YOUR HEALTH

 

Don't be an ostrich

 

Today more and more educated and young people in North America are avoiding regular booster shot inoculations and especially the annual flu vaccination.

 

So far this year in Canada, just over 1/3 of the population is bothering to get FREE vaccination again influenza even though now it is readily available at their doctors, public mass clinics and local drug stores.

 

The mindset is particularly misguided because influenza is always a nasty attacker and since 2009 the predominant or an always recurring strain is H1N1 – swine flu.

 

Many seem to think the flu (at a 14 day run) is only a longer version of the common cold      (7 days), but this is not true, especially with H1N1 lurking around.

 

The common cold attacks the head and its common passageways: the upper throat, nose, sinuses, and ears.   That is why you feel a scratchy/sore throat, ‘congested head’, plugged ears, and have a running/snotty nose.

 

 

 

By comparison, all of the 303 know varieties of influenza (which comes in type A or type B families)¹ launch a broader and more vicious attack:  leading to muscle aches, headaches, chills, nausea, vomiting, diarrhea and most characteristically, a high fever ( a fever which alone if not reduced by cold compresses, cold baths and ibuprofen or acetaminophen medication can literally burn out your brain circuitry and cause death). And, of course, the flu attacks the breathing system and the lungs causing phlegm, wet coughing and may progress to severe shortness of breath and pneumonia --  the latter two requiring emergency medical attention and hospital critical-care treatment for a week or more – if the patient survives.

 

Put simply, all flu strains are not nice and create a serious weakening of the immune system during its 2 week long attack and many who survive this struggle end up with permanent lung scarring and other immune system predatory conditions for two years or more².

 

And H1N1 – the common and often predominant strain in Canada since 2009 – is especially dangerous as it an equal opportunity attacker and killer.

 

Most flu viruses tend to attack and harm the weak (the old, the very young and those in between who are pregnant or have some serious health conditions related to a major organ: heart, lungs, kidneys, etc.)  So, in the past, half of all deaths from the regular flu epidemics were age 62 or older – when life expectancy was 71.

 

But HiN1 has a mid-point of age 40!!!   That is, it will attack all ages and seriously threatens the lives – or kills off— a 25 year old joggers ³, a construction worker age 45 or a teenager!!

 

And while H1N1 has not been around for many decades, its new, annual visit is of great concern, for we now know – through DNA tracking – that the much earlier, ancestral version was the Spanish Flu – which between 1918 and 1920 killed some 50 million people worldwide ^4.

 

Final note:  It takes 2 weeks for the flu vaccine to reach maximum protection, so even if we are in mid- flu season today in Ontario and Canada (November through April), still get your needle.  You may travel to other parts of the planet in June which is their flu season, or international visitors may bring it with them to your home.

 

Treatment basics: All flues, when in full force, require isolation, bed rest -- to allow all the body’s energies to focus on defeating the virus, plenty of replacement fluids and the above mentioned treatments for high (deadly) fever. Over the counter medicines can help but bed rest and isolation are key!!!

 

 

So, be pro-active and practice preventative medicine.  Get your flu shot now and in future at the start of the season.   Protect your health and the health of your family and friends, make your boss happy and avoid loss of income – and keep H1N1 and other influenza at bay.

 

Don’t be an ostrich and bury your head in the ground when danger appears.

 

  

_______

1. Public Health Agency of Canada FluWatch report: January 5 to January 11, 2014 (Week 02)

2. “1.5 million called in sick with flu” by Jeff Gray, Globe and Mail Website Update;   Published Friday, Jan. 15 2010, 9:17 AM EST;Last updated Thursday, Aug. 23 2012, 1:45 PM EDT

3. “The scars from H1N1 remain” by Deborah Folka, Globe and Mail Website Update; Published Monday, Oct. 04 2010, 12:00 AM EDT; Last updated Thursday, Aug. 23 2012, 4:19 PM EDT

4. See Wikipedia, “Spanish Flu” and “Influenza”

YOUR HEALTH

 

Organic is not the way

 

Today more and more educated and young people in the North America are embracing eating organic.

