Green Options

People living in slums the world over are dependent on pit latrines as their only recourse for a bathroom. And when those pits get full, they’re usually emptied by hand, with a bucket, and the feces is often deposited in the nearest body of water, spreading disease and contamination even further. But a machine made partly from recycled car parts, the Vacutug, may help stop that process.

While the world quivers over a potential Swine Flu pandemic, a far deadlier outbreak of dengue fever has gone comparatively under-reported in South America and Australia.

Hundreds of thousands have been infected in South America, and in Australia the outbreak is being called the worst seen in 50 years. While the swine flu scare may be an overreaction in comparison, both outbreaks do highlight a clear link between environmental degradation and the spread of disease.

Several San Francisco, California hotels promoted World Water Day - March 22 in collaboration with Blue Planet Run Foundation this past weekend. The book, Blue Planet Run: The Race To Provide Safe Drinking Water To The World, was placed in luxury suites as a gift to guests staying over the weekend.

First there was the Life Straw.  Then there was the Aquaduct Tricycle.  Now ordinary sand could provide an answer to one of the thorniest problems of the future: how to purify drinking water for the many millions of people who don’t have access to a clean, disease-free source — and no means to pay for conventional water treatment.

Most people are aware of at least a few of the problems associated with factory farming.

Anyone who has ever had the unfortunate experience of even being near one will tell you the smell alone is enough to make you instantly nauseated.

Aside from that, what are some of the other hazards of raising animals this way?

Here is a interesting list I’ve compiled of various pieces of information about this vile practice, and the impact it has on us and the environment:

A Swedish inventor has unveiled a solar-powered water purifier that could provide billions of the world’s poorest people with access to clean and disease-free drinking water [video].

The device, called the Solvatten, (Swedish for ’sun water’), looks much the same as a standard jerrycan and can be filled with up to ten liters of water, opened out, and left in the sun. A simple indicator shows either a red or green face to let users know when the water is safe to drink (typically after 3-4 hours), thus avoiding the risk of contracting water-borne diseases.

Researchers plan to use satellites to predict the movements of an unusual culprit in China. Their target: a dangerous underwater snail.

Underwater snails don’t sound very menacing. But some snails carry a kind of flatworm parasite called schistosoma. The parasite causes schistosomiasis, the second most widespread tropical disease after malaria. In China’s largest freshwater lake, Poyang Lake, there are billions of these snails, each one no bigger than the tip of your pinky finger.

“There are huge signs there that tell people not to go into the lake. People know about the dangers of infection, but they have to touch the water to some extent. It’s part of their lifestyle,” said Motomu Ibaraki, the US-based leader of the research project.

With the help of satellites, scientists will be able to track which areas have water conditions favorable to the snails. By keeping tabs on the probable whereabouts of the disease-carrying snails, health officials can ramp up the battle against schistosomiasis, sometimes also called “snail fever”.

Almost a third (28%) of South Africans have not heard about global warming or climate change while over a half considered their knowledge as “hardly anything” or less.

The Human Sciences Research Council, a South African parastatal, conducts human sciences research in support of the growth and development of the country. Their 2008 South African Social Attitudes Survey (SASAS) collected information from a representative sample of over three thousand people. One of the modules of the survey explored issues such as knowledge and concern about climate change, perceived causes and impacts, where responsibility for action lies, and the level of support for interventions.

The results show that South Africans are poorly informed about climate change and its implications. They lack a full understanding of the impacts it is likely to have on their lives over the next few decades. This hints at difficulties that will be encountered as South Africa addresses climate change.

Respondents identified food security (15%), temperature (13%), disease (13%) and the standard of living (11%) as issues that would be effected by climate change. Issues with less direct impact on the individual, such as storms, floods, and loss of biodiversity, were not identified as frequently.

Climate change could make it easier for some “deadly” diseases to be transmitted from animals to humans.

Global Warming is not just about melting ice caps and rising temperatures.  Scientists continue to discover new ways in which the “butterfly effect” of global warming could transform life on Earth as we know it.  The Wildlife Conservation Society (WCS) released a report on October 7th, naming 12 deadly human-wildlife diseases that could spread into new regions as a result of climate change.

The report, entitled The Deadly Dozen: Wildlife Diseases in the Age of Climate Change, was released at the IUCN Conservation Congress being held this week in Barcelona, Spain.  The report illustrates examples of how certain disease could spread as a result of rising temperatures and precipitation levels.

“We’ve seen Lyme disease work its way up from the US into Canada, and West Nile fever as well,” said William Karesh, director of WCS’s global health programs.  “Basically what you have now are fewer frozen nights in this region, and that allows the ticks and mosquitoes that carry these diseases to survive further north.”

It is Olympics season and every video house in this farming town is full with home fans following the athletics races in Beijing that their local heroes are featuring.

Eldoret is the bread basket of Kenya’s athletics elite and famous runners, including Kipchoge Keino who made history by winning the east African country’s first gold medal in the 1500 meters run at the Mexico City Games.

But the town is also home to Hanna Jeruto, a 24 year old HIV+ mother who exclusively breastfeeds her 4 month old son, Kipruto. Kipruto, however, is HIV negative and when she was delivering at the provincial hospital doctors had advised her not to breastfeed him.

The “decider” has decided to screw each and every person with pulmonary disease with what appears to be a “who cares” attitude.  The headline above, taken from an American Lung Association news release, tells it all.  As a matter of fact, for the boomers coming on board who haven’t yet, or are just beginning to feel the effects of lung disease, you should be furious.

If this provision never becomes law, then those of you who may someday become victims of lung disease, will have to do without rehab when you reach Medicare age.

Congress overwhelmingly approved the Pulmonary and Cardiac Rehabilitation Act, which, among other things, would make life easier for Americans who suffer from lung disease.  This, you say, may not tie into environmentalism, but think again; coal smoke, smoking, second-hand smoke, pollutants in the air, all add to lung disease, and heaven knows we’ve had a century of air pollution pouring into our lungs.  It isn’t over yet.