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The original thanksgiving celebration was held by the Pilgrim settlers in Massachusetts during their second winter in America in December, 1621. The first winter had killed 44 of the original 102 colonists. At one point their daily food ration was down to five kernels of corn apiece, but then an unexpected trading vessel arrived, swapping them beaver pelts for grain, providing for their severe need. The next summer’s crop brought hope, and Governor William Bradford decreed that December 13, 1621, be set aside as a day of feasting and prayer to show the gratitude of the colonists that they were still alive. These Pilgrims, seeking religious freedom and opportunity in America, gave thanks to God for His provision for them in helping them find 20 acres of cleared land, for the fact that there were no hostile Native Americans in that area, for their newfound religious freedom, and for God’s provision of an interpreter to the Native Americans in Squanto. Along with the feasting and games involving the colonists and more than 80 Native Americans (who added to the feast by bringing wild turkeys and venison), prayers, sermons, and songs of praise were important in the celebration. Three days were spent in feasting and prayer. From that time forward, Thanksgiving has been celebrated as a day to give thanks to God for His gracious and sufficient provision. President Abraham Lincoln officially set aside the last Thursday of November, in 1863, “as a day of thanksgiving and praise to our beneficent Father.” In 1941, Congress ruled that after 1941, the fourth Thursday of November be observed as Thanksgiving Day and be a legal holiday. Scripturally, we find things related to the issue of thanksgiving nearly from cover to cover. Individuals offered up sacrifices out of gratitude in the book of Genesis. The Israelites sang a song of thanksgiving as they were delivered from Pharaoh’s army after the crossing of the Red Sea (Exodus 15). Later, the Mosaic Law set aside three times each year when the Israelites were to gather together. All three of these times [Unleavened Bread (also called the Feast of the Passover) (Exodus 12:15-20), Harvest or Pentecost (Leviticus 23:15-21), and the Feast of Ingathering or Tabernacles (Leviticus 23:33-36)] involved remembering God’s provision and grace. Harvest and Tabernacles took place specifically in relation to God’s provision in the harvest of various fruit trees and crops. The book of Psalms is packed full of songs of thanksgiving, both for God’s grace to the Israelite people as a whole through His mighty deeds, as well as for His individual graces to each of us. In the New Testament, there are repeated admonitions to give thanks to God. Thanksgiving is to always be a part of our prayers. Some of the most remembered passages on the giving of thanks are the following: "Rejoice always, pray without ceasing, in everything give thanks; for this is the will of God in Christ Jesus for you" (1 Thessalonians 5:16-18, NKJV). "Be anxious for nothing, but in everything by prayer and supplication, with thanksgiving, let your requests be made known to God" (Philippians 4:6, NKJV). "Therefore I exhort first of all that supplications, prayers, intercessions, and giving of thanks be made for all men" (1 Timothy 2:1, NKJV). Of all of God’s gifts, the greatest one He has given is the gift of His Son, Jesus Christ. On the cross of Calvary, Jesus paid our sin debt, so a holy and just Judge could forgive us our sins and give us eternal life as a free gift. This gift is available to those who will call on Christ to save them from their sin in simple but sincere faith (John 3:16; Romans 3:19-26; Romans 6:23; Romans 10:13; Ephesians 2:8-10). For this gift of His Son, the gift which meets our greatest need, the apostle Paul says, "Thanks be to God for his indescribable gift!" (2 Corinthians 9:15). We, like the Pilgrims, have a choice. In life there will always be those things that we can complain about (the Pilgrims had lost many loved ones), but there will also be much to be thankful for. As our society becomes increasingly secular, the actual “giving of thanks to God” during our annual Thanksgiving holiday is being overlooked, leaving only the feasting. May God grant that He may find us grateful every day for all of His gifts, spiritual and material. God is good, and every good gift comes from Him (James 1:17). For those who know Christ, God also works everything together for good, even events we would not necessarily consider good (Romans 8:28-30). May He find us to be His grateful children.

http://www.gotquestions.org/thanksgiving-Christian.html

Religion

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When we closely examine history’s most impactful leaders, we often find common traits like boldness, eloquence, and creativity. But what about those characteristics that aren’t necessarily as celebrated? Indeed, a more detailed appraisal reveals a darker side to the pinnacle of leadership attained by so few. Let’s take a look at these unforgettable leaders who have not only gone to battle to create their idea of a perfect polity, but also went to battle with themselves, internally waging war with mental illness: Abraham Lincoln, the 16th President of the United States, suffered from episodes of depression throughout his life (described by one friend as bouts of profound melancholy). In one instance, he was rumored to have been found wandering the woods with a shotgun following the death of a close friend.Wikimedia Commons Joseph Stalin was the leader of the USSR from the 1920s to 1953. He ruled through terror, murdering millions of his own citizens. If he had been evaluated by today’s mental health standards, he very likely would have been diagnosed with narcissistic personality disorder, paranoid personality disorder, and manic depression.Wikimedia Commons Martin Luther King, Jr. It's hard to find a more passionate and expressive leader than Martin Luther King, Jr. Still, King suffered through dark days. The civil rights leader experienced severe depressive episodes well into adulthood following two reported suicide attempts as an adolescent. Even after his rise to prominence as a human rights activist, his staff urged him to seek psychiatric treatment, which he refused.Wikimedia Commons Diana, Princess of Wales Diana, Princess of Wales earned a world-renowned reputation for her compassion for others and charity work. In the midst of international admiration, the princess also suffered from severe depression and bulimia.Wikimedia Commons Maria I of Portugal Queen Maria I of Portugal ruled from 1777 to 1816. Although history remembers her as an excellent ruler, she also became known as Maria the Mad as it grew clear that she suffered from religious mania and melancholia. She was declared mentally insane in 1792 and her second son took over the leadership of the kingdom until her death.Wikimedia Commons Nero, Roman Emperor Nero, the Roman emperor from 54 to 68 AD, had Christians burned, executed his own mother and brother and ordered his subjects to revere him as a god. He suffered from narcissism and histrionic personality disorder. Wikimedia Commons Winston Churchill, Prime Minister of the UK from 1940 to 1945 and again from 1951 to 1955, struggled bipolar disorder, characterized by a tendency toward depression that he referred to as his "black dog." Wikimedia Commons Commodus, Roman Emperor Commodus, Roman ruler from 180 to 192, suffered from narcissistic and histrionic personality disorders. He renamed Rome and various streets after himself because he believed he was the reincarnation of Hercules. A savage ruler, he had a servant burned to death for making his bath too cold. Wikimedia Commons Lawton Chiles, Former Governor of Florida Lawton Chiles — Floridian senator from 1971 to 1989 and governor from 1991 to 1998 — won the gubernatorial election even after the public was made aware of his use of Prozac to treat clinical depression.Wikimedia Commons John Curtin, 14th Prime Minister of Australia John Curtin, 14th Prime Minister of Australia from 1941 to 1945, led Australia through the period when the nation squared off with Japan immediately before the onset of World War II. Revered widely, Curtin also suffered from bipolar disorder.Wikimedia Commons Academics studying his personality believe that Adolf Hitler suffered from borderline personality disorder and narcissistic personality disorder.Wikimedia Commons Next, discover the history of mental illness through the ages. Then, check out five horrifying historical "cures" for mental illness.

https://allthatsinteresting.com/mental-illness-leaders

Politics

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How to increase lung capacity for sports The lungs can operate more effectively with the help of some activities. When a person's lung capacity is restricted, this can lessen shortness of breath. The body requires the balance of oxygen and carbon dioxide, which would be made possible by the lungs. The lungs may function less effectively due to factors like aging, smoking, pollution, and other issues. Asthma and chronic obstructive (COPD) are two conditions that can limit lung function. It may not be possible for someone to alter how so much oxygen their lungs can store. Therefore, breathing exercises can help lessen breathlessness brought on by weakened lung capacity. This article examines three activities that can lessen breathlessness in persons with respiratory infections or persistent lung lip breathing benefits The movement of air into and out of the lungs can be made easier by pursed-lip breathing, which can assist keep the airways open for To breathe with pursed lips: - Straighten up in your seat to encourage lung movement. - Breathe in slowly and deliberately through your nose. - Lips must be pursed and nearly touching as if creating a "kissing" face. - Preferably, the exhale should last twice as long as the inhalation. Breathe out through pursed lips. Sometimes people find it particularly helpful to concentrate on the passing of time, for instance by inhaling for 5 seconds and exhaling for 10 seconds. A clock that displays the seconds should be kept close by. Pursed lip breathing may be especially beneficial for those who are not very physically active and may not regularly exercise their This lung expansion and lung-contraction speed-up workout from the American Lung Association helps. The diaphragm muscle, which enables one to inhale deeply, is targeted specifically by belly breathing. Performing the exercise: - Put your hand or another thin item on your stomach. - Gently inhale through your nose, paying attention to how high your stomach rises. - Exhale through your mouth. - Inhale via your nose, attempting to raise your stomach higher than it did with your previous breath. - Try to make each expiration twice as long as each inhalation as you breathe out. - Roll the shoulder blades and forth occasionally while moving - To make sure that the exercise is not causing upper-body tension, turn your head side to side. Practice belly breathing and pursed-lip breathing for 5–10 minutes each day to improve lung function. Interval training may have been a better option than continuous exercise if you experience dyspnea or shortness of breath when With interval training, you alternate between brief bursts of harder and easier exercise. One could, for instance, attempt walking quickly for one minute and then even more slowly for the following two minutes. According to this, a person may do bicep curls or lunges for one minute, followed by two to three minutes of easy walking. The lungs can rest after an interval workout before being put to the test again. This is a good idea to take a little break whenever an activity makes you feel out of breath. Practice breathing through pursed lips until the shortness of breath passes. for preserving lungs healthier Exercises can assist a person in making the most of their lungs, but they cannot undo lung disease. There really are additional techniques to maintain and enhance lung health, including: - Staying away from tobacco - Consuming a lot of water - Maintaining an active lifestyle A person should be seeing a doctor if they have signs of poor lung health, such as fatigue during normal activities, pain while breathing, or a persistent cough. The better the prognosis is expected to be the sooner a person receives treatment for any lung issues. breathing exercises work for the lungs? Breathing exercises help the lungs work more effectively, just as aerobic exercises can assist the heart's health. People with This condition and asthma should do breathing exercises because they assist maintain lung strength, according to pulmonologists, and lung specialists. To increase strength and maintain the exercises if one becomes out of breath, one should perform these exercises when someone feels that their lungs are in good condition. Exercises that involve deep breathing might help improve lung capacity. For instance, according to the British Lung Foundation, deep breathing following pneumonia can start clearing mucus from the lungs, allowing more air to circulate. To do this exercise, take five to ten deep breaths, followed by a few hard coughs, and then repeat. Breathlessness caused by a respiratory ailment can be controlled with the aid of additional exercises, including pursed-lip breathing. The National Institute for Health and Care Excellence states that this may alleviate COVID-19-related shortness of breath. Unfortunately, no studies have yet examined how breathing exercises affect COVID-19 patients' lung capacity. There really is currently no proof that they are a secure or reliable method of treating the signs of this new ailment. In general, it is wise to see a doctor before beginning any new breathing technique. People with minor respiratory symptoms might benefit from breathing exercises, but those with serious symptoms may need oxygen therapy or a mechanical ventilator. Anyone who is concerned about their respiratory problems ought to consult a doctor. Improved lung function can be achieved by lung exercises like belly breathing and pursed-lip breathing. Whenever beginning any new workout, including a breathing exercise, it is wise to consult a doctor. This really is especially true for those who have underlying medical conditions like COPD. To make sure the patient gets the best results, the doctor could offer advice. Was This Article Of Any Use To You? True or False Post a Comment

