Jack Dini
Livermore, California
(From a series on Unintended Consequences)
Acetylene could perhaps take the prize for how knowledge, intuitiveness, serendipity, and a mix of unintended consequences all came together in various parts of the world at different times to produce a variety of unexpected materials. In 1892, Canadian researchers Thomas Willson and James Morehead, attempted to produce aluminum in an electric furnace. They started with a mixture of coal tar and lime reasoning that the lime would be converted to calcium which, in turn, would strip the oxide away from aluminum oxide leaving pure aluminum. Upon opening the furnace they saw a dark residue, not the shiny aluminum they were expecting. When the mixture was thrown into a stream near their lab (this was long before the days of environmental concerns and regulations), bubbles formed and a plume of water shot into the air. They had discovered calcium carbide and acetylene. (1) On the other side of the world, Henri Moissan, a Frenchman trying to make artificial diamonds also discovered calcium carbide and acetylene. (2) But these scientists weren’t the first in this area of invention. Friedrich Wohler, a professor of chemistry at the University of Gottingen, had made calcium carbide around 1862 by heating calcium with charcoal to a high temperature. He observed that it formed acetylene when it reacted with water. However, his method of making the materials wasn’t efficient, so the discovery lay dormant until the 1890s, the era of the gaslight. (1) When it was realized that acetylene burned with a far more brilliant flame than kerosene, and efficient ways of making carbide were available, a vast new market opened up. As Joe Schwarcz reports, “By 1895 Thomas Willson had founded the company that eventually became Union Carbide, one of the biggest chemical companies in the world. Soon consumers were able to purchase lamps based on calcium carbide, clever devices in which water dripped into a container of carbide and generated acetylene gas. This gas, in turn, flowed to a nozzle where it could be ignited. A mirrored surface behind the flame increased the intensity of the light.” (3)
Then Thomas Edison came along with his electric light and the bottom dropped out of the acetylene market. Enter Fritz Klatte, working in Stuttgart at Greisham Electron. He was trying to find a material for weatherproofing aircraft wings. Working with a mixture of acetylene, hydrogen chloride, and mercury, he was unsuccessful, and set the mixture on a sunny window sill. Later he noticed that it formed a milky sludge which eventually turned solid. He convinced his firm to file a patent on the mixture and they did, but nothing was done to commercialize the discovery. In 1925 the patent lapsed. (4) It should also be noted, that as with acetylene, PVC had originally been discovered long before Klatte came along. French physicist Henri Victor Regnault was the original discoverer in 1835 but nothing was done with the product.
Back to Klatte. A year after his patent expired (1926), an American chemist, Waldo Semon, working at B. F. Goodrich, independently reinvented PVC. He envisioned that this material would make a perfect shower curtain so he and his colleagues at Goodrich patented the process (Klatte’s team apparently never filed for a patent outside Germany). It turns out PVC was much more than shower curtain material. It became the forerunner of many plastics without which modern industrialized nations could no longer function. (5)
These days PVC is everywhere. It’s one of the most widely used plastics in the world. It is also the cheapest and probably the most versatile plastic. Some uses include pipe and pipe fittings (the largest scale use), floppy computer discs, garden hose, building sidings, wire and cable insulation, food packaging, automobile seat covers, shower curtains, and many other household uses. (6)
Other Uses For Acetylene
In 1895, the same year Willson established his company, French chemist Henry-Louis Chatelier, discovered that when acetylene was burned with an equal volume of oxygen, a flame with a temperature over 3000 C was obtained. This temperature, high enough to melt steel, was much higher than achievable with any other gas and introduced the concept of welding. Oxyacetylene welding was a boon to the construction industry and is widely used today.
Joe Schwarcz adds, “About half of all acetylene produced today goes towards the production of other organic chemicals. Adding hydrogen cyanide to acetylene, for example, yields acrylonitrile, which is used in the production of acrylic fibers. Acetylene can also be converted into vinyl acetylene, which is the raw material needed for the manufacture of neoprene, one of the most useful synthetic rubbers.” (7) But once again, this wasn’t a finding that came easily or was predictable. Wallace Carothers, a chemist at Du Pont challenged one of his assistants, Arnold Collins, to make synthetic rubber. You guessed it—acetylene was the key starting material. Reacting it with hydrochloric acid produced something they called vinylacetylene, and one weekend when a mixture was left setting in a flask, by the following Monday it had turned into a tiny, cauliflower-type mass. Sharon Bertsch McGrayne notes, “Collins stuck a wire into the glass vessel and fished a few cubic centimeters of the substance out. It felt strong, resilient, and elastic, much like vulcanized rubber. Almost without thinking, Collins threw the mass against his laboratory bench. It bounced like a golf ball. Collins had made chloroprene in his test tube, and over the weekend it had spontaneously polymerized into the high-grade synthetic rubber that Du Pont would market as Neoprene.” (8)
DuPont promoted it cleverly as a specialty rubber, more durable than natural rubber and more resistant to oil, gasoline, solvents, sunlight, and heat. Neoprene was also great for making balloons, like the ones used in Macy’s Thanksgiving Day parade. It also gave chemists the impetus to develop other synthetic rubbers. (7)
So from experiments originally intended to produce aluminum in one case and cheap diamonds in another, acetylene, a key player in the plastics, chemistry, and metallurgical industries, was discovered. This then led to PVC and other plastics, many organic chemicals, and oxyacetylene welding. Besides all this, both acetylene and PVC had been discovered a number of times before their value was really known. Is there any doubt why this should not put acetylene at, or near the top of the unintended consequences list?
References
1.Joe Schwarcz, The Genie in the Bottle, (New York, Henry Holt & Company, 2002), 154
2.James Burke, Connections, (Boston, Little, Brown & Company, 1978), 209
3.Joe Schwarcz, The Genie in the Bottle, 155
4.James Burke, Circles, (New York, Simon & Schuster, 2000), 220
5.“Poly(vinyl chloride),” http://www.pslc.ws/mactest/pvc.htm
6.Royston M. Roberts, Serendipity, (New York, John Wiley & Sons, 1989), 185
7.Joe Schwarcz, The Genie in the Bottle, 156
8.Sharon Bertsch McGrayne, Prometheans in the Lab, (New York, McGraw-Hill, 2001), 131
Sunday, June 22, 2008
Wednesday, May 28, 2008
Global Warming Goes Round and Round
Jack Dini
Livermore, CA
(From Hawaii Reporter, May 28, 2008)
A very powerful case that the climate trend we’re currently seeing is part of a product of a solar-linked cycle that creates harmless naturally warmer conditions approximately every 1500 years is made in a recent book, Unstoppable Global Warming: Every 1500 Years, by S. Fred Singer and Dennis T. Avery. It has 459 references, a glossary and an index. This well written book is arguably the best book to date on the politics and science of global warming. In addition to presenting evidence for the 1,500 year solar cycle, first proposed by European researchers in the mid 1990s, the authors address both the Greenhouse and Solar/Cosmic Ray theories of climate change.(1) Singer and Avery maintain that there are natural cycles of cooling and warming going back at least a million years. These are small excursions of global temperature, much smaller than the ice ages, which is why they haven’t been noticed until the last 25 years or so.
This was reported in 1984 with the first analysis from the Greenland ice cores. Willi Dansgaard and Hans Oescher published their analysis of the oxygen isotopes in the ice cores extracted from Greenland. These cores provided 250,000 years of the Earth’s climate history in one set of ‘documents.’ The scientists compared the ratio of ‘heavy’ oxygen-18 isotopes to the ‘lighter’ oxygen-16 isotopes, which indicated the temperature at the time the snow had fallen. (2) As Singer and Avery report, “They expected to find evidence of the known 90,000 year Ice Ages and the mild interglacial periods recorded in the ice, and they did. However, they did not expect to find anything in between. To their surprise, they found a clear cycle—moderate, albeit abrupt—occurring about every 2,550 years running persistently through both. (This period would soon be reassessed at 1,500 years plus or minus 500 years.)” (3)
Since this early discovery, its fingerprints have been found all over the world, both in ice cores and sediments. (4)
- An ice core from the Antarctic’s Vostok Glacier, at the other end of the world from Greenland, was brought up in 1987 and showed the same 1,500 year climate cycle throughout its 400,000 year length.
- The 1,500 year cycle has been revealed in seabed sediment cores brought up from the floors of such far-flung waters as the North Atlantic Ocean and the Arabian Sea, the Western Pacific, and the Sargasso Sea.
- One seabed core near Iceland goes back a million years, and the 1,500 year cycle runs through the whole million years, roughly 600 of these moderate, natural cycles.
Over the last 1,200 years there has been a “Medieval Warming” (900-1300), when Greenland was green; a “Little Ice Age” (1300-1850), when New York harbor froze and people could walk from Manhattan across the ice to Staten Island a mile away (in 1780); and the current global warming (1850-??). Rather than ‘global warming,’ a better term for this phase of the solar cycle is “Modern Warming.” Since 1850, temperatures have risen 0.8 degrees C, most rapidly in 1850-1870 and 1920-1940. Temperatures in the 1,500 year solar cycle fluctuate within a 4 degree C range—two degrees above and two degrees below the norm. An added important point is that three-fourths of the present warming occurred before 1940, which was before most of the human emitted carbon dioxide we hear so much about these days.
So today’s global warming is part of a natural 1,500-year plus or minus 500-year cycle operating for at least a million years. The Earth’s climate has warmed and cooled nine times in the past 12,000 years in lock step with the waxing and waning of the sun’s magnetic activity. (5) The linkage with the sun has been verified by correlation between the Carbon 14 and Beryllium 10 isotopes in the ice with sunspot numbers.
The modern warming is not confined to this planet. Mars ice caps are melting and Jupiter is developing a second giant red spot, an enormous hurricane-like storm. Jupiter’s original Great Red Spot is 300 years old and twice the size of Earth. The new storm-Red Spot Jr. -is thought to be the result of a sudden warming on our solar system’s largest planet. Some parts of Jupiter are now as much as 6 C warmer than just a few years ago. (6) Neptune’s moon, Triton has heated up significantly since 1989. Parts of its frozen nitrogen surface have begun melting and turning to gas. (7) Even Pluto has warmed slightly in recent years, if you can call -230 C warmer than
-233 C.
All of this prompts Lorne Gunter to ask, “Is there something all these heavenly bodies have in common? Some one thing they all share that could be causing them to warm in unison? Hmmmm, is there some, giant, self-luminous ball of burning gas with a mass more than 300,000 times that of Earth and a core temperature of more than 20 million degrees C, that for the past century or more has been unusually active and powerful? Is there something like that around which they can all revolve that could be causing global warming?” (6)
Singer and Avery also cover a number of other issues:
- A particularly interesting chapter focuses on common sense regarding the extinction of species. The authors explain that most of the world’s animal species evolved 600 million years ago, so we know most of today’s species have successfully dealt with ice ages and global warming periods that have sent temperatures much higher and much lower than today’s temperatures. (8)
- The authors look at history and confirm that the frequency and severity of hurricanes, droughts, thunderstorms, hail and tornadoes have not increased in recent years. (9) John Christy of the University of Alabama at Huntsville, in testimony before Congress noted, ‘that the most significant droughts in the Southwestern United States occurred more than four hundred years ago, before 1600.’ He stated that before 1850, American’s Great Plains were called the ‘Great American Desert,’ and experts at the time said the region couldn’t be farmed. Weather just seems unusual and dangerous these days, said Christy, because of the increased media coverage of major storms.
