Ever heard of something called a “water footprint”? Neither had we, until recently. By now many of us know what a “carbon footprint” is, so puzzling out the general meaning of “water footprint” probably won’t be that difficult. But here’s a specific definition we found on the Water Footprint Network website: “The water footprint is a measure of humanity’s appropriation of fresh water in volumes of water consumed and/or polluted.” OK … and what exactly does that mean? “People use lots of water for drinking, cooking and washing, but even more is used for growing our food and for making our clothing, cars or computers. The water footprint measures the amount of water used to produce each of the goods and services we...
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Estimates reveal that as many as 30% of people in America suffer from depression. Mental illness and stress-related illnesses are at an all-time high. Most doctor visits have stress as an underlying theme. Unfortunately, the medications used to treat depression and stress are often ineffective. In the year 400 BC, Hippocrates, the father of medicine, played music for the mentally ill. Robert Burton, in the Anatomy of Melancholy, stated that dance and music were critical in treating mental illness. So is there any scientific truth in using music to relieve depression and mental instability? Apparently so: The mechanical sound waves of music travel through the air. The eardrums vibrate the bones in the middle ears. The brain then decodes these vibrations...
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As fall descends on us, with its beautiful leaves turning all colors, cooler temperatures and fewer hours of daylight, it’s probably a good time to remind ourselves about the importance of the sun to our overall health. In the first place, the sun feeds us. Through the process of photosynthesis, plants use sunlight to sustain themselves, and also to store the sun’s energy in the form of carbohydrates, which fuel our own bodies. But sunlight promotes health in other ways as well. It’s widely believed that too much exposure to the sun can damage our skin and even lead to skin cancer. But a recent article in the International Journal of Epidemiology found that more lives are lost to disease because of lack of...
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Need some more evidence that our “health care” system is really a “disease care” system? Have a look at one of our latest strategies for battling lung cancer. Lung cancer is one of the deadliest forms of this terrible disease. Most lung cancer cases affect middle-aged people and are due in large part to smoking. Tragically, lung cancer is usually diagnosed too late for surgery or drug-based therapies to save the patient’s life. Although smoking rates are declining in the U.S., they are still on the rise worldwide. So what to do about this growing problem? Well, a recent study funded by Genentech, a pharmaceutical manufacturer of anti-cancer drugs, showed that yearly CAT scans done on people who smoked a...
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By now, most of us know what a GMO is. But just to make sure, GMO stands for genetically modified organism. It’s mainly applied to genetically altered plants—many of which are consumed by people, and/or animals that are then consumed by people. By now, most people also know that there is a raging debate in this country—and indeed the world—about the safety of consuming GMOs. Proponents say that GMOs help grow more food, are more resistant to damage by insects and have several other advantages. Opponents site safety concerns about eating genetically altered food. They also want growers and manufacturers to label foods that contain GMOs. As of now, opponents of GMOs seem to be losing the battle—and losing it big....
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Ever heard of the Trans-Pacific Partnership? It’s a trade agreement between 12 nations—including the United States—that surround the Pacific Ocean (also known as the Pacific Basin). It’s designed to lower tariff barriers between the member nations, thus facilitating increased trade between them. Sounds good, right? After all, increased trade between nations usually causes job growth in the export sectors of those nations’ economies. It also tends to bring the member countries closer together diplomatically, reducing the chance for international conflict. It seems like a win-win all the way around—until you consider the health of our partners. You see, the Trans-Pacific Partnership will allow agribusiness to vastly increase the export of American meat products to countries like Japan and Mexico, not...
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In our last blog, we discussed the lack of leadership being provided by our elected officials when it comes to implementing measures that would protect our planet from further environmental damage, or fixing the damage that’s already been done. It’s been said that we get the political leaders we deserve. There’s a good deal of truth in this hard-edged observation. As citizens, we need to do a lot more than vote for the right candidates every few years, then sit back and expect them to take care of us and/or the environment. As long as we remain passive, we will continue to get bad leadership, and our environmental situation (and a lot of other issues as well) will only continue...
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Over the last several blogs, we’ve been revealing how our food choices affect the environmental health of the planet. Most are linked to the substantial growth of animal agriculture over the last generation. This growth is a major contributor to the over-exploitation of world fisheries, the creation of oceanic dead zones, soil erosion, and global warming—just to name a few. Taken together, these problems seem practically insurmountable. But take heart, folks. There are many smart, committed people working on all these problems, and many of them already have solutions—if only we would implement them. This brings up the issue of leadership—or more accurately—the lack of leadership, especially from our elected officials. Most of these folks depend on the financial support of special...
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Here’s yet another in our series of blog posts revealing how our food choices—especially the growing demand for meat—are having catastrophic effects on the global environment. Although all the issues we’ve brought up require individual solutions, none of them can safely be viewed as individual issues. They are all parts of the same overarching problem—one that needs to be addressed in an overarching, wholistic way. A highly revealing—and alarming—statement about how our food choices affect the global environment was detailed in a recent United Nations Environmental Program (UNEP) Millennial Ecosystem Assessment Report. This authoritative document delves deeply into the last half century of human damage to the world’s environment. Here are some of its more trenchant conclusions: Humans have made unprecedented changes...
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In our last few blog posts, we’ve been revealing how our food choices impact the environmental health of our planet—mainly our oceans. But of course those same food choices also have an enormous impact on our whole planet. Here are a couple of more issues to keep in mind: The overgrazing of livestock is an important factor in the rapidly diminishing amount of topsoil worldwide. Topsoil is the thin, rich layer of soil where most of the nutrients for plants are found. Most of the land-based biological activity of the Earth takes place in this layer of soil. But according to a report by the World Wildlife Fund, our planet has lost 50 percent of its topsoil in the last...
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