https://www.healthlifekit.com/2022/07/how-to-increase-lung-capacity-for.html

Health

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Solar energy is a radiant light and heat that is gotten from the sun. It is a renewable energy and also an inexhaustible form of energy and can be converted into different forms of energy for use. Did you know? The measure of sunlight that strikes the earth’s surface in 1 hour 30 minutes is large enough to cater for the energy consumption needs of the world for 1 full year. What is Solar Energy? Solar energy as earlier stated is energy gotten from the sun. The sun is an extremely inexhaustible and powerful energy source. Solar energy is by far the most cleanest energy source available to the world today. These radiations from the sun can be harvested by some solar technologies which would in turn convert them into other useful forms of power for easier consumption. So you can finance solar and start using solar energy. Read- Power inverters in Nigeria and where to buy them. How Does Solar Energy Works Solar energy technologies usually convert sunlight into electrical energy for usage. It is converted mainly by either photovoltaic (PV) panels or through mirrors that concentrate solar radiation. This energy converted can be used to generate electricity for personal or commercial consumption or be stored in solar batteries or thermal storage. In summary, it is achieved by: - The sunlight activates the panels on the rooftop. That is a rack-and-panel solar system - The cells now produce electrical current which is a wafer and silicon ingot. - Thirdly, the electrical energy is converted. - The electricity now powers your home, offices, hospitals and streets. - A net meter like charge controller now measures the usage. Solar Energy Facts The pure fact about Solar energy is that it is the radiant light and heat directly from the Sunlight that is harnessed using a range of technologies. The technologies used are photovoltaic to solar power to generate electricity, solar thermal energy, and solar architecture. These are various methods deployed to harness solar energy into electricity for human consumption. Read- Green steel making. 3 Ways of Harnessing Solar Energy Solar energy can be harvested and converted into electrical and thermal energy using the following technologies: - Conversation to thermal energy - Solar Architecture 1. The use of photovoltaics The photovoltaic system was first discovered by Alexandre-Edmond Becquerel in 1839. Becquerel was a French physicist. The process of generating electricity from solar radiation is called the photovoltaic effect. The use of solar panels is a good practical example of the use of photovoltaics. Solar panels usually involve a photovoltaic array and contain a collection of hundreds of solar cells. When these solar cells absorb sunlight, it loosens electrons which are then directed in one path into an electric current thereby producing electricity. Read- Point Source Carbon Capture 2. Conversion to thermal energy Energy from the sun can be harvested and then converted to heat as solar thermal energy either for direct or indirect use. The application of solar thermal energy has a broader application. Asides from large electricity generation, it makes use of flat plate collectors to generate thermal energy. Flat plate collectors are one of the devices used to capture solar radiation. These flat plate collectors can be made up of mirrors or blackened metal plates covered with one or two sheets of glass to reflect and direct the sunlight to the receiver which would collect the solar energy and convert it to heat. The heat can either be used directly or stored for later use. Flat plate collectors are mostly used to make water heaters and have an efficiency range of about 20-80%. This range value is reliant on the design of the collector. 3. Solar architecture Solar architecture is an architectural style that considers the sun to harvest clean and renewable solar energy. It makes use of the photovoltaic system for electricity conversion as well as passive solar energy techniques for thermal conversion. Throughout the day, solar energy forms a part of convection as it warms objects on the earth’s surface. This is a passive solar energy technique most homes take advantage of as they use this passive solar energy to effectively regulate heat in their homes at zero costs. This is why a building’s thermal mass is always taken into consideration as the thermal mass is what is mostly heated during the period of sunlight. During the night, the thermal mass would then release the heat it gathered during the day. It is efficiently regulated with the help of effective ventilation systems. 4 Advantages and 3 Disadvantages of Solar Energy Advantages | Disadvantages | It is a renewable energy source so you would never have to bother about running out of sunlight. | The cost of equipment required to harvest this solar energy is quite expensive for home/business owners to afford at a go. | Solar energy is a clean form of energy. It doesn’t release pollution that can affect the greenhouse balance while in use. | The solar panel technology is also heavy and sometimes might require you to reroof the building before it can be installed. | Solar energy can be used in any area but is better suited for regions with higher sunlight and low cloud covers. | Some determining factors like climate and weather conditions are out of our control and this has a relationship to how efficient the solar technologies will be. | Solar energy helps you cut costs of electric bills especially if you are a high energy consumer. | – | 8 Solar Energy Uses Solar energy is used for a whole a lot but the common ones are: - It is used for solar water heaters - Providing power source for electric devices in the home, hospitals, schools and offices - For house heating. - For cooking by using solar gadgets - It is used to power ventilation Fans - Used to power pumps - Used for house heating - Solar energy is used in charging batteries. Solar Energy Examples The common 5 examples of Solar Energy are: - Solar Water Heating - Solar Technology - Solar Cells - Solar Lighting - Rooftop Solar. Is the use of Photovoltaic Solar Panels more cost-friendly? With the increasing developments in the solar panel industry, most homeowners have taken to solar panel installation to take advantage of solar energy. When sunlight hits the panels, they generate direct current ( DC ) which is then converted to alternating current ( AC ) by an inverter before it is supplied to any building. This conversion is necessary as most home appliances function with only alternating currents. You also have the option of staying on-grid i.e. you would still be connected to your utility grid and supply the excess energy generated by your solar panel to the grid. In turn, you would be granted credits on your electricity bill. You could decide to go entirely off-grid and make use of solar batteries to store excess electricity generated from your panel. Either way, this is a good way to save yourself the cost of paying electricity bills as well as dealing with the incessant hikes. The solar market has grown over the last decade and is still growing with over 22 million homes having switched to using solar energy. The use of solar panels is the best way for individual property owners to take advantage of this source of renewable energy. - Solar energy is a source of renewable energy - Solar energy can be converted to electrical or thermal energy - Solar panels make use of photovoltaic effects.

https://solarshoot.com/solar-energy/

Business

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What is your body lacking when you get boils? An oil gland or hair follicle is where a boil develops, which is a skin illness. Infected skin initially becomes red in that location, and a sensitive lump forms. As pus gathers beneath the skin, the lump begins to turn white within four to seven days: Boils most frequently develop on the face, neck, armpits, shoulders, or buttocks. Sty is the term used when one develops on the eyelid. It's a carbuncle, a more dangerous infection if numerous boils appear together. A germ is usually to blame for boils (staphylococcal bacteria). This germ can enter the bloodstream through minute skin tears or cuts or by moving along the hair shaft to the follicle. Skin infections are more likely to occur as a result of the following health issues: - The immune system's issues - Inadequate nutrition - Bad hygiene - exposure to abrasive substances that cause skin irritation symptoms of boils A boil typically begins as a painful, firm, and red lump that is about half an inch in size. The lump softens, grows, and is more painful during the following few days. On top of the boil, a pus pocket soon forms. These symptoms of a serious illness include: - Infected skin forms around the boil. It becomes bloated, uncomfortable, heated, and red. - The primary boil may be surrounded by other boils. - A fever could appear. - Swollen lymph nodes are possible. Get Medical Attention - You begin to feel feverish. - Your lymph nodes are engorged. - The area around the boil becomes crimson or develops red streaks. - The discomfort gets worse. - Nothing drains from the boil. - There is a second boil. You get a boil if you use immune-lowering medications (such as corticosteroids or chemotherapy), have diabetes, a heart murmur, and any other immune system issue. Typically, boils do not require urgent medical intervention. However, you should visit the emergency room of a hospital if you are in bad condition and experience high fever and chills in addition to the illness. With a physical examination, your doctor can determine the diagnosis. This skin infection could affect various body areas, thus you might see references to other body parts in several of the questions or tests. for Boils: Natural Remedies - Use a warm compress and heat water to a boil. In addition to bringing the pus to the surface, this will lessen the pain. When the boil reaches its peak, repeated soaks will cause it to rupture. Around 10 days of its onset, this frequently happens. By soaking a washcloth in warm water and wringing off the extra moisture, you can create a warm compress. - Only when the boil begins to drain, clean it with rubbing alcohol after washing it with an antibacterial soap until enough pus is gone. Apply a bandage and a medicinal ointment (topical antibiotic). Till the wound heals, keep washing the infected area two to three times daily and using warm compresses. - Should not use a needle to puncture the boil. This can exacerbate the infection. Extra blood tests will be done if there are questions about how serious the illness is. In the case of a severe infection, the doctor might recommend antibiotics. If indeed the boil is removed, a culture may well be performed to identify the kind of bacteria inflicting the infection and evaluate whether the right medication was administered. is the next step. Again until the wound is healed, you must clean the infected region twice to three times per day, regardless of whether the boil is lanced by a physician or is drained at home. After bathing, slather on an antibiotic ointment and bandage. Call your doctor if the area becomes red or appears to be re-infected. to avoid Boils By adhering to these recommendations, you can prevent boils: - Make sure to clean a family member's clothes, bedding, and towels. - who has boils on their bodies? - Cleanse and take care of small skin wounds. - Take care of your personal hygiene. - Be as healthy as you can. The majority of boils will go away with easy home remedies. Post a Comment

https://www.healthlifekit.com/2022/07/how-to-get-rid-of-boil-overnight.html

Health

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The phenomenon of hearing voices inside the head, which others cannot, can be categorized as a common form of auditory hallucination. Hallucination is the perception or sensation of voices that can be heard by a person when they are awake and gives the feeling of being real. These are nothing but illusions created by the brain. People with auditory hallucinations tend to hear sounds they are familiar with and sometimes also hear unusual noises. The sound or voice a person hears may be frightening or pleasant. Types of voices heard The types of voices heard can vary depending on the severity of the psychiatric condition in a person. They may include: Voice of someone calling their name when no one is around them. Hearing mild voices when falling asleep. Constant occurrence of hearing voices inside the head. The feel of hearing voices outside, but soon recognize it as that heard from inside the ears. Thoughts of hearing other persons’ thoughts or feelings as if other people might hear your thoughts. Scary voices that command you to attempt dangerous things or to control your behavior. Friendly voices that direct you to do inappropriate things. Hearing voices that are supportive and helpful. Hearing two or more voices arguing or fighting inside the head. It is important to recognize that not all voices are negative or as a result of mental disorder. Hearing voices is much more common than many people realize, and sometimes they have positive effects. Whilst negative voices that are affecting a person’s well-being can require treatment, this is not always the case for positive voices and some people can live with them. Causes of voices Many significant factors can cause hearing voices. The major factors that contribute to this condition are stress, anxiety, depression, and traumatic experiences. In some cases, there might be environmental and genetic factors that cause such hearing of voices. The brain of the patient generates the voices and sounds, and they tend to hear both sounds simultaneously. The condition becomes severe when the patient fails to understand that they are hearing their voice. In recent studies, researchers have analyzed the occurrence of auditory hallucinations in the human brain. The basic form of hearing is processed in the temporal lobe of the brain. This part of the brain is found inside the ears. The research concluded that a particular region of the left temporal lobe is more active in auditory hallucination compared to non-hallucinating people. Several possible causes may cause people to hear voices, including: Traumatic incidents – Hearing voices might be the result of a traumatic incident that occurred in the early life of the patient while hearing one or more voices might be a result of his experiencing a disassociate disorder. Assault or Abuse – When a person is abused or assaulted, the voice or images of the abuser come in flashes. Sleeplessness – Lack of sleep might also cause hearing voices, though this is not experienced in daily life. Result of Drugs – People may hear voices as a side effect of some medication or drugs. For some people, these voices can be heard when they are being relieved from certain medical courses. Death of a loved one – This can occur when a person loses someone very close to their heart. Unable to tolerate their loss, they hallucinate about the dead person calling or speaking to them. Voices in sleep – These voices can occur before or after sleep, as the mind is dreaming. These voices vanish when fully awake. Auditory hallucination is a condition that presents as a symptom for people suffering from schizophrenia. Schizophrenia is a severe chronic mental disorder and can affect a person’s feelings, thoughts, and behaviors. Schizophrenia sufferers are reported to lose touch with their real lives. Although it is not as common as other mental disorders, the symptoms can be very debilitating for those who are affected. People with schizophrenia tend to feel things that are not present and hear voices that do not exist. The affected person often believes that his thoughts can be read and controlled by others. This kind of strange occurrence can make patients feel upset, or make the real world seem scary to them. The behavior of people with schizophrenia might be threatening or cause harm to the people around them in some cases. Affected individuals usually think and communicate strange thoughts and ideas making it difficult for other people to continue a conversation. They can sit idly for hours without making any movements. In schizophrenia, the voices the people hear may be internal or external. Internal voices are those that a person hears inside his mind, while external voices project as if another person is before them and is talking to them. Sometimes the sufferers talk back to the voices to stop it from recurring. However, this often makes the voices stronger and increases the frequency of occurrence of hearing voices. There is a theory that auditory hallucinations in schizophrenia are a result of the dopamine hypothesis, changes to the levels of the dopamine and serotonin neurotransmitters which some argue is the biological basis of schizophrenia. People with schizophrenia often find it difficult to go to work or care for themselves and depend on others for their daily living needs.

https://tashbaanherbs.art.blog/2023/11/06/the-pros-and-cons-of-learning-to-what-causes-hearing-voices-in-your-head/

