Watching the World
AIDS in Paris
“In Paris, 1 in every 3 deaths among men between 25 and 44 is caused by the AIDS virus,” says the French newspaper Le Monde. These latest statistics were recently made public by INSERM (French National Institute of Health and Medical Research). The report further reveals that between 1983 and 1990, infection by the AIDS virus increased the death rate among this same age group by 50 percent. Dr. Jonathan Mann, director of WHO (World Health Organization), predicted: “The worst is still ahead; everywhere the epidemic is progressing.” According to WHO, five thousand persons throughout the world are infected each day.
Children and Bottle-Feeding
About 25 percent of Japan’s children experience eating difficulties. The cause may be bottle-feeding. For over 20 years, reports Asahi Evening News, nursery-school teachers have noticed that some children have difficulty with food that is hard to chew. Some children have trouble swallowing it, others spit it out, and yet others still have it in their mouths after their afternoon nap. Doctors have observed that the jaws of these children are weak and their chins small. Dentist Naohiko Inoue and public-health specialist Reiko Sakashita claim to have traced the cause to infancy and blame bottle-feeding. It seems that when babies feed from bottles, they need only to suck without moving their jaws. However, when babies are breast-feeding, they vigorously use their jaws and strengthen the very muscles they will later on need in order to chew food.
Sea Turtles’ Problem
Although water is home to sea turtles, dry land is where they lay their eggs. After roaming vast distances in the world’s oceans, sea turtles return to specific beaches for breeding. After mating offshore, the female lumbers up the beach—possibly the very one on which she was born—and placidly lays her eggs at a carefully chosen site. This is done repeatedly for a few days, until all the eggs—usually about a thousand—have been laid and painstakingly covered. But then comes the problem. The South African journal Prisma calls it “the systematic stripping of nests” by man in his “unparalleled greed and a flagrant disregard for the environment,” which “has seriously interfered with the reproductive patterns of the turtles.” Some species now face extinction.
Tobacco Advertisers Exploit Women
“You’ve come a long way, baby.” For years in the United States, female smokers have been cheered on by such persuasive advertising slogans. These women have been exploited, laments Kathy Harty, chief of a smoking-prevention program for one of the northern states. Harty has cocreated a TV and radio advertising campaign stressing that message. One antismoking commercial shows an attractive woman stubbing out her cigarette on an advertising executive’s bald head. A radio ad features a woman telling cigarette manufacturers: “Thank you for making our hair smell like an ashtray. Thank you for staining our teeth and increasing our dry-cleaning bills. Thank you for the 52,000 cases of lung cancer you cause in women each year. We only hope we can return the favor some day.” Harty explains: “We want [women] to think about it twice: ‘Do I really want this cigarette? Do I really want to make someone else rich and myself sick?’”
Astronomers’ Hope
In a ten-year program managed by the U.S. National Aeronautics and Space Administration, astronomers are planning to spend $100 million in an effort to discover radio broadcasts from intelligent beings on other planets. According to the International Herald Tribune, their plan is to monitor simultaneously millions of microwave channels at radio telescopes in Argentina, Australia, India, Russia, Puerto Rico, and the United States. While some scientists optimistically forecast early success, others point out that the 50 searches conducted since 1960 have been unfruitful.
Preset the Television?
“For children, less TV is better, especially violent TV,” says the American Academy of Pediatrics in a study published in The Journal of the American Medical Association. The article reported that “infants as young as 14 months of age demonstrably observe and incorporate behaviors seen on television.” Much of what they see is aggressive and violent in nature. In an effort to restore parental authority, the report suggests using the modern technology of an electronic time-channel lock on the television so that programs, channels, and times can be preset. In this way, even when parents are not at home, they can control what their children watch on television and when they watch it.
Honey—A Healer
Since ancient times, bee honey has been used for its healing properties. La Presse Médicale, a French magazine, reports that modern medical science is now beginning to rediscover honey’s healing powers. In a recent study, doctors experimented with the use of pure natural honey for treating burns and various types of flesh wounds. Honey was applied directly to the wounds and covered with dry sterile bandages. This dressing was changed every 24 hours. The results show honey to be outstandingly effective as a cleansing and healing agent. It kills most germs on contact and stimulates new tissue growth. La Presse Médicale concludes: “As it is simple and inexpensive, honey should be better known and added to the list of commonly used antiseptic products.”
Superathletes Without Supergood Health
“Excessive training and emotional tension that precede an important competition have an extraordinarily negative effect on athletes’ immunological systems,” reports O Estado de S. Paulo. “The result can be a deficiency in the defense against infections much like the symptoms of AIDS.” Research by Dr. Gerd Uhlenbruck and Dr. Heinz Liesen reveals that professional athletes or supertrained ones have a higher rate of malignant tumors and infections. They suggest that this may be due to stress imposed by the “rigorous training and regimen of competition.” The report adds: “On the other hand, moderate practice of sports strengthens the organism and helps not only to prevent cancer but also to prolong the individual’s life.”
Telesurgery in the Future?
“The patient is in Rome, the surgeon operates from Milan,” explains the Italian daily Il Messaggero in describing the “first ever experiment in telesurgery using a robot.” Hundreds of miles away, by means of a phone hookup and a video monitor, the surgeon identifies the “exact point of the incision, gives the OK, and the robot goes into action. Its mechanical arm holding a scalpel is lowered onto the patient’s body and cuts.” In this demonstration operation enacted at the Rome Surgery ’92 congress, the patient was only a mannequin, since Italian law does not allow machines to operate on humans, but within six or seven years, telesurgery, that is, “remote control surgery,” may well become reality. According to Licinio Angelini, professor of general surgery at La Sapienza University, Rome, in the future “all those movements that are now carried out by the surgeon with some difficulty will be entrusted to machines.”
Unemployment and Health
Unemployment among young people is one of the most serious problems of the Western world, claims Dr. Anne Hammarström of the Karolinska Institute in Stockholm, Sweden. Her findings, as reported in the British Medical Journal, show that young unemployed men tend to lapse into unhealthy behavior, such as increased drinking and involvement in crime. Young unemployed women, however, are affected differently, developing more physical illnesses, along with feelings of guilt, worrying that they are a burden to their families. Men get significantly more attention from the public, since their reaction to unemployment is more obvious, observes Hammarström. She recommends that “the health care sector should be more alert to the effects of unemployment on women.” The Journal concludes that “the only fully effective remedy is meaningful employment.”
‘Germany a Pagan Country’
“The Federal Republic [of Germany] has become a pagan country with a Christian residue. Six million have lost their faith in God. The number of people who do not belong to any religion is greater than those who go to church. Just 10 percent attend church each Sunday.” Those were the findings of a survey commissioned by the German newsmagazine Der Spiegel. Answers were compared with those given in a similar survey in 1967. The “new pagans,” as the magazine called those who had left the church, “have said good-bye to the churches without pain or anger. It was not indignation but indifference that robbed the churches of their allegiance.”