Summary
Jay Lehr sums it up quite well, “Singer and Avery shatter the greenhouse gas theory, making it clear humanity’s modest addition to the atmosphere’s small amount of carbon dioxide does not hold up to a significant alteration in temperature. Obviously, all of this does not square with efforts to get us to reduce our use of cars, air conditioners, and fertilizer in order to reduce carbon in our atmosphere.” (10) So, regardless of what you do to reduce your carbon footprint, Mother Nature really doesn’t care.
References
1.S. Fred Singer and Dennis T. Avery, Unstoppable Global Warming, (New York, Rowman & Littlefield publishers, 2008), 24
2.W. Dansgaard et al., “North Atlantic Climatic Oscillations Revealed by Deep Greenland Ice Cores,” in Climate Processes and Climate Sensitivity, J. E. Hansen and T. Takahashi, Editors, (Washington, DC, American Geophysical Union, 1984) Geophysical Monograph 29, 288-90
3.S. Fred Singer and Dennis T. Avery, Unstoppable Global Warming, 2
4.S. Fred Singer and Dennis T. Avery, Unstoppable Global Warming, 3
5.Gerard Bond et al., “Persistent Solar Influence on North Atlantic Climate During the Holocene,” Science, 294, 2130, December 10, 2001
6.Lorne Gunter, “Breaking: Warming on Jupiter, Mars, Pluto, Neptune’s Moon & Earth Linked to Increased Solar Activity, Scientists Say,” National Post, March 13, 2007
7.J. L. Elliot, et al., “Global Warming on Triton,” Nature, 393, 765, June 25, 1998
8.S. Fred Singer and Dennis T. Avery, Unstoppable Global Warming, 163
9.S. Fred Singer and Dennis T. Avery, Unstoppable Global Warming, 201
10.Jay Lehr, “Careful Review of Science Refutes Global Warming Myths,” Environment & Climate News, 10, 12, March 2007
Livermore, CA
(From Hawaii Reporter, May 28, 2008)
A very powerful case that the climate trend we’re currently seeing is part of a product of a solar-linked cycle that creates harmless naturally warmer conditions approximately every 1500 years is made in a recent book, Unstoppable Global Warming: Every 1500 Years, by S. Fred Singer and Dennis T. Avery. It has 459 references, a glossary and an index. This well written book is arguably the best book to date on the politics and science of global warming. In addition to presenting evidence for the 1,500 year solar cycle, first proposed by European researchers in the mid 1990s, the authors address both the Greenhouse and Solar/Cosmic Ray theories of climate change.(1) Singer and Avery maintain that there are natural cycles of cooling and warming going back at least a million years. These are small excursions of global temperature, much smaller than the ice ages, which is why they haven’t been noticed until the last 25 years or so.
This was reported in 1984 with the first analysis from the Greenland ice cores. Willi Dansgaard and Hans Oescher published their analysis of the oxygen isotopes in the ice cores extracted from Greenland. These cores provided 250,000 years of the Earth’s climate history in one set of ‘documents.’ The scientists compared the ratio of ‘heavy’ oxygen-18 isotopes to the ‘lighter’ oxygen-16 isotopes, which indicated the temperature at the time the snow had fallen. (2) As Singer and Avery report, “They expected to find evidence of the known 90,000 year Ice Ages and the mild interglacial periods recorded in the ice, and they did. However, they did not expect to find anything in between. To their surprise, they found a clear cycle—moderate, albeit abrupt—occurring about every 2,550 years running persistently through both. (This period would soon be reassessed at 1,500 years plus or minus 500 years.)” (3)
Since this early discovery, its fingerprints have been found all over the world, both in ice cores and sediments. (4)
- An ice core from the Antarctic’s Vostok Glacier, at the other end of the world from Greenland, was brought up in 1987 and showed the same 1,500 year climate cycle throughout its 400,000 year length.
- The 1,500 year cycle has been revealed in seabed sediment cores brought up from the floors of such far-flung waters as the North Atlantic Ocean and the Arabian Sea, the Western Pacific, and the Sargasso Sea.
- One seabed core near Iceland goes back a million years, and the 1,500 year cycle runs through the whole million years, roughly 600 of these moderate, natural cycles.
Over the last 1,200 years there has been a “Medieval Warming” (900-1300), when Greenland was green; a “Little Ice Age” (1300-1850), when New York harbor froze and people could walk from Manhattan across the ice to Staten Island a mile away (in 1780); and the current global warming (1850-??). Rather than ‘global warming,’ a better term for this phase of the solar cycle is “Modern Warming.” Since 1850, temperatures have risen 0.8 degrees C, most rapidly in 1850-1870 and 1920-1940. Temperatures in the 1,500 year solar cycle fluctuate within a 4 degree C range—two degrees above and two degrees below the norm. An added important point is that three-fourths of the present warming occurred before 1940, which was before most of the human emitted carbon dioxide we hear so much about these days.
So today’s global warming is part of a natural 1,500-year plus or minus 500-year cycle operating for at least a million years. The Earth’s climate has warmed and cooled nine times in the past 12,000 years in lock step with the waxing and waning of the sun’s magnetic activity. (5) The linkage with the sun has been verified by correlation between the Carbon 14 and Beryllium 10 isotopes in the ice with sunspot numbers.
The modern warming is not confined to this planet. Mars ice caps are melting and Jupiter is developing a second giant red spot, an enormous hurricane-like storm. Jupiter’s original Great Red Spot is 300 years old and twice the size of Earth. The new storm-Red Spot Jr. -is thought to be the result of a sudden warming on our solar system’s largest planet. Some parts of Jupiter are now as much as 6 C warmer than just a few years ago. (6) Neptune’s moon, Triton has heated up significantly since 1989. Parts of its frozen nitrogen surface have begun melting and turning to gas. (7) Even Pluto has warmed slightly in recent years, if you can call -230 C warmer than
-233 C.
All of this prompts Lorne Gunter to ask, “Is there something all these heavenly bodies have in common? Some one thing they all share that could be causing them to warm in unison? Hmmmm, is there some, giant, self-luminous ball of burning gas with a mass more than 300,000 times that of Earth and a core temperature of more than 20 million degrees C, that for the past century or more has been unusually active and powerful? Is there something like that around which they can all revolve that could be causing global warming?” (6)
Singer and Avery also cover a number of other issues:
- A particularly interesting chapter focuses on common sense regarding the extinction of species. The authors explain that most of the world’s animal species evolved 600 million years ago, so we know most of today’s species have successfully dealt with ice ages and global warming periods that have sent temperatures much higher and much lower than today’s temperatures. (8)
- The authors look at history and confirm that the frequency and severity of hurricanes, droughts, thunderstorms, hail and tornadoes have not increased in recent years. (9) John Christy of the University of Alabama at Huntsville, in testimony before Congress noted, ‘that the most significant droughts in the Southwestern United States occurred more than four hundred years ago, before 1600.’ He stated that before 1850, American’s Great Plains were called the ‘Great American Desert,’ and experts at the time said the region couldn’t be farmed. Weather just seems unusual and dangerous these days, said Christy, because of the increased media coverage of major storms.
Summary
Jay Lehr sums it up quite well, “Singer and Avery shatter the greenhouse gas theory, making it clear humanity’s modest addition to the atmosphere’s small amount of carbon dioxide does not hold up to a significant alteration in temperature. Obviously, all of this does not square with efforts to get us to reduce our use of cars, air conditioners, and fertilizer in order to reduce carbon in our atmosphere.” (10) So, regardless of what you do to reduce your carbon footprint, Mother Nature really doesn’t care.
References
1.S. Fred Singer and Dennis T. Avery, Unstoppable Global Warming, (New York, Rowman & Littlefield publishers, 2008), 24
2.W. Dansgaard et al., “North Atlantic Climatic Oscillations Revealed by Deep Greenland Ice Cores,” in Climate Processes and Climate Sensitivity, J. E. Hansen and T. Takahashi, Editors, (Washington, DC, American Geophysical Union, 1984) Geophysical Monograph 29, 288-90
3.S. Fred Singer and Dennis T. Avery, Unstoppable Global Warming, 2
4.S. Fred Singer and Dennis T. Avery, Unstoppable Global Warming, 3
5.Gerard Bond et al., “Persistent Solar Influence on North Atlantic Climate During the Holocene,” Science, 294, 2130, December 10, 2001
6.Lorne Gunter, “Breaking: Warming on Jupiter, Mars, Pluto, Neptune’s Moon & Earth Linked to Increased Solar Activity, Scientists Say,” National Post, March 13, 2007
7.J. L. Elliot, et al., “Global Warming on Triton,” Nature, 393, 765, June 25, 1998
8.S. Fred Singer and Dennis T. Avery, Unstoppable Global Warming, 163
9.S. Fred Singer and Dennis T. Avery, Unstoppable Global Warming, 201
10.Jay Lehr, “Careful Review of Science Refutes Global Warming Myths,” Environment & Climate News, 10, 12, March 2007
Thursday, May 15, 2008
Looking For Germs? Check Your Money.
Jack Dini
Livermore, CA
(From Hawaii Reporter, May 15, 2008)
The legal tender in your pocket or purse definitely carries some germs and most likely also has some cocaine. Researchers at the Wright-Patterson Air Force Base in Ohio collected 68 dollar bills from people at a grocery store and a high-school sporting event. According to Dr. Peter Ender, lead researcher, sixty-four (94%) of the bills were contaminated with bacteria known to cause either serious or mild illness. Five bills (7%) were found to be contaminated with bacteria which can cause infections in healthy people. Those bacteria included Staphylococcus aureus and Klebsiella pneumoniae, both of which can cause pneumonia or blood infections. Fifty-nine bills were contaminated with bacteria that are usually harmless in healthy individuals, but can still trigger serious illness in those with depressed immune systems, such as people undergoing various types of medical treatment or those with HIV. (1) However, Ender stressed that real health risks to the average consumer are pretty low, adding that US dollar bills may be no more or less covered in microbial goo than, say, doorknobs, pens, or computer keyboards. But he points out that US currency, especially ‘finds its way into all areas of the world.’ “With the rapid dissemination of money in the era of drug-resistant bacteria, perhaps a resistance clone could be spread from one geographic location to another,” he concludes. (2)
Philip Turner adds, “Many studies, including two of my own, have shown that money can be effective for germ transaction. ABC’s “20/20” asked me to help them prepare a segment on this issue, and I devised a plan for collecting money from street vendors, shops, restaurants, and other establishments in Chicago, New York City, and Washington, DC. After each transaction, the bills received were put directly into newly purchased wallets, which were then sealed in plastic. The bills were tested and found to be contaminated with germs of fecal, respiratory, and skin origin. Although the risk of contracting a serious infection from dirty money is low, the germ count is high enough to make it easy to contract a cold, a bout of diarrhea, and similar ailments.” (3)
Depending on where you are in the world you might get a different reaction to this issue. Disease experts in northeastern India issued a recent report that said ‘overused and soiled’ currency can transmit tuberculosis, pneumonia and other lung infections. British health authorities and travel guides regularly warn tourists in the region to wash their hand following every financial transaction. (4)
By contrast, Dr. Frank Vriesekoop, from Ballarat University in Australia, reported that there are generally very few pathogenic bacteria on banknotes and coins. He found low levels of common bacteria on the currency that were traded through various food outlets in Australia and New Zealand. He claims that it would be impossible for them to cause diseases like diarrhea, vomiting, or other gastric symptoms as usually believed, as their numbers were so insignificantly small, and that fears about currency hygiene were unwarranted. (5)
So, what can you do? Well, thorough washing of your hands is most important. Or, you could travel to Japan or Australia. In Japan you can go to a ‘clean ATM’ and get your yen pressed between rollers for one-tenth of a second at 392 F, enough to kill many bacteria. (6)
The dirtiness of bills in one reason Australia is leading the charge to use a plastic currency that is supposed to be inhospitable to both germs and counterfeiters and four times as durable as paper notes. Australia introduced the rubber-feeling bills in 1998 and now prints them for 33 other countries, including Romania, Malaysia, and Mexico. (7)
Another option is to launder your money—literally, like the Industrial and Commercial Bank of China, which took emergency action in an effort to stop the spread of SARS. They put into effect a policy of holding money for twenty-four hours before re-circulating it—long enough for the germs to die. Money is also sterilized by being placed under ultraviolet light for an hour. (1)
Or, you could just carry coins. Patricia Gadsby reports that anything that is very hard and dry isn’t terribly hospitable to bacteria, and many metals have antibacterial activity. Pennies often are sterile, presumably due to the copper, and most US coins are also about 75 percent copper. (6)
Best recommendation is perhaps from Laura Lee, “Then again, none of these extreme measures is really necessary, say the experts. Although the germs on money have the potential to contaminate people, there are no documented cases that it has. Instead of avoiding or cleaning money, the best protection is to wash your hands regularly.” (1)
Cocaine
“The probability that every single person in the United States is carrying drug-tainted money is almost certain,” says Dr. James Woodford, forensic chemist from Atlanta. Woodford cites a 1989 experiment by Miami toxicologist Dr. William Hearn, who gathered 136 dollar bills from banks in twelve cities. Of these 131 had traces of cocaine.
