Obama Lights Up: Ruminations from a Fellow Addict

Will the stunning revelations never cease? When pressed during an interview with Tom Brokaw, Barack Obama waffled a bit before admitting that he hasn't been entirely successful in kicking his nicotine addiction. He still lights up from time to time, but he's promised that he won't do it in the White House.

During his interview with NBC News' Tom Brokaw over the weekend, President-elect Barack Obama acknowledged that he has had some trouble kicking his smoking habit but promised that the White House would remain a smoke-free zone.

"There are times where I've fallen off the wagon," Mr. Obama said when asked if he had stopped smoking...

— Source

Let's get the obvious out of the way. Smoking is bad. Kids, don't try this at home. Everybody tells you this stuff, so why should I repeat it? In most ways, this item is a non-story. The last eight years of radical misgovernment have left many aspects of our nation's well-being in smoking ruins. A smoking Executive? If he can pull America out of its historical nosedive and make repairs to our economy, infrastructure, international relations and commitment to education, I don't care if Obama likes to pound nails up his nose while singing the theme song from Bonanza at 3:00 in the morning in drag. Really, really bad drag. Get over yourselves, snap snap.

So while I'll readily admit that a smoking president might not be the greatest thing in the world, it's far from the worst. I say this as a smoker myself, and one who, like Obama, has made repeated and unsuccessful attempts to kick the habit. In light of that, my first bit of advice to the President-Elect, were he listening, would be to stay away from Chantix. It did weird things to me when I tried it, and I got my hands on a prescription the week after it went on the market. Chantix impaired my memory and caused me to have multiple episodes of sleep paralysis that left me an utter wreck after about two months on the stuff. We can't risk having that in a president. All things considered, he's better off sneaking out to the Rose Garden for the occasional smokebreak... and so are we if he stays away from varenicline.

So, even though I am painfully aware of how addictive cigarettes are and have a pretty thorough understanding of how and why they're so bad for you, I'm going to play the optimist here and speak about the upside of this nasty habit. Yes, there is one and no, it's not worth the health consequences and no, this isn't an endorsement of inhaling particulate matter. Still, the guy already smokes. Let's think about the lung being half-full for a moment.

In one way, I've benefited from being a smoker. Because we smokers are banned from indulging our habit indoors in the workplace (and rightfully so), we have to step away from whatever else we're doing every so often in order to pump a little sweet, sweet nicocrackatein into our bodies in order to be able to maintain our concentration and evenness of mood. It's boring to do that by ourselves, so smokers naturally form little cliques that take breaks together. From experience, I can say that these little sessions have allowed me the opportunity to learn about all sorts of things — useful things — from other smoking colleagues. This is as true now that I am studying biology as it was when I was a headhunter. It's hard to get time from people to simply learn from them what they know; everyone's days are pretty full. Those smokebreaks make it happen. I've learned about everything from inside information regarding the executive teams at high-tech startups to the problems with designing primers for insect mitochondrial genes from fellow junkies.

Might Obama reap the same sort of benefit from amongst the negative consequences of his unhealthful indulgence? He might. You know, he might not be the only world leader, or staffer employed by a world leader, who smokes. He might not be alone out there on the White House steps puffing away in the dead of winter. Who knows what breakthroughs might come when he's joined out there by some government official from another country? What inside knowledge might he gain from sharing a few tar-tawnied moments with a staffer traveling with the Prime Minister of Brunei? Scorn if you must, but these smoke session are intimate in a way that the inside of an office or conference room can never hope to be. You're removed from that environment. You're outside. Maybe you're cold and feeling a little alienated. It's natural that such a situation breeds candor amongst those involved. Obama's health might suffer just a little, but we as a nation might just come out ahead because of it.

I have another common trait I share with Obama, or at least I like to think so. Both he and I are highly educated and possessed of a level of intelligence markedly higher than the outgoing president. The latter is, in and of itself, not saying very much, I know. Still, from my own experience I can state that my own awareness of both the costs of smoking and my inability (so far) to quit is a rather humbling thing. It reminds me of my own frailties and it probably does the same for Obama. Such weaknesses are intrinsically humiliating things to anyone with even a modicum of self-awareness, and Obama's waffling in the interview likely demonstrates that he has experienced a similar awareness and its consequent humbling effect. I've long maintained that anyone narcissistic enough to think they ought to be president probably shouldn't be elected, so it's a hopeful sign that Obama gets this periodic thump upside his head with the two-by-four of an unresolved character flaw. He's aware that he's not perfect, that he can do wrong by himself. He's not likely to wave that silly banner of divine right and council like some Chief Executives we know. I'm aware that plenty of people will disagree with this notion that I prefer my humans both flawed and aware of their flaws. Lots of folks think that a president should be a spiritual leader of some sort, a shining paragon of white knight rectitude. Me, I like to see that the guy knows there are some chinks in the armor. It's hard to be humble when one thinks of themselves as perfected. Besides, as embarrassing a habit as smoking is, is it really any more humiliating than


I think not.

Now, look, the fact that Obama is going to sneak off for a cigarette when the pressure is on every so often is not something to be celebrated. Still, presidents have done a lot worse in recent memory. I'll take smoke-n-choke over shock-n-awe any day of the week.

So, Mr. President-Elect, smoke 'em if you got 'em until you don't need to get 'em anymore. From one smokin' schmuck to another, you have my sympathy on this. It must hurt to have the press and the naysayers jabbing their fingers into this bullet wound in your self-image. I'm sure Michelle gives you as much grief over the habit as LL gives me; I also can't smoke in my home or in my office and I'm quite acquainted with the winter winds of New England as one result. Still, maybe you can leverage this for our benefit somehow. Whatever it takes. If I'm ever in DC and see you out having a dose of the bad stuff, I'd love to come and join in your act of enlightened self-destruction. I've got a few thoughts on research funding, and so do you. We can talk about it while we die just a little.

See? Smokers' optimism.

