and the investment incentives offered by their governments will constitute an irresistible package' that will soak up global investment.
There is reason for hope, Prestowitz allows. America's technology is often the best, as are its universities. The U.S. leads in biotech, and it retains an entrepreneurial culture. That said, Prestowitz still could be too pessimistic. As with Trading Places, he tends to project current trends far into the unknowable future.
But the U.S. government is dangerously shortsighted. The country's savings rate, secondary-education system, energy and water conservation, critical infrastructure, research investment, and worker training lag behind those in too many other nations."
Read the entire review
"Businessweek, Book Review, June 20, 2005
Three Billion New Capitalists: The Great Shift of Wealth and Power to the East, are all too rational
By Clyde Prestowitz
Prestowitz has been mulling over America's competitiveness problems for 30 years, most recently as head of his own think tank -- the Economic Strategy Institute in Washington. Before that he was an international executive for U.S. multinationals, a trade negotiator in the Reagan Administration, and author of a ground-breaking, although ultimately alarmist, 1988 book about U.S.-Japan relations, Trading Places. Prestowitz writes with clarity, historical perspective, and an uncommon ability to extricate himself from the intellectual straitjackets that hobble so many Washington economic policymakers. Free trader or protectionist? Democrat or Republican? Keynesian or supply-sider? He doesn't fit in any of those boxes.
Governments have long been creating comparative advantages for their own economies, Prestowitz notes, but U.S. policymakers have apparently forgotten this. Despite today's fashionable disdain for industrial policy, Washington was once an active participant in boosting the gross domestic product. The federal government created Radio Corporation of America and established U.S. dominance in radio technology, launched Boeing (BA ) and nurtured it with government contracts, and created AT&T (T ) and its genius pool at Bell Laboratories (B ), cradle of microelectronics. Then there's the Internet. 'The apparently effortless technological supremacy Americans assume as a birthright...had nothing to do with market forces and everything to do with targeted policy decisions,' Prestowitz notes.
Prestowitz also challenges one of the most popular and soothing myths in Washington -- that U.S. workers can compete with any in the world if given 'a level playing field.' The truth: Western workers won't be able to compete without accepting wage cuts, since, in the area of labor costs, China enjoys a "fifteen to thirtyfold advantage" over the developed world.
China and India, which together accounted for 75% of the world's GDP before the discovery of America, are on a steep trajectory to regain their prominence. 'The potential size of their markets, their endless supply of low-cost labor, the unique combination of many highly skilled but low-paid professionals, and the investment incentives offered by their governments will constitute an irresistible package' that will soak up global investment.
There is reason for hope, Prestowitz allows. America's technology is often the best, as are its universities. The U.S. leads in biotech, and it retains an entrepreneurial culture. That said, Prestowitz still could be too pessimistic. As with Trading Places, he tends to project current trends far into the unknowable future.
But the U.S. government is dangerously shortsighted. The country's savings rate, secondary-education system, energy and water conservation, critical infrastructure, research investment, and worker training lag behind those in too many other nations."
Read the entire review
Most U.S. Doctors Believe in God
Most U.S. Doctors Believe in God
"Most U.S. Doctors Believe in God
By LINDSEY TANNER, AP Medical Writer, Wed Jun 22, 9:03 PM ET
A survey examining religion in medicine found that most U.S. doctors believe in God and an afterlife — a surprising degree of spirituality in a science-based field, researchers say.
In the survey of 1,044 doctors nationwide, 76 percent said they believe in God, 59 percent said they believe in some sort of afterlife, and 55 percent said their religious beliefs influence how they practice medicine.
"We were surprised to find that physicians were as religious as they apparently are," said Dr. Farr Curlin, a researcher at the University of Chicago's MacLean Center for Clinical Medical Ethics.
"There's certainly a deep-seated cultural idea that science and religion are at odds," and previous studies have suggested that fewer than half of scientists believe in God, Curlin said Wednesday.
A previous survey showed about 83 percent of the general population believes in God.
But while medicine is science-based, doctors differ from scientists who work primarily in a laboratory setting, and their direct contact with patients in life-and-death situations may explain the differing views, Curlin said.
The study is based on responses to questionnaires mailed in 2003. It is to appear in an upcoming issue of the Journal of General Internal Medicine and was released online to subscribers earlier this month.
Dr. J. Edward Hill, president of the American Medical Association, said religion and medicine are completely compatible, as long as doctors do not force their own beliefs on patients.
Belief in "a supreme being ... is vitally important to physicians' ability to take care of patients, particularly the end-of-life issues that we deal with so often," said Hill, a family physician from Tupelo, Miss.
Religions among physicians are more varied than among the general population, the survey found. While more than 80 percent of the U.S. population is Protestant or Catholic, 60 percent of doctors said they were from either group.
Compared with the general population, more doctors were Jewish — 14 percent vs. 2 percent; Hindu — 5 percent vs. less than 1 percent; and Muslim — almost 3 percent vs. less than 1 percent."
Read at the original source
"Most U.S. Doctors Believe in God
By LINDSEY TANNER, AP Medical Writer, Wed Jun 22, 9:03 PM ET
A survey examining religion in medicine found that most U.S. doctors believe in God and an afterlife — a surprising degree of spirituality in a science-based field, researchers say.
In the survey of 1,044 doctors nationwide, 76 percent said they believe in God, 59 percent said they believe in some sort of afterlife, and 55 percent said their religious beliefs influence how they practice medicine.
"We were surprised to find that physicians were as religious as they apparently are," said Dr. Farr Curlin, a researcher at the University of Chicago's MacLean Center for Clinical Medical Ethics.
"There's certainly a deep-seated cultural idea that science and religion are at odds," and previous studies have suggested that fewer than half of scientists believe in God, Curlin said Wednesday.
A previous survey showed about 83 percent of the general population believes in God.
But while medicine is science-based, doctors differ from scientists who work primarily in a laboratory setting, and their direct contact with patients in life-and-death situations may explain the differing views, Curlin said.
The study is based on responses to questionnaires mailed in 2003. It is to appear in an upcoming issue of the Journal of General Internal Medicine and was released online to subscribers earlier this month.
Dr. J. Edward Hill, president of the American Medical Association, said religion and medicine are completely compatible, as long as doctors do not force their own beliefs on patients.
Belief in "a supreme being ... is vitally important to physicians' ability to take care of patients, particularly the end-of-life issues that we deal with so often," said Hill, a family physician from Tupelo, Miss.
Religions among physicians are more varied than among the general population, the survey found. While more than 80 percent of the U.S. population is Protestant or Catholic, 60 percent of doctors said they were from either group.
Compared with the general population, more doctors were Jewish — 14 percent vs. 2 percent; Hindu — 5 percent vs. less than 1 percent; and Muslim — almost 3 percent vs. less than 1 percent."
Read at the original source
Can China Go Green?
Can China Go Green?
"CAN CHINA GO GREEN?
Fortune, June 27, 2005
When China's ministry of Science and Technology decided to build a new headquarters in Beijing, the government sought help from an unlikely partner - the Natural Resources Defense Council, best known for litigating and lobbying for stricter environmental rules in the U.S. The resulting green building uses the best available technology to save energy and water; since it opened last year, it has been toured by 2,000 local officials, designers, and architects. 'In terms of environmental innovation, China's going to kick our ass within a decade unless we wake up,' says Rob Watson, a senior scientist with the NRDC who works on China projects.
