Saturday, April 19, 2008

2nd today

Did you know that exposure to many environmental toxins can result in sensorimotor periferal neuropathy?
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4 comments:

Anonymous said...

I saw a story on the Today Show recently about the little triangles with the numbers inside them that are on the bottoms of plastic containers. I never knew what the numbers signified -- still couldn't tell you, except that numbers 3, 6, and 7 should not be used to hold food or beverages. 1 and 5 are safe for those. So, I check the little plastic containers the babyfood comes in -- 7! The bottles Ensure comes in -- 7! I figure by now so many chemical toxins from these containers have leached into the food and beverages that I've consumed that it's totally all over for me....

April 19, 2008 at 4:15 PM
Gopher MPH said...

you don't even want to get one of our profs going ... he adamantly recommends to every woman of childbearing age that she shouldn't use clear polycarbonate bottles for liquids. Like those things 1/2 the population uses. They will leach very small amounts of chemicals that are sort of like estrogens, that cause problems in animal models. Really small animals. Haven't confirmed if these are bad for humans. Of course, not to disparage his opinion, generally the smaller the animal, the less optimum it is as a model for specific action.

As for liquid, pre-made baby formula ... I cannot imagine anyone wanting to use it, rather than the powdered kind. Soooooo much wasted packaging.

Last semester I had an environmental health class - every night after class, my friends and I would look at each other and say "I don't want to go outside!" or "We're all gonna die!!!"

There is absolutely so much crap in the environment these days. Sure, health 1000 years ago had its problems. Estrogen-mimicing chemicals weren't one of them. They just had cholera, typhoid, syphilis, and an infant mortality rate of 5 years.

Then again, there are things that are decried as results of 'modern' living: autism, cancer, or attention-deficit-hyperactivity-disorder. Many of which I think is causative bullshit. I.e., correlation does not equal causation. ah, I shouldn't get myself going ...

April 19, 2008 at 5:33 PM
Anonymous said...

The Today Show this morning had a follow-up report about plastic bottles -- now the FDA is assuring the public that no way will adults be affected adversely by plastic bottles. Children, infants and fetuses would be affected, however, because they are still developing. So, I guess there needs to be a change in the packaging of solid babyfood.

The increase in the incidence of autoimmune diseases is also something that may be attributed to "modern" life. If you put together the estimates of the total people affected by each disease -- and there are over 50 of them now -- it's in the millions. Diabetes alone affects 19 million people in the U.S. The big question is how are they triggered -- is it genetic or something in the environment? For Crohn's, there is some evidence of bacteria triggering it. Researchers have identified specific genes that say a person can have the disease, but not everyone with these genes develops it. For example, they have found the genes in Asian populations where there is no Crohn's. So, are we doing this to ourselves somehow? Is modernity really worth it?

April 21, 2008 at 10:40 AM
Gopher MPH said...

The genetic route is interesting. There are studies indicating the relationship between cancers and genes. I can't recall if it is the presence or absence of the gene that was effecting the likelihood of cancer formation. I think it was the presence increasing the potential - but the presence of the gene didn't mean one would get it.

Some of the perceived increase in some diseases is simply due to 1) an increase in medical awareness, 2) an increase in ability to collate and tabulate data, and perhaps counter-intuitively, 3) drastically improved diets.

The average life expectancy in 1960 in the USA was about 65 years. [Hence the social security 'retirement' age of 65 - makes you think twice, when you realize half of adult men were expected to die before then, assuring the Soc.Sec. system would remain solvent.] The dramatic rise in neurological problems like Alzheimers might reasonably be connected to modern environmental toxin exposure - it is absolutely related to the fact so many people are living long enough for it to be measurable.

So many diseases and problems are being attributed to bacteria and viruses, which even 30 or 40 years ago would not have been. See the ads for a vaccine to prevent cervical cancer. That blows my mind. It also gives me great hope. If something so debilitating as crohn's might be connected to some nasty little bug ... it seems (to me) to make amelioration of the disease more achievable. Even something like HIV - if we know what causes AIDS, surely the prevention, or at least great minimization, should be possible?

Though, yes, I think there is much about 'modern' life which is totally, and completely unnecessary. Every time I open a bottle of over-the-counter pills, and start swearing because of the little "safety" seal, I damn the idiots who were in a mindless panic in the late 70s about cyanide in tylenol. Something which never actually happened. And so much food 'safety' wrapping... so totally useless.

Society cannot discern where to draw the line between public health and private health. How much is the public willing to indirectly subsidize private medical fears?

April 21, 2008 at 11:50 AM

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