Daily Science Dose

As if pesticides were not bad enough, Bayer, you still insist on using a highly toxic and dangerous chemical to produce those pesticides. No other pesticide manufacturer is stockpiling methyl isocyanate (MIC), so why do you continue to endanger the health of your employees and to a lesser extent your neighbors by finding that it necessary to house large quantities of methyl isocyanate.

A little history…Methyl Isocyanate is an ester of isocyanic acid, a volatile and poisonous substance made up of one Hydrogen, one Nitrogen, one Carbon and one oxygen atom. You’d think that those four elements would produce nothing but good, but then you’d be wrong. Methyl Isocyanate is used in making pesticides such as Bayer’s trademarked Sevin (carbaryl), among other pesticides used in industrialized agriculture.

Methyl isocyanate is not the only chemical that Bayer can use to produce carbaryl, but it is the cheapest. So you see, it’s not that Bayer has to use MIC, it’s that it is more profitable to use MIC. And we all know that profits come before human health and safety.

A plant making Sevin in India accidentally released MIC into the surrounding area of the then-Union Carbide Ltd plant outside of Bhopal back in 1984. The death toll from that accident is estimated to be around 16,000. One of the consequences of one of the worst industrial accidents ever was that Union Carbide and other chemical companies phased out MIC as a major ingredient in those yummy pesticide.

Everyone except Bayer, that is. And then, last year, an explosion at a Bayer CropScience plant in Institute, West Virginia narrowly avoided another disaster. The fire at the plant was a mere 80 feet from the above-ground MIC storage tank. At the time, Bayer assured the public that the MIC was in an underground storage tank far away from the fire.

But it seems that Bayer was lying. And because they lied, that meddling Committee on Energy and Commerce is looking into why Bayer still feels the need to keep so much MIC around. The Institute, WV plant is the only plant in the US that still has a substantial (more than 10,000 pounds) inventory of MIC.

Bayer is being asked (nicely) to give the CEC an explanation why it has so much MIC lying around, if Bayer has even begun to think about not using MIC, and what it would cost to switch to alternative chemicals. I hope that the cost estimate is not being included, so we taxpayers can cough up the dough to help a very rich company pay for being safe.

Bayer, pesticide, Bhopal, gas, MIC, methyl isocyanate, toxic substance, chemicals, agriculture, India, industrial accident, Congress

As I have been busy in the garden, digging up a patch for my sunflowers as part of the Great Sunflower Project, honeybees are not far from my mind or the mind of many a gardener/farmer. I’ve noticed a few bumble bees, but nary a honeybee. Maybe it’s too early, but I’ve got blossoms-a-rama in my strawberry patch, so what up, bees?

Scientists in Spain may have made a bee-line in the fight to save the honeybees. One possible reason for the devastating Colony Collapse Disorder is a really, really small parasite called Nosema ceranae. It is not totally agreed on in the scientific community what indeed has or is causing CCD in the honeybee populations in Europe and the US, but more data and more testing is showing evidence of an Asian parasite-strain, the Nosema ceranae, jumped from the Apis cerana, or the Asian Honeybee, to Apis mellifera, otherwise known as the Western Honeybee.

However, the CCD and nosema ceranae relationship is not altogether understood, as the bees are usually not analyzed until after the colony has collapsed. It may very well be that pesticides or mites or something else is causing the deaths, and maybe the nosema ceranae are only moving in once the bees are weakened.

But Spanish scientists have found a way to treat this microscopic pest, and they did is successfully in two colonies that losing their numbers.

They found no evidence of any other cause of the disease (such as the Varroa destructor, IAPV or pesticides) other than infection with Nosema ceranae. The researchers then treated the infected surviving under-populated colonies with the antibiotic drug, flumagillin and demonstrated complete recovery of all infected colonies. –Compute Scotland

Is it wrong of me to still want to blame pesticides?

honeybees, colony collapse disorder, CCD, Spain, nosema ceranae, Western honeybees, Asiatic honeybee, parasite, pesticides, Apis cerana, Apis mellifera

Did you know that bats hibernate during the winter and that it is called hibernacula. Like Dr-acula? Come on. I may be having fun with that, but there is nothing fun about what is happening to bats in the eastern United States. They are dying of what biologists are calling white-nose syndrome.