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Who's Healthy: America's Health Rankings 2008 Issued by United Health Foundation

United Health Foundation has just released its 2008 America's Health Rankings. The report considers a number of components the UHF considers important to public health, analyzes their availability compared to a national mean on a state-by-state basis, and then ranks each state according to its overall score.

The overall result is shown in the following chart, listing the states from healthiest to least healthy according to the study's metrics:


I won't get into the minutia of everything that went into these calculations. If you're interested in them, all the information you could possibly need is available via the UHF.

It's also interesting to check out the Nation at a Glance clickable map. There, you can click a state to get a brief list of strengths and challenges as well as a snapshot that gives considerably more detail of trends in the state.

A few particulars leap right out, though. With the exception of Nevada (#42), the bottom 10 states in terms of overall health are all southern states. Five of the top ten (Vermont #1, New Hampshire #3, Massachusetts #6, Connecticut #7 and Maine #9) are in New England. In fact, the only New England state not in the top 10 is Rhode Island, which comes in at #11. No southern state made the top 10; the highest ranked among those is Virginia at #20. In fact, it's the only state in the southeast that comes in above the national average, to which Arizona comes closest.

According to the report, Massachusett's biggest overall public health challenge is binge drinking. Louisiana, at the bottom of the list, has low binge drinking as one of its strengths. This reveals a personal bias of mine; because of Mardi Gras, I always connect Louisiana with drinking, so it's a surprise to learn that its more of a problem here than there.

I also can't help thinking back to the Pew Religious Landscape Survey (I blogged about it here). It's interesting to note that the most religious states are also the ones that come in at the bottom of the UHF's health ranking and the least religious come out near the top. Mississippi, for instance, was the most religious state of all according to Pew's metrics and according to UHF ranks #49 out of 50 in terms of public health (it ranked dead last in 2007, but Louisiana has now surpassed it). This is correlation and doesn't demonstrate that poor public health increases religious sentiments, nor vice versa, but the correlation is unmistakable overall (Utah in particular bucks the trend, however). I suspect that there may well be a factor common to both religious fervor (e.g. fundamentalist tendencies) and poor health when it comes to the bigger public health picture. Perhaps poverty, for instance, and/or lack of access to good education might be a contributing factor in the correlated results of both studies.

In any case, the Health Rankings report is interesting to poke about in. Enjoy.

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First Winter Cold

I believe I have my first real winter cold. It started yesterday with a tickle in the throat when I woke up, but by the time I taught my first bio lab this had progressed to a sore throat and loss of voice. Three hours later my throat and voice were almost completely shot and a cough came on as well. By the time I finished my second biology lab section at around 8:30 PM, my throat was on fire and my voice completely shot.

This morning, I woke up at 3:30 with a pounding headache, a cough, a mild (100°) fever and an utterly raw throat. I've spent most of the day since in bed, which is where I plan on spending much of the rest of it as well.

This is what happens when one gets locked in a room with students for six hours every week, the temperature drops by about 30° in a single day, and sleep has been in short supply.

LL gets back from Florida tomorrow, having successfully defended her prospectus. I'm hoping to be in better shape by then. My other plans for the day include chicken broth and a couple of movies from Netflix. I should be getting Lucio Fulci's Beatrice Cenci and The Dead Pit today. And sleep, too. Nyquil is my friend.

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Earwax Removal: Ur Doin It Wrong

The new national earwax removal guidelines are out! The new national earwax removal guidelines are out!

It's an exciting day. In fact, by proclamation, today, August 29, 2008 is hereby declared National Proper Earwax Removal Day. Take your earwax to lunch to celebrate.

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Dyslexics Benefit Permanently from Remedial Training: I'll Vouch for That

When I was a child I had a fever. My hands didn't feel like two balloons, but the high fever I had at the age of about 5 as the result of a strep infection went untreated for more than twenty-four hours. The result was that part of my brain lost functionality and, as I found out many years later, that part of my brain was involved with interpreting numbers and symbols. I was left with a nearly lifelong learning disability when it came to mathematics of any sort. Throughout my education, I was an honors/advanced placement student in every subject except math in which I struggled to barely pass classes year after year until my first try at college. I had to take remedial algebra and couldn't even pass that after two attempts. I gave up.

It wasn't until I was just over 30 that my condition was diagnosed. I learned strategies to deal with the problem and essentially use different skills than "normal" people would use to interpret the symbols that had never made sense to me before. Within a year, I could do math. I went back to school and earned a 4.0 in math courses, acing everything from algebra to calculus to three semesters of statistics. It still wasn't easy, but at least I could do it.

This is all completely anecdotal, of course, but a study by researchers at Carnegie Mellon University looking at the effects of remedial training on classic dyslexics (I neer had a problem with letters, only with numbers, which isn't what most people think of when they hear "dyslexia") confirms my anecdote. They've found that 100 hours of intensive remedial training rewires the brain and overcomes the disorder, apparently for good.

Remedial instruction rewires dyslexic brains, provides lasting results, study shows

A new Carnegie Mellon University brain imaging study of dyslexic students and other poor readers shows that the brain can permanently rewire itself and overcome reading deficits, if students are given 100 hours of intensive remedial instruction.

The study, published in the August issue of the journal Neuropsychologia, shows that the remedial instruction resulted in an increase in brain activity in several cortical regions associated with reading, and that neural gains became further solidified during the year following instruction.

"This study demonstrates how remedial instruction can use the plasticity of the human brain to gain an educational improvement," said neuroscientist Marcel Just, director of Carnegie Mellon's Center for Cognitive Brain Imaging (CCBI) and senior author of the study. "Focused instruction can help underperforming brain areas to increase their proficiency..."

The new findings showed that many of the poor readers' brain areas activated at near-normal levels immediately after remediation, with only a few areas still underactive. However, at the one year follow-up scan, the activation differences between good and poor readers had nearly vanished, suggesting that the neural gains were strengthened over time, probably just due to engagement in reading activities...