At least on paper, China is matching, if not exceeding, environmental standards set in the West. To curb its dependence on imported oil, China has adopted fuel-economy rules for automobiles that are more stringent than those in the U.S. or Europe. That is putting pressure on GM and Volkswagen, the leading foreign carmakers in China, to find ways to profit from selling small, fuel-efficient vehicles. The Chinese government is also investing in fuel-cell technologies for motor scooters, cars, and buses, hoping to invent an entirely new kind of auto industry. 'They've set the policy stage for innovation,' says Watson.
Desperation is driving the initiatives: Like so much in China, the scale of environmental problems is mind-boggling. China is home to five of the world's ten most polluted cities in terms of air quality. It burns dirty coal in more than 2,000 plants, generating clouds bearing mercury, soot, and sulfur dioxide that have been tracked all the way to the Oregon coast. China's industry is wasteful, requiring three to ten times more energy than industry in the U.S., Western Europe, or Japan to produce a dollar of economic output. Water is in short supply and deserts are expanding rapidly, according to Elizabeth Economy, the author of The River Runs Black, a book about China's environmental crisis.
Global companies are poised to capitalize. Immelt says that GE's investments in clean coal technology, wind power, nuclear energy, and fuel cells are being made with China in mind. "While Europe has been a driver for innovation in cleaner technologies, China promises to be its market," he says.
Because China relies so heavily on coal, for instance, it is likely to become the biggest buyer of a cleaner coal technology called IGCC (integrated gasification combined cycle, if you must know) that converts coal to natural gas, which generates fewer pollutants. The technology can be combined with a process in which carbon dioxide, which contributes to global warming, can be captured and buried deep in the earth. David Hawkins, an expert on climate change with the NRDC who has consulted in China, says, "I think we'll see the technology move forward there faster, conceivably, than in the U.S."
Bill McDonough, the architect and industrial designer, predicts that China will become a seedbed for environmental innovation. "The Chinese are very practical," he says. "They are asking what mistakes have been made in the rest of the world and how they can avoid them." McDonough, who is chairman of a nonprofit called the China-U.S. Center for Sustainable Development, says new building materials will be developed for China—he is working with the chemical industry giant BASF to develop a strong, lightweight, insulating poly- styrene to replace brick—as armies of Chinese people move to the cities. He foresees solar-power farms on a vast scale. "China is the place where the costs of solar collectors will drop once they go into mass production," he says. "It's a massive gift that China will give to the world."
Read the entire article
"CAN CHINA GO GREEN?
Fortune, June 27, 2005
When China's ministry of Science and Technology decided to build a new headquarters in Beijing, the government sought help from an unlikely partner - the Natural Resources Defense Council, best known for litigating and lobbying for stricter environmental rules in the U.S. The resulting green building uses the best available technology to save energy and water; since it opened last year, it has been toured by 2,000 local officials, designers, and architects. 'In terms of environmental innovation, China's going to kick our ass within a decade unless we wake up,' says Rob Watson, a senior scientist with the NRDC who works on China projects.
At least on paper, China is matching, if not exceeding, environmental standards set in the West. To curb its dependence on imported oil, China has adopted fuel-economy rules for automobiles that are more stringent than those in the U.S. or Europe. That is putting pressure on GM and Volkswagen, the leading foreign carmakers in China, to find ways to profit from selling small, fuel-efficient vehicles. The Chinese government is also investing in fuel-cell technologies for motor scooters, cars, and buses, hoping to invent an entirely new kind of auto industry. 'They've set the policy stage for innovation,' says Watson.
Desperation is driving the initiatives: Like so much in China, the scale of environmental problems is mind-boggling. China is home to five of the world's ten most polluted cities in terms of air quality. It burns dirty coal in more than 2,000 plants, generating clouds bearing mercury, soot, and sulfur dioxide that have been tracked all the way to the Oregon coast. China's industry is wasteful, requiring three to ten times more energy than industry in the U.S., Western Europe, or Japan to produce a dollar of economic output. Water is in short supply and deserts are expanding rapidly, according to Elizabeth Economy, the author of The River Runs Black, a book about China's environmental crisis.
Global companies are poised to capitalize. Immelt says that GE's investments in clean coal technology, wind power, nuclear energy, and fuel cells are being made with China in mind. "While Europe has been a driver for innovation in cleaner technologies, China promises to be its market," he says.
Because China relies so heavily on coal, for instance, it is likely to become the biggest buyer of a cleaner coal technology called IGCC (integrated gasification combined cycle, if you must know) that converts coal to natural gas, which generates fewer pollutants. The technology can be combined with a process in which carbon dioxide, which contributes to global warming, can be captured and buried deep in the earth. David Hawkins, an expert on climate change with the NRDC who has consulted in China, says, "I think we'll see the technology move forward there faster, conceivably, than in the U.S."
Bill McDonough, the architect and industrial designer, predicts that China will become a seedbed for environmental innovation. "The Chinese are very practical," he says. "They are asking what mistakes have been made in the rest of the world and how they can avoid them." McDonough, who is chairman of a nonprofit called the China-U.S. Center for Sustainable Development, says new building materials will be developed for China—he is working with the chemical industry giant BASF to develop a strong, lightweight, insulating poly- styrene to replace brick—as armies of Chinese people move to the cities. He foresees solar-power farms on a vast scale. "China is the place where the costs of solar collectors will drop once they go into mass production," he says. "It's a massive gift that China will give to the world."
Read the entire article
Sunday, June 12, 2005
The incredible shrinking aquifer - Ecocreto porous concrete
The incredible shrinking aquifer - ecological paving material called Ecocreto
"The incredible shrinking aquifer
BY ELIZA BARCLAY/The Herald Mexico, El Universal, Lunes 21 de febrero de 2005
For most Mexico City residents, the circulation of water is an obvious element of daily urban life, be it a projectile coursing down from the sky during the rainy months, a weekly task to replace or refill large plastic jugs of purified drinking water, or as a biweekly gift from the faucet for those marginalized communities whose utility service remains irregular.
As generations have built layer upon layer of structures to create the massive urban jungle that the city is today, it has become easy to forget that the city is sagging atop an enormous underground aquifer, where it has rested since the Aztecs built Tenochtitlan in the Valley of Mexico in the 14th century.
As the city's population has swelled to 18.5 million people, the pressure on the aquifer has become critical as the city's consumption of water has risen to 10,500 cubic feet per second, according to the city government's water division. Estimates of the aquifer's size and its ability to continue to sustain Mexico City vary considerably. Some local hydrologists say it could be fully depleted in as few as 10 to 20 years, while some government officials expect it to last 70 more years at minimum.
But the issue that is of concern to nearly everyone is insuring that the aquifer recharges properly as a means of avoiding full depletion. Though the city gets an average of 40 inches of rainfall per year, groundwater pumping exceeds the natural recharge by 50 to 80 percent. This overuse has resulted in declining groundwater levels, compression of the aquifer, subsidence of the land, and damage to buildings and other structures on the surface -- some parts of the Historic Center have dropped 30 feet.
An effort to recharge the aquifer has emerged from the private sector, in the form of an ecological paving material composed of aggregate grains that allow water to seep through straight into the ground. This porous concrete, called Ecocreto, has been employed in the construction of street pavement, sidewalks, parking lots, and bikepaths at more than 50 sites around the city, including the Televisa headquarters in Santa Fe and the National Museum of Antropology.
Developed by a team of Mexican engineers and architects in 1994 who were distressed by the looming water crises of Mexico City and Guadalajara, Ecocreto is similar to hydraulic concrete but manufactured without sand, which permits as much as 80 percent of rainwater to pass through into the subsoil.