 

The organic movement -- which rejects pesticides, insecticides, man-made fertilizers and any genetic modifications (GMO) -- is no longer ‘fringe thinking’ but high profile, receiving space in regular green grocers, supermarket stores and the exclusive Whole Foods chain.

 

General Mills has blinked as well and is going to ensure all ingredients in its Cheerios cereal are GMO free -- to bolster declining cereal sales in an overcrowded market.

 

Yes, organic farming methods go back thousands of years, but today, as in the past it:

 

·        involves intensive labour due to constant manual weeding and hand or simple machine planting and crop collection 

·        has limited success at controlling bugs and disease attacks -- ongoing challenges with few ‘natural’ remedies

·        relies on crop rotation and leaving 1/3 to 1/2 of one’s fields fallow each year or planted with clover or other so-called ‘green manure’  which are left to die and be buried in the soil (See Wikipedia) -- to prevent depletion of soil nutrients

·        and, of course, any scientific genetic modification of food (GMO) is strictly verboten and shunned.

·        Finally, it uses traditional ‘organic fertilizer’ extensively; namely, 'poop' -- mostly from cows, sheep and pigs.

 

The above characteristics automatically result in reduced crop yields by over 1/3, increased spoilage and waste, and higher consumer prices of 10% to 30%. 

 

And the reliance on traditional animal ‘poop’  has revived the incidences of deadly animal E. coli bacteria, a harmless and common bug in animals, but a serious threat to human health and life: when ‘animal manure’ gets in direct contact with crops, vegetables, berries,  or leaks into nearby streams, rivers or wells and contaminates the water supply.   Just Google Walkerton Ontario or check out your local 'food poisoning outbreak' at some banquet hall offering organic fruits or vegetables to hundreds of guests.

 

 
While those who are affluent can afford the much higher food costs; can ignore the waste of arable land; can ignore laboratory tests that have proven organic and non-organic foods have the same nutrients and nutrition levels; and that some 70-80% of all foods sold in North America contain GMOs and have done so for well over a decade without harm ( Time magazine, Jan. 20, 2014, p.15) , the poor and low income of America, and the vast majority of the planets 7 billion people cannot.

 

The very scientific, modern farming improvements that are being shunned -- carefully designed pesticides and insecticides and precision man-made fertilizers (all of which come from natural ingredients), and GMOs (which are tailored to resist drought or excessive rain or bugs or disease) all have greatly increase crop yields and have allowed the West to become abundant in food -- so even our poor can eat.  And these western innovations have transformed food production (See Wikipedia “Green Revolution”) since the 1960s across India, Africa and now China -- so that billions no longer face starvation.

 

Yet educated Westerners are turning their backs on this progress.  They buy into the misguided belief that ‘natural’, ‘old-fashioned’ food is better for our health than foods with human intervention – despite no evidence to support this except, maybe, a placebo effect.

 

If this mindset spread around the world and ‘organic’ returns as the agricultural norm, three things are certain:

 

1. regular famines and starvation would return as has been the case for millennia under the vagaries of nature: drought, pestilence and crop disease

 

2. the world’s population would have to return to numbers that allowed organic farming at best to meet the food needs of the population:  no more than the 1.5 billion as at the start of the 20^th century. 

 

Today, there are 7 billion people.

 

3. and while most people today live in cities and towns and no longer tend the ‘organic’ fields as of old – the manual labour needed for traditional organic food production would require well over 50% of the population to go back to the farm.

YOUR MONEY

CANADA – USA  merger

No, I am not talking about a complete union making Canada another US state, but rather a financial union or at least a fixed rate peg.

In the last 3 months or so the Canadian dollar has dropped from par to some $0.90 cents US and the valuation fluctuates daily by a ½% to almost a full 1% - rarely up and overall falling downward.

In fact, I foresee a freefall to that ridiculous range of some $0.65 US as was the case during the late 1990’s and early 2000’s.  The chart below – which ends with 2011 – highlights this fluctuation insanity.

The graph covering 2002 through 2011 found at  http://www.nbforestry.com/issues/the-dollar/   is a wild sea-saw ride    from $0.62 to over $1.10 Canadian and then falling again.

Canada does some 80% of its exporting with and importing from the USA and to allow the exchange rate to radically and uncontrollably fluctuate makes no sense for business, international corporations or individual citizens.