And so far, no one knows what is causing it. Huh, kinda like the honeybees…

Anyway, the US Fish and Wildlife Service is advising to suspend all caving activity in the Eastern US in hopes of stopping the spread of the mysterious syndrome that is killing 90 to 100 percent of all bats affected by it. This is very sad news, and can affect the eastern states in terms of insect control and pollenation provided by bats in agriculture. Bats are a very important part of the ecosystem, so to see such decimation in numbers is worrying. White-Nose Syndrome has killed 75% of the bat populations in the affected areas in the US. See map below.

The FWS provides this information about the symptoms.

While they are in the hibernaculum, affected bats often have white fungus on their muzzles and other parts of their bodies. They may have low body fat. These bats often move to cold parts of the hibernacula, fly during the day and during cold winter weather when the insects they feed upon are not available, and exhibit other uncharacteristic behavior.

I’m going to play armchair scientist and offer a theory. This white-nose syndrome is a fungal attack on the skin of the bats. The areas most affected are the nose. The bat’s shove those noses into all sorts of places, like flowers that may have been treated with some sort of pesticide, herbicide, fertilizer, or whatnot. Not only that, but bats also consume things that other pesticides are meant to kill and maybe part of the meal for the unsuspecting bat. Maybe there is a link between the bats and the honeybees. Both are major players in the our agriculture, and maybe our newfangled way of growing stuff is killing them.

United States, bats, white nose syndrome, fungal, disease, die off, caves, deaths, wildlife, insects, pesticide, honeybee, agriculture, farming, colony collapse disorder, US Fish and Wildlife Service, FWS, advisory

A new study, one being praised for its thoroughness, shows that heavy red-meat eaters are at a higher risk of death from pretty much everything.

The National Cancer Institute looked at the cases of 500,000 patients and in particular questionaires they filled out detailing their intake of red meat and processed meats, as well as other factors like smoking, exercise, fondness for vegetables and fruits, how much they ate, yada, yada, yada. They split the respondents into five groups and the group you were in related to how much red and processed meat you ate. Level 1 the lowest, level five the highest.

It seems that over the years from 1995 to 2005, about 48,000 of the men in the study died, as well as almost 24,000 women. And guess what? A larger percentage of those heavy meat consumers died than the level 1’s.

The quintile who ate the most red meat had a higher risk for overall death, death from heart disease and cancer than the men and women who ate the least red meat.

The researchers said thousands of deaths could be prevented if people simply ate less meat.

“For overall mortality, 11 percent of deaths in men and 16 percent of deaths in women could be prevented if people decreased their red meat consumption to the level of intake in the first quintile,” [Rashmi] Sinha’s team wrote. –Reuters via Planet Ark

Well, what do you know… Red meat is bad for your health. I’m sure cows would agree with me here.

Not only does beef cost a hefty price in terms of your health, but do you know how bad the beef and meat industry is for the larger world? Pollution, water usage, crop diversion to animal feed, the flatulence…cows and pigs are dirty creatures. Chickens and turkeys are, too. Especially the way we raise them.

Not only that, but in the US, we consume far too much meat, due to our relative affluence and a snappy campaign from the Beef Industry to the tune of Aaron Copeland. There’s a lot of people in this world are vegetarians not by choice, but by necessity.

But in this land of meat and potatoes, and heart attacks, obesity, high cholesterol, hyper-tension, diabetes, cancer…when will we stop believing the ad campaigns? Just say no.

And I love the response from the American Meat Institute, an industry front.

But American Meat Institute executive president, James Hodges, said: “Meat products are part of a healthy, balanced diet and studies show they actually provide a sense of satisfaction and fullness that can help with weight control. Proper body weight contributes to good health overall.” –ibid.