A study conducted at the Houston Advanced Research Center in Texas and the Argonne National Laboratory in Illinois examined currency (mostly singles, but also fives, tens, and twenties) in Miami, Chicago, and Houston. This project found an overall 70 to 80 percent contamination rate in the three cities, with single dollar bills more commonly contaminated than the higher denominations. Overall, the more worn the bills, the more coke was found on them. In very old bills, the contamination rate was closer to 90 percent. A recent look at money circulating in northern Illinois, found even higher rates: close to 93 percent of the sample, and 100 percent of the $20 bills tested positive for cocaine. “In fact, most Americans handle small amounts of cocaine every day, not as packets sold by drug dealers, but on the dollar bills that line their pockets,” were conclusions from this study. (6)
J. Oyler and colleagues reported that cocaine was present in 79% of currency samples analyzed in amounts above 0.1 microgram and in 54% of the currency in amounts above 1.0 microgram. Contamination was widespread and was found in single dollar bills from a number of US cities. Cocaine amounts were highly variable and ranged from nanogram to milligram amounts. The highest amount of cocaine detected on a single dollar bill was 1327 milligrams. These results indicated that cocaine contamination of currency is widespread throughout the United States. (9) The reason for this contamination relates to the exchange of illicit cocaine for money by drug dealers. During this exchange there is ample opportunity for paper currency to become contaminated.
Should you worry? Not at all. Cocaine on cash is so commonplace that the courts have ruled that police can no longer use a drug-sniffing dog’s signal to nab a suspect or to confiscate money because it’s deemed drug-related. (7)
References
1.Laura Lee, 100 Most Dangerous Things in Everyday Life, (New York, Broadway Books, 2004), 140
2.“Bacteria Study Gives New Meaning to ‘Dirty Money’”, Reuters, May 23, 2001
3.Philip M. Turner, The Secret Life of Germs, (New York, Pocket Books, 2001), 104
4.Steve Newman, “Currency Health Risk,” San Francisco Chronicle, May 4, 2002, Page C10
5.“Research Shows That Money May Not Harbor Many Pathogenic Bacteria,” medindia.com, July 13, 2006
6.Patricia Gadsby, “Filthy lucre-money is contaminated with bacteria,” Discover, 19, 76, October 1998
7.Carol X. Vinzant, “The Secret Life of the Dollar,” money.aol.com; accessed January 30, 2008
8.Kathryn Garfield, “Stinking Lucre,” Discover, 28, 15, February 2007
9.J. Oyler, W. D. Darwin, and E. J. Crane, “Cocaine contamination of United States paper currency,” J. Anal. Toxicol., 20, 213, 1996
Livermore, CA
(From Hawaii Reporter, May 15, 2008)
The legal tender in your pocket or purse definitely carries some germs and most likely also has some cocaine. Researchers at the Wright-Patterson Air Force Base in Ohio collected 68 dollar bills from people at a grocery store and a high-school sporting event. According to Dr. Peter Ender, lead researcher, sixty-four (94%) of the bills were contaminated with bacteria known to cause either serious or mild illness. Five bills (7%) were found to be contaminated with bacteria which can cause infections in healthy people. Those bacteria included Staphylococcus aureus and Klebsiella pneumoniae, both of which can cause pneumonia or blood infections. Fifty-nine bills were contaminated with bacteria that are usually harmless in healthy individuals, but can still trigger serious illness in those with depressed immune systems, such as people undergoing various types of medical treatment or those with HIV. (1) However, Ender stressed that real health risks to the average consumer are pretty low, adding that US dollar bills may be no more or less covered in microbial goo than, say, doorknobs, pens, or computer keyboards. But he points out that US currency, especially ‘finds its way into all areas of the world.’ “With the rapid dissemination of money in the era of drug-resistant bacteria, perhaps a resistance clone could be spread from one geographic location to another,” he concludes. (2)
Philip Turner adds, “Many studies, including two of my own, have shown that money can be effective for germ transaction. ABC’s “20/20” asked me to help them prepare a segment on this issue, and I devised a plan for collecting money from street vendors, shops, restaurants, and other establishments in Chicago, New York City, and Washington, DC. After each transaction, the bills received were put directly into newly purchased wallets, which were then sealed in plastic. The bills were tested and found to be contaminated with germs of fecal, respiratory, and skin origin. Although the risk of contracting a serious infection from dirty money is low, the germ count is high enough to make it easy to contract a cold, a bout of diarrhea, and similar ailments.” (3)
Depending on where you are in the world you might get a different reaction to this issue. Disease experts in northeastern India issued a recent report that said ‘overused and soiled’ currency can transmit tuberculosis, pneumonia and other lung infections. British health authorities and travel guides regularly warn tourists in the region to wash their hand following every financial transaction. (4)
By contrast, Dr. Frank Vriesekoop, from Ballarat University in Australia, reported that there are generally very few pathogenic bacteria on banknotes and coins. He found low levels of common bacteria on the currency that were traded through various food outlets in Australia and New Zealand. He claims that it would be impossible for them to cause diseases like diarrhea, vomiting, or other gastric symptoms as usually believed, as their numbers were so insignificantly small, and that fears about currency hygiene were unwarranted. (5)
So, what can you do? Well, thorough washing of your hands is most important. Or, you could travel to Japan or Australia. In Japan you can go to a ‘clean ATM’ and get your yen pressed between rollers for one-tenth of a second at 392 F, enough to kill many bacteria. (6)
The dirtiness of bills in one reason Australia is leading the charge to use a plastic currency that is supposed to be inhospitable to both germs and counterfeiters and four times as durable as paper notes. Australia introduced the rubber-feeling bills in 1998 and now prints them for 33 other countries, including Romania, Malaysia, and Mexico. (7)
Another option is to launder your money—literally, like the Industrial and Commercial Bank of China, which took emergency action in an effort to stop the spread of SARS. They put into effect a policy of holding money for twenty-four hours before re-circulating it—long enough for the germs to die. Money is also sterilized by being placed under ultraviolet light for an hour. (1)
Or, you could just carry coins. Patricia Gadsby reports that anything that is very hard and dry isn’t terribly hospitable to bacteria, and many metals have antibacterial activity. Pennies often are sterile, presumably due to the copper, and most US coins are also about 75 percent copper. (6)
Best recommendation is perhaps from Laura Lee, “Then again, none of these extreme measures is really necessary, say the experts. Although the germs on money have the potential to contaminate people, there are no documented cases that it has. Instead of avoiding or cleaning money, the best protection is to wash your hands regularly.” (1)
Cocaine
“The probability that every single person in the United States is carrying drug-tainted money is almost certain,” says Dr. James Woodford, forensic chemist from Atlanta. Woodford cites a 1989 experiment by Miami toxicologist Dr. William Hearn, who gathered 136 dollar bills from banks in twelve cities. Of these 131 had traces of cocaine.
A study conducted at the Houston Advanced Research Center in Texas and the Argonne National Laboratory in Illinois examined currency (mostly singles, but also fives, tens, and twenties) in Miami, Chicago, and Houston. This project found an overall 70 to 80 percent contamination rate in the three cities, with single dollar bills more commonly contaminated than the higher denominations. Overall, the more worn the bills, the more coke was found on them. In very old bills, the contamination rate was closer to 90 percent. A recent look at money circulating in northern Illinois, found even higher rates: close to 93 percent of the sample, and 100 percent of the $20 bills tested positive for cocaine. “In fact, most Americans handle small amounts of cocaine every day, not as packets sold by drug dealers, but on the dollar bills that line their pockets,” were conclusions from this study. (6)
J. Oyler and colleagues reported that cocaine was present in 79% of currency samples analyzed in amounts above 0.1 microgram and in 54% of the currency in amounts above 1.0 microgram. Contamination was widespread and was found in single dollar bills from a number of US cities. Cocaine amounts were highly variable and ranged from nanogram to milligram amounts. The highest amount of cocaine detected on a single dollar bill was 1327 milligrams. These results indicated that cocaine contamination of currency is widespread throughout the United States. (9) The reason for this contamination relates to the exchange of illicit cocaine for money by drug dealers. During this exchange there is ample opportunity for paper currency to become contaminated.