"Our product is 100 percent permeable concrete additive that will help to recharge groundwater resources in Mexico and other parts of the world where water is scarce," said Néstor de Buen Unna, Ecocreto's general director. Ecocreto's popularity has bloomed in the past few years and the company now has distributors in Mexico, Canada and the United States.
Though initiatives like Martínez Santoyo's and Buen Unna's are steps forward in respecting the limits of the aquifer and finding ways to recharge it, the city still faces significant challenges in getting a grip on its water use. As the aquifer remains invisible to the eye above ground, it may be caught in losing tug-ofwar with the city's 18.5 million residents."
Read more about Ecocreto
Read the entire article
"The incredible shrinking aquifer
BY ELIZA BARCLAY/The Herald Mexico, El Universal, Lunes 21 de febrero de 2005
For most Mexico City residents, the circulation of water is an obvious element of daily urban life, be it a projectile coursing down from the sky during the rainy months, a weekly task to replace or refill large plastic jugs of purified drinking water, or as a biweekly gift from the faucet for those marginalized communities whose utility service remains irregular.
As generations have built layer upon layer of structures to create the massive urban jungle that the city is today, it has become easy to forget that the city is sagging atop an enormous underground aquifer, where it has rested since the Aztecs built Tenochtitlan in the Valley of Mexico in the 14th century.
As the city's population has swelled to 18.5 million people, the pressure on the aquifer has become critical as the city's consumption of water has risen to 10,500 cubic feet per second, according to the city government's water division. Estimates of the aquifer's size and its ability to continue to sustain Mexico City vary considerably. Some local hydrologists say it could be fully depleted in as few as 10 to 20 years, while some government officials expect it to last 70 more years at minimum.
But the issue that is of concern to nearly everyone is insuring that the aquifer recharges properly as a means of avoiding full depletion. Though the city gets an average of 40 inches of rainfall per year, groundwater pumping exceeds the natural recharge by 50 to 80 percent. This overuse has resulted in declining groundwater levels, compression of the aquifer, subsidence of the land, and damage to buildings and other structures on the surface -- some parts of the Historic Center have dropped 30 feet.
An effort to recharge the aquifer has emerged from the private sector, in the form of an ecological paving material composed of aggregate grains that allow water to seep through straight into the ground. This porous concrete, called Ecocreto, has been employed in the construction of street pavement, sidewalks, parking lots, and bikepaths at more than 50 sites around the city, including the Televisa headquarters in Santa Fe and the National Museum of Antropology.
Developed by a team of Mexican engineers and architects in 1994 who were distressed by the looming water crises of Mexico City and Guadalajara, Ecocreto is similar to hydraulic concrete but manufactured without sand, which permits as much as 80 percent of rainwater to pass through into the subsoil.
"Our product is 100 percent permeable concrete additive that will help to recharge groundwater resources in Mexico and other parts of the world where water is scarce," said Néstor de Buen Unna, Ecocreto's general director. Ecocreto's popularity has bloomed in the past few years and the company now has distributors in Mexico, Canada and the United States.
Though initiatives like Martínez Santoyo's and Buen Unna's are steps forward in respecting the limits of the aquifer and finding ways to recharge it, the city still faces significant challenges in getting a grip on its water use. As the aquifer remains invisible to the eye above ground, it may be caught in losing tug-ofwar with the city's 18.5 million residents."
Read more about Ecocreto
Read the entire article
The Next Plague? Contagion through history
The Next Plague? Contagion through history
"The Next Plague?
Contagion through history
by Michael Slenske, The Atlantic Monthly, June 2005
From last December to this writing, the disease known to epidemiologists as H5N1 avian flu infected twenty-eight people in Vietnam, killing fourteen. On the scale of global catastrophe that may not sound like a lot. But World Health Organization officials worry that a worldwide outbreak could kill as many as seven million. Human populations have proved particularly susceptible to new flu pandemics every twenty to thirty years, as flu strains mutate and overcome built-up immunities. The most recent major flu pandemic petered out in 1972, so we may be overdue. Here are some noteworthy disease outbreaks through history.
1. Pneumonic plague. Since last December there have been some 300 suspected cases of—and at least sixty-one deaths from—pneumonic plague in eastern Congo. This is the largest plague outbreak since 1920, when more than 9,000 Manchurians succumbed.
2. Severe acute respiratory syndrome. SARS first appeared in China in November of 2002, and was soon recognized as a coronavirus that caused high fevers and fatal pneumonia. Over the course of the next eight months the disease infected more than 8,000 people and killed 774 in twenty-six countries.
3. West Nile virus. Although outbreaks of this mosquito-borne encephalitis were identified as early as 1937, in Uganda, West Nile didn't reach the United States until the summer of 1999, when it infected sixty-two people and killed seven in New York City. Since then more than 15,000 American cases—and more than 500 deaths—have been reported to the Centers for Disease Control.
4. Ebola virus. Nearly two decades after Ebola—which can turn organs into virus-ridden slime in less than a week—took the lives of 600 people in Zaire and Sudan, in 1976, it resurfaced in Zaire, infecting 316 people and killing 245 from May to July of 1995. Fifty of the victims were hospital staffers treating the outbreak.
5. Hong Kong flu. Sweeping across the Pacific from Hong Kong in early 1968, the disease reached the United States by September of that year and went on to kill 34,000 Americans in six months. Outbreaks of this strain recurred in 1970 and 1972, and may have produced a million fatalities worldwide—despite the fact that another flu eleven years earlier (see #6) is believed to have built up global resistance to the disease.
6. Asian flu. First identified by health officials in East Asia in February of 1957, this influenza traveled to the United States that summer and spread through classrooms nationwide, even though a vaccine was introduced in August of that year. The flu claimed 70,000 American lives, and a million worldwide, before dissipating in March of 1958.
7. Spanish flu. After coursing through the trenches of World War I in 1918—accounting for half of all GI deaths during the war—this bug was carried across the globe by homebound soldiers. By some estimates it infected a billion people (about half the world's population), killing 20 million to 50 million in just one year. Most victims of "la Grippe" were healthy adults aged twenty to fifty.
8. Yellow fever. Thousands of Philadelphia residents, including President George Washington, fled their city (then the nation's capital) in 1793, after seeing scores of infected people turn yellow and vomit blood. The fever—which killed 5,000 people (10 percent of Philadelphia's population at the time)—returned to the city in subsequent years, though not on the scale of the '93 epidemic.
9. Black Death. Although it is generally thought to have been transmitted from rodents to human beings, some scholars believe that the Black Death was actually a person-to-person disease. It ravaged Europe from 1347 to 1352, killing around 25 million people— nearly a third of the Continent's population."
Read the entire article
"The Next Plague?
Contagion through history
by Michael Slenske, The Atlantic Monthly, June 2005
From last December to this writing, the disease known to epidemiologists as H5N1 avian flu infected twenty-eight people in Vietnam, killing fourteen. On the scale of global catastrophe that may not sound like a lot. But World Health Organization officials worry that a worldwide outbreak could kill as many as seven million. Human populations have proved particularly susceptible to new flu pandemics every twenty to thirty years, as flu strains mutate and overcome built-up immunities. The most recent major flu pandemic petered out in 1972, so we may be overdue. Here are some noteworthy disease outbreaks through history.
1. Pneumonic plague. Since last December there have been some 300 suspected cases of—and at least sixty-one deaths from—pneumonic plague in eastern Congo. This is the largest plague outbreak since 1920, when more than 9,000 Manchurians succumbed.