Yes, analysts hype the reduced dollar as ‘giving us an edge’ in exporting to the US but this ignores the equally important importing side: for machinery, goods and especially food that come from south of the border.

A reduced Canadian dollar causes our prices to rise – i.e., inflation – for a wide range of essential and irreplaceable imports.   It hurts the average consumer at the supermarket, Home Depot, Walmart and Target chains let alone more pricy retail.

If this was a government strategy (and one explained to the public) it might be valid, but governments and central banks have not really controlled their currency exchange rates for some 40 years: the last time the gold standard was removed.

Currency traders make these ‘decisions’ and ‘calls’ based on ‘perceived’ future strengths of any given economy, and all central banks can do is waste money to stem a freefall – if they so wish – by buying back their own currency and giving currency exchange companies a ‘handling’ profit.

It does not take a genius to recognize currency volatility is bad for business and individuals.  You cannot plan ahead because what you think makes sense and is a ‘good deal’ at $0.95 USA or $1.00 US exchange rate makes no sense when the bill comes in months later at a different rate – say $0.80 US. or $0.65 US!!   

While Canada’s employment numbers and bank stability have been the envy of the world throughout the Great Recession (2008 onward), and our debt to GDP is far better the US’s,  with ample farmland, forests, mining resources and huge tar sands/oil and natural gas reserves,  Canada’s dollar should be at or near par with the US if not higher.

But that is not what the currency traders say as they manipulate and speculate on their computers destabilizing and harming the overall economy and individual finances of Canadians.

In conclusion, we are too closely connected with America in trade, business, foodstuffs and travel to allow such shenanigans that are really beyond government control.   We should either peg the Loonie to the Greenback as some other countries do, or, like Europe, create a common North American currency – a EURO type GREENLOON.

OUR NEW WORLD

 

India’s star rising

 

The recent announcement - mentioned in a previous blog (Dec. 16/13) -  that India has successfully launched a probe to Mars was covered in a detailed segment on WNED Buffalo TV PBS news this Saturday evening.

 

The notable points:

 

1. India has had a space program for almost half a century, building and launching India made rockets and state of the art weather, communication (and military) satellites for decades.

 

2. India’s space program budget is a mere $1 billion dollars US and represents less than 1/3 of one percent of the country's total budget.

 

3. The probe to Mars mission cost a mere $72 million dollars US and this is a small fraction of what similar probes cost in the West.

 

4. The probe to Mars is a purely scientific exploration activity and it is hoped the new technologies and skills used in the mission will benefit Indian scientific and technological industries in general. 

 

5.  India has first class engineers and scientists and is adding thousands more to their numbers through its extensive university programs.

 

6. The mission has been a great source of national pride and raised India’s prestige and technological reputation throughout the Far East, Asia and beyond.

 

7.  India’s space exploits put it on par with neighbouring China -- as the two competitors rise to become world leaders in space and modern technology.

 

So, with the Russian and American space programs in decline due to budget cuts, with the two superpowers relying on ‘past laurels’, the real future of space exploration seems to be in India and China's courts -- with their far lower costs for the production of rockets and space technology, and their determination to be the number one nation on the planet: not only in population but in technology and scientific progress.

 

Put simply, the East is rising while Russia, Europe and the USA are treading water.

 ***  For more details on the full India space program, see Wikipedia "Indian Space Research Organisation"

 

GAIA

Listen to the Bible

Environmentalists and conservationists are always wringing their hands and bewailing the deterioration of our planet’s ecosystems and wildlife due to man’s predations – planned or unplanned.

We humans are seen as the source of all the problems of the planet and, if not for us, the world would bloom with plants, trees and infinite non-human life.

It is therefore a bit of a shock for such activists to read the cover story in Time magazine on the state of nature in the USA today. (Time, December 9, 2013, pages 36-43)

Instead of decline and devastation, Gaia and her systems are doing fine, thank you -- to the point of excess!!!