Brilliant. I wonder how many of those heavy red meat consumers are achieving “proper body weight.”

red meat, processed meat, beef industry, National Cancer Institute, death, obesity, heart disease, cancer, pollution, water, Americans, health, food, agriculture

We humans are in quite a noodle. We need energy. Both in our bodies in the form of food and in our creature comforts in the form of fuel. Crops need good soil in which to grow, and there is only so much good soil in the world. Our fuel choice du seicle are fossil fuels, and though they sure do create a lot of energy, they also create a lot of carbon dioxide and other environmentally-detrimental substances. So-called biofuels are those that are not based upon deposits of petrochemicals underground, but instead rather on renewable (read re-growable) plant or other organic matter. Seems like these fuels would make a better choice for humanity’s power lust, but…

Some biofuels are better than others.

Japtropha

Jatropha curcas, also known as the Barbados Nut and the Physic Nut is a perennial shrub that produces black seeds or “nuts” that contain a large amount of oil that can be used directly in some generators and can also be processed into a higher quality bio-diesel. The seed is about one-third oil, and one hectare of jatropha bushes can produce over one metric ton of oil in even poor soils.

And that is the real bonus of jatropha. Jatropha bushes can grow just about anywhere. The bushes only need about 10 inches of rain a year, and that is only when they are young. Additionally, the Jatrophas are long-lasting producers and can live for 40 years.

Jatropha up until recently was not cultivated as a domesticated crop, but that may be changing as the potential of jatropha is being researched and developed in such developing countries as Zambia, Mali, India, China and the Phillipines. Jatropha originates in the Central America, and was exported to colonies to grow as live hedges to keep livestock and crops safe. The bushes are poisonous to most animals, so it acts as a great fence, in addition to acting as a good wind break for more delicate crops. The bushes were also inter-planted among field crops, and it was found that the bushes grew very well as companion plants.

Oh, did I mention that Japtropha has no need for pesticides and deters pests from entering the field? Yeah, jatropha is naturally disease- and pest-resistant. And the matter that is left over after the seeds have been pressed for oil is naturally high in nitrogen, phosphorus and potassium, which are the big three nutrients used to fertilize other crops.

Let’s review. Jatropha can grow in poor soils that won’t grow other crops and needs very little water. It can be interplanted among other crops as a secondary crop, and acts as a pest-deterrent. It needs no fertilizing, and it’s waste matter makes a great fertilizer rich in nutrients. Jatropha produces a biofuel that can be used to run generators in small villages as well as processed to produce biodiesel.

In addition to biofuels, the jatropha oil can also be made into soap, charcoal, and mosquito repellant.

jatropha, jatropha curcas, biofuels, biodiesel, fossil fuels, carbon dioxide, crops, agriculture, energy, fertilizer, pesticide, nutrients, soil

In a very creepy Children of Men kind of way, this recent development in the state of our world’s water resources could be the first step to lower fecundity in humans, which yes, in an extreme case like the world of 2027 in Children of Men, could lead to diminished birth rates.

Guess I’ll stop worrying about overpopulation…

A British joint-research project finds that increasing numbers of new chemicals such as those used in pharmaceuticals and fertilizers — the very things that make life worth living, am I right? — are showing up in our water supplies. These chemicals may have a rather harmful and decidedly less fruitful side effect on a man’s reproductive system.

And on a fish’s reproductive system. Studies in the past have shown that male fish are being “feminized” due to female hormones in the water supply. Certain hormones in the water are turning the fish into girl fish, kind of in some cases and literally in others. These estrogens are making it through the water treatment process after passing through women taking birth-control pills. To be fair, chemicals that act like estrogen also have the same effect on fish, and those chemicals are coming from industrial manufacturing.

Now, researchers are finding new chemicals they are calling “anti-androgens.” These are acting much like the estrogen and faux-estrogen. Androgens are male hormones like testosterone, and serve to support sperm production.

In fact, the researchers says they really don’t know where some of these chemicals are coming from.