Dyslexic kids today are lucky. When my disorder began way back in the early 1970's, most educators and parents hadn't heard of dyslexia, and because of that simple fact I wasn't diagnosed. Today, there's a very good chance that a dyslexic child will be diagnosed and can receive proper intervention instead of struggling through life as I did and as, I'm sure, many thousands of others my age and older had to do.

And if your kid has a fever of more than 102°, don't wait for a day to see if it will go away on its own or say a prayer and confine your child to bed. It doesn't work and the damage can have repercussions that you've never thought of. I say this from personal experience.

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Cell Phone Cancer: I Couldn't Agree More

...Cell phones emit radiofrequency energy, a type of radiation that is a form of electromagnetic radiation, according to the National Cancer Institute. Though studies are being done to see if there is a link between it and tumors of the brain and central nervous system, there is no definitive link between the two, the institute says on its Web site.

"By all means, if a person feels compelled that they should take precautions in reducing the amount of electromagnetic radio waves through their bodies, by all means they should do so," said Dan Catena, a spokesman for the American Cancer Society. "But at the same time, we have to remember there's no conclusive evidence that links cell phones to cancer, whether it's brain tumors or other forms of cancer..."

— Source

...Prof Alan Preece, Emeritus Professor of Medical Physics at the University of Bristol, said the evidence for harmful effects was "still confused and inconclusive".

He added: "Whilst I would agree that precaution for children is an excellent idea... it is only very long term heavy use that would seem to be sensible to avoid until there is positive evidence of harm.

"In any case, modern phones cause far less exposure than their counterparts 10 or 20 years ago, and hands-free devices effectively solve the problem by removing heavy exposure to the head."

Prof Will Stewart of the University of Southampton, who is a Fellow of The Royal Academy of Engineering, said he would be intrigued to see the early research.

"One cannot refute the 'early findings from unpublished data' since we have not seen them - but there is enough published data, including the MTHR review, to make the advice sound alarmist..."

— Source

Despite some of the comments I've received on the latest manifestation of cell phone fright — some rather rambly and strange — I don't see any particular reason to be in a tizzy about Dr. Ron Herberman's memo. And keep in mind, it was just that, a memo.

Still, if you're feeling panicked about this, by all means use a headset (the headset manufacturer will surely thank you), or toss your cell phone in the trash, or pray, or whatever it is that you're inclined to do when the latest scare pokes its head up.

Personally, I've looked at links that I've been sent, both here and in other fora, and I still haven't seen a good reason to be concerned about this issue beyond attempting to put forth basic information that contradicts the panic. Despite a couple of accusations, I don't take any money from any cell phone-related corporations. In fact, I hardly get any money at all from anybody. I don't particularly care if companies that have a stake in making or selling cell phones go out of business; I've no more stake in their future than does anyone else not employed by them. I suppose I should also add that I haven't been possessed by Satan, nor am I under alien mind control and helping to plot the downfall of mankind by working to increase the rates of brain cancers.

It's no surprise, but there are people blowing this way out of proportion and letting fear of the unknown overcome reasonable skepticism. I have seen no reason to be concerned and remain unconvinced that Herberman is on the right track here.

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In Praise of Vista's Speech Recognition Software

I know that a lot of people hate Microsoft and think that Vista is unstable bloatware. I come not to bury Vista but to praise part of it.

I have been having some problems with my wrist lately. Long bouts of typing are painful, so I’ve been trying to minimize when keyboarding. For that reason, I’ve been using the speech recognition software that comes bundled with Vista. It’s not perfect, but it’s pretty good and does some unexpected things.

For example, I was surprised to find that the first time I said the name of the city I live in, the software recognized it and spelled it correctly. Now, if I lived in New York or Dallas, that wouldn’t be saying much, but I live in Worcester. For those who don’t live near here, that’s pronounced “woostah.” Getting that right the first time is something that eludes most humans.

In fact, thanks to a little time put into training the software, it can now recognize obscure mycological jargon. It has no problem with words like Phellinus, Fulvifomes, cystidia and pileus. It can even handle “dikaryotic nuclei,” which isn’t bad for a laptop.

This very entry has been composed entirely using only the speech recognition software. I’ve touched neither the keyboard nor mouse once while writing this. My wrist thanks you, Microsoft!

The biggest problem it has is that it doesn't work very well with Firefox. If anyone knows of a patch for this problem, please let me know.

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Confederacy of Dunces Lumbers On In Its War on Science

Pointing out the instances of dishonesty perpetrated against scientific findings is almost too trite to bother with. Writing about the shriveled mechanical blackness that substitutes for a conscience in the psyche of Dick Cheney is doubly so. Still, the latest revelation of Cheney's attempts to suppress information about climate change needs to be highlighted. His attempt to remove the findings of studies related to the potential impact of climate change on public health are beyond the pale, so over the top, so demonstrative of how this administration is willing to sacrifice the well-being of Americans for the benefit of corporate cronies, so totally immoral that I simply can't let it pass without comment.

Cheney's office accused of censoring climate data
FORMER EPA OFFICIAL SAYS TESTIMONY ON HEALTH RISKS WAS DELETED

By Frank Davies, Mercury News Washington Bureau

Vice President Dick Cheney's office last year blocked testimony on how global warming endangers public health, a former Environmental Protection Agency official said Tuesday.

It was the strongest evidence yet of White House efforts to censor data on climate change.

Jason Burnett, former top adviser on climate change to EPA chief Stephen Johnson, made several other damning revelations in a letter to Sen. Barbara Boxer, also released Tuesday. Among them: new information about the recent disclosure that White House officials had refused to open an e-mail from the EPA with its findings on global warming...

In October, Julie Gerberding, director of the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, was prepared to testify before Boxer's committee that climate change "is likely to have a significant impact on health," warning of extreme heat and weather, water-borne diseases and food and water scarcity.