2. Severe acute respiratory syndrome. SARS first appeared in China in November of 2002, and was soon recognized as a coronavirus that caused high fevers and fatal pneumonia. Over the course of the next eight months the disease infected more than 8,000 people and killed 774 in twenty-six countries.
3. West Nile virus. Although outbreaks of this mosquito-borne encephalitis were identified as early as 1937, in Uganda, West Nile didn't reach the United States until the summer of 1999, when it infected sixty-two people and killed seven in New York City. Since then more than 15,000 American cases—and more than 500 deaths—have been reported to the Centers for Disease Control.
4. Ebola virus. Nearly two decades after Ebola—which can turn organs into virus-ridden slime in less than a week—took the lives of 600 people in Zaire and Sudan, in 1976, it resurfaced in Zaire, infecting 316 people and killing 245 from May to July of 1995. Fifty of the victims were hospital staffers treating the outbreak.
5. Hong Kong flu. Sweeping across the Pacific from Hong Kong in early 1968, the disease reached the United States by September of that year and went on to kill 34,000 Americans in six months. Outbreaks of this strain recurred in 1970 and 1972, and may have produced a million fatalities worldwide—despite the fact that another flu eleven years earlier (see #6) is believed to have built up global resistance to the disease.
6. Asian flu. First identified by health officials in East Asia in February of 1957, this influenza traveled to the United States that summer and spread through classrooms nationwide, even though a vaccine was introduced in August of that year. The flu claimed 70,000 American lives, and a million worldwide, before dissipating in March of 1958.
7. Spanish flu. After coursing through the trenches of World War I in 1918—accounting for half of all GI deaths during the war—this bug was carried across the globe by homebound soldiers. By some estimates it infected a billion people (about half the world's population), killing 20 million to 50 million in just one year. Most victims of "la Grippe" were healthy adults aged twenty to fifty.
8. Yellow fever. Thousands of Philadelphia residents, including President George Washington, fled their city (then the nation's capital) in 1793, after seeing scores of infected people turn yellow and vomit blood. The fever—which killed 5,000 people (10 percent of Philadelphia's population at the time)—returned to the city in subsequent years, though not on the scale of the '93 epidemic.
9. Black Death. Although it is generally thought to have been transmitted from rodents to human beings, some scholars believe that the Black Death was actually a person-to-person disease. It ravaged Europe from 1347 to 1352, killing around 25 million people— nearly a third of the Continent's population."
Read the entire article
Exposure to pesticides can cause Parkinson's
Exposure to pesticides can cause Parkinson's
"Exposure to pesticides can cause Parkinson's
By Andy Coghlan, Special Report from New Scientist Print Edition, May 26, 2005
SUSPICIONS that pesticides could cause Parkinson's disease have been strengthened. The more pesticide you are exposed to, the higher your risk of developing the disease, say investigators who have studied almost 3000 people in five European countries. The results reinforce the need for amateur gardeners and farmers alike to wear protective equipment when spraying pesticides, the team concludes."
Read the entire article
"Exposure to pesticides can cause Parkinson's
By Andy Coghlan, Special Report from New Scientist Print Edition, May 26, 2005
SUSPICIONS that pesticides could cause Parkinson's disease have been strengthened. The more pesticide you are exposed to, the higher your risk of developing the disease, say investigators who have studied almost 3000 people in five European countries. The results reinforce the need for amateur gardeners and farmers alike to wear protective equipment when spraying pesticides, the team concludes."
Read the entire article
Can taking the pill dull a woman's desire forever?
Can taking the pill dull a woman's desire forever?
"Can taking the pill dull a woman's desire forever?
Special Report from New Scientist Print Edition, May 27, 2005
ORAL contraceptives may free a woman to have sex without fear of getting pregnant, but they could also extinguish her desire.
The pill has been associated with many side effects, including blood clots, migraines and weight gain. Perhaps least talked about is its tendency to dull libido by decreasing testosterone levels.
Contraceptive drugs curb the hormone's production in the ovaries and also raise levels of sex hormone binding globulin (SHBG), a substance that takes it out of play. But it is unclear how common problems are in pill users. Until now, any sexual dysfunction, including loss of libido, muted or non-existent orgasms or painful intercourse, was thought to be reversible when women stopped taking the drug.
Irwin Goldstein, Claudia Panzer and their colleagues at Boston University studied 125 young women who attended a sexual dysfunction clinic. Sixty-two of them were taking oral contraceptives, 40 had previously taken them and 23 had never taken them. The team measured levels of SHBG in the women every three months for a year, and found that in pill users they were seven times as high as in women who had never taken them. Levels had declined a bit in women who had stopped taking the pill, but remained three to four times as high as in those who had never taken it, the researchers told a meeting of the American Association of Clinical Endocrinologists in Washington DC last week. 'There's the possibility it is imprinting a woman for the rest of her life,' says Goldstein."
Read the entire article
"Can taking the pill dull a woman's desire forever?
Special Report from New Scientist Print Edition, May 27, 2005
ORAL contraceptives may free a woman to have sex without fear of getting pregnant, but they could also extinguish her desire.
The pill has been associated with many side effects, including blood clots, migraines and weight gain. Perhaps least talked about is its tendency to dull libido by decreasing testosterone levels.
Contraceptive drugs curb the hormone's production in the ovaries and also raise levels of sex hormone binding globulin (SHBG), a substance that takes it out of play. But it is unclear how common problems are in pill users. Until now, any sexual dysfunction, including loss of libido, muted or non-existent orgasms or painful intercourse, was thought to be reversible when women stopped taking the drug.
Irwin Goldstein, Claudia Panzer and their colleagues at Boston University studied 125 young women who attended a sexual dysfunction clinic. Sixty-two of them were taking oral contraceptives, 40 had previously taken them and 23 had never taken them. The team measured levels of SHBG in the women every three months for a year, and found that in pill users they were seven times as high as in women who had never taken them. Levels had declined a bit in women who had stopped taking the pill, but remained three to four times as high as in those who had never taken it, the researchers told a meeting of the American Association of Clinical Endocrinologists in Washington DC last week. 'There's the possibility it is imprinting a woman for the rest of her life,' says Goldstein."
Read the entire article
Watching New Love as It Sears the Brain
Watching New Love as It Sears the Brain
"Watching New Love as It Sears the Brain
By BENEDICT CAREY
New York Times, May 31, 2005
New love can look for all the world like mental illness, a blend of mania, dementia and obsession that cuts people off from friends and family and prompts out-of-character behavior - compulsive phone calling, serenades, yelling from rooftops - that could almost be mistaken for psychosis.
Now for the first time, neuroscientists have produced brain scan images of this fevered activity, before it settles into the wine and roses phase of romance or the joint holiday card routines of long-term commitment.
In an analysis of the images appearing today in The Journal of Neurophysiology, researchers in New York and New Jersey argue that romantic love is a biological urge distinct from sexual arousal.
It is closer in its neural profile to drives like hunger, thirst or drug craving, the researchers assert, than to emotional states like excitement or affection. As a relationship deepens, the brain scans suggest, the neural activity associated with romantic love alters slightly, and in some cases primes areas deep in the primitive brain that are involved in long-term attachment.
The research helps explain why love produces such disparate emotions, from euphoria to anger to anxiety, and why it seems to become even more intense when it is withdrawn. In a separate, continuing experiment, the researchers are analyzing brain images from people who have been rejected by their lovers."