“We have identified a new group of chemicals in our study on fish, but do not know where they are coming from. A principal aim of our work is now to identify the source of these pollutants and work with regulators and relevant industry to test the effects of a mixture of these chemicals and the already known environmental estrogens and help protect environmental health.” [quote from Lead author on the research paper, Dr Susan Jobling at Brunel University's Institute for the Environment]

Senior author Professor Charles Tyler of the University of Exeter said: “Our research shows that a much wider range of chemicals than we previously thought is leading to hormone disruption in fish. This means that the pollutants causing these problems are likely to be coming from a wide variety of sources.

“Our findings also strengthen the argument for the cocktail of chemicals in our water leading to hormone disruption in fish, and contributing to the rise in male reproductive problems. There are likely to be many reasons behind the rise in male fertility problems in humans, but these findings could reveal one, previously unknown, factor.”–SPX via TerraDaily

These anti-androgens are known to cause a condition called testicular dysgenesis syndrome. Even the name tells us what is going on — dys means “ill” and genesis means “birth“. The anti-androgens can cause developmental damage to the reproductive system in embryos and the syndrome is becoming more and more common unfortunately.

We are what we drink. The ultimate anti-androgens, Women.

Yet more bad news for our water supply.

fertility, reproductive health, men, mens health, water, water pollution, androgens, anti-androgens, fish, feminizing, fecundity, Children of Men, overpopulation, sperm, pharmaceuticals, fertilizers, hormones, estrogen, testosterone, manufacturing, chemicals, water treatment, testicular dysgenesis syndrome, embryos, developmental damage

You may have heard something along the lines of pharmaceuticals showing up in our water supply, as so many of us are taking more than an aspirin and still calling our doctors for more. Well, the good news is that yes, pharmaceuticals are showing up in water and in great concentrations in what is removed from our water — sewage sludge. The bad news is that there is a lot more stuff in that sewage sludge than just antidepressants.

Biosolids and You

As the EPA says, “The terms sewage sludge and biosolids are used by EPA interchangeably, but others often use the term biosolids to describe sewage sludge that has had additional processing for land application.” So in this case, biosolids are solid and biological in origin, that is it comes from humans and animals. These biosolids are often converted to fertilizers as our poo and pee have lots of nitrogen and other beneficial nutrients. That’s why manure is used in organic farming, after all. Well, sometimes that manure is yours.

Or was yours, rather.

What the report says is that there is a whole lotta sh*t in our sewage sludge, and I’m not talking feces here. The EPA looked at samples from 74 water treatment plants in 35 states, and here’s what they were looking for in all that sludge.

four anions (nitrite/nitrate, fluoride, water-extractable phosphorus)

28 metals

four polycyclic aromatic hydrocarbons

two semi-volatiles

11 flame retardants

72 pharmaceuticals

25 steroids and hormones

Many of the 145 chemicals tested for were present nationwide. Biosolids from all of the 74 large treatment plants surveyed contained the same 27 metals, but only zinc, molybdenum, and nickel exceeded standards for application to fields. Almost all of the 11 flame retardants on the list were present in every sample. Twelve of the 72 pharmaceuticals were similarly ubiquitous.

Two of the most common drugs were the antibiotics triclocarban and ciprofloxacin. Although the average concentrations were similar to those in previous small-scale studies, several samples harbored up to 440 parts per million of triclocarban, which is added to antimicrobial soap and other personal care products. That’s almost 10 times higher than ever reported in biosolids and “astonishingly high,” Halden says. One question is whether the antibiotics harm soil microbes, or aquatic life if enough leaches into streams, Halden says. “We really don’t have the answer.” –Science

Remember how some people warned everybody about using antibacterial soaps because they would breed super germs? Seems like that was the least of our worries. If sewage sludge continues to accumulate antibiotics, and if that sewage were processed through into fertilizer, the antibiotics could end up creating major issues in agricultural soils which depend on beneficial microbes and bacteria to break down nutrients for crops.

And that’s just the downside to antibiotics…we haven’t even gotten into the other stuff yet.