But Cheney's office and the Council on Environmental Quality effectively deleted six pages of Gerberding's testimony, Burnett said: "CEQ requested that I work with CDC to remove from the testimony any discussion of the human health consequences of climate change..."

This is disgusting stuff, and Americans ought to be outraged that people in their government are attempting to cover up findings related to issues that stand to profoundly impact their lives. This is not some small thing; this is an abrogation of an elected official's primary responsibility to the governed. The people deserve to have access to the findings of studies that not only point out what their future may hold but are being paid for with the money that they themselves pay to their government with their taxes in the first place. What they do with that information, and whether they agree or disagree with it, is a secondary consideration. They have to know that the information exists first, and for Cheney to interfere with that basic right should be enough to have him removed from office, hung up by the ankles and used as a piñata at a child's birthday party in Turkmenistan.

Let's just hope that what we get for a new administration come January 2009 will be better and more concerned with the health and well-being of the American people than these black-hearted sons and daughters of jackals that we're saddled with until then. It's hard to conceive of an administration that would be worse in this regard.

Still, we shouldn't worry about Cheney's career after ShrubCo plods off into the annals of governmental ignominy. I'm sure there are job openings out there for an experienced puppy-strangler and propagandist for which he'll be well-qualified.

The preamble to the Constitution of the United States doesn't seem to be taken too seriously these days, but so far the Ministry of Truth hasn't quite managed to get it expunged. As a reminder, it reads:

We the people of the United States, in order to form a more perfect union, establish justice, insure domestic tranquility, provide for the common defense, promote the general welfare, and secure the blessings of liberty to ourselves and our posterity, do ordain and establish this Constitution for the United States of America.

I'd say that knowing about possible outbreaks of disease and famine touch at least a little on the general welfare and that an informed citizenry is necessary for the preservation of liberty, but what do I know? I'm just one of those crazy liberals who thinks that a government owes honesty to the governed before all other things. What a wacky concept!

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White Nose Syndrome: It's Looking Bad for the Bats and That's Bad News for Us

An article in today's Nashua Telegraph discusses some new information about the white nose syndrome that is decimating bat populations in America's northeast. The news isn't good. If I'm understanding the article correctly, the Fusarium species that gives the disease its name is apparently only a symptom, not the cause of the disease. Researchers have not found, according to the article, any ebidence of a bacterial or viral pathogen (so much for my bacteria-based hypothesis). The focus now seems to be on a new fungus found in the bats that was previously unknown to mycology.

From what bat ecologists are saying, this seems like very bad news, indeed. Population losses among some species that play a major role in reducing the numbers of disease-vectoring insects range between 80 and 90%. Sad to say that it's feasible that we could be witnessing an extinction event for some Chiroptera, and they may just be the tip of the iceberg. The article also points out that fungal diseases have newly appeared or increased in prevalence in other taxa as well.

Disease taking a toll on state's bat population
By ANDREW WOLFE, Staff Writer

..."I think we're on the front end of something that's just going to be getting worse in the next few years," Reynolds said, adding later, "If the numbers are down and reproduction is down, the big impact will be next year. . . . This may be the front edge of the storm..."

White nose syndrome has hit hardest among little brown bats, one of the most common species, known for its voracious consumption of mosquitoes. A little brown bat eats about half its weight, or about 4,000 mosquitoes, every night...

"If in fact we have 500,000 fewer bats in the landscape this year, that adds up to about 2 billion insects that are not eaten each night," Vermont Fish and Game bat biologist Scott Darling said.

The scope of white nose syndrome has been compared to Colony Collapse Disorder, which has been decimating North American honeybees, and its cause has remained similarly elusive.

Experts from around the United States and Canada gathered last month in Albany, N.Y., to share information on the disease and try to coordinate strategies for dealing with it...

"Some sites have 90 percent loss," Reynolds said. "Others have as little as 80 percent loss, but it's all of that order."

Researchers simply don't know how far the disease may spread or how bad the impact might be, and they've been wary of predictions, mainly for fear that their estimates would sound incredible, Reynolds said.

"The reductions are overwhelming," Reynolds said...

So far, researchers have been unable to find any hint of a bacterial or viral cause, Reynolds said, but they've found a previously unidentified species of cold-weather fungus. The question is whether it's new to bats or just new to researchers.

"We know we're finding fungus, but we don't know that it's a new fungus for them," Reynolds said of the bats.

Scientists "didn't know this fungus existed before," Reynolds said. "The mycologist was almost giddy talking about it."

The new fungus isn't the same one that causes the distinctive white snouts, however, Reynolds said...

The combination of new funguses striking bees and bats and the recent worldwide amphibian fungus epidemic have Darling concerned about the entire "ecological infrastructure," he said...

I wish this writer hadn't written "funguses." The word is "fungi." Niggling, I know, but these are some of the most fascinating organisms in the world and if they're capable of causing ecological collapse we should at least get their name right. For that matter, what's killing amphibians isn't exactly a fungus but a chytrid; the Chytridiomycota are the sister group to the fungi, but they have flagellated gametes. True fungi never have flagella at any stage. Things change quickly, but I don't think that they're currently considered fungi (some kindly chytrid researcher may well correct me on this point, though).

Linguistic and taxonomic quibbling aside, the idea of an extra 2,000,000,000 mosquitoes surviving to reproduce every night is a scary prospect. Beyond the sheer annoyance of increased numbers, the potential for the expansion of diseases from eastern equine encephalitis to dengue should frighten the heck out of anyone. The solution to such outbreaks would likely be to increase spraying programs, and that may have benefits in the short-term, but it also opens the door to the evolution of resistance in mosquito populations in the long term. There are almost always unseen ecological effects down the road from pumping chemicals into ecosystems as well. The complexity of any given ecosystem — particularly those with enough warmth and moisture to produce large numbers of mosquitoes in the first place — largely preclude our being able to take every potential ramification of pesticide use on those systems into account given current technology. In other words, solving one problem in this manner carries a high risk of causing one or more new ones.