Read the entire article
"Watching New Love as It Sears the Brain
By BENEDICT CAREY
New York Times, May 31, 2005
New love can look for all the world like mental illness, a blend of mania, dementia and obsession that cuts people off from friends and family and prompts out-of-character behavior - compulsive phone calling, serenades, yelling from rooftops - that could almost be mistaken for psychosis.
Now for the first time, neuroscientists have produced brain scan images of this fevered activity, before it settles into the wine and roses phase of romance or the joint holiday card routines of long-term commitment.
In an analysis of the images appearing today in The Journal of Neurophysiology, researchers in New York and New Jersey argue that romantic love is a biological urge distinct from sexual arousal.
It is closer in its neural profile to drives like hunger, thirst or drug craving, the researchers assert, than to emotional states like excitement or affection. As a relationship deepens, the brain scans suggest, the neural activity associated with romantic love alters slightly, and in some cases primes areas deep in the primitive brain that are involved in long-term attachment.
The research helps explain why love produces such disparate emotions, from euphoria to anger to anxiety, and why it seems to become even more intense when it is withdrawn. In a separate, continuing experiment, the researchers are analyzing brain images from people who have been rejected by their lovers."
Read the entire article
Coming Clean: Hospital infections kill an estimated 103,000 people in the United States a year
Coming Clean: Hospital infections kill an estimated 103,000 people in the United States a year
"Coming Clean
By BETSY MCCAUGHEY, The New York Times, June 6, 2005
INFECTIONS that have been nearly eradicated in some other countries are raging through hospitals here in the United States. The major reason? Poor hygiene. In fact, hygiene is so inadequate in most American hospitals that one out of every 20 patients contracts an infection during a hospital stay. Hospital infections kill an estimated 103,000 people in the United States a year, as many as AIDS, breast cancer and auto accidents combined.
And the danger is worsening as many hospital infections can no longer be cured with common antibiotics. One of the deadliest germs is a staph bacteria called M.R.S.A., short for methicillin-resistant Staphylococcus aureus, which lives harmlessly on the skin but causes havoc when it enters the body. Patients who do survive M.R.S.A. often spend months in the hospital and endure several operations to cut out infected tissue. In 1974, 2 percent of staph infections were from M.R.S.A. By 1995, that number had soared to 22 percent. Today, experts estimate that more than 60 percent of staph infections are M.R.S.A.
Hospitals in Denmark, Finland and the Netherlands once faced similar rates, but brought them down to below 1 percent. How? Through the rigorous enforcement of rules on hand washing, the meticulous cleaning of equipment and hospital rooms, the use of gowns and disposable aprons to prevent doctors and nurses from spreading germs on clothing and the testing of incoming patients to identify and isolate those carrying the germ.
Too few hospitals in the United States are using these precautions, though where they are used they are highly effective. In a pilot program, the veterans hospital in Pittsburgh reduced M.R.S.A. 85 percent, and the University of Virginia Medical Center eradicated it. Unfortunately most hospitals have not shown the will to defeat infections.
More than half the time, doctors and other caregivers break the most fundamental rule of hygiene by failing to clean their hands before treating a patient.
Hospital infections can be stopped, but most hospital administrators have not made prevention a top priority. The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention are also to blame. While the C.D.C. has made some efforts to curb hospital infections, they have failed to ask hospitals to follow the rigorous precautions that are working in other countries and in those American hospitals where they have been tried.
In 2003, a task force for the Society of Healthcare Epidemiologists of America chastised the C.D.C. for this failure, but the C.D.C. has still not acted. Every year of delay is costing thousands of lives.
Many hospital administrators say they can't afford to take the necessary precautions, but they can't afford not to. Infections erode hospital profits because rarely are hospitals fully paid for the added weeks or months that patients must spend in the hospital when they get an infection. Studies show that when hospitals invest in these proven precautions, they are rewarded with as much as tenfold financial return. These infections add about $30 billion annually to the nation's health costs. This tab will increase rapidly as more infections become drug-resistant.
In February, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention declared that it will not support the growing demand to make hospital infection rates public. That's a shame because if you need to be hospitalized, you should be able to find out which hospitals in your area have the worst infection problems. This secrecy may allow some hospitals to save face, but it won't save lives or money."
Read the entire article
"Coming Clean
By BETSY MCCAUGHEY, The New York Times, June 6, 2005
INFECTIONS that have been nearly eradicated in some other countries are raging through hospitals here in the United States. The major reason? Poor hygiene. In fact, hygiene is so inadequate in most American hospitals that one out of every 20 patients contracts an infection during a hospital stay. Hospital infections kill an estimated 103,000 people in the United States a year, as many as AIDS, breast cancer and auto accidents combined.
And the danger is worsening as many hospital infections can no longer be cured with common antibiotics. One of the deadliest germs is a staph bacteria called M.R.S.A., short for methicillin-resistant Staphylococcus aureus, which lives harmlessly on the skin but causes havoc when it enters the body. Patients who do survive M.R.S.A. often spend months in the hospital and endure several operations to cut out infected tissue. In 1974, 2 percent of staph infections were from M.R.S.A. By 1995, that number had soared to 22 percent. Today, experts estimate that more than 60 percent of staph infections are M.R.S.A.
Hospitals in Denmark, Finland and the Netherlands once faced similar rates, but brought them down to below 1 percent. How? Through the rigorous enforcement of rules on hand washing, the meticulous cleaning of equipment and hospital rooms, the use of gowns and disposable aprons to prevent doctors and nurses from spreading germs on clothing and the testing of incoming patients to identify and isolate those carrying the germ.
Too few hospitals in the United States are using these precautions, though where they are used they are highly effective. In a pilot program, the veterans hospital in Pittsburgh reduced M.R.S.A. 85 percent, and the University of Virginia Medical Center eradicated it. Unfortunately most hospitals have not shown the will to defeat infections.
More than half the time, doctors and other caregivers break the most fundamental rule of hygiene by failing to clean their hands before treating a patient.
Hospital infections can be stopped, but most hospital administrators have not made prevention a top priority. The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention are also to blame. While the C.D.C. has made some efforts to curb hospital infections, they have failed to ask hospitals to follow the rigorous precautions that are working in other countries and in those American hospitals where they have been tried.
In 2003, a task force for the Society of Healthcare Epidemiologists of America chastised the C.D.C. for this failure, but the C.D.C. has still not acted. Every year of delay is costing thousands of lives.
Many hospital administrators say they can't afford to take the necessary precautions, but they can't afford not to. Infections erode hospital profits because rarely are hospitals fully paid for the added weeks or months that patients must spend in the hospital when they get an infection. Studies show that when hospitals invest in these proven precautions, they are rewarded with as much as tenfold financial return. These infections add about $30 billion annually to the nation's health costs. This tab will increase rapidly as more infections become drug-resistant.
In February, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention declared that it will not support the growing demand to make hospital infection rates public. That's a shame because if you need to be hospitalized, you should be able to find out which hospitals in your area have the worst infection problems. This secrecy may allow some hospitals to save face, but it won't save lives or money."
Read the entire article
Thursday, June 09, 2005
Obesity as a Major Malnutrition Issue
Obesity as a Major Malnutrition Issue
"The Changing Face of Malnutrition
Reported by Chris Burslem, International Food Policy Research Institute, October 2004
For as long as the world has known it, malnutrition has been associated with hunger, conjuring up images of gaunt and prematurely aged children and adults. In 2004, malnutrition is still very much with us, and it is taking on a new form as well.
To be sure, there are still far too many hungry and underfed people--1.1 billion at last count. But over one billion people are now overweight and obese.
