Climate Change

Last week, scientists found that a large chunk of the artic ice shelf recently broke off near the Canadian coast.

The current warming being experienced in the Arctic means the conditions needed to rebuild the shelves simply does not exist...

...Further loss of Arctic ice will see radiation absorbed by darker seawater and snow free land, potentially warming the Earth's climate at an even faster rate than current observational data indicates.

Yikes! There still seems to be a delusion to the effects of global warming, by many nay-sayers. As if the large, unseasonal, and deterious effects of extreme weather events in recent years hasn't clued them in, we can take a look at daily news from around the world to see the obvious effects of global warming/climate change.

Some examples of detrimental effects of climate change worldwide:

* The effects of climate change can be easily seen across the continent of Africa.

* Lake Victoria suffering from pollution, over-fishing and climate change.

* Food and water shortages in Nairobi.

* Severe and constant flooding in Bangladesh. (Although the UN contends that it's not so bad because sediment deposits are creating more land. Yeah, that totally makes up for the illness, homelessness and poverty caused by the increased levels of water?)

* Desertification in Burkina Faso.

* Coral Reef destruction in Central America.

* Flooding in Ukraine and Romania.

Bloomberg/Gates Anti-Smoking Collaboration

Two wealthy men, maybe you've heard of them - Michael Bloomberg and Bill Gates, are joining the forces of their very wealthy and influential foundations to discourage smoking around the world, with a focus in the developing world. I'm looking forward to hearing more about this in the future. I wonder how the tobacco industry is preparing for this. Apparently though, they can jump on the finding that tobacco can be used to help create a vaccine for lymphoma. A new market for tobacco? It would fair much better for their reputation.

This generation's coat hanger

According to this report, women seeking abortions in countries where they are illegal have been turning to websites that will send them medications. It's good to know that there are alternatives out there for these women, but some of the sites sound a little sketchy. Of course, when anything is done illegally there is a high risk of a) sketchy people trying to take advantage of the vulnerable, b) little to no legal repercussions for dangerous alternatives, and c) few resources to turn to because of the taboo.

Quotes

Protect me from knowing what I don't need to know. Protect me from even knowing that there are things to know that I don't know. Protect me from knowing that I decided not to know about the things that I decided not to know about. Amen.
-Douglas Adams, Mostly Harmless

Lord, lord, lord. Protect me from the consequences of the above prayer.
-Douglas Adams, Mostly Harmless

Solutions for Global Hunger

Solutions for world hunger or Promotion of free trade?
Interestingly enough, I could not find anything in the BBC or the NYTimes about the G8 summit today.

More about hunger relief from IRIN.

Both of these articles bring into focus the use of aid through imported food, rather than helping to support the production of local agriculture

What's the saying? When you give a (wo)man a fish, you feed him (her) for a day. When you teach a (wo)man to fish, you feed him(her) for a lifetime.

Doctors not judges

There was an interesting post in a NY Times blog today regarding whether doctors should lecture obese patients about their weight. It's actually a blog post about a blog post from a doctor, which I am now posting about in my blog.

In the original blog, Musings of a Distractible Mind, the writer (Dr. Rob) contemplates whether obese people really need to be told that they need to lose weight. The blog in general is great, this MD is very mindful of his practice, his patients, and of the woes of U.S. Health Care. He's witty about it too, which helps to lighten up some heavy topics.

The specific post mentioned in the Times, entitled Shame, is really entriquing. I'm sure that it's frustrating for doctors to see patients who they feel are not following their recommendations when it comes to health, but shaming someone for not taking your medical advice is not a tactic that will make people change their behaviors. I doubt that if a doctor routinely told me that I need to stop drinking soda, I would. When I feel more shameful about it, I struggle even more with stopping.

But the idea that their personal worth lies on their BMI is extremely damaging. There are a lot of screwed-up skinny people out there; just look at super-models...Our culture of accusation and shame simply makes obese people hate themselves. If you hate yourself, why should you want to take care of your body?

An interesting concept brought up to me by a friend who has for many years reclaimed the fat chick label, was that after losing a bit of weight she felt like she was betraying herself. She had spent so many years accepting herself at the weight she was that she had to change her image of herself and tell herself it was okay to lose the weight. We need medical providers and a society that accepts us at all weights, and allows us to be what we are. Kudos to Dr. Rob for his post!

Barely a glimpse into the mistreatment of the mentally ill

How sad that it takes such a tragic event to spur outrage against the treatment of psychiatric patients. Have psychiatric staff become so numb that they can ignore a woman lying on the floor for an hour? It makes you think about the patients who don't fall over and die. What are they being put through that is not noticed by the staff or the governing bodies like the Health and Hospitals Corporation? It seems that this incident has sparked questions about the treatment of psychiatric patients in regards to this specific hospital, but I have seen nor heard much about this issue on a larger scale. Where is NAMI?