I'm not at all involved in this research (though sometimes I wish I was), but if there are already 80-90% die off rates and reproduction has taken a major hit among the survivors, then this is a problem that we'd best hope gets solved very quickly, indeed. Hemorrhagic fever can ruin a summer, to say the least.

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Opening Day: West Nile Found in Massachusetts

It's not exactly the most wonderful time of the year. West Nile virus has become a fact of life in the US, and news comes today that Mother Nature has pitched the first virus-bearing mosquito of the season at humanity right here in Worcester.

The state Department of Public Health announced today that the West Nile virus has been detected in mosquitoes in Massachusetts for the first time this year.

The mosquito sample was collected on June 27 in the city of Worcester.

— Source

There were only six cases of the disease in the state last year; let's hope it'll be the same or less this year.

I spend a great deal of time in situations which put me at risk for mosquito bites. I do field work and there's a good deal of standing or sluggish water in the place I do it. I almost never get bitten, though, because I douse myself in 25% DEET repellent when I'm in the woods. I've been in the habit of doing so since I started collecting in Florida where the risk from mosquitoes isn't so much West Nile as it is being dropped from a height sufficient to cause injury. I refer to the chemical scent of DEET as field work cologne.

But like most people, I don't wear the stuff all the time. Drain that standing water, denizens of Wormtown!

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LL is OK

I got a text message from LL a litle while ago. She's awake (captain obvious strikes again!) and the surgery appears to have gone well. I guess I can relax a bit now.

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Haven't Heard About LL Yet

It's coming up on 3:30 PM in Lebanon as I write this. LL's surgery would have begun about 4½ hours ago assuming that it wasn't delayed for some reason. It shouldn't have taken very long if there were no complications.

When I last spoke with LL on Saturday, she promised me that one of her relatives would get word to me that she was doing alright if she wasn't able to do so herself soon after the procedure had been completed. I haven't yet heard anything, though, so I'm worried. It's probably nothing, but I can't help but fret about it. She's thousands of miles away in a country that isn't about to win any awards for its stability and I haven't a clue as to what's going on with her.

Normally, I'd be getting ready to head out the door by now. As it is, though, I haven't yet been able to get myself motivated. I keep checking Skype, my email and my cell phone for word from Lebanon. I know that stressing over it helps nothing but I can't help myself.

I wish somebody from over there would get word to me. This could turn out to be an insufferably long day otherwise.

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LL Having Surgery: I May Not Sleep Tonight

I haven't mentioned it until now, but LL is back in Lebanon for the next few weeks. She's having elective surgery and is staying with her mother in Junieh to recuperate. I'll leave it to her to mention what she's having done, and she's already talked a bit on Girl-Geek Academic about the difference in the cost of medical care between the US and Lebanon. That may have a lot to do with Lebanon's economy being in far worse shambles than that of the US and its having an unimaginably high unemployment rate by American standards. The fact remains, however, that a procedure that costs about $5000 over there would have run in excess of $14,000 if she'd had it done here and because it's an elective (although preventative) surgery her insurance won't cover it. By having it done in Lebanon her family can come up with enough money to help her pay for it.

In any case, she goes under the knife at 4:00 AM East Coast US time (Lebanon is seven hours ahead). We didn't connect on Skype today so I haven't even had the chance to talk to her. It's a laparoscopic procedure that two of her cousins have already had performed by the same doctor. If it were almost anybody else having it done I probably wouldn't be quite as obsessed with it, but as it is I haven't been able to concentrate on anything today and am not likely to get much sleep tonight. I'll probably be in this state until I hear from her that everything went alright.

That should happen sometime late tomorrow, I would imagine (and hope).

Because she's having this surgery and recuperating in Junieh, she won't be here for the first anniversary of our move to Worcester on Friday. Time flies. She'll get back just in time for our anniversary on 7/25. That'll mark the start of our 13^th year together.

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Be Careful Around Compost: Death in UK Linked to Decay-Loving Fungus

I want to preface this with a disclaimer. What follows may be a bit scary for people who compost as part of their gardening, but it's nothing to get panicked about. It's a call for a bit of caution regarding something about which people may not know.

The death of a gardener in the UK was caused by inhalation of spores from the fungus Aspergillus fumigatus, an ascomycete mold that is commonly found in small quantities in compost. Readers may have heard about other members of the genus Aspergillus in recent memory; this is the same group of molds that contains species which produce aflatoxin and have been found on grain products in the past.

In this case, however, the gardener who died was not killed by aflatoxin but by infection with the mold itself. This happened because he inhaled an unusually large quantity of spores while working with compost. The spores germinated in his lungs and caused an infection capable of killing an otherwise healthy (but see below) 47-year old man.

Fungal exposure and gardening
National Health Service, UK

...a case of a 47-year-old man who "went to hospital with chest pains just a day after opening a bag of rotting leaves". The man died three days later from aspergillosis, which he contracted after inhaling spores from a fungus that grows on dead leaves (Aspergillus fumigatus)...

A 47-year-old man – a welder by trade – was admitted with a history of cough, pleuritic chest pain (a sharp pain worsened by breathing, coughing and movement), increasing shortness of breath, fever and myalgia (muscle aches). He had previously been in good health, although he was a smoker. Other features at presentation included high fever, high breathing rate, irregular chest X-rays, high white blood cell count and crackling sounds in the lung while breathing. The initial assumption was that he had pneumonia, so he was put on antibiotics while further investigations took place.

After 24 hours, the patient was transferred to intensive care because of extreme shortness of breath. His condition worsened, and he showed signs of kidney distress and sepsis (high heart rate, low blood pressure and fever in response to infection throughout the body). The clinicians found that a fungus called Aspergillus fumigatus grew from the man's saliva samples...

Clinicians established from his partner that the symptoms started less than 24 hours after he spread rotting tree and plant mulch from a sack around the garden. Clouds of dust had "engulfed him"...