1. Forests across the USA are still vast despite the rise in USA’s population to some 320,000,000 people.

This is because today humans tend to form dense small footprint clusters such as cities and towns:  New York at 8.34 million and the other top 9 cities account for 32.26 million people or 10% of the entire population -- in 10 urban dots. (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_United_States_cities_by_population)  

Agriculture – i.e., the countryside - employs only some 5% of the population and including hamlets, villages and small towns, rural America accounts for only some 18% of the USA’s population according to the World Bank (http://www.tradingeconomics.com/united-states/rural-population-percent-of-total-population-wb-data.html).

Today, thanks to national and state parks and other wooded areas, forests cover some 75% of the US’s North Eastern, Great lakes, Mid-west, the South and the Rockies (Time, p.40). And according to estimates used by the US Dept. of Agriculture and Forest Service, forest areas today amount to 70% of the coverage in 1630, when colonists first arrived -- with most the deforested areas converted to farmland and animal husbandry. (p.3 of http://www.fia.fs.fed.us/library/briefings-summaries-overviews/docs/ForestFactsMetric.pdf).

 

2. Wildlife species that are forest based and that a short while ago seemed on the verge of extinction -- and were put on ‘protected lists’ -- are now at record numbers and exponentially increasing a la Malthus.

White tailed deer, according to the National Wildlife Research Center, have reached 30 million and growing – far more than in Columbus’s day.  Wild pigs, first brought to America in the 16^th century by Hernando de Soto, now number some 5 million and run amuck throughout the mainland’s 48 states (Time, p. 38).

The population explosion also applies to beavers, bald eagles, coyotes, wild turkeys, Burmese pythons – that make south Florida the world’s capital, alligators, bears and numerous others. 

Time’s chart of the top 10 wildlife population explosions (page 41) is as follows:

 

species	Numbers today	Increase since mid-20th century as percent
all deer	32,000,000	800  %
wild turkeys	8,000,000	1,500  %
Canada geese	5,700,000	370  %
wild pigs	5,500,000	120  %
racoons	5,000,000	2,700 %
beavers	5,000,000	2,400 %
alligators	5,000,000	400 %
black bear	450,000	320 %
cougars	100,000	1,600%
gray wolves	5,000	610 %

 

As urban and suburban areas are often near forested areas, and wild animals now regularly visit, feed and attack small pets, children and even adult humans in these residential areas, governments, even in Bambi-friendly New Jersey, are again encouraging hunting season and animal culls.

As a high school principal who spent years among northern Indian tribes once told me, humans have always been a part of nature’s system of checks and balances.  We are apex predators and nature has built in our participation to help maintain and restore wildlife balance.

A more important lesson and message from the Time article is this:

With forest coverage remaining vast, and in light of the current wildlife explosion, it is no longer tenable to blame humans, urbanization and industrialization for the record low forest wildlife populations in the 19^th through 20^th centuries --  as has long been the environmentalist’s battle cry.

We, the human ant, are a factor, but far less so than often assumed.

 

Gaia is mighty and resilient, and her ecosystems and life forms either bounce back, or due to ice age cycles, asteroid assault and the like, go through phases of decline, extinction and new birth.

America’s booming forest wildlife attests to this, and the need for human intervention: as we too, though small ants, are an element in maintaining balance.

                                                            +   +   +   +   +   +

I have not before quoted the Bible in this blog, but it seems apropos here.

The very first commandment was given to animals: Genesis ch 1:22   “. . . be fruitful and multiply”.

The very second commandment, given to mankind, is Genesis ch 1:28

“Be fruitful and multiply; fill the earth and subdue it. Rule over the fish in the sea and the birds in the sky and over every living creature that moves on the ground.”   

YOUR MONEY

Bernanke meows

Yesterday, the US Federal Reserve finally did what it has promised to do since mid-summer – some 6 months ago: start tapering its $85 billion dollar monthly buyback program.

It did so with a just over 10% reduction.

How did the markets react?    A spectacular change in the Dow Jones of 292 points; but all going UP, UP, UP – to just 8 points below the all time stock market record.

Analysts seem confused by this outcome as logic would have markets start to recede as almost free money for speculation is winding down.

Yes, $75 billion dollars is still being added to feed the gravy train this month.

And even if the same, approximately 10% cut were done each month – it would take a year before the ‘tapering’ and extra cash would be removed from the speculative stock market and derivative plays.