Health

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Ebola virus disease (EVD or Ebola) is a rare but severe illness in humans. It is often fatal. People get infected with Ebola by touching: - infected animals when preparing, cooking or eating them - body fluids of an infected person such as saliva, urine, faeces or semen - things that have the body fluids of an infected person like clothes or sheets. Ebola enters the body through cuts in the skin or when touching one’s eyes, nose or mouth. Early symptoms include fever, fatigue and headache. Some types of Ebola can be prevented with vaccines and treated with medicines. Ebola first appeared in 1976 in 2 simultaneous outbreaks, one in what is now Nzara, South Sudan, and the other in Yambuku, Democratic Republic of the Congo. The latter occurred in a village near the Ebola River, from which the disease takes its name. The virus family Filoviridae includes 3 genera: Cuevavirus, Marburgvirus, and Ebolavirus. Within the genus Ebolavirus, 6 species have been identified: Zaire, Bundibugyo, Sudan, Taï Forest, Reston and Bombali. It is thought that fruit bats of the Pteropodidae family are natural Ebola virus hosts. Ebola is introduced into the human population through close contact with the blood, secretions, organs or other bodily fluids of infected animals such as fruit bats, chimpanzees, gorillas, monkeys, forest antelope or porcupines found ill or dead or in the rainforest. Ebola then spreads through human-to-human transmission via direct contact (through broken skin or mucous membranes) with: - blood or body fluids of a person who is sick with or has died from Ebola; and - objects that have been contaminated with body fluids (like blood, feces, vomit) from a person sick with Ebola or the body of a person who died from Ebola. Health-care workers have frequently been infected while treating patients with suspected or confirmed Ebola. This occurs through close contact with patients when infection control precautions are not strictly practiced. Burial ceremonies that involve direct contact with the body of the deceased can also contribute to the transmission of Ebola. People remain infectious as long as their blood contains the virus. After recovery, there is the possibility of sexual transmission, which can be reduced with support and information for survivors. Pregnant women who get acute Ebola and recover from the disease may still carry the virus in breastmilk, or in pregnancy related fluids and tissues. The symptoms of Ebola infection can be sudden and include fever, fatigue, muscle pain, headache and sore throat. These are followed by vomiting, diarrhoea, rash, and internal and external bleeding. The time from when someone gets infected to having symptoms is usually from 2 to 21 days. A person with Ebola can only spread the disease once they have symptoms. People can spread Ebola for as long as their body contains the virus, even after they have died. After recovering from Ebola, some people may have symptoms for two years or longer. These symptoms can include: - feeling tired - muscle and joint pain - eye pain and vision problems - weight gain - belly pain and loss of appetite - hair loss and skin problems - trouble sleeping - memory loss - hearing loss - depression and anxiety. People should speak to a health-care professional if they have: - symptoms and have been in an area known to have Ebola, or - been in contact with someone who may have had Ebola. It can be difficult to clinically distinguish Ebola virus disease from other infectious diseases such as malaria, typhoid fever and meningitis. Many symptoms of pregnancy and Ebola disease are also quite similar. Because of risks to the pregnancy and themselves, pregnant women should ideally be tested rapidly if Ebola is suspected. Confirmation that symptoms are caused by Ebola virus infection are made using the following diagnostic methods: - antibody-capture enzyme-linked immunosorbent assay (ELISA) - antigen-capture detection tests - serum neutralization test - reverse transcriptase polymerase chain reaction (RT-PCR) assay - electron microscopy - virus isolation by cell culture. Diagnostic tests evaluated through the WHO emergency use assessment and listing process can be seen here. People with symptoms of Ebola should get medical care immediately. Early care improves a person's chances of surviving Ebola. Treatment includes oral or intravenous fluids and medicines provided in the hospital. It is not safe to care for people with Ebola at home, because the person may make other people sick. At home, they will not receive the same level of care they can get from professionals. There is an effective vaccine for the Zaire type of Ebola, which is mostly found in Guinea and the Democratic Republic of the Congo. It is treated with antibodies. These antibody medicines are given intravenously and increase the chances of survival. Research is ongoing to find vaccines and treatments for other types of Ebola. For all types of Ebola, supportive treatments save lives and include the following: - oral or intravenous fluids - blood transfusions - medicines for other infections the person may have, such as malaria - medicines for pain, nausea, vomiting and diarrhoea. WHO has guidance that outlines the optimized supportive care Ebola patients should receive, from the relevant tests to administer, to managing pain, nutrition and co-infections (such as malaria), and other approaches that put the patient on the best path to recovery. In the 2018–2020 Ebola outbreak in the Democratic Republic of the Congo, the first-ever multi-drug randomized control trial was conducted to evaluate the effectiveness and safety of drugs used in the treatment of Ebola patients. WHO has living guidance on the recommended treatments and approaches. Prevention and control People can protect themselves from getting Ebola by: - washing hands - avoiding touching the body fluids of people who have, or may have, Ebola - not touching the bodies of people who have died from Ebola - getting the Ebola vaccine if they are at risk for the Zaire type of Ebola. The Ervebo vaccine has been shown to be effective in protecting people from the species Zaire ebolavirus and is recommended by the Strategic Advisory Group of Experts on Immunization as part of a broader set of Ebola outbreak response tools. Good outbreak control relies on applying a package of interventions, including case management, surveillance and contact tracing, a good laboratory service, safe burials and social mobilisation. Community engagement is key to successfully controlling outbreaks. Raising awareness of risk factors for Ebola infection and protective measures (including vaccination) that individuals can take is an effective way to reduce human transmission. Risk reduction messaging should focus on several factors: - reducing the risk of wildlife-to-human transmission - reducing the risk of human-to-human transmission - outbreak containment measures, including safe and dignified burial of the dead - reducing the risk of possible sexual transmission - reducing the risk of transmission from pregnancy related fluids and tissue. Health-care workers should always take standard precautions when caring for patients, regardless of their presumed diagnosis. These include basic hand hygiene, respiratory hygiene, use of personal protective equipment (to block splashes or other contact with infected materials), safe injection practices and safe burial practices. Health-care workers caring for patients with suspected or confirmed Ebola virus should apply extra infection control measures to prevent contact with the patient’s blood and body fluids and contaminated surfaces or materials such as clothing and bedding. Laboratory workers are also at risk. Samples taken from humans and animals for investigation of Ebola infection should be handled by trained staff and processed in suitably equipped laboratories. WHO has developed detailed advice on Ebola infection prevention and control: WHO works with countries to prevent Ebola outbreaks by maintaining surveillance for Ebola virus disease and supporting at-risk countries to develop preparedness plans. This document provides overall guidance for control of Ebola and Marburg virus outbreaks: When an outbreak is detected, WHO responds by supporting community engagement, disease detection, contact tracing, vaccination, case management, laboratory services, infection control, logistics, and training and assistance with safe and dignified burial practices. WHO has a range of advice and guidance for managing Ebola outbreaks: - Clinical management - Disease outbreaks - Health product policy and standards - vaccine standardization - Medical devices for Ebola outbreak - Sexual and Reproductive Health and Research (SRH) and Ebola

http://www.who.int/mediacentre/factsheets/fs103/en/

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An enormous lake that has lain buried under Antarctic ice for millions of years is home to a new kind of bacterial life, Russian scientists claim. The researchers found evidence for the unidentified organism in water samples brought up from Lake Vostok, the largest subglacial lake on the Antarctic continent. The Russian team found seven samples of the mystery species in water that had frozen on a drill head used to reach the lake that lies beneath an ice sheet more than two miles (3.5km) thick. The scientists extracted strands of DNA from the organism, but said the genetic code was never more than an 86% match with any of the species listed in global databanks. Sergey Bulat, a researcher on the team at the Petersburg Nuclear Physics Institute, said that anything less than a 90% match usually indicated that the organism was unknown. "We call it unidentified and 'unclassified' life," Bulat told the state news agency, RIA Novosti. "If it were found on Mars, people would call it Martian DNA. But this is DNA from Earth," he added. The Russian team broke through to the lake under the East Antarctic Ice Sheet last year. When the ice cover was pierced, water burst up through the borehole. The huge body of water stretches for 150 miles and is 30 miles wide in places. Several expeditions have set out to look for life in Antarctica's subglacial lakes. The organisms are likely to be different from well-known life because they have evolved in isolation, under intense pressure, and with no sunlight, for millions of years. "It's rather tantalising," said David Pearce, a microbiologist at the British Antarctic Survey. "We can't read too much into it yet, but I would be surprised and disappointed if they had not found anything. This whets the appetite for what is to come." The Russian team said it planned more tests, but needed more specimens of the bugs. Those might be among water samples collected from the lake earlier this year, which are being carried by ship back to the Russian mainland. The scientists ultimately hope to grow the bacteria so they can study their size, shape and physiology, and confirm whether or not the bugs are new to science. In January this year, a US team broke through 800 metres of Antarctic ice to reach Lake Whillans, another subglacial lake. Water samples brought up from the lake also contained microbial life. On Christmas Day last year, a British team aborted an expedition to drill through almost two miles of ice to Lake Ellsworth in Antarctica after failing to link two boreholes to recirculate drilling water back to the surface.

http://m.guardian.co.uk/world/2013/mar/08/scientists-bacterial-life-antarctic-lake