The clinicians conclude that the patient experienced an acute invasive pulmonary aspergillosis infection. Although this infection would normally be seen only in immunocompromised patients, they say that "smoking and welding could have damaged his lungs and increased his susceptibility to infection". The clinicians also say that "because he died so quickly", they cannot rule out an undiagnosed immunodeficiency.

The clinicians add that although acute aspergillosis following contact with decayed plant matter is rare, it "may be considered an occupational hazard for gardeners". They recommend that quick and appropriate treatment for the fungal infection is essential...

This unfortunate individual seems to have created the circumstances that led to his demise. Such a situation is easily avoidable, though.

First, Aspergillus species mainly flourish where temperature and moisture are high. In the case of this gardener, it's worth noting that he was storing his compost in a plastic bag. That allows for the build-up of lots of moisture while trapping the heat naturally generated by decay and so is almost certain to foster the growth of numerous Aspergillus species, the spores from which are ubiquitous in the air and soil. The remedy is to keep temperature and moisture levels low by allowing heat and water to escape. Compost should never be stored in fully-closed containers and should be turned over frequently to allow for cooling and evaporation. Most species won't grow at all when moisture content is lower than 7%. The particular species in this case, A. fumigatus, also prefers temperatures close to that of the human body.

Second, it would be a very good idea to wear a pollen mask when coming into contact with compost. Aspergillus spores can't hurt you if you don't inhale them in the first place and a mask is an effective and relatively cheap way of preventing this. Compost is by its very nature a breeding ground for fungi and bacteria and inhaling compost dust can lead to infections other than aspergillosis, so don't do it.

Again, there's nothing here to be overly concerned about. As the British NHS states at the end of the article linked above:

Gardeners should not be overly worried that their occupation or hobby has suddenly become a dangerous one. Gardeners are likely to be exposed to a variety of bacteria and mould, which are present in the soil and the compost that they use. In healthy individuals, these do not usually cause serious infections...

A modicum of caution goes a long way.

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Sad News: Kennedy Has a Malignant Brain Tumor

America's second longest-serving senator has a malignant brain tumor of the left parietal lobe. While my saying so will no doubt generate all sorts of glee from the more twisted feathers on the right wing, those who espouse pro-life policies while finding joy in the likely lingering death of a man who has served his country to the best of his ability and conscience longer than I have been alive, I'll say it anyhow.

I'm deeply saddened by this news. We would seem to be losing not only one of our most devoted public servants but also a man who has long been a link to a much more optimistic period in our history.

Sen. Kennedy has brain tumor, hospital says

Massachusetts Sen. Edward Kennedy has a malignant brain tumor, his doctors said on Tuesday, of a type considered potentially very dangerous.

Kennedy has a glioma and likely will require chemotherapy and radiation therapy, neurologist Dr. Lee Schwamm of Massachusetts General Hospital in Boston, and Dr. Larry Ronan, a primary physician there, said in a statement.

Kennedy, 76, has been hospitalized since he had a seizure on Saturday. He was airlifted to Massachusetts General Hospital on Saturday morning after being rushed by ambulance to a local hospital near his family's Cape Cod vacation compound...

According to the Society for Neuroscience, about 20,000 Americans are diagnosed with a glioma every year and more than half die within 18 months...

...preliminary results from a biopsy of the brain identified the cause of the seizure as a malignant glioma in the left parietal lobe...

I wish Senator Kennedy nothing but the best and hope that he is among the lucky 50% who survive this terrible affliction.

At the same time, I also hope that Senator Kennedy is putting some thought into stepping aside. It's time for him to retire and recuperate, or at least to spend more time with the people he cares for and less worrying about the affairs of American government. He's done that for the past 46 years already. If anyone deserves a break right about now, it's Ted Kennedy.

His will be some tremendous shoes to fill.

As a matter of editorial policy on this, I will not permit any comment that smacks of glee about Kennedy's condition. If you're one of those people, you already know plenty of other places to act like a schmuck. Now would be a good time to go there.

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Whooping Cough Outbreak in California: Losing Herd Immunity?

There's been an outbreak of whooping cough (pertussis) at a private school in El Sobrante, California. If you're not familiar with a map of the state, that's a town a bit north of Berkeley and northeast of San Francisco. Apparently a number of people, both kindergarten-aged students and teachers, have contracted the disease.

Whooping cough outbreak closes school

A private school in El Sobrante is closed today because of an outbreak of whooping cough, authorities said.

Classes will not be in session today at the East Bay Waldorf School at 3800 Clark Road because a number of kindergartners and their teachers have come down with the contagious lung infection, authorities said.

In a letter to parents that was posted at the K-12 school, administrator Morgan Cleveland wrote, "You should be aware that because this is considered a significant outbreak, there is likely to be media attention..."

Most children are immunized against this disease as part of the childhood DPT (diptheria, pertussis and tetanus) vaccination. The disease had practically vanished from the United States as of just a few years ago because of this.

Unfortunately, hysteria about vaccinations has taken its toll. While I don't know for a fact how many of those who contracted the disease weren't immunized, I'm willing to bet it will be found that most were not, keeping in mind that the DPT vaccination doesn't last forever and should be readministered every 10 years or so. Many adults fail to do this, which would explain why teachers came down with pertussis in this case, but kindergarten children aren't old enough for their vaccines to have worn off.

There have recently been measles outbreaks as well, and in those cases a lack of immunization was to blame. If people keep up not having their children immunized because of vague, unsubstantiated worries about autism, for example, or for religious reasons (that religious exemptions exist at all is silly; that they can be so easily claimed is downright stupidity), eventually these outbreaks will turn into epidemics as the benefits of herd immunity are lost. In order for the benefit to disappear entirely, it would only require that about 9% of children aren't immunized in a given population.

Then again, there were plagues in the Dark Ages, too, and we came through those just fine... right?

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Good Fungus, Bad Fungus: Cryptococcus and Phellinus in the News

I'm still insanely busy and haven't had time to keep up with reading, let alone writing, blogs. The ends of semesters are crazy times.

