So this week has seen one giant leap forward on the horizon and a few steps back in global health -
First, one giant leap forward:
This is very cool and it was only a matter of time...introducing the Cicret bracelet!
My only problem is what does one do when one is wearing sleeves. Other than that, next stop - brain implants.
Btw, since this is an invention from Israel, I just want to point out if you did not catch it . It starts with the guy waiting for the subway or most likely the Metro in Paris. One of the images on the forearm at around :41 has a headline from Le Monde. Now my French is not that good, but loosely translated, the headline reads "Hamas refuses any negotiations for disarmament". It goes by really quickly, but you got to love the lack of subtlety...
Now for the "Two Steps Back":
What is the point of World Health Organization (WHO), the CDC of the United Nations? On Monday, they publish findings that all red and processed meats "may" cause cancer. Yeah, but don't worry, they spent billions to come up with this 1st World disease scrouge.
Then, the next day, the eminent scientific brains that ignored the Ebola epidemic in western Africa until it became a global panic, publish another study opining that tuberculosis now rivals AIDS as the leading cause of death in the 3rd World. The reason is as unshocking as it is unsurprising.
Okay, the floor is open...
Well, okay, this will learn me. After speaking to my IT friend and doing about 20 seconds worth of "research", I have found out that the Cicret bracelet/arm pad is not technically real. But in my defense using my best Dan Rather/Mary Mapes logic: "It COULD have been real!"
First, one giant leap forward:
This is very cool and it was only a matter of time...introducing the Cicret bracelet!
My only problem is what does one do when one is wearing sleeves. Other than that, next stop - brain implants.
Btw, since this is an invention from Israel, I just want to point out if you did not catch it . It starts with the guy waiting for the subway or most likely the Metro in Paris. One of the images on the forearm at around :41 has a headline from Le Monde. Now my French is not that good, but loosely translated, the headline reads "Hamas refuses any negotiations for disarmament". It goes by really quickly, but you got to love the lack of subtlety...
Now for the "Two Steps Back":
What is the point of World Health Organization (WHO), the CDC of the United Nations? On Monday, they publish findings that all red and processed meats "may" cause cancer. Yeah, but don't worry, they spent billions to come up with this 1st World disease scrouge.
Then, the next day, the eminent scientific brains that ignored the Ebola epidemic in western Africa until it became a global panic, publish another study opining that tuberculosis now rivals AIDS as the leading cause of death in the 3rd World. The reason is as unshocking as it is unsurprising.
"...there remains a $1.4 billion gap in the amount of funding needed for TB interventions in 2015."All I can say is that if WHO had spent less time and money on demonizing beef and processed meat, they would have all the funds they would ever need to fight the very real scourge of TB.
Okay, the floor is open...
Well, okay, this will learn me. After speaking to my IT friend and doing about 20 seconds worth of "research", I have found out that the Cicret bracelet/arm pad is not technically real. But in my defense using my best Dan Rather/Mary Mapes logic: "It COULD have been real!"
Bev, They can have my hamburger if those emaciated unhealthy vegans can pry it from my cold dead hand!!
ReplyDeleteThe bracelet is cool! :)
BTW, the way they are determining what causes cancer, anything can cause it. It's statistical chicanery.
ReplyDeleteAndrew, that's the way they've done it for years with everything.
ReplyDelete"Is this chemical dangerous?"
"I don't know. Let's inject rats with it and keep at it until they die."
"Oh, look! The rats died."
"Just as I suspected. This stuff is deadly."
tryanmax, Exactly. So the results tend to be "If you take something in a pure form that consumers never get, distill it to its essence and turn it into a fluid, and then inject 1 million times what a human could absorb into a rat," the rat dies. This must cause cancer!!
ReplyDeleteThen you get the meta-studies which are BS. They basically take dozens of unrelated studies and try to reach conclusions those other studies never addressed. By definition that's correlation, not causation... and manufactured correlation at that.
It just makes me want to eat more beef and processed meat-food. Oh, and by the way "beef" in those studies does not mean "dead cow flesh". It is pig, cow and lamb. Well, anything on a hoof that expels too much methane and just takes up too much dang room. Unlike "free range, humanely raised" chickens, ducks etc. Because nothing says "cancer-free" foods like chickens that are clucking happily about the barnyard just before they are yanked by the neck and brutally slaughtered.
ReplyDeleteI wouldn't get too hung up on the WHO release. It really wasn't news and the increase is small. What they reported was that people with a diet that contained processed meat, which had a huge inclusive definition, had a 17% increase in cancer risk. There are known carcinogens in these products but usually small amounts. It is possible that the risk comes from being overweight, which populations that tend to eat this kind of meat also tend to have higher rates of obesity.
ReplyDeleteThey key is the same message I give about 20 times per day. Ok to eat these in moderation, eat lots of fruits and vegetables, exercise and watch your weight.
What is the scandal is how this was reported. Very misleading with significant hyperbole.
To be fair Bev, Cicret is real just not to the level in the video yet. There is a prototype. They have a patent and a manufacturer. There is a video on their web site on what it is capable to doing now. Pretty basic but awesome idea.
ReplyDeleteHyperbole?! Scoundrel! The MSM never lies ever! They are always right. This is the worst news since the plague wiped out 112% of the population of everywhere, and you meat industry types are worse than Hitler!
ReplyDeleteBesides, what's hyperbole anyways?
Koshcat - My point really is this - at the same time they are screaming about the cancer causing effects of meat in the 1st World and spending billions of dollars to do that; in the same week they issued another dire warning about how they just don't have the $$$ to fight the great scourge of TB that, btw, IS a great scourge to the 3rd World. But WHO, like every other bureaucracy in known and unknown universe is less interested in actually helping people they were designed to help as it is to perpetuate its own existence and relevance.
ReplyDeleteBev, I'm not as worried about it because there is a ton of money in research and I'm fine with them researching anything that will make people healthier. BUT... but, I agree with your point. The problem as I see it, is that this is more of a politicized study meant to attack things they don't like. And rather than waste money doing politicized stuff, they should be more worried about medicine and should be looking to cure genuine medical problems.
ReplyDeleteDear WHO,
ReplyDeleteYes, we most definitely concur with your latest study. And to further bolster your findings, we have it on great authority and as historical fact...FACT, mind you... that everyone in history who has ever eaten RED meat has died. So the eating of all RED meat should be banned. Thank you for your attention to this matter.
Yours truly,
Elsie who is definitely not a cow
Whoa! Isn't the WHO study a tantamount endorsement of Chic-fil-a? Shaky ground. Shaky ground.
ReplyDeleteWow, Tryanmax, that is a great point. This is why the Obamas have not yet commented on this particular study most likely.
ReplyDelete