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Slavery’s last stronghold Mauritania’s endless sea of sand dunes hides an open secret: An estimated 10% to 20% of the population lives in slavery. But as one woman’s journey shows, the first step toward freedom is realizing you’re enslaved. In 1981, Mauritania became the last country in the world to abolish slavery. Activists are arrested for fighting the practice. The government denies it exists. “On this land, everybody is exploited.” The vast Saharan nation didn't make slavery a crime until 2007. Only one slave owner has been successfully prosecuted. Mauritania by the numbers - Population: 3.4 million - Percentage living in slavery: 10% to 20% - Enslaved population: 340,000 to 680,000 - Year slavery was abolished: 1981 - Year slavery became a crime: 2007 - Convictions against slave owners: One - Area: 400,000 square miles, slightly larger than Egypt - Capital: Nouakchott - Bordered by: Mali, Senegal, Algeria, Western Sahara - Landscape: Sahara Desert, Sahel - Farmable land: 0.2% - Languages: Arabic, French and regional languages - Official religion: Islam - Literacy rate: 51% - Unemployment: 30% - Population density: 8 people per square mile - Percentage living on less than $2 per day: 44% - GDP (purchasing power parity): $7.2 billion, less than Haiti - GDP per capita: $2,200 (compared to $48,000 in the U.S.) - Currency: Ouguiya - Government: Republic (currently under military rule) - Legal system: Mix of Islamic and French civil law - President: Mohamed Ould Abdel Aziz - Recent history: Gained independence from France in 1960. Aziz came to power in a military coup in 2008, overthrowing first democratically elected leader. Aziz was elected in 2009 as a way to validate his rule. Sources: United Nations, Encyclopedia Britannica, CIA World Factbook, International Monetary Fund, World Bank, "Disposable People," BBC Country Profiles Nouakchott, Mauritania (CNN) Moulkheir Mint Yarba returned from a day of tending her master’s goats out on the Sahara Desert to find something unimaginable: Her baby girl, barely old enough to crawl, had been left outdoors to die. The usually stoic mother — whose jet-black eyes and cardboard hands carry decades of sadness — wept when she saw her child’s lifeless face, eyes open and covered in ants, resting in the orange sands of the Mauritanian desert. The master who raped Moulkheir to produce the child wanted to punish his slave. He told her she would work faster without the child on her back. Trying to pull herself together, Moulkheir asked if she could take a break to give her daughter a proper burial. Her master’s reply: Get back to work. “Her soul is a dog’s soul,” she recalls him saying. Later that day, at the cemetery, “We dug a shallow grave and buried her in her clothes, without washing her or giving her burial rites.” “I only had my tears to console me,” she would later tell anti-slavery activists, according to a written testimony. “I cried a lot for my daughter and for the situation I was in. Instead of understanding, they ordered me to shut up. Otherwise, they would make things worse for me — so bad that I wouldn’t be able to endure it.” Moulkheir told her story to CNN in December, when a reporter and videographer visited Mauritania — a vast, bone-dry nation on the western fringe of the Sahara — to document slavery in the place where the practice is arguably more common, more readily accepted and more intractable than anywhere else on Earth. An estimated 10% to 20% of Mauritania’s 3.4 million people are enslaved — in “real slavery,” according to the United Nations’ special rapporteur on contemporary forms of slavery, Gulnara Shahinian. If that’s not unbelievable enough, consider that Mauritania was the last country in the world to abolish slavery. That happened in 1981, nearly 120 years after Abraham Lincoln issued the Emancipation Proclamation in the United States. It wasn’t until five years ago, in 2007, that Mauritania passed a law that criminalized the act of owning another person. So far, only one case has been successfully prosecuted. The country is slavery’s last stronghold. Even knowing those facts before we departed, what we found on the ground in West Africa astonished us. Mauritania feels stuck in time in ways both quaint and sinister. It’s a place where camels and goats roam the streets alongside dented French sedans; where silky sand dunes give the land the look of a meringue pie topping; where desert winds play with the cloaks of nomadic herdsmen, making their silhouettes look like dancing flames on the horizon; and where, incredibly, the nuances of a person’s skin color and family history determine whether he or she will be free or enslaved. That reality permeates every aspect of Mauritanian life — from the dark-skinned boys who serve mint-flavored tea at restaurants to the clothes people wear. A man wearing a powder-blue garment that billows at the arms and has fancy gold embroidery on the chest is almost certainly free and comes from the traditional slave-owning class of White Moors, who are lighter-skinned Arabs. A woman in a loud tie-dye print that covers her hair, but not her arms, is likely a slave. Her arms are exposed, against custom, so she can work. It’s a maddening, complicated place — one made all the more difficult for outsiders to understand because no one is allowed to talk about slavery. When we confronted the country’s minister of rural development about slavery’s existence, Brahim Ould M’Bareck Ould Med El Moctar told us his country is among the freest in the world. “All people are free in Mauritania and this phenomenon (of slavery) no longer exists,” he said. The issue is so sensitive here that we had to conduct most of our interviews in secret, often in the middle of the night and in covert locations. The only other option was to do them in the presence of a government minder, who was assigned to our group by the Ministry of Communications to ensure we didn’t mention the topic. Our official reason for entering the country was to report on the science of locust swarms; our contacts for that story were unaware of our plan to research slavery. If we were caught talking with an escaped slave like Moulkheir, we could have been arrested or thrown out of the country without our notebooks and footage. That point was made clear to us in a meeting with the national director of audiovisual communications, Mohamed Yahya Ould Haye, who told us journalists who attempted to report on such topics were jailed or ejected from the country. More important, getting caught talking about slavery could have put our sources at risk. Anti-slavery activists say they have been arrested and tortured for their work. When we met Moulkheir in a gray, open-air office in Nouakchott, Mauritania’s seaside capital city where concrete buildings are scattered on the Sahara like Legos in a sandbox, our hired security guard stood watch at the door to make sure no government representatives were following us, as they had during other parts of our visit. Moulkheir, who is in her 40s, wore a bright blue headscarf and matching dress. She was brave enough to tell her tale with poise and unflinching resolve. She did so in hopes her former masters would be brought to justice. She was aware that telling her story could put her in danger but asked to be named and to have her photograph shown. “I am not afraid of anyone,” she said. As she recounted her torture, imprisonment and escape, her hands gestured wildly but her eyes stayed focused, with dart-like precision, on mine. Listening to her story, two facts became painfully clear: In Mauritania, the shackles of slavery are mental as well as physical. And breaking them — an unthinkably long process — requires unlikely allies. DOCUMENTARY: The long path to freedom Moulkheir was born a slave in the northern deserts of Mauritania, where the sand dunes are pocked with thorny acacia trees. As a child, she talked more frequently with camels than people, spending days at a time in the Sahara, tending to her master’s herd. She rose before dawn and toiled into the night, pounding millet to make food, milking livestock, cleaning and doing laundry. She never was paid for her work. “I was like an animal living with animals,” she said. Slave masters in Mauritania exercise full ownership over their slaves. They can send them away at will, and it’s common for a master to give away a young slave as a wedding present. This practice tears families apart; Moulkheir never knew her mother and barely knew her father. Most slave families in Mauritania consist of dark-skinned people whose ancestors were captured by lighter-skinned Arab Berbers centuries ago. Slaves typically are not bought and sold — only given as gifts, and bound for life. Their offspring automatically become slaves, too. All of Moulkheir’s children were born into slavery. And all were the result of rape by her master. The attacks began when she had barely begun to cover her head with a scarf, a Muslim tradition that begins at puberty. The master took Moulkheir out to the goat fields near his home and raped her in front of the animals. Moulkheir had no choice but to endure this torture. She’d convinced herself that her master knew what was best for her — that this was the way it had always been, would always be. She couldn’t see beyond her small, enslaved world. To document slavery in Mauritania, we traveled out of Nouakchott and into the Sahara, where the desert landscape is so expansive it’s claustrophobic. We drove for hours without seeing a single person or dwelling, save for the military checkpoints where men in black turbans — only slivers of their faces showing — stop every vehicle, demanding to know what its occupants are doing in the desert. “I was like an animal living with animals.” — Moulkheir Mint Yarba, escaped slave The scenery is a highlight reel of emptiness: dusty plains, thorny shrubs and sand dunes flying past our Land Cruiser’s windows at 75 mph. It looks as if an enormous syringe has been jabbed into the ground to suck out all the color — except for yellows and browns. The farther into the desert one goes, the more it seems possible that the outside world simply doesn’t exist — that memory is playing a trick. That this is all there is. It’s in this isolated environment that slavery has been able to thrive. Occasionally, a village pops into view. In most of these, we saw the same scene: dark-skinned people working as servants. They live in tents made of rags, some so shabby that their bark-stripped stick frames look like carcasses left to rot in the sun. It’s impossible, from the road, to know for sure which of these men and women are enslaved and which are paid for their work. Many exist somewhere on the continuum between slavery and freedom. Some are beaten; some aren’t. Some are held captive under the threat of violence. Others are like Moulkheir once was — chained by more complicated methods, tricked into believing that their darker skin makes them less worthy, that it’s their place to serve light-skinned masters. Some have escaped and live in fear they’ll be found and returned to the families that own them; some return voluntarily, unable to survive without assistance. Because slavery is so common in Mauritania, the experience of being a slave there is quite varied, said Kevin Bales, president of the group Free the Slaves. “We’re talking about hundreds of thousands of people,” he said when asked about how slaves are usually treated in Mauritania. “The answer is all of the above.” In a strange twist, some masters who no longer need a slave’s help send the servants away to slave-only villages in the countryside. They check on them only occasionally or employ informants who make sure the slaves tend to the land and don’t leave it. Fences that surround these circular villages are often made of long twigs, stuck vertically into the ground so that they look like the horns of enormous bulls submerged in the sand. Nothing ties these skeletal posts together. Nothing stops people from running. But they rarely do. Life in Mauritania To understand Moulkheir’s path to freedom, we sought out the two unlikely allies who helped liberate her in 2010: a slave and a slave master. Boubacar Messaoud and Abdel Nasser Ould Ethmane grew up in radically different worlds. Each would take an amazing journey of his own to end up fighting for the freedom of Moulkheir and others like her. We met Abdel, an olive-skinned man with a marathon-runner’s figure and a Caesar-style haircut, in his family’s apartment in Nouakchott, well past dark, while our government minders were asleep. Abdel’s oversized blue robe, a sign of nobility, crinkled like crepe paper as he tucked the flowing garment behind his knees and sat down on an embroidered green sofa. He offered us camel’s milk and asked if he could smoke before curling into the couch like a Cheshire cat and beginning his story. It’s the tale of how a slave owner becomes an abolitionist. Abdel is 47. He was 7 when he selected a boy with skin the color of coal to be his personal slave for life. The young slave owner made the choice at his circumcision ceremony; he could have picked anything as a gift for this rite of passage into adulthood: a goat, candy, money. But Abdel wanted the dark-skinned boy. Ethnic groups in Mauritania Lighter-skinned Berber people who speak Arabic and have traditionally owned slaves. Most men wear light blue shirts called boubous, which have ornate designs on the chest. White Moors are the power class in Mauritania and control more wealth than any other group. Some, however, live in poverty. It's not uncommon to find a White Moor living in a tent only slightly larger than that of his or her slaves. Darker-skinned people who historically have been enslaved by the White Moors. Originally from sub-Saharan Africa, the Black Moors have taken on many aspects of the Arab culture of their masters. They speak Hassaniya, an Arabic dialect. Mauritania‘s other darker-skinned people come from several ethnic groups, including the Pulaar, Soninke and Wolof. These groups also are found in Senegal, which shares Mauritania‘s southern border. They look similar to Black Moors, but never were enslaved and are quite different in terms of culture and language. The word literally means "freed slaves," but it can be used to describe people who are in slavery or who belong to the former slave class of Black Moors. Many Haratine people exist somewhere on the spectrum between slavery and freedom and are the target of class- and race-based discrimination. “It was as if I were picking out a toy,” Abdel said of choosing his slave. “For me, it was as if he were a thing — a thing that pleased me. This idea came to me because there were all these stories about him which made me laugh — that he talked in his sleep, that he was a bit chubby and a bit clumsy, that he was always losing the animals he was supposed to be watching over and was then always getting punished for this. “So for me, he was an interesting and comic figure. It’s normal that I chose him.” Abdel was careful to say his family never beat his slave, Yebawa Ould Keihel. Family members did, however, force him to tend their herds of goats and camels, out in the deserts of central Mauritania, without pay. At the time, Abdel told us, he didn’t feel guilty. In fact, he and the other children in their nomadic group, which followed water from one anonymous area of the Sahara to the next, openly taunted the slaves who served them. When it rained on the Tagant plateau, slaves like Yebawa had to hold up the edges of the master-family’s tent to prevent water from leaking in, he told us. Abdel recalls hearing the slaves’ teeth chattering through the cold desert nights — and mocking this “teeth music” with his slave-owning friends. “Here they were standing up, protecting us, and we were completely unconscious (and) ignorant,” Abdel said. “This was actually quite innocent because, for us, slavery was really a natural state. One must really have in mind that when one is born into a certain environment, it is considered the right one — just and fair.” Abdel could have gone on thinking that way if it weren’t for a teacher who sent him to a library where books transported him to other worlds — places where slavery had long been abolished. Abdel’s parents wanted him to go to school in Nouakchott, 300 miles to the west of the sandy