Friday, September 17, 2010
A Campaign for Peace in Congo
Falling Whistles - Be a Whistleblower for Peace in Congo from Falling Whistles on Vimeo.
Falling Whistles gives a small window into our world’s largest war. Originally just a journal written about boys sent to the frontlines of war armed with only a whistle, readers forwarded it with the same kind of urgency in which it was written and demanded to know –
what can we do?
The Falling Whistles campaign launched with a simple response - make their weapon your voice and be a whistleblower for peace in Congo. Read the story and buy the whistle. Proceeds go to rehabilitate and advocate for war-affected children. Share their story and speak up for them.
Together, we'll become the voice of a growing coalition for peace in the Democratic Republic of Congo.
Wait, there’s a war in Congo?
The Democratic Republic of Congo is home to the world’s largest and most deadly war. During the past 10 years, roughly 6 million people have died, and nearly 1,500 people continue to lose their lives daily. Sexual violence is more rampant here than anywhere else in the world, and thousands of children are involved in the war. Why?
There are a number of reasons, dating back over a century. However, most of the conflict is tied directly to the country's vast natural resources. They are both a blessing and a curse, making Congo a country of great potential and a frequent victim of exploitation. The minerals found in Congo are used in consumer electronics, including laptops and cell phones. While many benefit from the mineral trade, it is the Congolese people who bear the consequences of a conflict that sustains profitable mining enterprise.
A combination of unstable governance, a history of bitterness between local groups, and international interest in Congo makes this situation one of the most complicated on the planet. It is this complexity that has left the current systems in place largely ineffective. A new approach is needed.
To read more about this cause visit this website.
Sugar: So Sweet Yet So Evil
By Emily Sohn - Discovery News
Mon Sep 13, 2010 07:00 AM ET
Mon Sep 13, 2010 07:00 AM ET
THE GIST
- Sugar damages our health in ways that have nothing to do with extra calories.
- Sugar's power over us began during a time of starvation, when the ability to get fat off of sugar was a survival tool for our ancestors.
- Sugar may be just as bad as alcoholism when it comes to liver health.
Sugar is the enemy, according to a growing body of research, and not just because it rots our teeth and adds padding to our thighs.
The real danger is fructose -- a main ingredient in table sugar, high fructose corn syrup, and fruit -- that actually gets into our cells and alters metabolism.
The findings may help to explain how our nation's excessive consumption of sweetened foods is contributing to growing rates of obesity, heart disease, high blood pressure, diabetes and more -- in a way that has nothing to do with sugar's rich source of empty calories.
What's more, there may be deep evolutionary roots that explain sugar's power over our bodies. Many millions of years ago, according to new research, our ape ancestors developed mutations that made it easy for them to get fat from eating fructose.
Learn about the top five things you may not have known about sugar in this slide show.
At the time, the mutation was a good thing. It allowed our ancestors to survive seasonal periods of famine when the fruit trees went bare.
Today, the mutation makes a year-round, fructose-filled diet dangerous to our health, said Richard Johnson, chief of the division of Renal Diseases and Hypertension at the University of Colorado, Denver, and author of "The Sugar Fix: The High-Fructose Fallout That Is Making You Fat and Sick."
Both sugar and high-fructose corn syrup are equally bad, he said, because both contain about the same amount of fructose.
"This mutation that occurred 15 million years ago could explain why we're fat today," Johnson said. "It doesn't mean we all become obese. It doesn't mean everyone is going to get diabetes. It does mean that all of us are more susceptible to being fat than most other mammals."
As rates of diabetes and obesity increased in the 1960s, Johnson said, an idea emerged that some ancient mutation might have occurred during a time of famine, increasing people's ability to become fat easily when food became plentiful again. But only recently have scientists found evidence to explain what that mutation might be and how it might work.
In a paper published in January in the journal Transactions of the American Clinical and Climatological Association, and a more detailed paper set for publication in November, Johnson and colleagues identify just such a mutation that affects how our bodies deal with uric acid, an ordinary byproduct of metabolism.
The mutation evolved 15 million years ago, during a period of starvation. One hundred percent of us have it.
While many of the details have yet to be published, Johnson said that the mutation led to an increase in how much uric acid our bodies produce after eating fructose, while also lengthening the amount of time that uric acid sticks around after a sweet treat.
The result, he said, is inflammation and an increased ability for cells to become fat. In other words, uric acid works within cells to amplify sugar's ability to cause obesity.
Even on a calorie-restricted diet, he said, animals that eat too much sugar develop insulin resistance, an early sign of diabetes. Other trials in people have shown that lowering uric acid levels lowered their blood pressure.
"We need to start thinking about sugar in a completely different way," said Robert Lustig, a pediatric endocrinologist at the University of California, San Francisco.
Lustig agrees with Johnson that uric acid might drive high blood pressure, but he isn't convinced that uric acid explains all of sugar's power to induce obesity, diabetes and cardiovascular disease. Instead, he thinks the story is more complicated than that.
In several papers, including one published in the Journal of the American Dietetic Association, Lustig and colleagues report striking similarities in the health effects of both sugar and ethanol, the active ingredient in beer, wine and liquor.
Fatty-liver disease, for example, is common in alcoholics, and it appears in more than a third of obese kids and nearly half of obese adults. In these obese patients, Lustig said, the liver looks exactly like the liver of an alcoholic with the disease, even when the patient doesn't drink.
