Archive for 2011

A Doctor’s Hopes for 2012

by Alan Sosin, MD,

20121. Doctors spending more time with patients

The average office visit for established patients in most practices runs 7-15 minutes, and 30 minutes for new patients. That is barely enough time to get right down to business, do a cursory exam and write a prescription, with no opportunity to learn about the patient's lifestyle, family difficulties and other stresses. Physicians may be scheduled to see 30-40 patients a day. Being in such a rush stresses the doctor, leads to wrong diagnoses and wrong therapies. It also leads to more drug prescribing and more tests, as the quickest way to dispose of a patient is to write a prescription or order a test. Discussion invariably suffers from neglect.

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Greening Cities on the Cheap

by Jared Green, via Grist.org,

Architect and urban planner and founder of the Instituto Jaime Lerner.Jaime Lerner was elected mayor of Curitiba, Brazil, in 1971, and reelected two more times before serving as governor of the Brazilian state of Paraná. As mayor, Lerner devised a number of low-cost solutions and innovative partnerships with the public and private companies that turned Curitiba into a model green community. He has won a number of major awards for his transportation, design, and environmental work, including the United Nations Environment Award. In 2002, Lerner was elected president of the International Union of Architects. Today, he is principal of Jamie Lerner Associated Architects.

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Food Support Reform Needed to Fight Obesity

by Alvin Powell, via The Harvard Gazette,

Food stamps for sodasEvery day, the government’s food stamp program buys Americans 20 million servings of soda, paying billions for a program that fosters the obesity that the government then has to pay again for in increased health care expenditures.

“That is arguably the single largest contributor to obesity,” said David Ludwig, a pediatrics professor at Harvard Medical School (HMS) and Harvard-affiliated Children’s Hospital Boston and professor of nutrition at the Harvard School of Public Health (HSPH). “It makes no sense … especially when we might wind up paying for that as a society in obesity and diabetes.”

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Lawsuit Alleges Frito-Lay’s GMO Snacks Aren’t “Natural”

by Michele Simon, cross posted from Appetite for Profit,

Frito Lay productsIn August, I reported on a lawsuit against ConAgra for deceptive labeling of its Wesson brand of cooking oils as "natural." The case alleges that the products contain genetically-modified organisms (GMOs), which are not by any stretch of the imagination, natural. A similar case was recently filed in California (by the same class action firm — Milberg) against Frito-Lay — the snacks division of food and beverage giant PepsiCo.

As I noted before, the implications of such a case is potentially far-reaching, given how many brands containing GMO ingredients are currently touting the meaningless natural label.

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New Emission Rules—The EPA Gets it Right

Coal-fired power plant. Photograph: Jason Hawks/Getty ImagesIn a historic move, the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) announced sweeping new air quality regulations -- the first ever to severely restrict the levels of mercury, arsenic and other carcinogens being spewed into the atmosphere. The new rules call for scrubbers to be installed on smokestacks, which will take out 90 percent of the mercury and also remove dangerous particulates from the air. This is good news for anyone who lives downwind of a fossil-fuel burning power plant, 40 percent of which lack modern pollution controls.

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Opportunity for Youth Knocking from the Farm

by Dinesh Ramde, AP, via The Huffington Post,

Young people moving to farmingA Wisconsin factory worker worried about layoffs became a dairy farmer. An employee at a Minnesota nonprofit found an escape from her cubicle by buying a vegetable farm. A nuclear engineer tired of office bureaucracy decided to get into cattle ranching in Texas.

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Micro-Hydro Turbines: Turning Canals into Power Sources

by by Lauren Craig, via EarthTechling,

Turbine being installed. Image via HydrovoltsHydrovolts is a Seattle, Washington-based start-up with an innovative micro-hydro turbine technology. Instead of relying on natural water resources, the Hydrovolts turbine is designed specifically for use in man-made waterways, such as irrigation canals, water diversion channels, discharge channels for wastewater, cooling water discharges from thermal power plants and large hydropower projects.

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Documenting the Realities of Farming

Graham Meriwether and Paul WillisAgriculture is often painted in simple, black-and-white terms. On one side there’s the evil industrial-agriculture meat farmer, raising animals with inhumane practices, polluting the environment, eating up fossil fuel, and tainting products with hormones and antibiotics. On the other side, we find the sustainable practitioner, letting animals roam freely and graze, as nature intended, using no antibiotics (as they’re not needed in this setting), and creating a natural cycle in which pollution is not an issue.

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Rapping for Organics

Ietef Vitaby Andrew Leonard, via Grist.org,

Three blocks from his old high school in the historic Five Points district of Denver, Colo., recalls Ietef Vita, stands a youth penitentiary where friends Vita hasn't seen since middle school are still locked up.

Gentrification is now starting to soften the hard edges of Five Points, but when he was growing up, says Vita, the neighborhood was "saturated by gang violence and police brutality."