The ‘cut’, put simply, was too little to alter the speculative games.

In fact, speculators now know they have at least a year to ‘play’ with government subsidized, taxpayer cash.

And Bernanke’s comments that this ‘tapering’ would only go on if the economy stayed strong, all but guaranteed Wall Street and international speculators  that their money ‘bets’ – with almost free Bernanke dollars – are protected.

 

Well done Mr. Bernanke.

You are not a tiger, but a paper tiger.

You don’t roar, just meow.

YOUR MONEY

Which way is up – oh learned economic experts?

The world of central bankers is becoming more and more chaotic by the day as the old rules and logic fly out the door!

Should Central banks focus on unemployment or inflation/deflation or GDP or trade balances or rising house prices when deciding to intervene?

The primary principal for the 20 years leading up to the crash of 2008 was to keep inflation ‘managable’ to under 3% as, if nothing else, government debt becomes a  loans shark disaster when international market interest rates rocket.  Inflation also leads to people falling behind compared to rising prices for food, fuel, etc. and leads to increased poverty and social unrest (and possible revolt).

But since 2008, the focus has been on keeping the capitalist markets ‘cash fluid’ with cheap – almost free – money through government bailouts and bank prime rates of 1% or less for some 4+ years running, as well as other ‘clever’ ways of priming the cash flow through ‘quantitative easing’—a shell game  that has add trillions to the national debt of the USA alone!

With the US and Canadian and British economies showing steady signs of improvement and ‘life’ – in reduced unemployment, improved GDP and near or record stock markets, some central bankers – especially Ben Bernanke – have stated that they will taper off their buyback ‘subsidies’ soon.

While this makes sense and should have been done much sooner – since the lion’s share of the extra cheap money is ending up in speculative market plays -- fear and panic is setting in as these very same ‘beneficiaries’ and ‘players’ fear the end of the gravy train and ‘burst bubbles’ in their speculative games.

The new “enemy” we are being told, is DEFLATION – when the price of goods keeps on dropping.

Cheaper prices are good for consumers but deflation usually becomes a problem when ordinary people cannot afford to buy at even reduced prices, and manufacturing and importing grind to a halt with ‘over-capacity’ – resulting in greater unemployment and a vicious cycle to the bottom.

Some ‘experts’ see this danger approaching and the quest to control inflation has been given a new ‘spin’: inflation must be forced up to at least 2% to 3% or the economy will crash.    Governments must continue to flood the capital markets with almost free money to ‘stimulate’ the economy or else it will crash!

This mindset is currently Japan’s government policy, called Abenomics. And while given a fancy name after the current Prime Minister, it is the same foolish strategy that has been in place in Japan since the 1990s when it entered deflation – and has stayed that way for over 20 years.

Giving Toyota, Fuji and the other handful of super-conglomerates   almost free money has helped these companies make huge profits through their foreign branch dealings, but has starved Japanese retires of bank account income and made no difference to GDP and the overall Japanese economy.

Endless government infrastructure programs – whether make work projects or necessitated by almost annual earthquakes , especially severe ones at Kobe in 1995 and  Fukuoka in 2005 – have really not made an overall difference.

In general, it would be better, simpler and fairer, if governments wished to boost consumer spending to give each person a refund cheque or reduce income taxes.

That would prime the consumer money pump directly.  But adding billions to the national debt to primarily benefit banks and especially speculative investors and derivate plays is today’s central bank mindset.

Look to Japan’s lost almost ¼ century, you fools, and don’t fall into the same, deadly trap.

Even better, raising interest rates to historic norms will, if done gradually, spur companies to invest NOW in capital equipment and spur consumers to ‘buy’ before credit becomes more expensive. (In fact, this fear has been feeding the housing/condo boom in Canada for over a year now.)

It will also save private pension funds and national pension plans from ruin as they must keep some 40% of their assets in cashable, interest fixed bonds to pay retirees monthly cheques. For the last 4 years, nearly all have been losing money as a result, and have been forced to look for ‘better profits’ at higher risk investments – buying airports, hotels and even hockey teams.

The crash of Donald Trump International or the NHL Coyotes are two cautionary tales that I hope never befall our pension plans – or else all hell will break loose!!!