EPA, sewage sludge, sewage, fertilizer, crops, soil, water, water treatment, antibiotics, antidepressants, water supply, waste, human, agriculture, chemicals, organic farming

My thanks to the FEED newsletter from the Union of Concerned Scientists for this one.

It seems that traditional breeding methods are out-performing genetic modifications in developing drought-resistant crops. And as water becomes more and more scarce, drought-resistant crops are a big deal.

The United States Department of Agriculture has recently published some news about drought-resistant soybeans. By going back to the home of the soybean, China, for variety species that are not known in the US, and using some more exotic Chinese varieties of the staple crop, breeders have been able to cross a drought-resistant variety with a more common variety to produce soybeans that are testing well here in the US.

Using conventional breeding methods, Carter and his team develop hundreds of new breeding lines each year, for a total of more than 5,000. Five of them have stood out for further development and are now in validation trials across the South. Based on the results of these tests, the team will soon release advanced breeding lines that carry the slow-wilting trait and also show good yield potential when rainfall is plentiful.

The slow-wilting lines yield 4 to 8 bushels more than conventional varieties under drought conditions—depending on the region and environment, says Carter. For example, under drought conditions, normal soybeans yield 30 bushels per acre, but slow-wilting types yield about 35 bushels per acre. –USDA

That’s zero for genetically-modified drought-resistance, and a gazillion for traditionally-bred drought-resistance.

Ok, I have no data to back up that “gazillion” claim, but traditional breeding has been around for a long time, and there is no telling how many times it has helped develop crops that can go without water for a bit or withstand long, hot summers or even thrive in harsh conditions. If it were not for traditional breeding, well, we may not have many sub-species and varieties that we have today.

Besides, traditional breeding is the way Nature does it, so why shouldn’t we?

On another note, a NGO (non-governmental organization) is working with farmers in Africa and developed a drought-resistant variety of cassava (a staple in that part of the world and others, also known as yuca). And this variety is producing 6 to 10 times the amount of cassava that the usual seed stock is producing.

USDA, drought-resistance, genetically-modified, traditional breeding, genetics, GMO, NGO, soybeans, cassava, yuca, Africa, crops, agriculture

While I was watching NOVA last night, which was called “Ocean Animal Emergency” and truly saddening, I was struck by a small seal pup that had facial tumors growing out of its mouth. The tumors were found to be inoperable, and the poor, little Harbor seal had to be euthanized.

The moment I saw the seal’s tumors I was reminded of another creature that has become afflicted with grotesque facial tumors, the Tasmanian Devil.

Are the facial tumors afflicting the harbor seal on NOVA and Tasmanian Devil related? Could there be something more to this? What is it that is causing these odd, devastating growths? In January 2008, reports came out detailing that Tasmanian Devils have elevated levels of chemicals used as flame retardants in their blood stream. Could these chemicals be causing this kind of growth? Or are the chemicals just enabling this kind of cancer, making some animals more susceptible to disease?

The science is still out on the Tasmanian Devil, but as more than 60% of the wild population has died in the last decade since this facial cancer was first discovered, there may not be much time for scientists to figure it out.

The facial growth I saw on the harbor seal did not look quite as gruesome as that which I have seen in pictures of tasmanian devils. The harbor seal’s tumors looked more like big “toes” sticking out of its mouth. The seal didn’t look bothered by them, so it is unsure if the tumors were causing pain of any kind. I have to wonder if there is some correlation between the toxins we keep dumping in the ocean and this poor seal’s face.

NOVA explained that the seal and sea lions that are euthanized at the Marine Mammal Center are given a post-mortum examination, and blood and tissue samples are collected. I have to wonder what the MMC will find, if anything. Of course, it may simply be a birth defect, and I am worrying over nothing. But as seals are higher up on the food chain and consume other marine creatures, they could be the front line when it comes to realizing the effects of the many, many substances we allow to flow into our waters.