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2012: The Year to Stop Playing Nice

by Michele Simon, cross posted from Appetite for Profit,

Get political!Instead of a potentially depressing year-in-review post, I decided to look ahead. (But do see Andy Bellatti’s amusing compilation of 2011 food news.) Given all the defeats and set-backs this year due to powerful food industry lobbying, the good food movement should by now be collectively shouting: I am mad as hell and I’m not going to take it anymore.

If you feel that way, I have two words of advice: .

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Supersized Fast Food Marketing Makes Supersized Nations

via University of Michigan School of Public Health,

Fast food leads to obesityNew research from the University of Michigan suggests obesity can be seen as one of the unintended side effects of free market policies.

A study of 26 wealthy nations shows that countries with a higher density of fast food restaurants per capita had much higher obesity rates compared to countries with a lower density of fast food restaurants per capita.

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Erin Brockovich on Saving the World

by Claire Thompson, via Grist.org,

Erin BrockovichIn the decade or so since her life was immortalized in the Oscar-winning Julia Roberts flick, Erin Brockovich, the real Brockovich has continued her environmental crusade. (To refresh your memory: Brockovich is the working mom who, as a file clerk in a California law firm, stumbled upon records that eventually forced Pacific Gas and Electric to pay the largest toxic tort injury settlement in U.S. history, for poisoning the groundwater in the small town of Hinkley, Calif.) She's used her newfound status as everywoman environmental hero to help other communities kick corporate polluters out of their backyards, but she also found time to travel the lecture circuit and host ABC and Lifetime TV series.

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What’s really in that candy cane?

Just Label It!Candy canes - they're sticky, they're sweet, and they aren't what they seem.

These innocent stocking-stuffers are just one of many holiday goodies that could be made from genetically engineered ingredients. But if you go to the grocery store, you'd never know it from looking at the package.

That’s because the Food and Drug Administration (FDA)’s current policy does not require products that use genetically modified ingredients to be labeled that way. But there’s a great need. The government estimates that about jaw-dropping 2/3 of processed foods contain genetically engineered ingredients. And the majority of the livestock we consume have been raised on genetically engineered grains!

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Future Ships: Going Green by Going Retro

by Jesse Emspak, via New Scientist,

Future innovations for green shippingLike the clippers of old, the cargo ships of tomorrow may one day raise sails, though with a modern twist. They might also sport solar panels, and even glide through the ocean on cushions of air.

Typical cargo ships today are little different from their forbears a century ago: dirty, oil-burning behemoths. Because of their huge size, they're an efficient way to move goods, but the industry is so vast that the amount of carbon they emit exceeds that of all the world's aircraft. If the global fleet were a single country, its emissions would rank seventh in the world (see graph).

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Congress to Kids: Drop Dead

by Michele Simon, cross posted from Appetite for Profit,

Pizza. Congress's new veggie for kidsLast month, when Congress declared pizza a vegetable, it was hard to believe things could get much worse. But never underestimate politicians’ ability to put corporate interests ahead of children’s health. In the massive budget bill just passed, Congress stuck in language to require the Federal Trade Commission to conduct a cost/benefit analysis before finalizing a report that would provide the food industry with science-based nutrition guidelines for marketing to children. Experts from four federal agencies put heads together, and for the past two years have tried to complete its charge (which ironically, came from Congress in the first place) amidst powerful industry push-back.

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Glow and Be Recognized

Fluorescent molecules with an open scaffolding called a metal-organic framework (MOF)by David Chandler, via MIT News Office,

Researchers at MIT have developed a new way of revealing the presence of specific chemicals — whether toxins, disease markers, pathogens or explosives. The system visually signals the presence of a target chemical by emitting a fluorescent glow.

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Mrs. Q’s Battle Cry for Lunch

Mrs. QSarah Wu was a speech pathologist with the Chicago Public Schools, in her third year of professional life. She loved her job, and felt she was making a difference with the low-income elementary school children with whom she was working. She had a husband and child, was a private person and a self-described even-tempered individual who rarely “got mad” about things. Almost three years later, however, under the pseudonym “Mrs. Q,” she is an Internet sensation because of her outspoken campaign for the improvement of school lunches; and she is now the author of a book, Fed Up With Lunch: How One Anonymous Teacher Revealed the Truth About School Lunches—and How We Can Change Them!, detailing her experiences.

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Putting an Environmental Message in “Ski Porn”

by Rae Tyson, via The Daily Climate,

David Mossop and Sherpas Cinemas are transforming ski flicks, turning the usual plot-less, context-less jumble of skiing images into a message about environmental destruction, mass consumption and climate change.A critically acclaimed film combining action, free-style skiing and a climate impact message debuted this fall. Representing the leading edge of a new wave of ski films, All.I.Can juxtaposes "ski-porn"—plot-less montages of expert skiers flying down and off impossibly steep mountainsides—against images of environmental destruction and mass consumption. Reviewers say the movie, available on DVD and to be released on iTunes on Nov. 14, could change the genre permanently.