Perhaps most surprisingly, these aren't all cheeseburger-eating Westerners. Most are Asians, Pacific islanders, and Latin Americans, in particular urban women, living in developing countries. Usually poor, they are succumbing in alarming numbers to the misleadingly named 'diseases of affluence'--obesity, heart disease, cancer, and diabetes--that arise from changing diets, lifestyles, and economies.
Chronic non-communicable diseases now cause close to 60 percent of all deaths worldwide. Surprisingly, nearly 80 percent of these deaths occur in developing countries.
Overweight and obesity, the most glaring outward sign of the changing face of malnutrition in developing countries, increase the chances of a person falling prey to the other non-communicable diseases.
Nutritionists working in developing countries once thought that if people obtained enough energy in their diets, they would obtain enough minerals, vitamins, and other micronutrients. But that is clearly not the case. Malnutrition is not simply caused by a lack of food overall, but by a lack of high-quality foods such as whole grains, fiber, fruits, and vegetables. Diets can also be injurious to health if they contain an excess of components such as saturated fat, sodium, and added sugar.
"Sadly, it seems that we have somehow managed to bypass good health, moving from hunger to obesity in a single generation in many parts of the world," says Marie Ruel, interim director of IFPRI's Food Consumption and Nutrition Division.
Perhaps most worrying is that obesity and diet-related non-communicable diseases are reaching epidemic levels in countries that are still struggling to eliminate hunger and poverty, encumbering them with a double health burden.
In some cases, undernutrition and obesity can even be found under the same roof. The prevalence of households with both overweight and underweight members in Brazil, for example, stands at 11 percent. In Asia it ranges between 3 and 15 percent, with households typically containing an underweight child and an overweight, nonelderly adult.
This one-two health punch has the potential to cause an economic and human disaster in countries whose medical systems are woefully unprepared to deal with diseases requiring long-term care."
Read the entire article
"The Changing Face of Malnutrition
Reported by Chris Burslem, International Food Policy Research Institute, October 2004
For as long as the world has known it, malnutrition has been associated with hunger, conjuring up images of gaunt and prematurely aged children and adults. In 2004, malnutrition is still very much with us, and it is taking on a new form as well.
To be sure, there are still far too many hungry and underfed people--1.1 billion at last count. But over one billion people are now overweight and obese.
Perhaps most surprisingly, these aren't all cheeseburger-eating Westerners. Most are Asians, Pacific islanders, and Latin Americans, in particular urban women, living in developing countries. Usually poor, they are succumbing in alarming numbers to the misleadingly named 'diseases of affluence'--obesity, heart disease, cancer, and diabetes--that arise from changing diets, lifestyles, and economies.
Chronic non-communicable diseases now cause close to 60 percent of all deaths worldwide. Surprisingly, nearly 80 percent of these deaths occur in developing countries.
Overweight and obesity, the most glaring outward sign of the changing face of malnutrition in developing countries, increase the chances of a person falling prey to the other non-communicable diseases.
Nutritionists working in developing countries once thought that if people obtained enough energy in their diets, they would obtain enough minerals, vitamins, and other micronutrients. But that is clearly not the case. Malnutrition is not simply caused by a lack of food overall, but by a lack of high-quality foods such as whole grains, fiber, fruits, and vegetables. Diets can also be injurious to health if they contain an excess of components such as saturated fat, sodium, and added sugar.
"Sadly, it seems that we have somehow managed to bypass good health, moving from hunger to obesity in a single generation in many parts of the world," says Marie Ruel, interim director of IFPRI's Food Consumption and Nutrition Division.
Perhaps most worrying is that obesity and diet-related non-communicable diseases are reaching epidemic levels in countries that are still struggling to eliminate hunger and poverty, encumbering them with a double health burden.
In some cases, undernutrition and obesity can even be found under the same roof. The prevalence of households with both overweight and underweight members in Brazil, for example, stands at 11 percent. In Asia it ranges between 3 and 15 percent, with households typically containing an underweight child and an overweight, nonelderly adult.
This one-two health punch has the potential to cause an economic and human disaster in countries whose medical systems are woefully unprepared to deal with diseases requiring long-term care."
Read the entire article
Our Grass Could be Greener
Nationwide, we’ve planted enough lawn to cover the state of
A gas-powered mower pollutes as much in one hour as a car driven for 350 miles, according to the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency. About 30 million tons of fertilizer and pesticides, many containing chemicals known to cause birth defects, cancer and damage to the reproductive system, are dumped annually on residential lawns. The runoff from those lawn treatments pollutes groundwater and nearby lakes, bays and oceans.
Want to make your lawn a kinder, gentler part of the landscape? Start here:
- Switch to electric or battery-powered mowers, or, for a smaller lawn, use a reel mower.
- If you use a gas-powered mower, opt for a four-stroke model rather than a two-stroke one. They emit about half the carbon monoxide and one-tenth the hydrocarbons.
- Reduce mowing time and watering demands. Grow low-maintenance, slow-growing grasses. Or convert part of your lawn to ornamental native plants.
- Switch to organic fertilizers – naturally occurring animal and plant byproducts such as manure, fish, bone and blood meal, and fruit scraps. A good buying guide: If the nitrogen, phosphorus and potassium ratio equals more than 15, or if one of the numbers is higher than 8, then it’s not likely organic.
Nation Wastes Nearly Half Its Food
Nation Wastes Nearly Half Its Food
"Nation Wastes Nearly Half Its Food
By Jeff Harrison, November 18, 2004
America has been long been the poster child for the "throw-away society" and researchers have known for years about the volumes of food Americans toss into the trash. Only recently, though, has that been quantified as a percentage of what is produced. A new study from the University of Arizona in Tucson indicates that 40 to 50 percent of all food ready for harvest never gets eaten.
Timothy W. Jones, an anthropologist at the UA Bureau of Applied Research in Anthropology, has spent the last 10 years measuring food loss, including the last eight under a grant from the U.S. Department of Agriculture. Jones started in the farms and orchards, went on through the warehouses, retail outlets and dining rooms, and to landfills.
What he found was that not only is edible food discarded that could feed people who need it, but the rate of loss, even partially corrected, could save U.S. consumers and corporations tens of billions of dollars each year. Jones says these losses also can be framed in terms of environmental degradation and national security.
On average, households waste 14 percent of their food purchases. Fifteen percent of that includes products still within their expiration date but never opened. Jones estimates an average family of four currently tosses out $590 per year, just in meat, fruits, vegetables and grain products.
Nationwide, he says, household food waste alone adds up to $43 billion, making it a serious economic problem. (In addition to farms and households, Jones also is currently researching retail food waste, again a sector where annual losses run in the tens of billions of dollars.)
Cutting food waste would also go a long way toward reducing serious environmental problems. Jones estimates that reducing food waste by half could reduce adverse environmental impacts by 25 percent through reduced landfill use, soil depletion and applications of fertilizers, pesticides and herbicides."
Read the entire article
"Nation Wastes Nearly Half Its Food
By Jeff Harrison, November 18, 2004
America has been long been the poster child for the "throw-away society" and researchers have known for years about the volumes of food Americans toss into the trash. Only recently, though, has that been quantified as a percentage of what is produced. A new study from the University of Arizona in Tucson indicates that 40 to 50 percent of all food ready for harvest never gets eaten.
Timothy W. Jones, an anthropologist at the UA Bureau of Applied Research in Anthropology, has spent the last 10 years measuring food loss, including the last eight under a grant from the U.S. Department of Agriculture. Jones started in the farms and orchards, went on through the warehouses, retail outlets and dining rooms, and to landfills.