The MMC and other marine researchers are finding that another toxin, domoic acid, is killing sea lions and the numbers are only increasing. The domoic acid is a toxin released by the Pseudo-nitzschia algae, an algae that needs sunlight and nutrient-rich water, which are usually not the same water. However, with increasing amounts of nutrients in the form of fertilizers running into our near-shore waters, like Southern California where many sea lions are dying, algae blooms are becoming common in the spring and early summer.

seals, NOVA, pbs, ocean, animals, marine, mammal, tumors, growths, flame retardants, chemicals, toxins, cancer, tasmanian devil, water, pollution, algae, bloom, California, Marine Mammal Center, sea lions, domoic acid, Pseudo-nitzschia, harbor seal

There is nothing I find more oxymoronic than the term “political science.” More often than not, politics and science are locked in battle, with politics trumping science.

When Good Science Is Ignored

With the upcoming election, it is hard not to be thinking of politics lately, and if you have read some of my previous posts, you will notice that I tend to think in political terms often when it comes to science. For example, what can the new President and Congress do to compensate for 8 years of bad science by way of the Bush Administration? Do you remember those days, less than 2 years ago, when Bush and his “scientists” claimed that global warming was a hoax, the science was bad, it wasn’t man-made, there wasn’t a consensus among scientists on the issue, it was the fault of alarmist environmentalists, etc, etc, etc…

Seems like global warming isn’t the only crisis that is worsening due to politics trumping good science. I ran across this article recently, and despite our nation’s growing (excuse the pun) obesity problem, it seems that the food industry is trying its hardest to undermine science. And why, you ask? Money, profits, returns to shareholders, call it what you want, I call it greed.

All that processed food Americans eat come from major corporations that all form a, shall we say, club. That club then goes to Congressional leaders asking them to let them market their products, however unhealthy, to kids. And by way of thanks, those corporations have employees that give lots of money to that same Congressional leader that is letting them sell their processed, sugary, salty, so-good-but-oh-so-bad foods. If you don’t think that your favorite snack food is from a major corporation, check out the website. Look around for the parent company, usually at the bottom of the page, next to a year and a copyright symbol or trademark. Better yet, go to the corporate websites for Kraft, Nabisco, or even Kelloggs. You will see how many brands are owned by the same company. Even seemingly competing brands, like the so-called healthy brands like Snackwells and the far-from-healthy Oreos, are being marketed by the same company (in this case, Nabisco) or for another example, Hormel not only sells Hormel Chili, but also Stagg Chili. For goodness sake, look at the cola wars. Coke and Pepsi are great examples of corporate-power-gone-wrong.

I remember in high school when a soda vending machine was installed in our cafeteria. And then I read that soda machines went into elementary schools. Soda? Soda is so far-from-healthy that no one should drink it, much less little kids.

Now, don’t get me wrong, every little kid wants soda, and it is not going to kill anybody sparingly or at least in moderation, but we are seeing the effects of children and processed, sugary foods. This nation is fat and our kids are going to suffer for it. And rather than reign in the companies that are pitching their goods at little kids, the Government is putting its head in the sand.

Kind of like with global warming. Will an 8 year absence of reason be too long to rectify when saner heads prevail in our nation’s capital? Will saner heads ever prevail in Washington, or will we, as a people, reject the constant bombardment of advertising at our kids and show that rejection by passing on the high fructrose corn syrup?

science, global warming, politics, Bush, environmentalists, alarmist, scientists, greed, corporations, shareholders, Kraft, Nabisco, Kelloggs, Coke, Pepsi, Hormel, Stagg, processed food, junk food, cola, high fructrose corn syrup, advertising, kids, children

We have been looking at the danger posed by once-tropical diseases spreading into more temperate zones as the world warms. Hey, that may be a good idea for a new soap opera, As the World Warms. Just remember, you heard it her first.

First we looked at Malaria and Dengue Fever, and today’s topic is our not-so-friendly stomach flora, Cholera.

The yellow areas are local cholera outbreaks, and the black dots represent imported reported cases. I believe Alaska is only colored yellow due to it being part of the US.