Should you worry? Not at all. Cocaine on cash is so commonplace that the courts have ruled that police can no longer use a drug-sniffing dog’s signal to nab a suspect or to confiscate money because it’s deemed drug-related. (7)
References
1.Laura Lee, 100 Most Dangerous Things in Everyday Life, (New York, Broadway Books, 2004), 140
2.“Bacteria Study Gives New Meaning to ‘Dirty Money’”, Reuters, May 23, 2001
3.Philip M. Turner, The Secret Life of Germs, (New York, Pocket Books, 2001), 104
4.Steve Newman, “Currency Health Risk,” San Francisco Chronicle, May 4, 2002, Page C10
5.“Research Shows That Money May Not Harbor Many Pathogenic Bacteria,” medindia.com, July 13, 2006
6.Patricia Gadsby, “Filthy lucre-money is contaminated with bacteria,” Discover, 19, 76, October 1998
7.Carol X. Vinzant, “The Secret Life of the Dollar,” money.aol.com; accessed January 30, 2008
8.Kathryn Garfield, “Stinking Lucre,” Discover, 28, 15, February 2007
9.J. Oyler, W. D. Darwin, and E. J. Crane, “Cocaine contamination of United States paper currency,” J. Anal. Toxicol., 20, 213, 1996
Monday, April 7, 2008
More Pressing Issues Than Global Warming
Jack Dini
Livermore, CA
(From Hawaii Reporter, April 7, 2008)
“As often happens—especially these days with Web-based media—contentious issues such as global warming become politicized to the point that the discourse trivializes to an alarming extent. Indeed, all one seems to hear about climate change are essentially useless debates between believers and skeptics, along with unrealistic and grotesquely draconian proposals that would force us back into the Stone Age in an effort to mitigate carbon dioxide production,” says Michael Shaw. He adds, “Assertions by zealots and politicians, who should really know better, that climate change is the ‘most important environmental problem facing the world,’ ought to be subjected to the cold light of reason. Before untold resources are spent, shouldn’t we at least compare climate change to other problems facing mankind?” (1)
Let’s look at some of these other problems facing mankind. Ten of the most serious challenges facing the world today include: access to education, climate change, communicable diseases, conflicts, corruption and governance, financial instability, hunger and malnutrition, migration, sanitation and access to clean water, and subsidies and trade barriers. The Copenhagen Consensus explored opportunities for addressing these issues. This group, organized by Danish statistician Bjorn Lomborg, is an attempt by leading economists (including three Nobelists) to set priorities for spending using traditional cost-benefit analysis. They were asked to address the challenge areas and to answer the question: ‘What would be the best ways of advancing global welfare, and particularly the welfare of developing countries, supposing that an additional $50 billion of resources were at governments’ disposal?’ Challenge papers, commissioned from acknowledged authorities in each area of policy, set out more than thirty proposals in descending order of desirability. In ordering the proposals the panel was guided predominantly by consideration of economic costs and benefits. (2)
The results? Compared to other issues such as communicable diseases, malnutrition and hunger, sanitation and water, and the rest, climate change ranked last on the list. Vernon Smith, Professor of Economics and Law, George Mason University, provided this summation: “It is clear from both the science and the economics of intervention that those of us who care about the environment are not well advised to favor initiating a costly attempt to reduce greenhouse gases build-up in the atmosphere in the near future based on available information. Although the ultimate dangers may turn out to prompt action, the current evidence indicates that it is much too soon to act relative to the many other important and pressing opportunities that demand immediate attention.”(3) (Smith’s italics, not mine)
Indur M. Goklany, whose resume includes stints with federal and state governments, think tanks, and the private sector for over 30 years, has also analyzed this issue. He examined certain risks to humanity, and compared the contributory effects of climate change to non-climate factors. His most significant conclusion: “Climate change is clearly not the most important environmental, let alone public health problem facing the world today, nor is it likely to be the most important environmental problem confronting human or environmental well-being, at least through the foreseeable future. Hence, the argument that we should shift resources from dealing with the real and urgent problems confronting present generations to solving potential problems of tomorrow’s wealthier and better positioned generations is unpersuasive at best and verging on immoral at worst.” (4)
Goklany provides data from the World Health Organization (WHO). Similar to the conclusions from the Copenhagen Consensus mentioned earlier, climate change doesn’t even make the top ten global health risk factors related to food, nutrition, and environmental occupation exposure. Specifically, the WHO provides the following information:
Malaria (2001) 1.12 million deaths
Malnutrition 3.24 million deaths
Unsafe water, inadequate sanitation,
and hygiene 1.73 million deaths
Indoor air pollution from heating and cooking
with wood, coal, and dung 1.62 million deaths
Urban air pollution 800,000 deaths
Lead exposure 230,000 deaths
How many deaths from climate change? No one knows. However, a review paper published in Nature in 2005 claims that global warming may have been responsible for about 170,000 deaths worldwide in 2000. (5) This estimate is based on an analysis which was put out under the auspices of WHO. However, as Goklany notes, “The 170,000 estimate should be viewed with skepticism since science was admittedly sacrificed in hot pursuit of a predetermined policy objective.” (4)
Let’s look at malaria. Some alarmists promote the idea that tropical diseases like malaria will spread because of global warming. However, the geographical spread of these diseases has very little to do with climate. (6) Throughout the Little Ice Age, malaria was a major epidemic disease in Europe and far into the Arctic Circle. (7) In the nineteenth century, malaria, cholera, and other diarrheal and parasitic diseases were prevalent around the world, including northern Europe. (7) Malaria was endemic in England until the late 1800s and in Finland until after World War II. Malaria in the US was still endemic in 36 states until after World War II. (6) Today this disease is a problem only in countries where the necessary public health measures are unaffordable or have been compromised. Past history reveals that combating malaria is primarily a question of development to ensure efficient monitoring of the disease and resources to secure a strong effort to eradicate the mosquitoes and their breeding grounds. Wealth and a functioning public health system is what matters when it comes to combating tropical diseases. (7)
Malaria is functionally eliminated in a society whose annual per capita income reaches $3,100. Even under the poorest scenario prediction, the average GDP per capita for developing countries is projected to be $11,000. Hence, few, if any countries ought to be below the $3,100 threshold in 2085. (4) According to the UN Millennium project, a 75% reduction in malaria deaths can be achieved for $3 billion/year, with a program focused directly on malaria prevention. Talk about a better bang for your buck! (1)
Summary
By focusing our priorities on future generations, we focus less on improving the lives of people who are alive today. These future generations bear no closer relationship to us than those now living in developing countries whose lives we disdain to save. Why are we not feeding people in the world who are hungry? Why are we not giving clean water to the almost one billion people who don’t have clean water? The greatest source of environmental degradation is poverty. Why aren’t we helping eliminate poverty? One answer is that perhaps it is a lot easier worrying about future generations than trying to fix present day problems.
Even the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC), the organization which is providing much of the doom and gloom about global warming, raises the flag about future generations. This is the same IPCC whose scenarios predict that by 2100, nations that are poor today will at least by as rich as we are at present, and more likely will be 2 to 4 times more wealthy. The IPCC makes this important point about developing countries: “If we take aggressive action to limit climate change they may regret that we did not use the funds instead to push ahead development in Africa, to better protect species against the next retrovirus, or to dispose of nuclear materials safely…Alternatively, if the developed countries choose to embark on an aggressive control regime now, and if this cuts into their growth rates, the result will shrink export markets for developing countries and thus reduce growth there. In addition, if developed countries view their greenhouse effects as, in effect, aid to developing countries, they may cut back on other programs (sanitation, education for women, etc.) that have a more immediate impact on life expectancy, health and well-being.” (8)
Bjorn Lomborg observes: “Imagine if you were a rich Chinese or a rich Rwandan or a rich Bolivian in 2100, looking back on 2004, saying how odd that people of 2004 were so concerned about helping me a little bit through climate change and so relatively unconcerned about helping my grandfather and my great-grandfather who needed the help much, much more. (9)
References
1.Michael D. Shaw, “A Rational Look at Climate Change,” healthnewsdigest.com, February 10, 2008
2.Global Crises, Global Solutions, Bjorn Lomborg, Editor, (Cambridge, Cambridge University Press, 2004) 605
3.Global Crises, Global Solutions, Bjorn Lomborg, Editor, 635
4.Indur M. Goklany, “What to do about climate Change,” Policy Analysis No. 609, Cato Institute, February 5, 2008
5.Jonathan A Patz et al., “Impact of Regional Climate Change on Human Health,” Nature, 438, 310 2005
6.Martin Ague, “Is Kyoto a good idea?” in Adapt or Die, Kendra Okonski, Editor, (London, Profile Books Limited, 2003), 77
7.Bjorn Lomborg, The Skeptical Environmentalist, (Cambridge, Cambridge University Press, 2001), 291
8.Wilfred Beckerman, “The precautionary principle and our obligation to future generations,” in Rethinking Risk and the Precautionary Principle, Julian Morris, Editor, (Oxford, Butterworth Heinemann, 2000), 53
9.Marc Morano, “Ignore Global Warming Says Former Greenpeace Member,” cnsnews.com, December 14, 2004
Livermore, CA
(From Hawaii Reporter, April 7, 2008)
“As often happens—especially these days with Web-based media—contentious issues such as global warming become politicized to the point that the discourse trivializes to an alarming extent. Indeed, all one seems to hear about climate change are essentially useless debates between believers and skeptics, along with unrealistic and grotesquely draconian proposals that would force us back into the Stone Age in an effort to mitigate carbon dioxide production,” says Michael Shaw. He adds, “Assertions by zealots and politicians, who should really know better, that climate change is the ‘most important environmental problem facing the world,’ ought to be subjected to the cold light of reason. Before untold resources are spent, shouldn’t we at least compare climate change to other problems facing mankind?” (1)
Let’s look at some of these other problems facing mankind. Ten of the most serious challenges facing the world today include: access to education, climate change, communicable diseases, conflicts, corruption and governance, financial instability, hunger and malnutrition, migration, sanitation and access to clean water, and subsidies and trade barriers. The Copenhagen Consensus explored opportunities for addressing these issues. This group, organized by Danish statistician Bjorn Lomborg, is an attempt by leading economists (including three Nobelists) to set priorities for spending using traditional cost-benefit analysis. They were asked to address the challenge areas and to answer the question: ‘What would be the best ways of advancing global welfare, and particularly the welfare of developing countries, supposing that an additional $50 billion of resources were at governments’ disposal?’ Challenge papers, commissioned from acknowledged authorities in each area of policy, set out more than thirty proposals in descending order of desirability. In ordering the proposals the panel was guided predominantly by consideration of economic costs and benefits. (2)
The results? Compared to other issues such as communicable diseases, malnutrition and hunger, sanitation and water, and the rest, climate change ranked last on the list. Vernon Smith, Professor of Economics and Law, George Mason University, provided this summation: “It is clear from both the science and the economics of intervention that those of us who care about the environment are not well advised to favor initiating a costly attempt to reduce greenhouse gases build-up in the atmosphere in the near future based on available information. Although the ultimate dangers may turn out to prompt action, the current evidence indicates that it is much too soon to act relative to the many other important and pressing opportunities that demand immediate attention.”(3) (Smith’s italics, not mine)
Indur M. Goklany, whose resume includes stints with federal and state governments, think tanks, and the private sector for over 30 years, has also analyzed this issue. He examined certain risks to humanity, and compared the contributory effects of climate change to non-climate factors. His most significant conclusion: “Climate change is clearly not the most important environmental, let alone public health problem facing the world today, nor is it likely to be the most important environmental problem confronting human or environmental well-being, at least through the foreseeable future. Hence, the argument that we should shift resources from dealing with the real and urgent problems confronting present generations to solving potential problems of tomorrow’s wealthier and better positioned generations is unpersuasive at best and verging on immoral at worst.” (4)
Goklany provides data from the World Health Organization (WHO). Similar to the conclusions from the Copenhagen Consensus mentioned earlier, climate change doesn’t even make the top ten global health risk factors related to food, nutrition, and environmental occupation exposure. Specifically, the WHO provides the following information:
Malaria (2001) 1.12 million deaths
Malnutrition 3.24 million deaths
Unsafe water, inadequate sanitation,
and hygiene 1.73 million deaths
Indoor air pollution from heating and cooking
with wood, coal, and dung 1.62 million deaths
Urban air pollution 800,000 deaths
Lead exposure 230,000 deaths
How many deaths from climate change? No one knows. However, a review paper published in Nature in 2005 claims that global warming may have been responsible for about 170,000 deaths worldwide in 2000. (5) This estimate is based on an analysis which was put out under the auspices of WHO. However, as Goklany notes, “The 170,000 estimate should be viewed with skepticism since science was admittedly sacrificed in hot pursuit of a predetermined policy objective.” (4)
Let’s look at malaria. Some alarmists promote the idea that tropical diseases like malaria will spread because of global warming. However, the geographical spread of these diseases has very little to do with climate. (6) Throughout the Little Ice Age, malaria was a major epidemic disease in Europe and far into the Arctic Circle. (7) In the nineteenth century, malaria, cholera, and other diarrheal and parasitic diseases were prevalent around the world, including northern Europe. (7) Malaria was endemic in England until the late 1800s and in Finland until after World War II. Malaria in the US was still endemic in 36 states until after World War II. (6) Today this disease is a problem only in countries where the necessary public health measures are unaffordable or have been compromised. Past history reveals that combating malaria is primarily a question of development to ensure efficient monitoring of the disease and resources to secure a strong effort to eradicate the mosquitoes and their breeding grounds. Wealth and a functioning public health system is what matters when it comes to combating tropical diseases. (7)
Malaria is functionally eliminated in a society whose annual per capita income reaches $3,100. Even under the poorest scenario prediction, the average GDP per capita for developing countries is projected to be $11,000. Hence, few, if any countries ought to be below the $3,100 threshold in 2085. (4) According to the UN Millennium project, a 75% reduction in malaria deaths can be achieved for $3 billion/year, with a program focused directly on malaria prevention. Talk about a better bang for your buck! (1)
Summary
By focusing our priorities on future generations, we focus less on improving the lives of people who are alive today. These future generations bear no closer relationship to us than those now living in developing countries whose lives we disdain to save. Why are we not feeding people in the world who are hungry? Why are we not giving clean water to the almost one billion people who don’t have clean water? The greatest source of environmental degradation is poverty. Why aren’t we helping eliminate poverty? One answer is that perhaps it is a lot easier worrying about future generations than trying to fix present day problems.
