Health | Ain't Complicated

Got Dirt?

Alternate post titles:

Where Does Dirt Come From?
Global Dedirting
Never Mind Global Warming
Save That Dirt!

It seems dirt must be an unreplenishable resource. I wonder where it goes. And how long it has been going there. And why I have to keep dusting it off slow-to-sell books and scrubbing it out from between my toes.

Nevertheless, as a public service, here’s the beginning of the article:

The lowdown on topsoil: It’s disappearing

The planet is getting skinned.

While many worry about the potential consequences of atmospheric warming, a few experts are trying to call attention to another global crisis quietly taking place under our feet.

Call it the thin brown line. Dirt. On average, the planet is covered with little more than 3 feet of topsoil — the shallow skin of nutrient-rich matter that sustains most of our food and appears to play a critical role in supporting life on Earth.

“We’re losing more and more of it every day,” said David Montgomery, a geologist at the University of Washington. “The estimate is that we are now losing about 1 percent of our topsoil every year to erosion, most of this caused by agriculture.”

Agriculture, eh?

Maybe we should quit eating.

I think that would solve the man-caused global warming issue as well.

Now I’ve got to figure out in what category to place this post . . . .

Need More (and Better) Sleep?

I certainly could use more, but this isn’t my problem:

Can’t get the sandman to stop by? Quit calling the guy. According to reports from Wayne State University in Detroit, Michigan, talking on a cell phone before heading to bed can prevent a person from getting a good night’s sleep.

The more I learn about cellphones, the less I like them. 😯

But I still like mine enough to keep it. 😳

To Ask Your Doctor

“Are you in treatment for any sort of addiction?”

(Follow-up questions encouraged.)

Doctors in rehab still practice

Troubling cases in which doctors were accused of botching operations while undergoing treatment for drugs or alcohol have led to criticism of rehab programs that allow thousands of U.S. physicians to keep their addictions hidden from their patients.

Nearly all states have confidential rehab programs that let doctors continue practicing as long as they stick with the treatment regimen. Nationwide, as many as 8,000 doctors may be in such programs, by one estimate.

I know that’s a MessNBC story, but still . . . .

On the Vaccination Front

OK, three articles to point you to — all from the same site.

Why, just because I thought you should know. 🙂

Adults Beware — New Vaccine Guidelines Released:

The Advisory Committee on Immunization Practices, a division of the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC), has released the 2007-2008 recommended immunization schedules for adults in the US.

The schedule includes 11 different types of vaccines for adults, including….

[…]

Vaccinations of all kinds hit you right at the core of your fears, no matter what vaccine we’re talking about.

[…]

But getting back to the vaccines, Big Pharma may appear idiotic, but they are no fools. They know people want guaranteed safety. “Here, take this shot and nothing bad will happen to you,” they say. And a lot of people believe them, even when evidence of the opposite comes out. They just want the magic pill to be true.

Some hard-hitting evidence released just a couple of months ago should make anyone think twice about the flu shot: flu vaccines have NEVER been proven to prevent flu-related deaths in people over age 65, which is one of the primary groups for which they’re recommended.

You may also be shocked to learn that the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) grossly distorts the facts about flu deaths. If you go to the CDC’s main flu page, you’ll see their statistic that about 36,000 people die from the flu in the United States each year.

But if you search a little harder, you can find the actual number of people who died from the flu in 2005 (this is the most recent data that’s available). Want to take a guess at what it is?

In 2005, 1,806 people died from influenza, not 36,000.

[…]

How to Prevent the Flu Naturally

Then there’s this one on children’s shots and exemptions and education and stuff:

Growing Number of Parents Use Religion to Avoid Vaccines

Many states are seeing increases in the rate of religious exemptions from vaccinations claimed for kindergarteners, according to a review of states’ vaccination records and data from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention conducted by the Associated Press.

A growing number of parents are claiming religious exemptions to avoid vaccinations for their children because they are skeptical of the shots’ effectiveness or are concerned about potential side effects, including autism.

The number of parents choosing not to vaccinate is still small, as only a few thousand children were not vaccinated, compared with 3.7 million vaccinated, among children who entered kindergarten in 2005.

[…]

More parents are clearly starting to understand that vaccinations are not a miracle cure-all that will keep their children from getting sick. Instead, they are seeing the truth: that vaccines carry the risk of serious side effects, including autism.

[…]

The topic of vaccinations is always emotional for both sides of the camp. People who have not done their research are quick to say that it is ignorant to avoid vaccinations. However, this is quite the oxymoron because mothers with college educations and higher incomes are those who are LESS likely to vaccinate their children.

[…]

The trend toward not vaccinating has been growing for some time now. One study found 93 percent of pediatricians and 60 percent of family physicians said at least one parent had refused a vaccine for their child in 2003. Also, 69 percent of the physicians said that the number of concerns from parents had increased significantly.

What’s your stance on vaccinations?

(I’m leery of them.)

Then Tax Abortions Also!

Taxes trigger big drop in U.S. smoking

Higher state taxes on smoking are producing sharp declines in tobacco consumption in the United States, just as Congress considers a huge federal cigarette tax hike, USA Today reported in its Friday editions.

The newspaper, conducting its own analysis of taxation and consumption figures, said the degree of decline in smoking appears to be tied directly to the size of the tax increase.

We know taxing smokes isn’t about legislating morality. So taxing abortion wouldn’t be either.

We know that consistency demands that “pro-choicers” should oppose someone deciding to smoke just as much as they should oppose someone deciding to have an abortion.

And what would be done with the money generated by state and federal taxes on abortions?

Well, I take you back to the story for my answer:

The Senate last week approved a $35 billion tobacco tax increase as a way to pay for expanded government health care for children. Meanwhile, the House of Representatives has proposed its own plan to provide health care to children through higher tobacco taxes

Abortion taxes for the children!

Makes sense to me.

Rattler Warning

I’ve never heard of this before:

Turns out, even beheaded rattlesnakes can be dangerous.

That’s what 53-year-old Danny Anderson learned as he was feeding his horses this week when a 5-foot rattler slithered onto his central Washington property, about 50 miles southeast of Yakima.

Anderson and his 27-year-old son, Benjamin, pinned the snake with an irrigation pipe and cut off its head with a shovel. A few more strikes to the head left it sitting under a pickup truck.

“When I reached down to pick up the head, it raised around and did a backflip almost, and bit my finger,” Anderson said. “I had to shake my hand real hard to get it to let loose.”