Cholera is a water-borne and food-borne (as water is a major component in food production) disease that is spread by the Vibrio cholerae bacterium. According to the Centers for Disease Control (CDC), cholera has not been present in the industrialized nations in 100 years, other than the rare case of a traveler returning to a non-cholera country from a nation where cholera is common, for instance India and Sub-Saharan Africa. In fact, cholera is currently at “pandemic” status in the poorer parts of the world

The major problem with getting cholera is that the bacterium causes an intestinal infection which leads to diarrhea. The problem with diarrhea is of course dehydration. If your body er, uh, ejects too much fluid before that fluid can be replenished, you can die. Remember in high school US history classes, when you were studying any of the major wars, and it would come up that not every casualty was due to violence, but that some soldiers died from things like dysentery. Dysentery is a severe intestinal infection that also causes rather horrible diarrhea…a terrible way to die.

Cholera is easily treated, but that treatment is important to get in the first few hours if the infection is bad enough. But what is bad enough, and how do I know if I get it, you may be asking. Hopefully, you will never have to worry about cholera — at least not in the industrialized world. Effective sewer systems and water treatment processes have for the most part eliminated the presence of cholera in the US and Europe, although the bacterium can exist in these areas. Some people get cholera from eating raw seafood from the Gulf of Mexico, but the chances for that are fairly low, so I don’t want you to panic. I write about cholera because of the relationship between cholera (and other tropical diseases) and a warmer world.

Cholera is commonly associated with higher sea temperatures.

From the Environmental Protection Agency’s page on climate change:

…algal blooms could occur more frequently as temperatures warm — particularly in areas with polluted waters — in which case diseases (such as cholera) that tend to accompany algal blooms could become more frequent.

Also, warmer waters accompany rising sea levels, which could flood areas and contaminate water meant for agricultural uses and drinking water. Higher need for potable water due to increased population may also strain sewer systems and treatment plants efficacy. I promise I am not trying to scare you, but a warmer climate can change the playing field when it comes to combating pandemics like cholera.

Here is a cute little rule of thumb when choosing water and food when traveling, or when the US turns tropical.

Boil it, cook it, peel it, or forget it.

tropical disease, diseases, cholera, malaria, dengue fever, Centers for Disease Control, CDC, pandemic, dehydration, India, Africa, US, Gulf of Mexico, World Health Organization, sewer system, water treatment, water, travel, algal blooms, sea level rise, climate change, global warming

Something that has caught my attention recently is talk of meat irradiation. I guess the USDA and the FDA are close to approving disturbing new rules regarding irradiation in the beef industry and may be moving to approving the use of irradiation of produce such as spinach, as a way to combat e. coli break outs.

So let’s talk about food irradiation.

Irradiating food does not make it radioactive, as you might think would happen from the name. Irradiation is the use of nuclear materials in order to shoot some gamma rays and x-rays at your food in order to kill things in that food. That is a rather simplistic description, but that is essentially what it is.

The approved methods of irradiating food uses either a super fast stream of electrons or uses the gamma rays from Cobalt-60. You can also use Cesium-137, but it is much rarer stuff, so the Cobalt-60 is pretty much the way to do it. The electron stream method can only penetrate a few inches into whatever is being shot full of electrons, but gamma rays can penetrate a substance a lot deeper. That makes gamma rays the preferred method as you can irradiate a large crate or pallet of items at the same time.

Now, here is where the controversy begins. The radiation from Cobalt-60 is a known cancer agent, so how does shooting gamma rays of Cobalt-60 into your food affect it? The US started irradiating food about fifty years ago, and then it was just a tax-payer funded experiment for the space program and the Army. And then in 1963, irradiation was used on wheat to kill pests in the crop. The next year it was used to increase shelf-life of white potatoes (irradiation stops the aging or ripening process, effectively kind of killing the potato’s instinct to sprout eyes). Then it was used on ham, and well, around the world there are now 40 food items that are irradiated.

If you see this symbol, your food was irradiated.