plateau where they raised goats and camels. He was assigned a tutor, an eccentric European man with chunky glasses and an Afro, as Abdel recalls. The man required Abdel, at about 12, to go to Nouakchott’s French Cultural Center every day to do extra reading. Hesitant at first, Abdel soon dove into every book he could find. He started with French comic books like “Asterix.” It wasn’t long before he was picking up volumes about the French Revolution. In a book on the subject of human rights, pulled from the library’s shelves almost at random, Abdel found the idea that would alter his life forever: Men are born and remain free and equal in rights. Abdel read the line again and again. “I started to ask myself if lies were coming out of this book,” he told us, “or if they were rather coming out of my very own culture.” Once this seed — a question that would undo his entire world — had been planted in his mind, he couldn’t stop it from growing. By 16, he returned to his family’s nomadic settlement in the desert to tell his slaves that they were free. He was shocked by their response. They did not want to be free, he recalled. Or they didn’t know what freedom was. His mother told him to stop being silly — that the slaves needed the family to take care of them and that this was the natural order of the world, the way it always would be. But Abdel was becoming ever more set in his belief that slavery was wrong — that the rights of his slave, Yebawa, were no different from his own. In his early 20s, Abdel organized a community of young activists, most of them light-skinned like him, who began to debate the merits of the slavery they’d grown up with and had, in fact, perpetuated. They sat on sand dunes late at night — in secret, for fear they would be found out by the government, which officially abolished slavery in 1981 but allowed it to continue. There, they discussed ways to end the practice that was so ingrained in their culture. It was through these conversations that Abdel met Boubacar Messaoud. The men came together on a rooftop in 1995, under a midnight sky of desert stars. In muffled voices, they plotted the founding of the abolitionist organization called SOS Slaves. It’s one of the few groups fighting slavery in Mauritania today. And it would liberate Moulkheir. Boubacar still lives in the concrete compound that served as the meeting place for that first rooftop discussion about SOS Slaves. The night we interviewed him, we walked a circuitous route to his house, turning down sandy alleys and doubling back to check for followers. We slipped through the metal door that serves as the compound’s entry around midnight, with only a sliver of the moon hanging in a charcoal sky. We found Boubacar, an imposing figure with strong shoulders, ebony skin and a snowy goatee, reclining in his living room. Why slavery still exists in 2012 Why has slavery continued in Mauritania long after it was abolished elsewhere? There are many factors that contribute to the complex situation. Here are a few: Mauritania's government has done little to combat slavery and in interviews with CNN denied that the practice exists. "All people are free in Mauritania and this phenomenon (of slavery) no longer exists," one official said. Mauritania is a huge and largely empty country in the Sahara Desert. This makes it difficult to enforce any laws, including those against slavery. A branch of al Qaeda has found it an attractive hiding place, and the country's vastness also means that rural and nomadic slave owners are largely hidden from view. Forty-four percent of Mauritanians live on less than $2 per day. Slave owners and their slaves are often extremely poor, uneducated and illiterate. This makes seeking a life outside slavery extremely difficult or impossible. On the other hand, poverty has also led to some slave masters setting their slaves free, because they can no longer afford to keep them. Local Islamic leaders, called imams, historically have spoken in favor of slavery. Activists say the practice continues in some mosques, particularly in rural areas. Various religions in many countries have been used to justify the continuation of slavery. "They make people believe that going to paradise depends on their submission," one Mauritanian activist, Boubacar Messaoud, said of how religious leaders handle slavery. Slavery in Mauritania is not entirely based on race, but lighter-skinned people historically have owned people with darker skin, and racism in the country is rampant, according to local analysts. Mauritanians live by a rigid caste system, with the slave class at the bottom. Perhaps most surprising, many slaves in Mauritania don't understand that they are enslaved; they have been brainwashed, activists say, to believe it is their place in the world to work as slaves, without pay, and without rights to their children. Others fear they would lose social status if they were to run away from a master who is seen as wealthy. Slaves of noble families attain a certain level of status by association. An evening breeze sailed through the open windows as he told us about his life as the son of slaves in southern Mauritania, near the country’s border with Senegal. Even though the master had granted his family limited freedom before Boubacar was born, he still grew up working in the man’s field, he said, and the master took a cut of the crops they produced each year. This may not have been literal slavery, but it wasn’t substantially different. “In that period, I could still feel that I was a slave,” Boubacar told us, “that I was different from other children.” One important distinction: He could not go to school. The master would not allow it, and his parents weren’t going to take up the issue. This is something Boubacar never understood. So at 7, the same age Abdel selected his slave, Boubacar went to the local school even though he wasn’t allowed to be there. An administrator saw him standing on the steps of the schoolhouse crying and, out of empathy, Boubacar told us, allowed him to attend. Education would change Boubacar’s life, just as it had changed Abdel’s. Once he started reading about life outside his tiny world, he grew dedicated to the idea that all people — including those in his family — should be free. Years later, he would find an instant ally in Abdel, the former slave master. This collaboration — between two men from opposite ends of Mauritania’s rigid caste system — would become the inherent power of SOS Slaves. “If we fail to convince a maximum number of whites and a maximum number of blacks” that slavery is wrong, Boubacar told us, “then slavery will not go away.” Together, they developed a method for fighting slavery in Mauritania. Step one was to interview escaped slaves and publicize their stories. The thinking: If a person knows slavery exists, how could they not want to fight it? Step two was to help slaves gain their freedom. This was trickier, Boubacar told us, because a slave like Moulkheir — the woman whose child was left outside to die — must decide she wants to be free before SOS can do anything to help. Scholars find many similarities between modern Mauritanian slavery and that in the United States before the Civil War of the 1800s. But one fundamental difference is this: Slaves in this African nation usually are not held by physical restraints. “Chains are for the slave who has just become a slave, who has . . . just been brought across the Atlantic,” Boubacar said. “But the multigeneration slave, the slave descending from many generations, he is a slave even in his own head. And he is totally submissive. He is ready to sacrifice himself, even, for his master. And, unfortunately, it’s this type of slavery that we have today” — the slavery “American plantation owners dreamed of.” For a slave to be free, she first must break the shackles in her mind. The first time activists tried to rescue Moulkheir, she refused to go. She’d never known life outside of the desert. The thought of the city scared her and she feared violent retribution by masters who had already been so abusive. “She was unwilling to talk to us — with anyone, for that matter,” said Boubacar, the SOS Slaves co-founder. “She was with her masters and that was that.” This was 2007, shortly before Mauritania passed a law criminalizing slavery. After that law went into effect, the government embarked on a campaign to prove slavery did not exist, Boubacar said. A public official in Adrar, the region where Moulkheir lived, tried to deny the presence of slavery in his province. An SOS Slaves representative in that region said otherwise: We know of a slave named Moulkheir, he told officials. She is very badly treated. We tried to rescue her but she would not come with us. She needs help. To ensure that Moulkheir’s story of slavery would not be made public, Boubacar and Moulkheir said, government officials staged a fake rescue. They arrived in a police car and took the woman and her five children away from the master who had enslaved all of them since birth. The master cooperated, Moulkheir said. To her surprise and confusion, he gave her six goats and a loincloth to take with her. She’d never had a possession before. “I realized later that this was all in order to conceal my true condition of slavery,” she told anti-slavery activists, according to a written transcript of the interview. Her taste of freedom would be brief, like an ethereal mirage on the horizon. Soon, Moulkheir and her children were given to a former colonel in the Mauritanian army, SOS Slaves says. He was supposed to employ them. What he did, Moulkheir says, is re-enslave them. “He turned out to be worse” than the original master, Moulkheir told us. “He beat me and slept with my daughters. He would fire above their heads with a gun” to scare them. Soon, the abuse — directed not just at her, but at her young children — would be more than Moulkheir could stand. Slave villages, and life in limbo The fact that Moulkheir can talk about the abuses she suffered is, in itself, a victory. For many slaves, the idea of being owned by another person and treated as a piece of livestock is normal — and has been for centuries. Against the government’s wishes, a small number of reporters and activists have visited Mauritania to try to document this phenomenon, which is unique in the modern world. In the 1990s, Kevin Bales, the American anti-slavery activist, posed as a zoologist to obtain permission to enter the country, which is required of most outsiders. He found a system of slavery that echoes that of Old Testament times. “Its closeness to old slavery makes the situation in Mauritania highly resistant to change. Because it never went away or reappeared in a new form, this slavery has a deep cultural acceptance,” he wrote in the book “Disposable People: New Slavery in the Global Economy.” “Many people in Mauritania see it as a natural and normal part of life, not as an aberration or even a real problem; instead, it is the right and ancient order of things.” Our first journey out of Nouakchott took us north, where purple mountains dip in and out of the desert like a dragon crawling through the sand. We would visit a center for locust research located in that part of the country. The true goal, of course, was to find people who were currently enslaved. A government minder was assigned to shadow us, which would make it difficult to talk with slaves at length. We drove in a small convoy, our SUV behind the government’s white 4x4 truck. In a remote stretch of the Inchiri region, rectangular tents made of bright-colored rags caught our eyes. We waited for the government’s vehicle to shrink on the horizon ahead, then slammed on the brakes and pulled over to talk to a group of villagers living by the side of the road. Before the government officials noticed, we were able to speak with slaves and slave masters. They talked about their situation as if nothing were wrong. Fatimetou, a dark-skinned woman who covered her hair with a purple-and-green fabric that would look at home at a Grateful Dead concert, told us her family doesn’t own anything and can’t leave the village. “On this land, everybody is exploited,” said another dark-skinned man, speaking through a translator. We ducked into the shade of a tent to muffle the sound of our potentially dangerous conversation. Within eyeshot was another tent camp, slightly larger. There, we met a man who appeared to be Fatimetou’s master. Mohammed, an older man with a toothy smile and slightly lighter skin, told us in a nonchalant manner that he holds workers on the compound without compensation. “We don’t pay them,” he said through a translator. “They are part of the land.” Four sets of eyes peeked through the sheets of the slave master’s tent while we talked. They disappeared before our minder returned to shut down the interview and warn us against stopping in the desert without seeking his consent. We asked a few questions about locusts as he approached to try to keep up our cover, but sensed he was getting angrier. We apologized halfheartedly and moved on, wishing we’d had more time to talk with people who see slavery as a normal part of life. After the tour of the north, we turned our sights south to the Brakna region, where the terrain is the color of Mars. Our mission was to visit the villages inhabited entirely by slaves and former slaves, places called adwaba. These villages, more than anywhere else, represent the limbo that many slaves find themselves in. Neither free nor shackled, the residents of adwaba villages are owned and beholden to masters who live elsewhere, according to abolitionists. The slaves’ owners come to town for harvest, to reap the bounty of the workers they do not pay. It’s as if these slaves are bound to their masters by a long leash — one that’s elastic but can’t be broken. At the first slave village, we tried the same trick to ditch our minders — stopping unexpectedly and then rushing to do interviews before they could make a U-turn and come back. At the base of a picturesque sand dune, where goats nibbled on bits of shrubs, we found Mahmoud, a dark-skinned 28-year-old man wearing a purple striped shirt and a black turban. Kids clamored at our ankles as Mahmoud gave us a hurried tour of his village. It’s unclear who owns the land here, but in many adwaba villages like this one, all profits are said to go back to the “tribe.” (According to local slavery experts, one light-skinned family usually manages the tribe of black slaves). Food shortages in Mahmoud’s village are so dire that children stave off hunger pangs by eating sand. We saw one barefoot boy scooping the gritty earth into his mouth with a bright green piece of plastic. Such conditions are yet another reason some Mauritanian slaves actually prefer to stay in the homes of their masters: If they leave, it’s difficult to survive. Couple all of this with masters — and some local religious leaders, according to activists — who tell slaves and the general population that their natural place in society is serving their masters, and you have a recipe for slavery that persists in 2012. “If a slave becomes free, others will judge him as evil,” Boubacar had told us. “The society he belongs to does not accept, nor forgive, him for being free.” Moulkheir’s oldest child, Selek’ha Mint Hamane, has skin the color of milky coffee — a visual reminder that she was born of her black mother’s rape by her first, light-skinned master. Slavery's history in Mauritania Circa 200 to 1900s Arab slave traders in the region that would become Mauritania capture darker-skinned people from sub-Saharan Africa and force them to work without pay. "You can trace this back for 2,000 years," said Kevin Bales, CEO of Free the Slaves. The colonial French administration declares an end to slavery in Mauritania. The abolition never takes hold, however, in part because of the vastness of the country. The United Nations adopts The Universal Declaration of Human Rights, which abolishes slavery internationally. After gaining independence from France the year before, Mauritania adopts a new constitution abolishing slavery. The effort has little impact, according to written accounts. 