Even the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC), the organization which is providing much of the doom and gloom about global warming, raises the flag about future generations. This is the same IPCC whose scenarios predict that by 2100, nations that are poor today will at least by as rich as we are at present, and more likely will be 2 to 4 times more wealthy. The IPCC makes this important point about developing countries: “If we take aggressive action to limit climate change they may regret that we did not use the funds instead to push ahead development in Africa, to better protect species against the next retrovirus, or to dispose of nuclear materials safely…Alternatively, if the developed countries choose to embark on an aggressive control regime now, and if this cuts into their growth rates, the result will shrink export markets for developing countries and thus reduce growth there. In addition, if developed countries view their greenhouse effects as, in effect, aid to developing countries, they may cut back on other programs (sanitation, education for women, etc.) that have a more immediate impact on life expectancy, health and well-being.” (8)
Bjorn Lomborg observes: “Imagine if you were a rich Chinese or a rich Rwandan or a rich Bolivian in 2100, looking back on 2004, saying how odd that people of 2004 were so concerned about helping me a little bit through climate change and so relatively unconcerned about helping my grandfather and my great-grandfather who needed the help much, much more. (9)
References
1.Michael D. Shaw, “A Rational Look at Climate Change,” healthnewsdigest.com, February 10, 2008
2.Global Crises, Global Solutions, Bjorn Lomborg, Editor, (Cambridge, Cambridge University Press, 2004) 605
3.Global Crises, Global Solutions, Bjorn Lomborg, Editor, 635
4.Indur M. Goklany, “What to do about climate Change,” Policy Analysis No. 609, Cato Institute, February 5, 2008
5.Jonathan A Patz et al., “Impact of Regional Climate Change on Human Health,” Nature, 438, 310 2005
6.Martin Ague, “Is Kyoto a good idea?” in Adapt or Die, Kendra Okonski, Editor, (London, Profile Books Limited, 2003), 77
7.Bjorn Lomborg, The Skeptical Environmentalist, (Cambridge, Cambridge University Press, 2001), 291
8.Wilfred Beckerman, “The precautionary principle and our obligation to future generations,” in Rethinking Risk and the Precautionary Principle, Julian Morris, Editor, (Oxford, Butterworth Heinemann, 2000), 53
9.Marc Morano, “Ignore Global Warming Says Former Greenpeace Member,” cnsnews.com, December 14, 2004
Tuesday, April 1, 2008
No Consensus on Global Warming
Jack Dini
Livermore, CA
(From Hawaii Reporter, April 1, 2008)
“Rashomon,” a celebrated Japanese film, presents four witnesses observing a single crime. Each witness perceives the situation so differently that the audience experiences what appears to be four distinct events. Current discourse on climate change, or if you prefer, global warming, raises a “Rashomon-like” specter of competing perceptions. On the one side are those of see the world in a heap of trouble. As Lynn Scarlett notes, “They focus on the moment, see despoliation, and predict doom. They believe we can evade doom, but only through sweeping changes, wrought through single-minded pursuit of an environmental imperative.” (1) They are convinced that mankind is responsible for the earth’s surface warming about 0.7C over the past century. These are the folks in the ‘consensus category’ that Al Gore and the media talk about. According to Gore, “The science is settled on climate change. The planet has a fever and its cause is too many cars, power plants, factories, and other human-related sources putting too many emissions into the atmosphere.” (2)
On the other side are the ‘disbelievers.’ These folks posit that warming is part of Mother Nature’s natural cycle and there isn’t a whole lot we can do about it. Although they are a ‘minority,’ there are many more scientists that fit this category than most people realize. They aren’t given much media attention since the media for the most part belongs too the ‘consensus’ group. After all, you don’t get attention by saying that things are just fine; you need to spruce news up with doom and gloom stories. More than 22,000 scientists signed the dissenting “Petition Project” which urges political leaders to reject the Kyoto Protocol or other similar proposals that would mandate draconian tax and regulatory measures aimed at virtually all human economic activity. The petition states there is no convincing scientific evidence that human release of carbon dioxide, methane, or other green house gases is causing or will, in the foreseeable future, cause catastrophic heating of the Earth’s atmosphere and disruption of the Earth’s climate. (3)
According to a January 1, 2007 New York Times article by Andrew Revkin, a new middle stance has emerged in the debate over climate change. Revkin reports that more scientists are distancing themselves from the extreme fear mongering and exaggerated claims of the climate-change alarmists. (4)
Marc Morano notes that after a May 16, 2007 vote in the Senate on global warming, “there is a shift taking place in climate science. Many former believers in catastrophic man-made global warming have recently reversed themselves and are now climate skeptics. The media’s fear factor seemingly grows louder even as the latest science grows less and less alarming by the day. It is also worth noting that the proponents of climate change fears are increasingly attempting to suppress dissent by skeptics.” (5)
In December 2007, over 400 scientists from more than two dozen countries voiced significant objections to major aspects of the so-called ‘consensus’ on man-made global warming. These scientists, many of whom are current and former participants in the UN IPCC (Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change), criticized the climate claims made by the UN IPCC, and Al Gore in a report issued by the Senate Environment and Public Works Committee. The report lists the scientists by name, country of residence, and academic/institutional affiliation. It also provides their own words, biographies, and weblinks to their peer reviewed studies and original source materials as gathered from public statements, various news outlets, and websites in 2007. (6)
And more recently, scientists skeptical of man-made climate fears met at the 2008 International Conference on Climate Change in New York City. The March 2-4 groundbreaking conference featured about 100 speakers with over people in attendance. Key items discussed at the conference included:
- Most of climate change is caused by natural forces.
- The human contribution is not significant.
- Solar activity changes are the main cause of climate change.
William Jasper reports,”The advocates of Kyoto and other schemes to super-regulate the planet frequently try to portray the scientists who dispute their claims of global warming peril as fringies, fogies, and ‘nut cases’ who shouldn’t be taken seriously. However, as brutal scientific facts have poked holes in their hypothetical global-warming models, the Gore camp has become more strident and abusive. Rather than answer the scientific critiques, they have tended simply to accuse opposition scientists of being in the pay of energy companies. Even worse, they have adapted the tactic of labeling scientists who dispute their claims as being ‘climate-change deniers,’ on a par with ‘Holocaust deniers.” The more radical elements of the climate-change alarmist movement have targeted dissenting scientists for vilification and harassment, even trying to deprive them of their jobs, research grants, and tenure. The most virulent ‘Greens’ call for them to be tried as ‘traitors.’ (2)
Many of the scientists feature in the Senate Report issued in December 2007 consistently stated that numerous colleagues shared their views, but they will not speak out publicly for fear of retribution. Atmospheric scientist, Dr. Nathan Paldor, Professor at the Hebrew University of Jerusalem and author of almost 70 peer-reviewed studies, explains how many of his fellow scientists have been intimidated: “Many of my colleagues with whom I spoke share these views and report on their inability to publish their skepticism in the scientific or public media.” (6) Another example is Dr. Robert Giegengack of the University of Pennsylvania, a geologist who studies ancient atmospheres and finds no relationship between global temperatures in the past and carbon dioxide levels. He says other scientists have told him to just stop broadcasting that finding saying, “People come to me and say, ‘Stop talking like this, you’re hurting the cause.’” (7)
Looks like William F. Buckley, Jr., wasn’t far off the mark with his comment: “The heavy condemnatory breathing on the subject of global warming outdoes anything since high moments of the Inquisition.” (8)
Some Final Words
Assertions by zealots and politicians, who should really know better, that climate change is the ‘most important environmental problem facing the world,’ ought to be subjected to the cold light of reason says Michael Shaw. Before untold resources are spent, shouldn’t we at least compare climate change to other problems facing mankind? (9) What about issues like communicable diseases, malnutrition and hunger, sanitation and access to clean water? Many, if not all, of these demand immediate attention and can aid folks in serious need at present, not some future generations, that may or may not be affected by the weather in the 2100s.
Lastly, 30 years ago we were supposedly headed into a cooling cycle akin to the Little Ice Age. (10) Now, it’s an unprecedented heating cycle. If you ask me, that’s an awfully quick time for a flip-flop on the weather. If the 14 billion year cosmic history were scaled to one day, then 100,000 years of human history would be 4 minutes and a 100 year life-span would be 0.2 seconds. (11) So, in less than 0.1 second in cosmic time we’ve switched on climate change. Seems like we need a few more cosmic time seconds to gather more data.