Ah, I didn’t answer the question about safety. That is because the jury is still out. That is what I love about the USDA and FDA. Both have a long history of approving things before conclusive and long-term evidence of safety is supplied. Let’s test it for a year, and then see what happens when we release it out into the world…

Some studies show that irradiated meat has an off-odor, smelling of burnt sulfur. Some studies show that mice get cancer when fed irradiated produce. And speaking of produce, irradiating it breaks down the vitamin content and also can really damage the vegetables at high doses. And guess what, you kind of need high doses to really kill everything. That’s another problem with food irradiation. It’s somewhat of a false security blanket. It has not been shown to kill all bacteria, so that begs the question of why use it at all?

But then, there is another side to the killing off of bacteria issues. Your stomach and digestive system are full of beneficial bacteria that you get from eating food. Irradiation can kill just as much beneficial bacteria as it does harmful.

Just to expand on what the USDA is thinking about doing. The heads of the Department are thinking about making the move to start irradiating whole cow carcasses before processing to stymie e. coli and thus costly meat recalls. The problem some watchdogs groups have is that once the beef is further processed, the meat will not have to be labeled as irradiated.

And it begins.

USDA, FDA, meat irradiation, beef, food safety, radiation, bacteria, e. coli, spinach, cancer

Well, it is exactly that. Technically, this condition is known as “hypoxia.” Remember that the prefix hypo- means low, so it means low oxygen (FYI: You can also suffer hypoxia in your blood). Dead zones are popping up all over the world, so this is a timely opportunity to find out what creates these dead zones.

Science is publishing a new report that the number and size of these oceanic dead zones are increasing. This may be because of more extensive surveying, but many of these dead zones are being attributed to agriculture and the use of fertilizers.

So, how do fertilizers kill organisms living in the ocean? Aren’t fertilizers used on land and not the sea? Also, how do fertilizers make our crops grow, but kill fish? What gives?

The red areas signify extremely low levels of dissolved oxygen in the water.

A notable dead zone of late is the Gulf of Mexico. I actually wrote something about it for Environmental Graffiti some time last year. The problem in the Gulf is that fertilizers being used in the Midwestern states like Iowa and Illinois are leaching into water sources or just running off the acres the nitrogen-rich fertilizers are originally applied and entering the Mississippi River system. Any little creek running by a corn farm in Iowa picks up the fertilizer run-off and then that creek meets up and joins a bigger creek, and then a small river, and so on until that fertilizer enters the Mississippi River. Then that nitrogen is headed for the Gulf of Mexico.

The nitrogen does not kill plants or animals in the Gulf. In fact, quite the opposite. The nitrogen and other nutrients involved in agricultural fertilizers cause what are known as “blooms.” Algae and other microscopic organisms thrive in this newly fertilized environment. They thrive and thrive so much that it is like a bloom, when everything comes into maturity at the same time. However, the downside of that is most organisms have an expiration date, if you will, and when a enormous number of anything dies at the same time, it means that an enormous number of things are going to decompose at the same time.

Guess what diatomic element is need for decomposition? Yep, O2. Good ol’ Oxygen.

The primary agents involved in decomposition are bacteria, and bacteria require oxygen. Thuse bacterial decomposition requires oxygen, and the problem is that when all that algae dies, their little corpses require a LOT of bacteria and that bacteria requires a LOT of oxygen. So much so that the too much oxygen is being depleted from the water at too fast a rate to balance the system. And voila, no oxygen, no life.

There are other dead zones that are not being attributed to fertilizers, but instead on perhaps natural fluctuations in ocean currents. The increase in hypoxia in the world’s waters may mean that ocean currents are becoming a little whacked out. Some scientists point to global warming as a cause for this disruption in normal ocean currents.

These dead zones are popping in some of the richest fishing waters around the globe, so obviously, this is a dangerous situation. The boom in ethanol and other bio-fuels is further heightening fears about the affects of fertilizers in our oceans.

And geez, it’s not like our fishing industries aren’t hurting enough…

dead zones, hypoxia, oceans, fertilizers, global warming, Science magazine, science, marine science, Gulf of Mexico, oxygen, nitrogen, bacteria, algae, blooms, ethanol, bio-fuels, fishing