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Tuesdays with Turtles – Travel Edition

Byoliveridley

sm_mapping.jpgIt’s travel all the time for sea turtles. Of course, the great turtle race is finally on, and windy’s in the lead, my pick billie’s in second place, a mere 30 miles behind. There’s a new turtle in the race, Colbertia, named in honor of Stephen Colbert, in third place.

Anything that gets turtles some attention is good.

But this is only a 500 mile sprint. PBS’ nature series had a one hour documentary on an 8000 mile, one plus year journey of a loggerhead turtle from her juvenile feeding grounds in Mexico to her adult breeding ground in Japan. It’s great to spend an hour at that close proximity to a turtle. But to me, the other animals, the dolphin pods, the giant fish swarms, the hammerhead sharks, the other sharks, the jelly fish, those little fish that eat parasites off the turtles and sharks kinda stole the show. There is something about thousands of animals of the same species doing something in concert. 

Anyway, nothing more to say, except that 8000 miles is a long way at a mile an hour. I don’t think any of us can appreciate the mindfulness and sense of purpose (do turtles have these qualities, or do they just keep on chuggin’?), not to mention the huge amount of luck it takes to get it done.

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    Canada loves asbestos (in third world lungs)

    Byoliveridley

    In a normal world, when something is severely restricted in your country, you would not export it to another country under the pretense that used under certain, very restricted conditions, your product only causes a moderate increase in cancer.

    While the federal government projects an image of being a helpful, international Boy Scout on issues ranging from peacekeeping to nuclear proliferation, Canada has a peculiar relationship to asbestos.

    globeandmail.com: Asbestos shame

    But we don’t live in a normal world, because asbestos is exported from Canada to India where it is added to cement.

    Tushar Joshi, a noted New Delhi occupational health expert, is flabbergasted over asbestos sales by a country of Canada’s stature. “As a developed country, you expect more civilized behaviour,” Dr. Joshi says. Canada’s activities are “beyond comprehension,” he adds, calling Ottawa’s promotion of asbestos “a black spot on a sparkling white dress.”

    yes, well said. It is very mysterious that asbestos use in India went up in the 1980s just as evidence about its incredibly destructive effects on respiratory systems had curtailed use in most of the first world. Clearly, third world lungs are not as important as Canadian lungs.

    Asbestos is one area where Canada lags even behind the US. And Canada’s environmental practices are going to come under increasing scrutiny as climate change unfreezes the great white North and exposes the resources underneath.

    Canada, the world is watching.

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  • 100s of turtles die in Andhra Pradesh

    Byoliveridley

      I have written about turtle excluder devices (TEDs) and how they save adult turtles lives previously. So, this story is an utterly avoidable tragedy brought about by the lack of implementation of laws regulating the use of TEDs.

    The death of hundreds of Olive Ridley turtles along the Paravada coast in December 2007 had occurred due to failure of the trawlers to install the mandatory turtle excluder device. Lab tests conducted at Andhra University and Veterinary Biological Research Institute, Hyderabad ruled out the largescale death of the endangered species due to consumption of toxic contents discharged by industries located nearby or on account of rise in the seawater temperature.“We didn’t find any abnormal pollution levels. The washing ashore of carcasses was not a localised phenomena as dead turtles were found all along the coast up to Srikakulam during the year-end – the breeding season,” P.J. Vijaykar, Divisional Forest Officer told The Hindu on Wednesday.

    The Hindu : Andhra Pradesh / Visakhapatnam News : Olive Ridley death riddle solved

    Andhra Pradesh was supposed to be a success story with the TEDs. This from an article by Kartik Shanker, one of SSTCN’s founding members…

    In India, the parallel cases of Orissa and Andhra Pradesh demonstrate how a TED programme should not (and should) be implemented. In Orissa, the polarization between the fishing community and conservationists has prevented the introduction of TEDs, while in Andhra Pradesh, TEDs were introduced by the state Fisheries Department with appropriate demonstration and training programmes (see Shanker and Pilcher, 2003).

    So, this occurrence in Andhra Pradesh is quite disheartening and speaks to the large gaps that lie between legislation, policy and implementation in India.

    Cross Posted at SSTCN

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    Chip Implants Linked to Animal Tumors

    Byoliveridley

    Thinking about implanting an RFID microchip under your skin? Don’t do it! Why would the FDA approve something that was linked to cancers in rats?

    Chip Implants Linked to Animal Tumors – washingtonpost.com:

    When the U.S. Food and Drug Administration approved implanting microchips in humans, the manufacturer said it would save lives, letting doctors scan the tiny transponders to access patients’ medical records almost instantly. The FDA found ‘reasonable assurance’ the device was safe, and a sub-agency even called it one of 2005’s top ‘innovative technologies.’

    But neither the company nor the regulators publicly mentioned this: A series of veterinary and toxicology studies, dating to the mid-1990s, stated that chip implants had ‘induced’ malignant tumors in some lab mice and rats.

    ‘The transponders were the cause of the tumors,’ said Keith Johnson, a retired toxicologic pathologist, explaining in a phone interview the findings of a 1996 study he led at the Dow Chemical Co. in Midland, Mich.

    Leading cancer specialists reviewed the research for The Associated Press and, while cautioning that animal test results do not necessarily apply to humans, said the findings troubled them. Some said they would not allow family members to receive implants, and all urged further research before the glass-encased transponders are widely implanted in people.