1980 - 1981 Mauritania's government abolishes slavery and declares that it no longer exists. This abolition was "essentially a public-relations exercise," says Human Rights Watch. "True, the government abolished slavery," writes Bales, the American anti-slavery activist, "but no one bothered to tell the slaves about it." A former slave and a former slave owner start an anti-slavery organization called SOS Slaves. Mauritania passes a law criminalizing slavery. It allows for a maximum prison sentence of 10 years. To date, only one legal case against a slave owner has been successfully prosecuted. Sources: Encyclopedia Britannica; Human Rights Watch; UN.org; Lonely Planet; "Disposable People: New slavery in the global economy"; Library of Congress; BBC Cruelty would drip from one generation to the next. Selek’ha’s beatings by the new master, the former colonel, started by age 13. The rapes came soon after. He would enter her room in the middle of the night, she said, waking her suddenly by smacking her face with an electrical cord or hitting her back with a stick. In spite of this treatment, Selek’ha still considered this light-skinned man to be a benevolent relative. He forced her to do chores all day long and beat and raped her in the middle of the night. He also made sure she was fed in a country where many die of hunger. “When I was with them, I thought they were family,” Selek’ha told us in an interview held in the middle of the night, so as not to draw attention. “But when they began to beat me and they did not beat their other sons and daughters, I realized something was wrong.” One incident forever changed her psyche and led Selek’ha and her mother, Moulkheir, to plot their escape: In 2009, when Selek’ha was 15 or 16, her master raped and impregnated her. From the moment she realized she was pregnant, Selek’ha was terrified of the day the child would be born. The master would be furious, she knew. That child’s birthday would never come. In Selek’ha’s ninth month of pregnancy, her master put her in the back of a pickup truck and drove her down a bumpy rural road at high speeds, jostling Selek’ha and her unborn child like laundry in a washing machine. Selek’ha’s baby died on that ride — just as the master planned. “There are no bad things they did not do to me,” she said. “He killed my baby.” Just as another master had killed her mother’s. Moulkheir felt a new pain, unlike anything she’d experienced before. She wanted out. Look closely at the desert of Mauritania and you’ll see that winds carry ghosts of sand along the surface of the ground, slowly pushing massive dunes across the Sahara. Freedom, too, is a transformative force here, but barely visible. During our travels, we met people who never knew freedom existed; people who claimed they were not slaves but whose environments suggested otherwise; people who dreamed about freedom but were too scared to escape; people who had seen friends die trying. Late at night, we spoke with Yebawa Ould Keihel, the slave Abdel selected at his circumcision ceremony decades ago. We met Yebawa in our hotel room, shades drawn — again, with a security guard keeping watch in the lobby in case someone had followed him. Yebawa has skin that evokes an African sky at midnight. He wore a thick white scarf and a blue cloak that gave him the air of a judge. Abdel, the SOS co-founder, said he freed Yebawa decades ago. He is in his early 40s now works as a servant for Abdel’s family, and others, for pay. But when we asked Yebawa about the moment he was freed, he was confused by the idea. It seemed as though he’d never considered it before. “No one ever told me I was free. I don't know what that would be like,” he said through our local translator, who, after the interview, expressed shock to have heard those words come out of the mouth of a person today, even in Mauritania. “I guess it would be something like what I am doing now, getting paid for work.” Abdel would later tell us he considers Yebawa’s plight to be one of his greatest failures. He has dedicated his life to working against slavery in Mauritania. But the very man he enslaved and then liberated hasn’t been able to capitalize upon his freedom — or, it seems, doesn’t understand it. “It is a catastrophe,” Abdel told us. “He’s my slave — he’d say nothing different even today. So, with Yebawa, I failed. I had success with others, but not with Yebawa.” We asked if there was a chance Yebawa’s life still could change. “No, it is too late,” he said. “Since he was little he’s been with animals, watching the herds, until now. The only difference is that now he gets a salary. . . . A person like Yebawa — if he gets paid a salary — he can’t count to see if he was paid right or not.” Boubacar, the other SOS founder, later would tell us that when masters grant freedom to their slaves, in a perverse way they are actually serving to further enslave them. “Freedom is not granted,” he said. “When freedom is granted by the master you remain dependent, grateful.” Freedom is something that must be claimed. From slave to free — and in-between News that Moulkheir had changed her mind — that she now wanted out of slavery — traveled from her master’s compound to the office of SOS Slaves in Nouakchott. Moulkheir’s brother alerted SOS Slaves to her situation. His sister had not been set free, he told Boubacar, the SOS co-founder. She had been recaptured and now was being treated even worse. If they went back to rescue her, he said, Moulkheir would be willing to leave. Boubacar agreed to help. This, after all, is why he and Abdel had founded SOS Slaves: to liberate people like Moulkheir, who had decided that they wanted to claim their freedom. To escape, however, she would have to leave her children behind. While the second master was out of town, an SOS representative in that region of the desert went to the compound where Moulkheir had been held for nearly three years and drove her to freedom. Later, she would go back to confront her master and demand custody of her children. He gave her four of the five. He kept Selek’ha. “No one ever told me I was free. I don't know what that would be like.” — Yebawa Ould Keihel, a slave freed by his master Moulkheir had one foot in the free world. The other remained firmly planted in the northern deserts of Mauritania, where her daughter was still enslaved. SOS could facilitate Selek’ha’s escape. But first they would have to convince her that she needed to go. SOS arranged a phone call between mother and daughter. Moulkheir told her daughter that she had to stand up for her freedom. When the master went away to a nearby village, SOS sent a team to rescue Selek’ha. Reunited in the city, mother and daughter are now focused on prosecuting the two slave owners who worked them all their lives without pay. “I demand justice — justice for my daughter that they killed, and justice for all the time they spent beating and abusing me,” Moulkheir told us, her eyes more serious than ever. “I want justice for all the work I did for them. I hold them all responsible.” Her odds of success in court are not good. Activists have tried to bring dozens of cases to trial since 2007, when the law criminalizing slavery was passed. Only one has been successful. In January 2011, Oumoulmoumnine Mint Bakar Vall was sentenced to six months in prison for enslaving two young girls, according to news reports. Yet the victory was seen as bittersweet: Anti-slavery activists were arrested and sentenced to 6 months in prison for bringing the case to the attention of the government, according to the human rights group Anti-Slavery International. In other instances, activists have gone on hunger strikes to try to force prosecutions. So far, no judge has taken up Moulkheir’s case. Moulkheir and Selek’ha, now 18, live together in a one-room shack on the outskirts of Nouakchott. The dwelling has a corrugated metal roof and no furniture. They sleep on the floor with sheets and, on winter nights, the warmth of their family. It’s a simple existence, but one that is peaceful and, most importantly, dictated by what the mother and daughter want to do with their time, not what someone else demands. Asked what she likes best about freedom, Moulkheir said: “I can make tea when I want. I can sleep. In the past, I could not sleep. I was like a donkey — just working.” Two or three times a week, the two attend a school for escaped slaves and their children. It’s a new project of SOS Slaves, located in a neighborhood where goats walk the dusty streets and men ride rickety wooden donkey carts, smacking the animals with switches to keep them moving down the alleys. We visited the center quickly, for only 20 minutes, because we didn’t want to be seen in a place that would give away our cover. To avoid being followed, we arrived in one car and left in another. From the outside, the school is eerily silent and still. But the anonymous facade gives way to a warm interior. The walls are painted a Caribbean turquoise and floors are speckled with red, yellow and blue chips of tile, the kind that might be found in a Tex-Mex restaurant in the United States. Women’s voices echo in an interior courtyard. The chatter of sewing machines is contained within the school’s concrete walls — a secret to the outside world. Here, former slaves and their children learn skills that will help them in their new lives, post-slavery. In one room, Mariem, 21, braids the hair of a mannequin that’s wearing oversized, Bono-style sunglasses. Someday, she says, she’d like to open her own hair salon. In another room, a dozen women sit on the ground tie-dying bright-colored garments. Moulkheir is with them, weaving white threads into a dress. Alioune Ould Bekaye, director of the recently opened center, says education is the only way former slaves can make a life for themselves as freed people. “It’s another way to liberate them,” he said. So far, 30 women have enrolled at the center, he said, with funding coming from SOS Slaves and the European Union. Much more is needed to meet the country’s demand for training of former slaves. Only one other such center exists, also in Nouakchott. There’s no help for slaves in rural areas, and many thousands of former slaves live on the fringes of the capital city in abject poverty. Slaves who don’t receive training are at more risk of being re-enslaved. Selek’ha says the center is changing her life. During our afternoon visit, while the Saharan sun beat down on the city outside, she sat in the shade at a sewing machine, stitching pink thread into khaki material — the start of a pair of trousers she was making from a pattern. “I want to know how to sew, and then I want to get my own sewing machine,” she told us. “Eventually, I want to open a shop.” Sometimes she wakes up in the middle of the night thinking of the master who beat her, raped her and killed her unborn baby. None of those thoughts come to her when she’s moving her hands across the fabric — creating something new. Photos: School for escaped slaves On our final evening in Mauritania, we met one last time with Moulkheir and Selek’ha, in a private residence with the exterior lights turned off. As we took the women through yet another conversation about their lives under the hand of the masters who beat and raped them, Moulkheir grew visibly uncomfortable. She covered her mouth with green fabric and put sunglasses over her eyes — a pair with fake rhinestones on the frames. “I can’t talk about this anymore,” she said. Her daughter urged her to continue. Speaking out might help their case against the masters, she said, because outsiders will then know what is happening here, largely hidden from view and in silence. But Moulkheir wouldn’t budge. I asked them one final question: What did their master look like? I wanted to be able to describe to readers the face that had haunted them over the years and caused them so much pain. “It's a destitute country. It needs a few friends in the world.” — Kevin Bales, Free the Slaves “He was light-skinned with a beard and glasses,” Selek’ha said. There was a pause. Then our translator spoke, giving words to the elephant in the room: “He looked like you.” I know it’s irrational, but in that moment I felt responsible for everything that had happened to Moulkheir and Selek’ha — and to their children who died. Who was I to ask them to unearth the horrors from their past? What could people outside this troubled country do to end a practice that’s thousands of years old and so ingrained in the national psyche? As we wrapped up the interview, I thought back to something Moulkheir had told us earlier in the week. I’d asked what she would say to people in the U.S., many of whom aren’t aware that slavery still exists in Mauritania — or who might feel helpless after learning about it. Her reply was simple: “I would ask them to help us to change our country.” It’s a question that keeps me up at night. Activists say the international community has done relatively little to pressure Mauritania to address slavery. “The French government and American government have had a lot of opportunities to help Mauritania step up and deal with this — and have pretty much squandered those opportunities,” says Kevin Bales, of Free the Slaves. People tend to focus on topics like child trafficking and sex slavery, says Sarah Mathewson, Africa program coordinator at Anti-Slavery International, rather than the old-world slavery in Mauritania. The U.S. ambassador to Mauritania, Jo Ellen Powell, called slavery in the country "completely unacceptable and abhorrent" and said America is pressuring Mauritania to change. The nation should invest in the education of its children rather than "keeping them sweeping floors somewhere or herding goats," she said. "Human capital development is something that's very important to the Mauritanians and I hope that they get that connection." For a few weeks after returning home, I tried to block the most troubling images from my mind: haunting villages where kids eat sand; a slave owner who smiled while he told us about the free labor he gets from people with darker skin; and, most of all, the piercing eyes of a woman whose master left her infant in the sand to die. Mauritania is a place of agonizing beauty, one that’s hard not to love and curse. Its people have lived with unfulfilled potential and broken promises for decades, since the country first tried to abolish slavery in 1905. But that could change, several activists told us, if Mauritania knew the rest of the world was watching. The United Nations has proposed a number of changes the Mauritanian government could make to quicken the end of slavery. Among them: Pay lawyers to represent victims; allow international monitors into the country to conduct a full survey of slavery; and fund centers like the one SOS runs to rehabilitate slaves who have claimed their freedom. It would help if a global public demanded these changes. “It’s a destitute country,” says Kevin Bales. “It needs a few friends in the world.” Perhaps then women like Moulkheir and Selek’ha could find justice. And Boubacar and Abdel could get their wish. We asked the SOS founders how they will know when their fight against slavery in Mauritania is over — how they’ll know they have won. Both men had the same answer: When a former slave becomes president. "Help us to change our country" - When freedom is 4,000 miles away - Slave master becomes an abolitionist - UN: There is hope for Mauritania - Official: Slavery does not exist here - Ambassador: Slavery is ‘abhorrent’ - EU: End slavery ‘not only in law but in practice’ - Mauritanian refugees find new home in Ohio - How to help end slavery in Mauritania - iReport: Send a message of hope - Gallery: A place where slavery is the norm How This story was reported CNN's John D. Sutter and Edythe McNamee traveled to Mauritania for eight days in December 2011 to witness slavery first-hand. Scenes of Moulkheir Mint Yarba's escape from slavery are reconstructed based on interviews with those involved, written and video testimonies given to abolitionists at the time of her escape and legal documents provided by SOS Slaves. CNN could not confront the men who allegedly enslaved Moulkheir. Their names have been omitted for this reason. Most interviews were conducted through a local translator, who spoke English, French and Hassaniya, a dialect of Arabic. The translator, who did not want his name used for security reasons, also conducted followup interviews on CNN's behalf. Design & development by Bryan Perry, Brian Duckett, Judith Siegel, Kyle Ellis, Nick Lusk, Thurston Allen & Ken Uzquiano