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Message to Mrs. Obama: Exercise Only Won’t Do the Trick

by Michele Simon, via Grist.org,

Let's MoveAt a recent summit on childhood obesity, the first lady announced a shift in her well-known Let's Move campaign -- away from food reform and toward an increased focus on exercise. Instead of "forcing [children] to eat their vegetables," she told her audience, "it's getting them to go out there and have fun."

Yes, you heard that right. The first lady actually said that eating vegetables is a chore. And that playing is a preferable focus for her campaign because it's easier.

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Financial Waste: The “Business” of Turning Food into School Lunches

by Tom Laskawy, via Grist.org,

I want to draw attention to an eye-opening investigative report on school lunch that has gotten a bit lost in the holiday shuffle. In a collaboration between The New York Times and the Investigative Fund, reporter Lucy Komisar delved into the billion-dollar business of the national school lunch program and found some unsettling news.

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Chicago’s Sustainable-Oriented Transportation Commissioner

by John Greenfield, via Grist.org,

Commissioner Gabe Klein. Photo: Steven VanceWhen forward-thinking Chicago Department of Transportation (CDOT) Commissioner Gabe Klein reported for work on May 16 as part of Mayor Rahm Emanuel's new administration, it marked a sea change in the city's priorities.

Chicago spent most of the 20th century trying to make it easier to drive. In recent years, as other cities pioneered green transportation initiatives like car-protected bike lanes, large-scale public bike sharing systems, and "ciclovia" events which shut down streets to make room for car-free recreation, Chicago futilely tried to fight auto congestion by removing pedestrian crosswalks, shortening walk signal times, and installing slip lanes and right-on-red signals to help drivers make faster turns.

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Is GMO Resistance “Bugging” Monsanto’s Future?

by Tom Laskawy, via Grist.org,

The Corn Rootworm. Photo: Jimmy SmithNow that 94 percent of the soy and 70 percent of the corn grown in the U.S. are genetically modified, Monsanto—one of the companies that dominates the GMO seed market  -- might look to some like it's winning. But if we look a little closer, I'd say they're holding on by a thread.

Their current success is due in large part to brilliant marketing. The company's approach was both compelling—their products were sold as the key to making large-scale farming far simpler and more predictable—and aggressive: Monsanto made it virtually impossible for most farmers to find conventional seeds for sale in most parts of the country.

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Corporate Speech Rights and the Health of America

By Steven Rosenfeld, via AlterNet.org,

Pack of cigarettes. Photo: smits.saraIn recent years, corporate lawyers representing industries whose products touch millions of American lives have stopped numerous government efforts to better inform the public about possible health risks with an eyebrow-raising legal strategy. They have asserted a constitutional right not to speak, or say more than they want on labels and advertising, and pro-business federal judges have agreed, rejecting the public’s right to know.

In cases involving man-made hormones fed to dairy cows, heart and lung disease caused by tobacco, the nutritional value of foods contributing to childhood and teenage obesity, and even radiation emitted by cell phones, the industries keep returning to court until a business-friendly judge or majority on an appeals court rules that the First Amendment includes the corporate right not to ‘speak’ if it could harm profits.

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Desertec Sahara Solar Project Could Power Half the World

By Charis Michelsen, via CleanTechnica,

Desertec solar power from AfricaThe African desert is hot. It gets a lot of sun. These are facts that we all know, even if we have no personal experience (and for those of you who haven’t been there, let me assure you, it’s true). It seems intuitive that the intensity of the sunlight pressing down on that desert makes the area ideal for generating solar power, and indeed – such plans were conceived in 1913 (by American engineer Frank Shuman), and again explored in 1986 (by German particle physicist Gerhard Knies).

Both Shuman and Knies strongly believed desert solar energy was necessary; Shuman believed that humanity would revert to barbarism without it, and Knies felt that it was the only way to avoid dirty and dangerous fossil fuels.

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Facts for Winning a Debate About GMO Food

by Melissa Breyer, via Care2.org,

Spraying a fieldIt’s happened to the best of us. The topic of genetically modified (GM) food and crops comes up and someone somewhere starts spewing a spate of pro-GMO rhetoric like, “GM food is the only way to feed the poor! GM crops benefit farmers! GM food and crops are safe!” and we are left with a stammering retort of, “but, but, no, but, uhm, no!”

Next time be prepared by bolstering your argument with these 10 Reasons to Avoid GMOs, courtesy of international bestselling author and GMO expert Jeffrey Smith from The Institute for Responsible Technology (IRT). This list of ten facts and supporting text clearly explain just how serious a threat GM food and crops pose to our personal health as well as the health of the planet.

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