Like alcohol, his recent study found, sugar is also habit-forming and possibly addictive.
More than half of the American population is overdosing on sugar, he added. The American Heart Association recommends a maximum of six teaspoons per day of added sugars for women and nine teaspoons for men. But with so much sugar and high fructose corn syrup in processed foods, Lustig said, education alone will never succeed at getting people down to slash the sweets from their diet.
"We need to have sugar policies the same way we have ethanol policies," he said. "And until we do, don't expect the obesity epidemic to get any better."
The real danger is fructose -- a main ingredient in table sugar, high fructose corn syrup, and fruit -- that actually gets into our cells and alters metabolism.
The findings may help to explain how our nation's excessive consumption of sweetened foods is contributing to growing rates of obesity, heart disease, high blood pressure, diabetes and more -- in a way that has nothing to do with sugar's rich source of empty calories.
What's more, there may be deep evolutionary roots that explain sugar's power over our bodies. Many millions of years ago, according to new research, our ape ancestors developed mutations that made it easy for them to get fat from eating fructose.
Learn about the top five things you may not have known about sugar in this slide show.
At the time, the mutation was a good thing. It allowed our ancestors to survive seasonal periods of famine when the fruit trees went bare.
Today, the mutation makes a year-round, fructose-filled diet dangerous to our health, said Richard Johnson, chief of the division of Renal Diseases and Hypertension at the University of Colorado, Denver, and author of "The Sugar Fix: The High-Fructose Fallout That Is Making You Fat and Sick."
Both sugar and high-fructose corn syrup are equally bad, he said, because both contain about the same amount of fructose.
"This mutation that occurred 15 million years ago could explain why we're fat today," Johnson said. "It doesn't mean we all become obese. It doesn't mean everyone is going to get diabetes. It does mean that all of us are more susceptible to being fat than most other mammals."
As rates of diabetes and obesity increased in the 1960s, Johnson said, an idea emerged that some ancient mutation might have occurred during a time of famine, increasing people's ability to become fat easily when food became plentiful again. But only recently have scientists found evidence to explain what that mutation might be and how it might work.
In a paper published in January in the journal Transactions of the American Clinical and Climatological Association, and a more detailed paper set for publication in November, Johnson and colleagues identify just such a mutation that affects how our bodies deal with uric acid, an ordinary byproduct of metabolism.
The mutation evolved 15 million years ago, during a period of starvation. One hundred percent of us have it.
While many of the details have yet to be published, Johnson said that the mutation led to an increase in how much uric acid our bodies produce after eating fructose, while also lengthening the amount of time that uric acid sticks around after a sweet treat.
The result, he said, is inflammation and an increased ability for cells to become fat. In other words, uric acid works within cells to amplify sugar's ability to cause obesity.
Even on a calorie-restricted diet, he said, animals that eat too much sugar develop insulin resistance, an early sign of diabetes. Other trials in people have shown that lowering uric acid levels lowered their blood pressure.
"We need to start thinking about sugar in a completely different way," said Robert Lustig, a pediatric endocrinologist at the University of California, San Francisco.
Lustig agrees with Johnson that uric acid might drive high blood pressure, but he isn't convinced that uric acid explains all of sugar's power to induce obesity, diabetes and cardiovascular disease. Instead, he thinks the story is more complicated than that.
In several papers, including one published in the Journal of the American Dietetic Association, Lustig and colleagues report striking similarities in the health effects of both sugar and ethanol, the active ingredient in beer, wine and liquor.
Fatty-liver disease, for example, is common in alcoholics, and it appears in more than a third of obese kids and nearly half of obese adults. In these obese patients, Lustig said, the liver looks exactly like the liver of an alcoholic with the disease, even when the patient doesn't drink.
Like alcohol, his recent study found, sugar is also habit-forming and possibly addictive.
More than half of the American population is overdosing on sugar, he added. The American Heart Association recommends a maximum of six teaspoons per day of added sugars for women and nine teaspoons for men. But with so much sugar and high fructose corn syrup in processed foods, Lustig said, education alone will never succeed at getting people down to slash the sweets from their diet.
"We need to have sugar policies the same way we have ethanol policies," he said. "And until we do, don't expect the obesity epidemic to get any better."
Green Eggs and Ham
Marc A.Reynolds - Garden State Green
Luckily in my household we only buy eggs from organic, cage-free, free-range chickens. Otherwise, we may have had to worry about being sicked by salmonella. If you are new to buying organic food or only buy a few things organic, eggs and milk should be the first two. Of course if you never eat eggs & don't consume dairy milk than it's a non-issue. The conditions under which factory farmed chickens live where they are not cage-free and free-range would turn your stomach. You have to be careful when buying the eggs, just because they are cage-free does not mean they are free-range. Cage-free only means they are not kept in battery cages and that some kind of ventilation is available sometimes in the chicken coop. The chickens are still cramped together and stepping in their own feces and other dead chickens. It sounds gross, because it is. It's even worse if you also eat chickens. You might also be surprised to learn that non-organic chickens are sometimes fed parts of other chickens. Now that doesn't seem normal, now does it? If you are a meat eater be sure to look for organic, cage-free & free-range labels in the produce section. I plan to compile a list of local places where such products can be bought. Look for it soon.
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