http://edition.cnn.com/interactive/2012/03/world/mauritania.slaverys.last.stronghold/index.html?hpt=hp_c1

Religion

en

credit to [email protected] Not all nations are created equal, a country that has abundant natural resources does not need to import as many raw materials, and has opportunity to increase its economic strength through income gained from resources export. These materials are the primary factors of production and the availability of particular natural resources gives that country a comparative advantage in trade. Those who have few, little or no resource, will need to import everything for their industries. They must compete with international bidders to secure stable supplies of resources, which basically means their industrial cost of production would also be higher. They are totally vulnerable to global commodities prices and any disruption to the supplies would bring their industries to halt. They must begin from zero as there is no natural endowment they can sell to others. Despite that though, there are currently 8 economies in the world who thrived under such environment (very limited or no resource), nature does not bless them much on lands, but gave them human brains instead, which they utilize to the fullest and become some of the world's most successful nations. Let us now recap countries who don't have much resources by its own, but still managed to contribute at least $200 billion worth of exports to the world; 1. Japan Exports: $787 billion Period of massive industrialization: Japanese post-war economic miracle (1950s - 1990s) A mountainous, volcanic island country, Japan has inadequate natural resources to support its growing economy and large population, hence dependent on imported raw materials. The country however, built up a very diversified, varieties of advanced industries that are among the world's most successful. Japan's major exports include automobiles, consumer electronics, computers, semiconductors, copper, iron and steel. Secondary key industries include petrochemicals, pharmaceuticals, bio-industry, shipbuilding, aerospace, textiles, and processed foods. The Japanese economy however, has stagnated, and was overtaken by China in 2010. It is now the world's 3rd largest economy. 2. South Korea Exports: $552 billion Period of massive industrialization: Miracle on the Han river (1960s - 1990s) Having very little natural resources (most of the mineral deposits in Korean peninsular is ironically located in North Korea), South Korea has always suffered from overpopulation and its industries highly dependent on foreign-imported materials. But South Korea, in the most famous example given by World Bank, went from an African standard nation (in par with Ghana) in the 1960s to one of the world's leading industrial powerhouse today. Major exports of South Korea include semiconductors, wireless telecommunications equipment, automotive, computers, steel, ships, petrochemicals, high tech electronics and information displays. The South Korean economy is still expanding and is one of the best performer among developed nations. South Korea is currently the 15th largest economy in the world. 3. Italy Exports: $525 billion Period of massive industrialization: Italian economic miracle (1950s - 1980s, interrupted in 1970s) Though Italy doesn't have much bustling skyscrapers, it is one of the world's leading economy and industrial nation. The main weakness Italy has over other major European powers however, is the lack of resources. Italy has few natural resources, and most raw materials needed for manufacturing are imported (the country imports 99.7% of its solid fuels demand, 92.5% of oil, 91.2% of natural gas) Left in ruins after World War 2, the country witnessed a period of rapid growth, transforming itself from a poor, mainly agricultural nation into a major industrial power until it was interrupted by the 1970s economic, political turmoil and social unrest. Major exports of Italy include engineering products, textiles and clothing, production machinery, automotive, transport equipment, chemicals; food, beverages and tobacco; refined metals and high-end luxurious consumer products. The Italian economy has stagnated and is now plagued by high level of debts. At its height in 1991, the Italian economy was the 4th largest in the world. It was re-overtaken by both France and the United Kingdom and is now the 8th largest economy. 4. Hong Kong Exports: $438 billion Period of massive industrialization: Industrialization of Four Asian Tigers (1960s - 1990s)Hong Kong, due to its size, has very little arable land and natural resources, so it imports most of its food and raw materials. Industrialization took place during the 1950s and 1960s, changing Hong Kong from an entrepot-reliance city into an international financial hub. Hong Kong however, has been losing its manufacturing industries since 1990s, with 80% of them now largely shifted to mainland China. What's remain in Hong Kong is the light and high-tech industries. Hong Kong is the world's largest entrepot, the city does not produce much, but it imports semi-manufacture, refine and assemble them, then re-export them at higher value. 96% of Hong Kong's exports are made up from re-exports. Major exports of Hong Kong include textiles & clothing, electronics, plastics, toys, watches and clocks. The rest are re-exports. The economy of Hong Kong is still growing thanks to its close connection to China. Hong Kong is currently the 40th largest economy in the world. 5. Singapore Exports: $415 billion Period of massive industrialization: Industrialization of Four Asian Tigers (1960s - 1990s) With no natural resources and having the smallest population in this list, Singapore shows the world how a tiny island can likewise become one of the world's most prosperous and advanced economy. Having virtually nothing in its island, Singapore has to import everything it needs, including water (from neighboring Malaysia) A leading entrepot like Hong Kong, 48% of Singaporean exports are made up from re-exports (importing raw goods, refine and re-export them), but unlike Hong Kong, Singapore has a strong manufacturing industries of its own. The tiny island produces 10% of world's semiconductor wafer. Major exports of Singapore include machinery and equipment, electronics, semiconductor, consumer goods, food & beverages, pharmaceuticals and other chemicals and refined oil. The rest are re-exports. The economy of Singapore is still surging, with compliments to good governance and strategic economic policies. Singapore is currently the 37th largest economy in the world. 6. Belgium Exports: $332 billion Period of massive industrialization: European postwar reconstruction (1960s - 1990s) Except for its coal, which is no longer economical to exploit, Belgium has virtually no natural resources. Belgium must import and is heavily reliance on foreign raw materials, and thus is very vulnerable to global market and commodities prices. The country, surrounded by industrial powerhouse the likes of Germany, France and the United Kingdom, has never got a chance to build up strong manufacturing base, instead it focuses on niche industries, especially light and high-tech industries. Belgium for instance, has the largest diamond cutting industry (Antwerp) in the world. The country is also a leading entrepot in Europe, where it imports raw materials and semi-finished goods that are further processed and re-exported. Major exports of Belgium include machinery and equipment, chemicals, finished diamonds, metals and metal products, foodstuffs. The rest are re-exports. The economy of Belgium has slowed down significantly amid Eurozone crisis, but still show a better growth than most of developed Europe. Belgium is currently the 23rd largest economy in the world. 7. Switzerland Exports: $322 billion Period of massive industrialization: European postwar reconstruction (1950s - 1970s)Switzerland is sort of different from others in the list - in that it is landlocked, but the country proved that such inconvenient is not a barrier to becoming one of the world's leading exporter. Switzerland has virtually no natural resources, and its annual trade balance is usually in the red, owing to the economy's reliance on large quantities of imported raw materials for industry. Surrounded by major industrial nations (i.e. Germany, France, Italy), Switzerland, like Belgium, has no chance of establishing a strong manufacturing base. It instead, focuses in niche industries, specifically light and agricultural industries. Switzerland has very strong food processing and confectionery industry, producing multinational food company such as Nestle. The Swiss also excelled in luxurious watch-manufacturing, with well-known global brands such as Rolex and Swatch. Major exports of Switzerland include machinery, chemicals, metals, watches, agricultural products and foodstuffs, and the country is the 19th largest economy in the world. 8. Taiwan Exports: $307 billion Period of massive industrialization: Taiwan Miracle (1970s - 2000s) During the 50 years of Japanese colonial rule, Japan extensively swept up the natural resources of Taiwan. By the end of World War 2, Taiwan has been pretty much devoid of its resources. Towards the 1950s, Taiwan was a rural, backwater island with living standard on par with the nation of Congo in Africa. Due to the lack of natural resources, Taiwan is forced to and is heavily reliant on foreign imports of raw materials, where up to 98% of its domestic industrial needs are to be imported. The island however, experienced rapid industrialization which transformed it into the world's no.1 hi-tech electronics and semiconductor manufacturing hub. In the 1980s, Taiwan had become an economic power, with a mature and diversified economy, solid presence in international markets and huge foreign exchange reserves. By 2010, Taiwan replaced former colonial master Japan as the world's top producer of semiconductor. Major exports of Taiwan include computers, electronics, semiconductor, flat panels, machinery; metals; textiles, plastics, chemicals; optical, photographic, measuring and medical instruments. The economy of Taiwan is currently experiencing upward trajectory growth due to global consumer electronics boom, with worldwide consumer electronics spending expected to reach $1 trillion in 2012. Taiwan is the 27th largest economy in the world.

http://www.gamespot.com/forums/offtopic-discussion-314159273/8-countries-with-no-natural-resource-but-thrive-to-29364331/

Politics

en

History of Homelessness Homelessness has surged and receded throughout the nation’s history, with spikes during the colonial period, pre-industrial era, post-Civil War years, Great Depression, and today. While there are many drivers of modern-day homelessness, it is largely the result of failed policies; severely underfunded programs that have led to affordable housing shortages; wages that do not keep up with rising rents and housing costs; inadequate safety nets; inequitable access to quality health care (including mental health care), education, and economic opportunity; and mass incarceration. In effect, more than half of Americans live paycheck to paycheck and one crisis away from homelessness. At the root of these systemic failures is historical and ongoing racism. From slavery and the Indian Removal Act to redlining and mass incarceration, people of color and other historically marginalized groups (such as LGBTQI+ youth) have been denied rights and excluded from opportunities in ways that continue to have negative impacts today. State of Homelessness Homelessness in the United States is an urgent public health issue and humanitarian crisis. It impacts cities, suburbs, and rural towns in every state. Housing is a social determinant of health, meaning lack of it has a negative impact on overall health and life expectancy. Tens of thousands of people die every year due to the dangerous conditions of living without housing—conditions that have worsened due to climate change’s rise in extreme weather. People who experience homelessness die nearly 30 years earlier than the average American—and often from easily treatable illnesses. Given the pervasiveness of homelessness, most Americans—often unknowingly—have friends, family, coworkers, or neighbors who are experiencing homelessness today or who have experienced homelessness at some point in their lives. While homelessness impacts people of all ages, races, ethnicities, gender identities, and sexual orientations, it disproportionately impacts some groups and populations. Compared to the portion of the U.S. population they make up, people of color, for instance, are overrepresented in the population experiencing homelessness. People with preexisting health issues are also more likely to experience homelessness—particularly unsheltered—and they are up to seven times more likely to lack health insurance. While rates of homelessness for people with severe mental health or substance use issues are high, the majority of people experiencing homelessness have neither a severe mental health nor substance use issue. Furthermore, the large majority of Americans with mental health and substance use issues do not experience homelessness. There are two main sources of federal homelessness data: the Annual Homeless Assessment Report, published by the Department of Housing and Urban Development; and the Annual Student Homelessness in America Report, published by the Department of Education’s technical assistance operator, the National Center for Homeless Education. Several other agencies—including the departments of Agriculture and Defense; the Census Bureau; the Office of Head Start; and the Health Resources and Services Administration—collect data on homelessness that USICH publishes in reports, which can be found here. Homelessness Fact vs. Fiction There are many myths about the causes of and solutions to homelessness, particularly the “Housing First” approach that has been proven by decades of research to be effective and cost-effective. Below are some of the most common myths—and the reality surrounding them: Myth: People experiencing homelessness just need to get a job. Fact: While employment helps people stay housed, it does not guarantee housing. As many as 40%-60% of people experiencing homelessness have a job, but housing is unaffordable because wages have not kept up with rising rents. There is no county or state where a full-time minimum-wage worker can afford a modest apartment. At minimum wage, people have to work 86 hours a week to afford a one-bedroom. Even when people can afford a home, one is not always available. In 1970, the United States had a surplus of 300,000 affordable homes. Today, only 37 affordable homes are available for every 100 extremely low-income renters. As a result, 70% of the lowest-wage households spend more than half their income on rent, placing them at high risk of homelessness when unexpected expenses (such as car repairs and medical bills) arise. Myth: People experiencing homelessness choose to live outside in tents or cars. Fact: Homelessness usually happens because of economic reasons (such as job loss), and many people have nowhere else to go but outside. Many shelters are full or limited to people who are sober, straight, free of disability or criminal history, and/or willing to separate from their children, partners, or pets. These discriminatory policies leave parents, couples, pet owners, LGBTQI+ members, and people with addictions, disabilities, or criminal records on the streets, where they live in constant fear of hunger, violence, storms, and infectious disease. “Out of sight, out of mind” laws that make it illegal to sit or sleep in public outdoor spaces only exacerbate the revolving door between homelessness and incarceration, and they do not solve homelessness. Housing and supports solve homelessness—not handcuffs. Myth: People experiencing homelessness are dangerous and violent. Fact: Not having a home does not make someone a criminal, just like having a home does not make someone innocent of any and all crimes. According to data, people experiencing homelessness are far more likely to be victims of violent crime than to commit violent crime. But because of the infrequency of violent crimes committed by people experiencing homelessness, they tend to be considered “newsworthy” and attract more media attention. Myth: Most people experiencing homelessness have a substance use and/or mental health disorder. Fact: While rates of homelessness for people with severe mental health or substance use disorders are high, the majority of people with no home also have no mental health or substance use disorder. Furthermore, the large majority of Americans with mental health or substance use disorders do not experience homelessness, demonstrating that mental health and substance use disorders do not cause homelessness. Myth: Homelessness is not preventable. Fact: Homelessness is a policy choice, and the COVID-19 pandemic proved the power of prevention. During the pandemic, governments instituted eviction moratoriums, deployed emergency rental assistance, expanded unemployment assistance and the Child Tax Credit, and issued cash directly to millions of lower-income Americans. In effect, poverty dropped by 45%, millions of evictions were prevented, and homelessness remained steady during a time when a surge in homelessness would have been expected. Myth: Housing First only helps people get housing but does not address the issues that led them to homelessness—and could again. Fact: The Housing First approach recognizes that housing is the immediate solution to homelessness—but not the only solution. Housing First offers support (such as substance use treatment, legal aid, or job training) at the same time as housing and continues to offer support long after people are housed to prevent them from losing their home again. One element that sets Housing First apart from some other approaches is that it does not force people to accept support. Forced mental health or substance use treatment, for instance, is proven to be largely ineffective and to have unintended, harmful, even deadly consequences. Myth: Housing First is expensive and ineffective. Fact: Decades of research prove how effective and cost-effective Housing First can be. Studies show that 9 out of 10 people remain housed a year after receiving Housing First assistance, and that housing can be three times cheaper than criminalization. According to a recent study, Housing First pays for itself within 1.5 years and can reduce homelessness and government reliance—all while getting people back to work.