References
1.Lynn Scarlett, “Clear Thinking About the Earth,” in Environmental Gore, John A. Baden, Editor, (San Francisco, Pacific Research Institute, 1994), 249
2.William F. Jasper, “2008 Climate Debate,” The New American, March 31, 2008
3.William F. Jasper, “Analyzing Global-Warming Science,” The New American, February 18, 2008
4.Andrew C. Revkin, “A New Middle Stance Emerges in Debate Over Climate,” The New York Times, January 1, 2007
5.Marc Morano, “List of global warming activists, now skeptics,” Spero News, May 16, 2007
6.“United States Senate Report: Over 400 Prominent Scientists Disputed Man-Made Global Warming Claims in 2007; Senate Report Debunks ‘Consensus’”, December 20, 2007
7.William J. Broad, “In Ancient Fossils, Seeds of a New Debate on Warming,” in The Best American Science Writing 2007, Gina Kolata, Editor, (New York, Harper Perennial, 2007), 252
8.William F. Buckley, Jr., National Review, March 31, 2007
9.Michael D. Shaw, “A Rational Look at Climate Change,” healthnewsdigest.com, February 10, 2008
10.Stephen H. Schneider, The Genesis Strategy, (New York, Plenum Press, 1976), 90
11.Max Tegmark, “We’re Not Insignificant After All,” in What Are You Optimistic About?, John Brockman, Editor, (New York, Harper Perennial, 2007), 4
Livermore, CA
(From Hawaii Reporter, April 1, 2008)
“Rashomon,” a celebrated Japanese film, presents four witnesses observing a single crime. Each witness perceives the situation so differently that the audience experiences what appears to be four distinct events. Current discourse on climate change, or if you prefer, global warming, raises a “Rashomon-like” specter of competing perceptions. On the one side are those of see the world in a heap of trouble. As Lynn Scarlett notes, “They focus on the moment, see despoliation, and predict doom. They believe we can evade doom, but only through sweeping changes, wrought through single-minded pursuit of an environmental imperative.” (1) They are convinced that mankind is responsible for the earth’s surface warming about 0.7C over the past century. These are the folks in the ‘consensus category’ that Al Gore and the media talk about. According to Gore, “The science is settled on climate change. The planet has a fever and its cause is too many cars, power plants, factories, and other human-related sources putting too many emissions into the atmosphere.” (2)
On the other side are the ‘disbelievers.’ These folks posit that warming is part of Mother Nature’s natural cycle and there isn’t a whole lot we can do about it. Although they are a ‘minority,’ there are many more scientists that fit this category than most people realize. They aren’t given much media attention since the media for the most part belongs too the ‘consensus’ group. After all, you don’t get attention by saying that things are just fine; you need to spruce news up with doom and gloom stories. More than 22,000 scientists signed the dissenting “Petition Project” which urges political leaders to reject the Kyoto Protocol or other similar proposals that would mandate draconian tax and regulatory measures aimed at virtually all human economic activity. The petition states there is no convincing scientific evidence that human release of carbon dioxide, methane, or other green house gases is causing or will, in the foreseeable future, cause catastrophic heating of the Earth’s atmosphere and disruption of the Earth’s climate. (3)
According to a January 1, 2007 New York Times article by Andrew Revkin, a new middle stance has emerged in the debate over climate change. Revkin reports that more scientists are distancing themselves from the extreme fear mongering and exaggerated claims of the climate-change alarmists. (4)
Marc Morano notes that after a May 16, 2007 vote in the Senate on global warming, “there is a shift taking place in climate science. Many former believers in catastrophic man-made global warming have recently reversed themselves and are now climate skeptics. The media’s fear factor seemingly grows louder even as the latest science grows less and less alarming by the day. It is also worth noting that the proponents of climate change fears are increasingly attempting to suppress dissent by skeptics.” (5)
In December 2007, over 400 scientists from more than two dozen countries voiced significant objections to major aspects of the so-called ‘consensus’ on man-made global warming. These scientists, many of whom are current and former participants in the UN IPCC (Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change), criticized the climate claims made by the UN IPCC, and Al Gore in a report issued by the Senate Environment and Public Works Committee. The report lists the scientists by name, country of residence, and academic/institutional affiliation. It also provides their own words, biographies, and weblinks to their peer reviewed studies and original source materials as gathered from public statements, various news outlets, and websites in 2007. (6)
And more recently, scientists skeptical of man-made climate fears met at the 2008 International Conference on Climate Change in New York City. The March 2-4 groundbreaking conference featured about 100 speakers with over people in attendance. Key items discussed at the conference included:
- Most of climate change is caused by natural forces.
- The human contribution is not significant.
- Solar activity changes are the main cause of climate change.
William Jasper reports,”The advocates of Kyoto and other schemes to super-regulate the planet frequently try to portray the scientists who dispute their claims of global warming peril as fringies, fogies, and ‘nut cases’ who shouldn’t be taken seriously. However, as brutal scientific facts have poked holes in their hypothetical global-warming models, the Gore camp has become more strident and abusive. Rather than answer the scientific critiques, they have tended simply to accuse opposition scientists of being in the pay of energy companies. Even worse, they have adapted the tactic of labeling scientists who dispute their claims as being ‘climate-change deniers,’ on a par with ‘Holocaust deniers.” The more radical elements of the climate-change alarmist movement have targeted dissenting scientists for vilification and harassment, even trying to deprive them of their jobs, research grants, and tenure. The most virulent ‘Greens’ call for them to be tried as ‘traitors.’ (2)
Many of the scientists feature in the Senate Report issued in December 2007 consistently stated that numerous colleagues shared their views, but they will not speak out publicly for fear of retribution. Atmospheric scientist, Dr. Nathan Paldor, Professor at the Hebrew University of Jerusalem and author of almost 70 peer-reviewed studies, explains how many of his fellow scientists have been intimidated: “Many of my colleagues with whom I spoke share these views and report on their inability to publish their skepticism in the scientific or public media.” (6) Another example is Dr. Robert Giegengack of the University of Pennsylvania, a geologist who studies ancient atmospheres and finds no relationship between global temperatures in the past and carbon dioxide levels. He says other scientists have told him to just stop broadcasting that finding saying, “People come to me and say, ‘Stop talking like this, you’re hurting the cause.’” (7)
Looks like William F. Buckley, Jr., wasn’t far off the mark with his comment: “The heavy condemnatory breathing on the subject of global warming outdoes anything since high moments of the Inquisition.” (8)
Some Final Words
Assertions by zealots and politicians, who should really know better, that climate change is the ‘most important environmental problem facing the world,’ ought to be subjected to the cold light of reason says Michael Shaw. Before untold resources are spent, shouldn’t we at least compare climate change to other problems facing mankind? (9) What about issues like communicable diseases, malnutrition and hunger, sanitation and access to clean water? Many, if not all, of these demand immediate attention and can aid folks in serious need at present, not some future generations, that may or may not be affected by the weather in the 2100s.
Lastly, 30 years ago we were supposedly headed into a cooling cycle akin to the Little Ice Age. (10) Now, it’s an unprecedented heating cycle. If you ask me, that’s an awfully quick time for a flip-flop on the weather. If the 14 billion year cosmic history were scaled to one day, then 100,000 years of human history would be 4 minutes and a 100 year life-span would be 0.2 seconds. (11) So, in less than 0.1 second in cosmic time we’ve switched on climate change. Seems like we need a few more cosmic time seconds to gather more data.
References
1.Lynn Scarlett, “Clear Thinking About the Earth,” in Environmental Gore, John A. Baden, Editor, (San Francisco, Pacific Research Institute, 1994), 249
2.William F. Jasper, “2008 Climate Debate,” The New American, March 31, 2008
3.William F. Jasper, “Analyzing Global-Warming Science,” The New American, February 18, 2008
4.Andrew C. Revkin, “A New Middle Stance Emerges in Debate Over Climate,” The New York Times, January 1, 2007
5.Marc Morano, “List of global warming activists, now skeptics,” Spero News, May 16, 2007
6.“United States Senate Report: Over 400 Prominent Scientists Disputed Man-Made Global Warming Claims in 2007; Senate Report Debunks ‘Consensus’”, December 20, 2007
7.William J. Broad, “In Ancient Fossils, Seeds of a New Debate on Warming,” in The Best American Science Writing 2007, Gina Kolata, Editor, (New York, Harper Perennial, 2007), 252
8.William F. Buckley, Jr., National Review, March 31, 2007
9.Michael D. Shaw, “A Rational Look at Climate Change,” healthnewsdigest.com, February 10, 2008
10.Stephen H. Schneider, The Genesis Strategy, (New York, Plenum Press, 1976), 90
11.Max Tegmark, “We’re Not Insignificant After All,” in What Are You Optimistic About?, John Brockman, Editor, (New York, Harper Perennial, 2007), 4
Thursday, February 7, 2008
Friendly Bacteria and the Hygiene Hypothesis
Jack W. Dini
Livermore, CA
Our immune system needs a certain amount of bacteria or we get get into trouble. These days we can even purchase foods containing these friendly 'probiotic' bacteria.
Over 400 distinct species of micro organisms inhabit the various regions of the human digestive tract, making up nearly four pounds of every individual’s total body weight. This vast population of micro organisms far exceeds the number of tissue cells that make up the human body. It has been estimated that an adult carries 90 trillion microbes, a figure that outnumbers the body own cells by nearly 10 to one. (1)
With all of this we should normally have a balance of about 85% probiotic bacteria (friendly bacteria) and 15% harmful bacteria, but many people are so far off that their intestinal tract contains only 15% probiotic bacteria and 85% harmful bacteria. We need to have a large population of probiotic bacteria to aid with digestion and to keep harmful disease-causing micro organisms in check. If the percentage of good bacteria is too low, compared to the bad bacteria, our bodies function poorly. Over time we are likely to have many health problems. (2)
Have you heard about bugs in baby food, or microbes in your milkshakes? As Lindsey Tanner reports, these are not the latest health food scares, but rather a growing trend in foods designed to boost health, not make you sick. These products contain probiotics, the ‘friendly bacteria’ similar to those found in the human digestive system. (3)
Tanner also reports, “There are supplement pills, yogurts, smoothies, snack bars and cereals, even baby formula and chocolate. Sold by major names like Dannon and Kraft, they’re spreading like germs on grocery store shelves and in supermarket dairy cases. In 2007, more than 150 probiotic and prebiotic commercial food products were introduced in the US, compared with about 100 in 2006 and just 40 in 2005. Even without all the answers from science, probiotics are a multibillion-dollar global industry. In the United States alone, retail sales of probiotic-containing foods and supplements totaled and estimated $764 million in 2005 and are projected to reach $1 billion in 2010, according to the market firm BBC Research.” (3)
Jessica Synder Sachs adds to the success list of this futuristic approach: “a ‘probiotic’ nasal spray imbued with beneficial bacteria that helps prevent chronic childhood ear infections; a bioengineered strain of mouth bacteria that prevent rather than cause cavities; and a so-called Dirt Vaccine that appears to ease a range of chronic inflammatory disorders and also jolts the immune system into a cancer-fighting mode. Some scientists are even dreaming about ‘probiotic’ cleaning products- each detergent, cleanser, or air spray formulated with its own patented mix of protective and health-enhancing microbes.” (4)
University of Michigan researcher, Gary Huffnagle calls probiotics ‘ a new essential food group’ in his book, The Probiotics Revolution. (5) Huffnagle does advise consumers to by wary of probiotic containing products that don’t specify how much or what type of bacteria. Evidence suggests the bugs need to be alive and ingested in huge amounts, generally between 5 billion and 10 billion daily. (3)
This is all fairly new. On a spring morning in 2003, a middle-aged Dutch farmer had swallowed his first twice-daily handful of ten small capsules, each filled with some 10 billion cells of the cheesemaking bacterium Lactococcus lactis. That small act entered the Dutchman into the history books as the first human deliberately colonized with transgenic bacteria. The live bugs he swallowed carried and expressed the human gene for the immune calming cytokine interleukin-10. The farmer had been debilitated with Crohn’s disease for more than twenty years. When consumed in dairy products, ordinary L. lactis disappears from a person’s intestinal tract within a day or two. The farmer noted a dramatic reduction in his symptoms. A follow-up trial with ten other patients also proved successful. Further studies are planned in the Netherlands this year with the hope that government regulators will allow this next trial on an out-patient basis. (6)
In perhaps the ultimate illustration of how far things have come, Joel Weinstock, a professor of internal medicine at the University of Iowa, recently ran a preliminary clinical trial in which six patients suffering from Crohn’s disease were treated with a dose of live parasitic worms. In five of the six, the disease went into complete remission in the period when the harmless microbes were in the patients’ bodies. The sixth patient also showed a significant improvement. (1)
This is all part of the so-called hygiene hypothesis, first voiced by a British epidemiologist, D. P. Strachan in 1989. The hypothesis is that our immune system needs a certain amount of bacteria on which to flex its muscles. Deprived of it, the white cells that are designed to fight bacteria fail to develop, and the other white cells, those designed to make antibodies to defend the body against microbial dangers as well as to produce allergic reactions—will take over. (7) One scientist has likened the immune system to the brain. You have to exercise it, that is, expose it to the right antigenic information so that it matures correctly. Excessive hygiene, therefore, may interfere with the normal maturation of the immune system. (8)
Here are some examples of the hygiene hypothesis:
•The hygiene hypothesis can be used to explain the Louisiana Purchase. In Haiti, the 1801 uprising of African slaves was successful because yellow fever killed twenty-seven thousand French troops while leaving untouched the African-born slaves, who were relatively immune because of their exposure earlier in life. Napoleon, discouraged by the loss of his Haitian colony, gave up his American ambitions and sold his remaining territory, the Louisiana Purchase. (9)
•Dirt and infection don’t just make you less allergy prone, they can fight off some cancers. Dairy farmers are as much as five times less likely to develop lung cancer. Working in a cotton factory protects you against lung, breast, liver, and other tumors. (10)
•A Canadian study published in November 2007 suggested that fermented milk containing Lactobacillus acidophilus and Lactobacilius caseli could prevent antibiotic-related diarrhea. (11)
•A 2007 study in Finland found that an oat drink containing Bifdobacterium lactis bacteria helped bowel function in nursing home residents. (11)
•Scientists in Argentina are investigating whether milk fermented with lactic acid bacteria might reduce amounts of cancer-causing substances in the intestine. (11)
Wine and Microbes
John Postage postulates that few people are aware that beers, wine, cheeses, and so on are prepared by allowing microbes to act on foodstuffs; even fewer recognize that food goes bad through the actions of microbes. (12)
Today, modern wine making techniques are wiping our Racodium cellare, a benign mold, once seen as the sign of a good Tokay cellar, since it helps keep the cellar air fresh. Stainless steel barrels prevent alcohol from evaporating, cutting off the Tokay mold’s food source. It is also under threat from modern standards of hygiene, which aim to create laboratory-like levels of cleanliness in wine cellars. Some vineyards, however, still go out of their way to encourage it. However, it seems to have disappeared from the UK. “I am very sorry to never have found Racodium in Britain,” says Henry Tribe of the University of Cambridge, who has studied the mold. “Even the cellars of St. John’s College are too hygienic. Hygiene is reaching stupid proportions.” (13)
Space Travel
John Postage provides this interesting information about microbes and space travel. “A space ship with a few astronauts taking a year-long trip to Mars would be a physically isolated community and a peculiar thing happens to the commensal microbes of people in such communities. One type of microbe tends to become dominant, from mouth to anus, and if this germ happens to be pathogenic the situation can be dangerous. Likewise, immunity to infection by ordinary microbes tends to be lost. It seems probable that astronauts will have to keep cultures of the varieties of microbes they started out with, and will need to deliberately re-infect themselves at intervals.” (14)
Next they will probably be telling us that when we go on long car or airplane trips we should carry our own satchel of personal microbes for ingestion after a certain number of hours. Think of all the fits this would create with airport security.