What he found was that not only is edible food discarded that could feed people who need it, but the rate of loss, even partially corrected, could save U.S. consumers and corporations tens of billions of dollars each year. Jones says these losses also can be framed in terms of environmental degradation and national security.
On average, households waste 14 percent of their food purchases. Fifteen percent of that includes products still within their expiration date but never opened. Jones estimates an average family of four currently tosses out $590 per year, just in meat, fruits, vegetables and grain products.
Nationwide, he says, household food waste alone adds up to $43 billion, making it a serious economic problem. (In addition to farms and households, Jones also is currently researching retail food waste, again a sector where annual losses run in the tens of billions of dollars.)
Cutting food waste would also go a long way toward reducing serious environmental problems. Jones estimates that reducing food waste by half could reduce adverse environmental impacts by 25 percent through reduced landfill use, soil depletion and applications of fertilizers, pesticides and herbicides."
Read the entire article
Institute for OneWorld Health - A Nonprofit Pharmaceutical Company
Institute for OneWorld Health - A Nonprofit Pharmaceutical Company
"Victoria Hale: Nonprofit Drugs For The Poor
By Jessi Hempel, Businessweek, May 9, 2005
Victoria Hale scours the globe for promising drugs that universities and drugmakers have discarded because they see little profit in developing them. "You just can't build a good business market for some diseases," she notes.
But Hale, 44, doesn't worry about markets. She runs OneWorld Health, the world's only nonprofit pharmaceutical company to market drugs to the developing world. Five years after launching OneWorld, Hale is completing trials for its first drug, an antibiotic for patients who contract deadly black fever from sandfly bites -- nearly 1.5 million of the world's poor each year.
Now, with $46 million from the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation, the San Francisco group is helping to develop a malaria drug that will sell for less than a dollar a dose. With three promising drugs in the pipeline, Hale hopes that OneWorld will soon be able to pay its own way."
See their site
"Victoria Hale: Nonprofit Drugs For The Poor
By Jessi Hempel, Businessweek, May 9, 2005
Victoria Hale scours the globe for promising drugs that universities and drugmakers have discarded because they see little profit in developing them. "You just can't build a good business market for some diseases," she notes.
But Hale, 44, doesn't worry about markets. She runs OneWorld Health, the world's only nonprofit pharmaceutical company to market drugs to the developing world. Five years after launching OneWorld, Hale is completing trials for its first drug, an antibiotic for patients who contract deadly black fever from sandfly bites -- nearly 1.5 million of the world's poor each year.
Now, with $46 million from the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation, the San Francisco group is helping to develop a malaria drug that will sell for less than a dollar a dose. With three promising drugs in the pipeline, Hale hopes that OneWorld will soon be able to pay its own way."
See their site
Wednesday, June 08, 2005
How Malpractice Suits Keep My Profession Honest
How Malpractice Suits Keep My Profession Honest
"How Malpractice Suits Keep My Profession Honest
By Bernard Sussman, The Washington Post, Sunday, April 24, 2005; Page B02
Most medical malpractice litigation is frivolous. That's what defense attorneys, insurance companies and even the U.S. president would have you believe. Some 80 percent of cases are, after all, resolved in favor of the defendant doctor.
But little is made of the advantages that doctors take into a courtroom. Physicians are apt to prevail in these cases because of their professional culture of silence, which can make it difficult for injured patients to secure reliable expert witnesses who will testify on their behalf. Nor is there any acknowledgement of the countless people who are unaware that injuries they have sustained in the hospital should rightly be blamed on medical negligence or error. As a neurosurgeon with some 50 years of clinical experience, I can say from first-hand observation that it's often not the patients' claims that are frivolous, but rather the manner in which those claims are treated."
Read the entire article
"How Malpractice Suits Keep My Profession Honest
By Bernard Sussman, The Washington Post, Sunday, April 24, 2005; Page B02
Most medical malpractice litigation is frivolous. That's what defense attorneys, insurance companies and even the U.S. president would have you believe. Some 80 percent of cases are, after all, resolved in favor of the defendant doctor.
But little is made of the advantages that doctors take into a courtroom. Physicians are apt to prevail in these cases because of their professional culture of silence, which can make it difficult for injured patients to secure reliable expert witnesses who will testify on their behalf. Nor is there any acknowledgement of the countless people who are unaware that injuries they have sustained in the hospital should rightly be blamed on medical negligence or error. As a neurosurgeon with some 50 years of clinical experience, I can say from first-hand observation that it's often not the patients' claims that are frivolous, but rather the manner in which those claims are treated."
Read the entire article
Tuesday, June 07, 2005
26 percent of U.S. suffers mental disorder
26 percent of U.S. suffers mental disorder
"26 percent of U.S. suffers mental disorder
By UPI, BETHESDA, Md., June 7, 2005
Twenty-six percent of U.S. residents had symptoms of a mental disorder in the past year but only 17 percent got professional help, a landmark study concludes.
Six percent had such severe problems they could not function normally for an average of three months, concludes the study by the National Institute of Mental Health in Bethesda, Md., the University of Michigan and Harvard University.
The study, which conducted face-to-face interviews with 9,282 randomly selected people, concludes half of the people living in the United States will develop mental illness, with the young being hit the hardest.
Twenty-seven other countries were completing studies similar to the $20 million U.S. effort, but the United States was poised to be No. 1 in the world in mental illness.
"We lead the world in a lot of good things, but we're also leaders in this one particular domain that we'd rather not be," lead researcher Ronald Kessler told the Washington Post.
Researchers reported results of the study in four articles in the June issue of Archives of General Psychiatry."
Read the entire article
"26 percent of U.S. suffers mental disorder
By UPI, BETHESDA, Md., June 7, 2005
Twenty-six percent of U.S. residents had symptoms of a mental disorder in the past year but only 17 percent got professional help, a landmark study concludes.
Six percent had such severe problems they could not function normally for an average of three months, concludes the study by the National Institute of Mental Health in Bethesda, Md., the University of Michigan and Harvard University.
The study, which conducted face-to-face interviews with 9,282 randomly selected people, concludes half of the people living in the United States will develop mental illness, with the young being hit the hardest.
Twenty-seven other countries were completing studies similar to the $20 million U.S. effort, but the United States was poised to be No. 1 in the world in mental illness.
"We lead the world in a lot of good things, but we're also leaders in this one particular domain that we'd rather not be," lead researcher Ronald Kessler told the Washington Post.
Researchers reported results of the study in four articles in the June issue of Archives of General Psychiatry."
Read the entire article
Sunday, June 05, 2005
UN and firms team up to tackle hunger
UN and firms team up to tackle hunger
"UN and firms team up to tackle hunger
A new map released this week highlights global crisis points and success stories.
By Abraham McLaughlin | Staff writer of The Christian Science Monitor, June 03, 2005
JOHANNESBURG, SOUTH AFRICA - The figures are almost too big to comprehend: 800 million of the world's 6.4 billion people go through their days hungry. About 300 million of them are children.
But a new map released this week by the United Nations and partner organizations puts a finer point on those numbers. It's a country-by-country survey of hunger around the world. And it arrives at a time of fresh focus on hunger and poverty in places like Zimbabwe and Congo - and on how corporations are stepping up to help fight food shortages. It also highlights some surprising findings:
- Eritrea has the highest rate of undernourishment in Africa - 73 percent. That's far higher than the 46 percent rate in neighboring Ethiopia, which is notorious for its hunger problems.