Still, a couple of recent stories in the news regarding fungi caught my eye and they're worth a quick note.

First, the bad news. There appears to have been another death in British Columbia caused by Cryptococcus gattii. This time, the victim is a 45 year old woman from Cowichan Bay. The article doesn't mention whether she was immunocompromised; most people who have contracted C. gattii infections have been. That's bad enough, so I hope that she had some prior medical history that explains her susceptibility. For otherwise healthy people to start succumbing would point to the possibility of an even worse scenario.

Fungus suspected in Cowichan Bay death

The B.C. Coroners Service is investigating the death of a Cowichan Bay woman at Victoria General Hospital Tuesday morning who is suspected to have died from a yeast-like fungus found on trees on Vancouver Island.

Regional coroner Rose Stanton said the 45-year-old woman's death is under investigation but she is suspected to have died from Cryptococcus gattii. Results won't be available until the end of the week. About one person dies from the disease in B.C. each year...

There's also good news, though. I haven't read the publication yet, but it's being reported that an extract from the hymenochaete Phellinus linteus may ultimately help in treating cancer by preventing angiogenesis. Any potential new tool in fighting cancer is to be cause for a little celebration, though it should be cautioned that this has only been tested by direct application to cancer cells in a petri dish; it's a long way off from human trials. Still, yay Phellinus!

Mushroom extract may stop breast cancer growth

Extracts from a mushroom used for centuries in Eastern Asian medicine may stop breast cancer cells from growing and could become a new weapon in the fight against the killer disease, scientists said on Tuesday.

Laboratory tests using human breast cancer cells show the mushroom called Phellinus linteus has a marked anti-cancer effect, probably by blocking an enzyme called AKT. AKT is known to control signals that lead to cell growth.

Phellinus linteus -- called song gen in Chinese medicine, sang-hwang in Korean and meshimakobu in Japanese -- has previously been shown to have anti-tumour properties on skin, lung and prostate cancer cells.

The new research on breast cancer, however, marks the first time that scientists have started to understand how it works...

The findings were reported in the British Journal of Cancer.

This latest story comes on the heels of a recent report that a compound in Ganoderma lucidum (also polyporoid but only distantly related to Phellinus) blocks androgen receptors and thus may be useful in treating or even preventing prostate cancer. It all makes me proud to be a mad mycologist, even if a few bad apples like Cryptococcus and Puccinia crop up. Those aren't charismatic macrofungi, anyhow.

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If You Are Going to Pray Instead of Getting Medical Treatment for Your Child

PZ Myers notes on Pharyngula yet another one of those tragic stories that appear every so often of a family that decides to pray ver a sick child instead of getting needed medical treatment. In this case, the child was an 11 year old girl who developed diabetes and, because of what I and any sane person would consider atrocious parental neglect, ultimately died of ketoacidosis. The condition could have been easily treated and the kid could be alive.

Police: Family prayed instead of getting medical aid for girl who died

An 11-year-old girl died after her parents prayed for healing rather than seek medical help for a treatable form of diabetes, police said Tuesday...

Vergin said an autopsy determined the girl died from diabetic ketoacidosis, an ailment that left her with too little insulin in her body, and she had probably been ill for about 30 days, suffering symptoms like nausea, vomiting, excessive thirst, loss of appetite and weakness.

The girl's parents, Dale and Leilani Neumann, attributed the death to "apparently they didn't have enough faith," the police chief said.

They believed the key to healing "was it was better to keep praying. Call more people to help pray," he said.

The mother believes the girl could still be resurrected, the police chief said...

Officers went to the home after one of the girl's relatives in California called police to check on her, Vergin said. She was taken to a hospital where she was pronounced dead.

The relative was fearful the girl was "extremely ill, dire," Vergin said.

The girl has three siblings, ranging in age from 13 to 16, the police chief said.

"They are still in the home," he said. "There is no reason to remove them. There is no abuse or signs of abuse that we can see..."

Isn't that last part appealing? The kid was already dead when police got to the house. Mom was probably praying over the body for resurrection, not satisfied by this most horrible of empirical tests that her refusal to face reality and reliance upon mumbo-jumbo was what killed her daughter in the first place. There are still two other minors in the home, but somehow there's no sign of abuse here and so no need to remove those minors. If this isn't abuse, how about neglect? How about manslaughter, for that matter?

Still, I realize that there are people in this country who disagree with my point of view, so let's assume for a moment that the parents were right. Their faith simply wasn't strong enough to save their daughter's life. If you're a fundamentalist parent contemplating praying over a critically ill child instead of getting them medical treatment, how do you know if your faith is strong enough before you turn your offspring into worm-food?

Lucky you, finding Hyphoid Logic today! I have a simple test you can take.

First, you'll need a handgun. A .22 will do, but I suggest using a snub-nosed .44 if you can get one.

Now, find a quiet room and sit with your back against a wall. Pray just as hard as you can. When you feel all prayed out, make sure you've taken the safety off and put the muzzle of the gun in your mouth. Make sure that the barrel is pointed up, toward your cranium. We have to be sure.

Pull the trigger.

If you can't pull the trigger, you know that your faith isn't strong enough. If you don't know wth certainty that God is going to stop that bullet from blowing your head off, there's no way your prayers are going to save your kid.

If you do pull the trigger and note a sudden proliferation of brain and skull fragments in your vicinity, congratulations! You've just been diagnosed with the sin of pride. Your faith wasn't strong enough, even though you thought it was. God hasn't stopped the bullet. You're dead and have likely stopped reading this. Good luck seeking pardon in the afterlife or whatever it is that happens to people who pray themselves to death. You may at least rest assured that your child will get appropriate medical attention when the authorities show up to investigate the death scene.

If and only if you pull the trigger and hear the gun discharge but are still alive and uninjured afterward may you deny medical attention to your child and instead rely on prayer for a cure. You have staked your life on the strength of your faith and passed the test. You can do whatever you want; if your faith can stop that bullet, it can also cure the child.