References
1.Garry Hamilton, “Why We Need Germs,” The Ecologist Report, June 2001
2.“Probiotic Bacteria and Your Health,” http://www.ghchealth.com/probiotic-bacteria-and-your-health.html; accessed December 25, 2007
3.Lindsey Tanner, “The next craze: ‘good’ germs in your food,” Honolulu Advertiser, December 10, 2007, Page A3
4.Jessica Snyder Sachs, Good Germs, Bad Germs, (New York, Hill and Wang, 2007), 12
5.Gary B. Huffnagle, The Probiotics Revolution, (New York, Bantam Books, 2007)
6.Jessica Snyder Sachs, Good Germs, Bad Germs, 206
7.Katherine Ashenburg, The Dirt On Clean, (New York, North Point Press, 2007), 290
8.Thomas R. DeGregori, The Environment, Our Natural Resources and Modern Technology, (Ames, Iowa, Iowa State Press, 2002)
9.E. Fuller Torrey and Robert H. Yolken, Beasts of the Earth, (New Brunswick, New Jersey, Rutgers University Press, 2005), 20
10.Jessica Marshall, “Filthy Healthy,” New Scientist, 197, 34, January 12, 2008
11.Lindsey Tanner, “Products With Good Bacteria Get Popular,” Examiner.com; December 10, 2007
12.John Postgate, Microbes and Man, Fourth Edition, (Cambridge, Cambridge University Press, 2000), 133
13.“Wine cellar mold,” New Scientist, 194, 57, June 9, 2007
14.John Postgate, Microbes and Man, Fourth Edition, 353
.
Livermore, CA
Our immune system needs a certain amount of bacteria or we get get into trouble. These days we can even purchase foods containing these friendly 'probiotic' bacteria.
Over 400 distinct species of micro organisms inhabit the various regions of the human digestive tract, making up nearly four pounds of every individual’s total body weight. This vast population of micro organisms far exceeds the number of tissue cells that make up the human body. It has been estimated that an adult carries 90 trillion microbes, a figure that outnumbers the body own cells by nearly 10 to one. (1)
With all of this we should normally have a balance of about 85% probiotic bacteria (friendly bacteria) and 15% harmful bacteria, but many people are so far off that their intestinal tract contains only 15% probiotic bacteria and 85% harmful bacteria. We need to have a large population of probiotic bacteria to aid with digestion and to keep harmful disease-causing micro organisms in check. If the percentage of good bacteria is too low, compared to the bad bacteria, our bodies function poorly. Over time we are likely to have many health problems. (2)
Have you heard about bugs in baby food, or microbes in your milkshakes? As Lindsey Tanner reports, these are not the latest health food scares, but rather a growing trend in foods designed to boost health, not make you sick. These products contain probiotics, the ‘friendly bacteria’ similar to those found in the human digestive system. (3)
Tanner also reports, “There are supplement pills, yogurts, smoothies, snack bars and cereals, even baby formula and chocolate. Sold by major names like Dannon and Kraft, they’re spreading like germs on grocery store shelves and in supermarket dairy cases. In 2007, more than 150 probiotic and prebiotic commercial food products were introduced in the US, compared with about 100 in 2006 and just 40 in 2005. Even without all the answers from science, probiotics are a multibillion-dollar global industry. In the United States alone, retail sales of probiotic-containing foods and supplements totaled and estimated $764 million in 2005 and are projected to reach $1 billion in 2010, according to the market firm BBC Research.” (3)
Jessica Synder Sachs adds to the success list of this futuristic approach: “a ‘probiotic’ nasal spray imbued with beneficial bacteria that helps prevent chronic childhood ear infections; a bioengineered strain of mouth bacteria that prevent rather than cause cavities; and a so-called Dirt Vaccine that appears to ease a range of chronic inflammatory disorders and also jolts the immune system into a cancer-fighting mode. Some scientists are even dreaming about ‘probiotic’ cleaning products- each detergent, cleanser, or air spray formulated with its own patented mix of protective and health-enhancing microbes.” (4)
University of Michigan researcher, Gary Huffnagle calls probiotics ‘ a new essential food group’ in his book, The Probiotics Revolution. (5) Huffnagle does advise consumers to by wary of probiotic containing products that don’t specify how much or what type of bacteria. Evidence suggests the bugs need to be alive and ingested in huge amounts, generally between 5 billion and 10 billion daily. (3)
This is all fairly new. On a spring morning in 2003, a middle-aged Dutch farmer had swallowed his first twice-daily handful of ten small capsules, each filled with some 10 billion cells of the cheesemaking bacterium Lactococcus lactis. That small act entered the Dutchman into the history books as the first human deliberately colonized with transgenic bacteria. The live bugs he swallowed carried and expressed the human gene for the immune calming cytokine interleukin-10. The farmer had been debilitated with Crohn’s disease for more than twenty years. When consumed in dairy products, ordinary L. lactis disappears from a person’s intestinal tract within a day or two. The farmer noted a dramatic reduction in his symptoms. A follow-up trial with ten other patients also proved successful. Further studies are planned in the Netherlands this year with the hope that government regulators will allow this next trial on an out-patient basis. (6)
In perhaps the ultimate illustration of how far things have come, Joel Weinstock, a professor of internal medicine at the University of Iowa, recently ran a preliminary clinical trial in which six patients suffering from Crohn’s disease were treated with a dose of live parasitic worms. In five of the six, the disease went into complete remission in the period when the harmless microbes were in the patients’ bodies. The sixth patient also showed a significant improvement. (1)
This is all part of the so-called hygiene hypothesis, first voiced by a British epidemiologist, D. P. Strachan in 1989. The hypothesis is that our immune system needs a certain amount of bacteria on which to flex its muscles. Deprived of it, the white cells that are designed to fight bacteria fail to develop, and the other white cells, those designed to make antibodies to defend the body against microbial dangers as well as to produce allergic reactions—will take over. (7) One scientist has likened the immune system to the brain. You have to exercise it, that is, expose it to the right antigenic information so that it matures correctly. Excessive hygiene, therefore, may interfere with the normal maturation of the immune system. (8)
Here are some examples of the hygiene hypothesis:
•The hygiene hypothesis can be used to explain the Louisiana Purchase. In Haiti, the 1801 uprising of African slaves was successful because yellow fever killed twenty-seven thousand French troops while leaving untouched the African-born slaves, who were relatively immune because of their exposure earlier in life. Napoleon, discouraged by the loss of his Haitian colony, gave up his American ambitions and sold his remaining territory, the Louisiana Purchase. (9)
•Dirt and infection don’t just make you less allergy prone, they can fight off some cancers. Dairy farmers are as much as five times less likely to develop lung cancer. Working in a cotton factory protects you against lung, breast, liver, and other tumors. (10)
•A Canadian study published in November 2007 suggested that fermented milk containing Lactobacillus acidophilus and Lactobacilius caseli could prevent antibiotic-related diarrhea. (11)
•A 2007 study in Finland found that an oat drink containing Bifdobacterium lactis bacteria helped bowel function in nursing home residents. (11)
•Scientists in Argentina are investigating whether milk fermented with lactic acid bacteria might reduce amounts of cancer-causing substances in the intestine. (11)
Wine and Microbes
John Postage postulates that few people are aware that beers, wine, cheeses, and so on are prepared by allowing microbes to act on foodstuffs; even fewer recognize that food goes bad through the actions of microbes. (12)
Today, modern wine making techniques are wiping our Racodium cellare, a benign mold, once seen as the sign of a good Tokay cellar, since it helps keep the cellar air fresh. Stainless steel barrels prevent alcohol from evaporating, cutting off the Tokay mold’s food source. It is also under threat from modern standards of hygiene, which aim to create laboratory-like levels of cleanliness in wine cellars. Some vineyards, however, still go out of their way to encourage it. However, it seems to have disappeared from the UK. “I am very sorry to never have found Racodium in Britain,” says Henry Tribe of the University of Cambridge, who has studied the mold. “Even the cellars of St. John’s College are too hygienic. Hygiene is reaching stupid proportions.” (13)
Space Travel
John Postage provides this interesting information about microbes and space travel. “A space ship with a few astronauts taking a year-long trip to Mars would be a physically isolated community and a peculiar thing happens to the commensal microbes of people in such communities. One type of microbe tends to become dominant, from mouth to anus, and if this germ happens to be pathogenic the situation can be dangerous. Likewise, immunity to infection by ordinary microbes tends to be lost. It seems probable that astronauts will have to keep cultures of the varieties of microbes they started out with, and will need to deliberately re-infect themselves at intervals.” (14)
Next they will probably be telling us that when we go on long car or airplane trips we should carry our own satchel of personal microbes for ingestion after a certain number of hours. Think of all the fits this would create with airport security.