    To date, about 2,000 of the so-called radio frequency identification, or RFID, devices have been implanted in humans worldwide, according to VeriChip Corp. The company, which sees a target market of 45 million Americans for its medical monitoring chips, insists the devices are safe, as does its parent company, Applied Digital Solutions, of Delray Beach, Fla.

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    India at 60 – A Public Health Perspective

    Byoliveridley

    Well, at least I don’t have to take part in endless parades and listen to speeches any more. But India turned 60 today, and the head of the Indian public health foundation takes stock, and it is sobering.

    The Hindu : Persisting public health challenges

    Recent health indicators in India are a cause for both celebration and concern. While life expectancy at birth has risen to 63 years, infant mortality rate (IMR) and maternal mortality rate (MMR) are still at unacceptably high levels (57 per 1000 and 301 per 100,000 live births respectively). There is widespread disparity among States with Kerala being the star performer. Within States, the rural areas are way behind the urban segments. Even as our economy has grown rapidly, the nutritional status of children has remained stunted, suggesting that wide income disparities are preventing the poor from becoming the beneficiaries of growth.

    Yes, I be the killjoy.

    More from Amartya Sen

    There is reason enough to celebrate many things happening in India right now. But there are failures as well, which need urgent attention. For example, there is still widespread undernourishment in general and child undernutrition in particular–at a shocking level. The failures include, quite notably, the astonishing neglect of elementary education in India, with a quarter of the population–and indeed half the women–still illiterate.

    The average life expectancy in India is still low (below 64) and infant mortality very high (58 per 1,000 live births). It is certainly true that India has narrowed the shortfall behind China in these areas–that is, in life expectancy and infant mortality–but there is still some distance to go for the country as a whole. The problems are gigantic in some of the more “backward” states like Bihar and Uttar Pradesh. And yet there are other states in which the Indian numbers are similar to China’s.

    he goes on…

    If India has to overcome these failures, it has to spend much more money on expanding the social infrastructure, particularly school education and basic health care. It also needs to spend much more in building up a larger physical infrastructure, including more roads, more power supplies and more water. In some of these, the private sector can help. But a lot more has to be spent on public services themselves, in addition to improving the system of delivery of these services, with more attention paid to incentives and disciplines, and better cooperation with the unions, consumer groups and other involved parties.

    Ah, basic and boring infrastructure building!

  • How Safe Is The US Food Supply?

    Byoliveridley

    A good summary of the state of food safety regulation in the United States.

    How Safe Is The Food Supply?

    These known cases make up a tiny fraction of the overall problem–an estimated 76 million illnesses and 5,000 deaths in the U.S. from food poisoning each year. Meanwhile, imports of food, some from countries without strict controls, soared to more than 9 million shipments last year doubling since 2002. The cash-strapped FDA is able to inspect less than 1% of imports. It’s a recipe for disaster. “Our food-safety system in this country is broken,” warned former FDA Commissioner Dr. David A. Kessler at a recent congressional hearing.

    Few incidents ever have a body count high enough to shock the country into making fundamental changes. Overall, “we do have a very safe food supply,” says Sanford A. Miller, former director of the FDA’s Center for Food Safety & Applied Nutrition. But the alarms over pet food and vitamin A have lit a fire under lawmakers and executives. On May 2 the Senate rushed to pass a bill by a vote of 94-0 giving the FDA more responsibilities, such as creating databases of adulterated food. Meanwhile, food producers have been holding emergency meetings with suppliers, looking for problems in their factories or supply chains. Companies are “feverishly examining their own purchasing policies and trying to ensure they are followed,” says Kovacs.

    Note that it is always tempting to blame the bureaucrats here. Bureaucracy is a dirty word in this country, associated with “red tape”, “corruption”, “standing in the way of business”, “pencil pushers”, “big government”, you name it, they get called it. But, agencies like the EPA and the FDA have competent scientists who know what they are doing. But, without the money and the authority, which is given to them by the political arm of the government, they cannot do much. They have also, in recent years, been headed by political appointees who come from the industry they are supposed to regulate and show a distaste for regulation which is in complete opposition of the mandate they are supposed to fulfill as the head of a regulatory agency.

    It’s easy to take potshots at the FDA, but remember who gives them the money, makes the rules and tells them what not to oversee.

  • Autism epidemic not caused by shifts in diagnoses; environmental factors likely

    Byoliveridley

    California’s sevenfold increase in autism cannot be explained by changes in doctors’ diagnoses and most likely is due to environmental exposures, University of California scientists reported. The scientists who authored the new study advocate a nationwide shift in autism research to focus on an array of potential factors in the environment that babies and fetuses are exposed to, including pesticides, viruses and chemicals in household products.

    Autism epidemic not caused by shifts in diagnoses; environmental factors likely — Environmental Health News

    One of the most common arguments you will see about a lot of mental health diagnoses is that doctors have changed their diagnostic practices significantly. While there is evidence of this occurring in diagnoses of childhood depression, anxiety, or even bipolar disorder due to the millions of dollars involved in medication and the attendant corruption, autism is different.

    This population study used 17 year data in California and concluded that diagnostic changes were only responsible for a 2 fold increase, not the seven fold increase seen. The rest is unexplained, and the authors attribute it to a confluence of environmental and genetic factors.

    And no, for the last time, VACCINES DO NOT CAUSE AUTISM!

One Comment

  1. But what has happened to Drexelina and Sundae?

    Just been blogging about this. Is there something they aren’t tell us?

Comments are closed.