If you think this all sounds completely stupid — and I agree that it does — then you MUST take your child for medical treatment. Those unwilling to take this test but who still deny treatment are nothing but murderers if that child dies based on your willingness to risk his or her life but not your own.

The appropriate place for Dale and Leilani Neumann, the parents in this article, is prison. Religion is not an excuse for criminally negligent homicide.

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They Grow Up So Fast These Days: Is a Fungal Toxin Involved?

Fungi are amazing biochemical factories. They produce a bewildering array of unusual compounds, including quite a few that qualify as toxins. These range from deadly amanitins to psychotropics. Moreover, some of these compounds are close mimics for human hormones. Because of this, my interest was quite high when I saw reports of a paper entitled High Growth Rate of Girls with Precocious Puberty Exposed to Estrogenic Mycotoxins in the Journal of Pediatrics. The idea that Fusarium, a common pathogen of certain grains, might have a role in inducing the early onset of puberty in girls is certainly an intriguing thought. After reading this paper, though, I'm not convinced that the authors have added anything to our body of knowledge regarding this possibility.

The study begins with two cohorts of girls who have sought treatment for central precocious puberty (CPP) in northwestern Italy. 17 are from Viareggio and 15 are from Pisa. Serum samples are taken and a variety of Fusarium-originated mycotoxins are sought. Out of the 32 girls diagnosed with CPP, only 6 of them test positively for two compounds, namely zearalenone (ZEA) and α-zearalanol (α-ZOL), one of its metabolites. All 6 of these girls were from the Viareggio cohort; none of the girls from Pisa were positive for any mycotoxin at all. Over the course of twelve months of treatment with triptorelin (Decapeptyl), the six girls with CPP and mycotoxins form one group and those with CPP but no mycotoxin (26) form a second. The changes to estrogen levels, height, weight and bone age, etc. are charted and compared to the control group of girls without CPP.

Herein lies my first problem with this study; there is no data on the effect of triptorelin on prepubescent children. Triptorelin itself is a gonadotropin inducer. According to the Mayo Clinic's Drugs & Supplements page, for example:

Triptorelin is similar to a hormone normally released from the hypothalamus gland...

Studies on this medicine have been done only in adult patients, and there is no specific information comparing use of triptorelin in children with use in other age groups.

The researchers are introducing a confounding factor from the outset.

Secondly, the researchers never appear to check whether any of their control subjects have mycotoxins in their blood. Considering that only 6 of the 32 girls presenting with CPP had the toxins, it would have been a good control to rule out the presence of ZEA and α-ZOL in the girls who didn't have CPP at all. A lack of controls is a problem throughout this study; however, forcing the investigators to admit in their closing discussion that

...ZEA pollution could not explain the epidemic CPP data of the Viareggio area, suggesting that other environmental factors such as dioxin and pesticides may be involved.

What the investigators demonstrate, in the end is that girls with CPP who are positive for the mycotoxins grow a bit faster than girls with CPP but no mycotoxin, and both groups get taller faster than those girls who don't have CPP at all.

That the first two groups grow faster than the control group is unsurprising; that's what one would expect with early puberty. Moreover, the differential growth between the two CPP groups is shown to occur only after therapy with injections of triptorelin has been ongoing for three and twelve months. There is no investigation of whether the treatment itself may be causing this effect. We don't even see a statiscally significant change in estrogen levels between the groups. At best we can say, then, that there may be evidence here that an interaction of triptorelin and Fusarium-derived 17β-estradiol mimics may cause an increased rate of growth in girls diagnosed with CPP. Even that is rather tenuous, though, as the sample size is so small and no controls have been put in place for other potential interactions.

Despite this, the authors go on to discuss the similarities between the mycotoxins found in the six girls from Viareggio and growth promoters fed to livestock in the United States but which have been banned in Europe since 1985. These compounds are similar, but they aren't the same as the compounds isolated from the mycotoxin-positive cohort. The language that follows strikes me as being a bit alarmist and speculative in terms of the phenomenon that the researchers had set out to study.

All in all, I don't see much of value in the results from this study. It remains possible, of course, that Fusarium might play a role in some instances of CPP, perhaps in combination with other factors. Then again, it might not. Without more information about the effects of the drug being given to these girls in the course of treatment and about other environmental contaminants, not to mention some genetic background, the authors haven't given us much to go on.

Reference:

Massart, F., Meucci, V., Saggese, G., Soldani, G. (2008). High Growth Rate of Girls with Precocious Puberty Exposed to Estrogenic Mycotoxins. The Journal of Pediatrics DOI: 10.1016/j.jpeds.2007.10.020

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Is It April Fools' Day?

Everybody knows the joke about how to tell if you have cancer, right? If you can put your hand over your face and touch one ear with your pinkie and the other with your thumb, you have cancer. While your friend is doing that, the punchline goes, you then strike the back of his hand so that he whacks himself on the nose. I remember that one from third grade.

Later, when I was a teenager, the joke was that if a guy's ring finger was longer than his index finger, he was gay. This digital relatinship is true of many men, of course, but teenage boys love their stupid jokes. I know I did.

Well, here's a new one for you: if your ring finger is longer than your index finger, you may be at an elevated risk for osteoarthritis, at least according to researchers at the University of Nottingham.

I'm not qualified to say anything about this study and don't have enough of a bona fide interest in the subject myself to take the time to read the paper, but c'mon... is this for real, or are we being treated to an early April Fools' gag? In light of all the juvenile japes that sound so similar to this, I can't help suspecting a set-up here.

The article is Index to Ring Finger Length Ratio and the Risk of Osteoarthritis, W. Zhang, J. Robertson, S. Doherty, J.J. Liu, R.A. Maciewicz, K.R. Muir, and M. Doherty, Arthritis & Rheumatism, January 2008; 58:1.

Don't be surprised if you click that link and wind up on some oddball website, though. I haven't tried it myself.

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