References
1.Garry Hamilton, “Why We Need Germs,” The Ecologist Report, June 2001
2.“Probiotic Bacteria and Your Health,” http://www.ghchealth.com/probiotic-bacteria-and-your-health.html; accessed December 25, 2007
3.Lindsey Tanner, “The next craze: ‘good’ germs in your food,” Honolulu Advertiser, December 10, 2007, Page A3
4.Jessica Snyder Sachs, Good Germs, Bad Germs, (New York, Hill and Wang, 2007), 12
5.Gary B. Huffnagle, The Probiotics Revolution, (New York, Bantam Books, 2007)
6.Jessica Snyder Sachs, Good Germs, Bad Germs, 206
7.Katherine Ashenburg, The Dirt On Clean, (New York, North Point Press, 2007), 290
8.Thomas R. DeGregori, The Environment, Our Natural Resources and Modern Technology, (Ames, Iowa, Iowa State Press, 2002)
9.E. Fuller Torrey and Robert H. Yolken, Beasts of the Earth, (New Brunswick, New Jersey, Rutgers University Press, 2005), 20
10.Jessica Marshall, “Filthy Healthy,” New Scientist, 197, 34, January 12, 2008
11.Lindsey Tanner, “Products With Good Bacteria Get Popular,” Examiner.com; December 10, 2007
12.John Postgate, Microbes and Man, Fourth Edition, (Cambridge, Cambridge University Press, 2000), 133
13.“Wine cellar mold,” New Scientist, 194, 57, June 9, 2007
14.John Postgate, Microbes and Man, Fourth Edition, 353
.
Saturday, February 2, 2008
Hysteria Over Minuscule Amounts of Chemicals Is Unwarranted
Jack Dini
Livermore, CA
(From Hawaii Reporter, February 1, 2008)
Imagine one dime in a stack reaching from the Earth to the Moon and half-way back. This is equivalent to one part in 1019, a detectability level for one atom of cesium in the presence of argon atoms reported by Oak Ridge National Laboratory scientists. (1)
These days scientists can find any thing in anything and this leads to a problem. The minute that something is found in food, in someone’s blood, etc., some folks get very concerned and start creating a lot of fuss. The very act of being able to measure something can give the impression that if it’s quantifiable, it’s dangerous. (2)
Todd Seavey observes, “When regulators began looking for traces of potentially harmful substances to ban a half-century ago, scientists were capable of finding traces as small as parts per million. Unfortunately, activists continue to panic—and make news—each time science improves our ability to detect minuscule traces, even if there’s not new evidence that these smaller and smaller traces can harm us. Now it isn’t hard to find traces of virtually any substance on the planet in virtually any place on the planet.” (3)
Here’s a great example of selectively picking data to arouse panic. Bill Moyers did a PBS special on plastics in January 2002. During the program a scientist reported that a sample of Moyers’ blood had been analyzed and about 400 chemicals were found that would not have been found in his blood 40 years ago. The inference was that all of this had come from big, bad industry. No mention was made of concentration levels. No mention was made of the fact that 40 years ago we were analyzing in the parts per million range (equivalent to finding 1 second in 12 years), whereas today we routinely report in the parts per trillion range ( 1 second in 32,000 years), and even greater as mentioned in the opening sentence of this article. No mention was made about the 1000 natural chemicals in coffee; no mention about the 2000 natural chemicals in chocolate.
Another naysayer, Lewis Smith reported, “Traces of a cocktail of toxic chemicals linked to cancer and fetal deformities are being eaten even in the healthiest of diets. Man-made pollutants and chemicals were found in every one of 27 food products, including staples such as bread and eggs, that were tested by experts in further tests carried out by WWF, formerly the World Wide Fund for Nature. Every one of 352 people who provided blood samples over the past five years was found to be contaminated with toxic chemicals. All the contaminants found in the samples were at low levels, well within legal limits, but there are serious fears for long-term health.” (4) How low were the levels? Not mentioned. Parts per million? Parts per trillion? Parts per quadrillion? Just low levels, and no references, other than mentioning WWF, an advocacy group well known for its chemophobia leanings.
This type of reporting led a number of Britain’s leading poison experts to denounce pressure groups for mounting a ‘hysterical scaremongering’ campaign against dangerous chemicals in the environment. They accused the groups of acting irresponsibly by publishing reports claiming most people have blood swimming with toxic compounds. Said Alan Boobis of Imperial College, London, “Most chemicals were found at a
fraction of a part per billion. There is not evidence such concentrations pose any threat to people’s health.” (5)
Anthony Trewavas points out that by failing to provide the full information on how minuscule these chemicals are, the public is deprived of the necessary information to make a balanced judgment. He adds, “Worse, a cardinal rule of toxicology is ignored: All chemicals are hazardous, depending on the dose. Drinking six pints of water quickly will kill the average adult from hyponatremia; an aspirin a day helps circulation but 40 stops it for good; you get the point.” (6)
Lastly, from Joe Schwarcz, “Evidence for the presence of a substance is not evidence of harm. After all, we don’t avoid apples even though their seeds harbor the deadly toxin cyanide; we happily eat strawberries although they contain acetone, a known neurotoxin; and we are not deterred from toast by the presence of 3,4-benzopyrene, and established carcinogen. The toxic properties of these chemicals are indeed real. When test animals are exposed to high does of acetone, or 1,4-dioxane, they certainly show neurological damage or tumor growth. But that doesn’t mean small doses will have a similar effect. In fact, they may have a significantly different effect. (7)
1.Mark S. Lesney, “Chain Reactions: Harvest of Silent Spring,” Today’s Chemist at Work, 8, (3), 63, 1999
2.Eric Dezenhall, Nail ‘Em, (New York, Prometheus Books, 2003), 41
3.Todd Seavey, “Undetected, Unmeasured Disaster,” HealthFactsandFears.com, November 19, 2004
4.Lewis Smith, “Man-made toxins are found in even the best diets,” timesonline.com, September 22, 2006
5.Robin Mckie, “Poison experts attack ‘hysteria’ over chemicals,” observer.gurdian.co.uk, September 18, 2005
6.Anthony Trewavas, “Chemical Warfare,” The Wall Street Journal, November 2, 2005, Page 14
7.Joe Schwarcz, Let Them Eat Cake, (Toronto, Canada, ECW Press, 2005), 159
Livermore, CA
(From Hawaii Reporter, February 1, 2008)
Imagine one dime in a stack reaching from the Earth to the Moon and half-way back. This is equivalent to one part in 1019, a detectability level for one atom of cesium in the presence of argon atoms reported by Oak Ridge National Laboratory scientists. (1)
These days scientists can find any thing in anything and this leads to a problem. The minute that something is found in food, in someone’s blood, etc., some folks get very concerned and start creating a lot of fuss. The very act of being able to measure something can give the impression that if it’s quantifiable, it’s dangerous. (2)
Todd Seavey observes, “When regulators began looking for traces of potentially harmful substances to ban a half-century ago, scientists were capable of finding traces as small as parts per million. Unfortunately, activists continue to panic—and make news—each time science improves our ability to detect minuscule traces, even if there’s not new evidence that these smaller and smaller traces can harm us. Now it isn’t hard to find traces of virtually any substance on the planet in virtually any place on the planet.” (3)
Here’s a great example of selectively picking data to arouse panic. Bill Moyers did a PBS special on plastics in January 2002. During the program a scientist reported that a sample of Moyers’ blood had been analyzed and about 400 chemicals were found that would not have been found in his blood 40 years ago. The inference was that all of this had come from big, bad industry. No mention was made of concentration levels. No mention was made of the fact that 40 years ago we were analyzing in the parts per million range (equivalent to finding 1 second in 12 years), whereas today we routinely report in the parts per trillion range ( 1 second in 32,000 years), and even greater as mentioned in the opening sentence of this article. No mention was made about the 1000 natural chemicals in coffee; no mention about the 2000 natural chemicals in chocolate.
Another naysayer, Lewis Smith reported, “Traces of a cocktail of toxic chemicals linked to cancer and fetal deformities are being eaten even in the healthiest of diets. Man-made pollutants and chemicals were found in every one of 27 food products, including staples such as bread and eggs, that were tested by experts in further tests carried out by WWF, formerly the World Wide Fund for Nature. Every one of 352 people who provided blood samples over the past five years was found to be contaminated with toxic chemicals. All the contaminants found in the samples were at low levels, well within legal limits, but there are serious fears for long-term health.” (4) How low were the levels? Not mentioned. Parts per million? Parts per trillion? Parts per quadrillion? Just low levels, and no references, other than mentioning WWF, an advocacy group well known for its chemophobia leanings.
This type of reporting led a number of Britain’s leading poison experts to denounce pressure groups for mounting a ‘hysterical scaremongering’ campaign against dangerous chemicals in the environment. They accused the groups of acting irresponsibly by publishing reports claiming most people have blood swimming with toxic compounds. Said Alan Boobis of Imperial College, London, “Most chemicals were found at a
fraction of a part per billion. There is not evidence such concentrations pose any threat to people’s health.” (5)
Anthony Trewavas points out that by failing to provide the full information on how minuscule these chemicals are, the public is deprived of the necessary information to make a balanced judgment. He adds, “Worse, a cardinal rule of toxicology is ignored: All chemicals are hazardous, depending on the dose. Drinking six pints of water quickly will kill the average adult from hyponatremia; an aspirin a day helps circulation but 40 stops it for good; you get the point.” (6)
Lastly, from Joe Schwarcz, “Evidence for the presence of a substance is not evidence of harm. After all, we don’t avoid apples even though their seeds harbor the deadly toxin cyanide; we happily eat strawberries although they contain acetone, a known neurotoxin; and we are not deterred from toast by the presence of 3,4-benzopyrene, and established carcinogen. The toxic properties of these chemicals are indeed real. When test animals are exposed to high does of acetone, or 1,4-dioxane, they certainly show neurological damage or tumor growth. But that doesn’t mean small doses will have a similar effect. In fact, they may have a significantly different effect. (7)
1.Mark S. Lesney, “Chain Reactions: Harvest of Silent Spring,” Today’s Chemist at Work, 8, (3), 63, 1999
2.Eric Dezenhall, Nail ‘Em, (New York, Prometheus Books, 2003), 41
3.Todd Seavey, “Undetected, Unmeasured Disaster,” HealthFactsandFears.com, November 19, 2004
4.Lewis Smith, “Man-made toxins are found in even the best diets,” timesonline.com, September 22, 2006
5.Robin Mckie, “Poison experts attack ‘hysteria’ over chemicals,” observer.gurdian.co.uk, September 18, 2005
6.Anthony Trewavas, “Chemical Warfare,” The Wall Street Journal, November 2, 2005, Page 14
7.Joe Schwarcz, Let Them Eat Cake, (Toronto, Canada, ECW Press, 2005), 159
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