- Marxist North Korea has an undernourishment rate of 36 percent, significantly lower than the 47 percent rate in Haiti, in America's backyard. (Tajikistan and Yemen round out the only four countries outside Africa that have undernourished rates higher than 35 percent.)
- South African transportation giant TNT provided trucks, airplanes, and staff in 2003 to help bring 33 tons of supplies to refugees in Chad who had fled fighting in Sudan's Darfur province.
The interactive version of the map (go here and under the "social" pull-down menu, select "hunger") also highlights things like how countries now facing the same amounts of undernourishment can be on divergent paths: In Southern Africa, for instance, Zambia has an undernourishment rate of 49 percent; neighboring Mozambique has a similar rate of 47 percent. But hunger in Zambia is growing worse, while Mozambique is showing progress.
The map was released in Cape Town, South Africa, at the Africa Economic Summit, which is focusing on the continent's business prospects. It also highlights how corporations are joining the global fight against hunger."
Read the entire article
"UN and firms team up to tackle hunger
A new map released this week highlights global crisis points and success stories.
By Abraham McLaughlin | Staff writer of The Christian Science Monitor, June 03, 2005
JOHANNESBURG, SOUTH AFRICA - The figures are almost too big to comprehend: 800 million of the world's 6.4 billion people go through their days hungry. About 300 million of them are children.
But a new map released this week by the United Nations and partner organizations puts a finer point on those numbers. It's a country-by-country survey of hunger around the world. And it arrives at a time of fresh focus on hunger and poverty in places like Zimbabwe and Congo - and on how corporations are stepping up to help fight food shortages. It also highlights some surprising findings:
- Eritrea has the highest rate of undernourishment in Africa - 73 percent. That's far higher than the 46 percent rate in neighboring Ethiopia, which is notorious for its hunger problems.
- Marxist North Korea has an undernourishment rate of 36 percent, significantly lower than the 47 percent rate in Haiti, in America's backyard. (Tajikistan and Yemen round out the only four countries outside Africa that have undernourished rates higher than 35 percent.)
- South African transportation giant TNT provided trucks, airplanes, and staff in 2003 to help bring 33 tons of supplies to refugees in Chad who had fled fighting in Sudan's Darfur province.
The interactive version of the map (go here and under the "social" pull-down menu, select "hunger") also highlights things like how countries now facing the same amounts of undernourishment can be on divergent paths: In Southern Africa, for instance, Zambia has an undernourishment rate of 49 percent; neighboring Mozambique has a similar rate of 47 percent. But hunger in Zambia is growing worse, while Mozambique is showing progress.
The map was released in Cape Town, South Africa, at the Africa Economic Summit, which is focusing on the continent's business prospects. It also highlights how corporations are joining the global fight against hunger."
Read the entire article
Saturday, June 04, 2005
Atlas reveals global devastation
Atlas reveals global devastation
"Atlas reveals global devastation
Saturday, June 4, 2005
LONDON, England (Reuters) -- The devastating impact of mankind on the planet is dramatically illustrated in pictures published on Saturday showing explosive urban sprawl, major deforestation and the sucking dry of inland seas over less than three decades.
Mexico City mushrooms from a modest urban center in 1973 to a massive blot on the landscape in 2000, while Beijing shows a similar surge between 1978 and 2000 in satellite pictures published by the United Nations in a new environmental atlas.
Delhi sprawls explosively between 1977 and 1999, while from 1973 to 2000 the tiny desert town of Las Vegas turns into a monster conurbation of one million people -- placing massive strain on scarce water supplies.
"If there is one message from this atlas it is that we are all part of this. We can all make a difference," U.N. expert Kaveh Zahedi told reporters at the launch of the "One Planet Many People" atlas on the eve of World Environment Day.
Page after page of the 300-page book illustrate in before-and-after pictures from space the disfigurement of the face of the planet wrought by human activities.
U.N. Environment Program chief Klaus Toepfer has chosen efforts to make cities greener as this year's theme for World Environment Day on Sunday on the basis that the world is becoming increasingly urbanized.
"Cities pull in huge amounts of resources including water, food, timber, metals and people. They export large amounts of wastes including household and industrial wastes, wastewater and the gases linked with global warming," he said in a statement.
"Thus their impacts stretch beyond their physical borders affecting countries, regions and the planet as a whole.
"So the battle for sustainable development, for delivering a more environmentally stable, just and healthier world, is going to be largely won and lost in our cities," Toepfer added.
The destruction of swathes of mangroves in the Gulf of Fonseca off Honduras to make way for extensive shrimp farms shows up clearly in the pictures.
The atlas makes the point that not only has it left the estuary bereft of the natural coastal defense provided by the mangroves, but the shrimp themselves have been linked to pollution and widespread damage to the area's ecosystem.
And images of the wholesale destruction of vital rainforest around Iguazu Falls -- one of South America's most spectacular waterfalls -- on the borders between Argentina, Brazil and Paraguay evoke comparisons with a bulldozer on a rampage.
"These illustrate some of the changes we have made to our environment," Zahedi said. "This is a visual tool to capture people's imaginations showing what is really happening."
"It serves as an early warning," he added.
Read at the original source
"Atlas reveals global devastation
Saturday, June 4, 2005
LONDON, England (Reuters) -- The devastating impact of mankind on the planet is dramatically illustrated in pictures published on Saturday showing explosive urban sprawl, major deforestation and the sucking dry of inland seas over less than three decades.
Mexico City mushrooms from a modest urban center in 1973 to a massive blot on the landscape in 2000, while Beijing shows a similar surge between 1978 and 2000 in satellite pictures published by the United Nations in a new environmental atlas.
Delhi sprawls explosively between 1977 and 1999, while from 1973 to 2000 the tiny desert town of Las Vegas turns into a monster conurbation of one million people -- placing massive strain on scarce water supplies.
"If there is one message from this atlas it is that we are all part of this. We can all make a difference," U.N. expert Kaveh Zahedi told reporters at the launch of the "One Planet Many People" atlas on the eve of World Environment Day.
Page after page of the 300-page book illustrate in before-and-after pictures from space the disfigurement of the face of the planet wrought by human activities.
U.N. Environment Program chief Klaus Toepfer has chosen efforts to make cities greener as this year's theme for World Environment Day on Sunday on the basis that the world is becoming increasingly urbanized.
"Cities pull in huge amounts of resources including water, food, timber, metals and people. They export large amounts of wastes including household and industrial wastes, wastewater and the gases linked with global warming," he said in a statement.
"Thus their impacts stretch beyond their physical borders affecting countries, regions and the planet as a whole.
"So the battle for sustainable development, for delivering a more environmentally stable, just and healthier world, is going to be largely won and lost in our cities," Toepfer added.
The destruction of swathes of mangroves in the Gulf of Fonseca off Honduras to make way for extensive shrimp farms shows up clearly in the pictures.
The atlas makes the point that not only has it left the estuary bereft of the natural coastal defense provided by the mangroves, but the shrimp themselves have been linked to pollution and widespread damage to the area's ecosystem.
And images of the wholesale destruction of vital rainforest around Iguazu Falls -- one of South America's most spectacular waterfalls -- on the borders between Argentina, Brazil and Paraguay evoke comparisons with a bulldozer on a rampage.
"These illustrate some of the changes we have made to our environment," Zahedi said. "This is a visual tool to capture people's imaginations showing what is really happening."
"It serves as an early warning," he added.
Read at the original source
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)