https://www.usich.gov/guidance-reports-data/data-trends

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In societies around the world, the issue of overpopulation and its socioeconomic implications have been topics of great concern. A stark contrast emerges when comparing the fertility rates of poor individuals with those of the wealthy. While poor people often struggle with the burden of too many children, the affluent have access to resources that enable them to control and limit their family size. This disparity not only impacts the individuals themselves but also has far-reaching consequences for communities and societies as a whole. The Challenges Faced by the Poor: For many impoverished individuals and families, the decision to have multiple children stems from a complex interplay of factors including limited access to education, healthcare, and contraceptives, as well as cultural and societal norms. In many developing countries, large families are seen as a form of social security, with children expected to support their parents in old age. However, this mindset can perpetuate a cycle of poverty, as limited resources are stretched even thinner among more offspring. The consequences of high fertility rates among the poor are manifold. Families may struggle to provide adequate nutrition, healthcare, and education for each child, perpetuating a cycle of generational poverty. Overpopulation can strain already limited resources, leading to increased competition for jobs, housing, and social services. Additionally, the lack of family planning options can result in unintended pregnancies and high maternal and infant mortality rates. The Solutions of the Rich: Conversely, wealthy individuals and families often have the means to control their family size through access to education, healthcare, and family planning services. They can make informed decisions about when and how many children to have, taking into consideration their financial stability and lifestyle goals. In many developed nations, declining fertility rates among the affluent have led to smaller families and a focus on quality over quantity in terms of child-rearing. By limiting their family size, affluent individuals can allocate more resources to each child, providing them with better education, healthcare, and opportunities for success. Smaller families also contribute to less strain on the environment and public resources, as consumption levels tend to be lower. Furthermore, limited family size allows for greater focus on individual development and the cultivation of skills that can lead to economic advancement. The disparity in fertility rates between the poor and the wealthy underscores the complex relationship between poverty, education, access to resources, and family planning. While the challenges faced by poor individuals in balancing the needs of a large family are significant, the solutions adopted by the affluent in controlling their family size also have profound implications for societal well-being. Addressing the root causes of high fertility rates among the poor, such as lack of access to education and healthcare, can help break the cycle of poverty and contribute to sustainable development. Similarly, promoting responsible family planning practices among the wealthy can help alleviate pressure on resources and foster a more equitable society for all. Ultimately, acknowledging and addressing the consequences of differing fertility rates is essential for creating a more just and sustainable future for all. If you find this article post useful for you, Please comment, subscribe, like, and share with your family and friends on social media, and don’t hesitate to ask for any topic you are looking for free. You can join our Whatsapp group for free: https://chat.whatsapp.com/Jkg4vAzCO4i6OP7P8veE9g Join our Whatsapp channel for free: https://whatsapp.com/channel/0029VaA2cWF0bIdwaQWVCe1t Join our telegram channel for free: https://t.me/occultbrotherhood4money

https://blackheartbrotherhood.family.blog/2024/09/14/a-tale-of-two-worlds-the-consequences-of-fertility-rates-among-the-poor-and-the-rich/

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Coronavirus disease (COVID-19): Food businesses 15 May 2020 | Q&A The main priority is to keep the virus out of the food environment. Several key measures are required including upgrading of cleaning and sanitation measures, disinfecting surfaces and high-touch points, educating staff on the virus and how to protect themselves and others, reinforcing protocols such as physical distancing, hand washing, and improved security with people staying in their vehicles/sanitizing hands when handing out documents and other material. Gloves may be used by food workers but must be changed frequently and hands must be washed between glove changes and when gloves are removed. Gloves must be changed after carrying out non-food related activities such as opening/closing doors by hand, and emptying bins. Food workers should be aware that wearing gloves can allow bacteria to build up on the surface of the hands, so hand washing is extremely important when gloves are removed to avoid subsequent contamination of food. Food workers should not touch their mouth, nose and eyes when wearing gloves. Disposable gloves can give a false sense of safety and should not be used in the food work environment as a substitute for hand washing. The COVID-19 virus can contaminate disposable gloves in the same way it can get onto workers hands and contact surfaces. Removal of disposable gloves can lead to contamination of hands. Wearing disposable gloves can give you a false sense of security and may result in staff not washing hands as frequently as required. Handwashing is a greater protective barrier to infection than wearing of disposable gloves. Food businesses need to ensure adequate sanitary facilities are provided and ensure food workers thoroughly and frequently wash their hands. Soap and water is adequate for hand washing. Hand sanitisers can be used as an additional measure but should not replace hand washing. Wearing of Face Masks WHO advice on the use of masks in the context of COVID-19 should be followed. Face Masks do not have to be routinely used by food workers to protect against transmission of COVID-19. However, for some food processing activities, such as working in abattoirs or handling cooked, ready-to-eat foods, wearing face masks is a usual practice. WHO recommends that face masks should be used if a person is sick with symptoms of COVID-19 (especially coughing) or looking after someone with suspected or confirmed COVID-19. However, a food worker who is sick or who has symptoms of COVID-19 should not be allowed to work in grocery stores or other food businesses and should be excluded from work until free of symptoms or deemed fit for work by a medical doctor. Staff who are feeling unwell should not report to work and should seek medical advice. However, in the event that a food worker becomes unwell in the workplace with typical symptoms of COVID-19, they should be removed to an area away from other people. If possible, find a room or area where they can be isolated behind a closed door, such as a staff office. If it is possible to open a window, do so for ventilation. Arrangements should be made for the unwell employee to be removed quickly from the food premise. The employee who is unwell should follow national guidelines for reporting cases/suspect cases of COVID-19. Whilst they wait for medical advice or to be sent home, they should avoid any contact with other employees. They should avoid touching people, surfaces and objects and be advised to cover their mouth and nose with a disposable tissue when they cough or sneeze and put the tissue in a bag or pocket and then dispose of the tissue in a bin. If they do not have any tissues available, they should cough and sneeze into the crook of their elbow. If they need to go to the bathroom whilst waiting for medical assistance, they should use a separate bathroom, if available. All surfaces that the infected employee has come into contact with must be cleaned. Alcohol based sanitizers/surface disinfectants should be used for cleaning purposes. In general, alcohol-based disinfectants (ethanol, propan-2-ol, propan-1-ol) have been shown to significantly reduce infectivity of enveloped viruses like COVID-19 virus, in concentrations of 70-80%. Common disinfectants with active ingredients based on quaternary ammonium compounds (QUATS) and chlorine would also have virucidal properties. All staff should wash their hands thoroughly for 20 seconds with soap and water after any contact with someone who is unwell with symptoms consistent with coronavirus infection. If an employee is confirmed as a case of COVID-19 it will be necessary to notify all close contacts of the infected employee so they too can take measures to minimise further risk of spread. WHO definitions of a contact of a COVID-19 case can be found here. Examples of contacts in the food businesses could include any employee who was in face-to-face or physical (i.e., touching) contact; any employee who was within 1 meter with the confirmed case; anyone who has cleaned up any bodily fluids without adequate PPE (e.g. gloves, overalls, protective clothing); employees in the same working team or workgroup as the confirmed case, and any employee living in the same household as a confirmed case. WHO recommends that contacts be quarantined for 14 days from the last point of exposure to the confirmed case.22 At a minimum, staff who have had close contact with the infected employee should be asked to stay at home for 14 days from the last time they had contact with the confirmed case and practice physical distancing. If they become unwell at any time within their 14-day isolation period and they test positive for COVID-19, they will become a confirmed case, and should be managed as such. Staff who have not had close contact with the original confirmed case should continue taking the usual precautions and attend work as usual. Organising employees into small teams or workgroups will help to minimise disruption to work processes in the event of an employee reporting sick with symptoms of COVID-19. Closure of the workplace is not recommended. More detailed information can be found in COVID-19 and food safety: guidance for food businesses. For more information on contacts of COVID-19 confirmed cases, see WHO guidance on surveillance and case definitions. A return to work policy for staff who have been infected and recovered from COVID-19 should be in place. WHO recommends that a confirmed patient could be released from isolation once their symptoms resolve and they have two negative PCR tests at least 24 hours apart. If testing is not possible, WHO recommends that a confirmed patient can be released from isolation 14 days after symptoms resolve. Taking the temperature of food workers is not recommended. Fever is only one of the symptoms of COVID-19 and absence of fever alone is not a reliable indicator of wellness. As part of a food business ‘fitness to work’ guidelines, staff should report to management if they are sick with typical COVID-19 symptoms, particularly fever. Physical distancing, good personal hygiene with frequent hand washing, and application of general food hygiene measures are the most important precautions food workers should adopt. Physical distancing is very important to help slow the spread of coronavirus. This is achieved by minimising contact between potentially infected individuals and healthy individuals. Frequent hand washing with soap and water and use of hand sanitizers are also important in reducing the risk of transmission. All food businesses should follow the physical distancing and hand washing guidance of WHO. The Codex Alimentarius Commission has adopted several practical guidelines on how to apply and implement best practices to ensure food hygiene (Codex General Principles of Food Hygiene, CXC 1- 1969), handle meats (Codex Code of Hygienic Practice for Meat, CXC 58 – 2005), and control viruses in foods (Guidelines for the Application of General Principles of Food Hygiene to the Control of Viruses in Food (CAC/GL 79-2012). Enhanced food safety practices at this time, such as those recommended in the Codex documents mentioned, will reduce the likelihood of contamination of foods with any pathogen and help lowering the public health burden caused by already established foodborne infections, reducing the stress on an already overburdened public health system. WHO guidelines are to maintain at least 1 metre (3 feet) between fellow workers. Where the food production environment makes it difficult to do so, employers need to consider what measures to put in place to protect employees. Examples of practical measures to adhere to physical distancing guidance in the food processing environment are to: - stagger workstations on either side of processing lines so that food workers are not facing one another, - provide personal protection equipment (PPE) such as face masks, hair nets, disposable gloves, clean overalls and slip reduction work shoes for staff. The use of PPE would be routine in high risk areas of food premises that produce ready-to-eat and cooked foods. When staff are dressed in PPE it is possible to reduce distance between workers, - space out workstations, which may require reduction in the speed of production lines, - limit the number of staff in a food preparation area at any one time, - organise staff into working groups or teams to facilitate reduced interaction between groups, including during change of work shifts. It is important to maintain good hygiene practices around open food displays, with ready-to-eat food products such as salad bars, fresh produce displays and bakery products. Consumers should always be advised to wash fruits and vegetables with potable water prior to consumption. Both customers and staff should strictly observe good personal hygiene practices at all times around open food areas. In order to hygienically manage open food displays and to avoid the transmission of COVID-19 through surface contact, food retailers should: - Maintain frequent washing and sanitising of all food contact surfaces and utensils; - Require food service workers to frequently wash hands, and, if using gloves, these must be changed; - Require food service workers to frequently clean and sanitise counters, serving utensils and condiment containers; - Make available hand sanitiser for consumers on their way in and out of the food premises; - Should consider not openly displaying or selling unwrapped bakery products from self-service counters. Bakery products on open, self-service displays in retail stores should be placed in plastic/cellophane or paper packaging. Where loose bakery products are displayed in retail stores, these should be placed in plexiglass display cabinets and placed in bags using tongs when customers are served. - Ready-to-eat salads available in retail for self-serve, should also be placed behind plexiglass display cabinets and serving utensils should be frequently sanitized. The handles of shopping trolleys or carts should be frequently cleaned using either alcohol-based sanitizers or chlorine-based disinfectants (sodium hypochlorite). Sanitizers, paper towels and trash bins should be placed outside the retail premises close to the trolley park for customers to use. In general, alcohol-based disinfectants (ethanol, propan-2-ol, propan-1-ol) have been shown to significantly reduce infectivity of enveloped viruses like SARS-CoV-2, in concentrations of 70-80% with one-minute exposure time. Chlorine-based disinfectants (sodium hypochlorite) are effective for surface decontamination, as are disinfectants with active ingredients based on quaternary ammonium compounds (QUATS). Currently, there is no evidence to suggest that food animals could be a possible route for transmission of COVID-19 to humans or that food animals can become infected by humans. Studies are underway to better understand the susceptibility of different animal species to the COVID-19 virus and to assess infection dynamics in susceptible animal species. Additional information can be found on the website of the World Organisation for Animal Health (OIE). Very little is known about how the SARS-CoV-2 virus survives outside the human body. Probably the most up-to-date summary of scientific information we have on survival in the environment is from the European Centre for Disease control (ECDC) and the following is extracted from their recent technical report: Recent publications have evaluated the survival of SARS-CoV-2 on different surfaces. According to van Doremalen et al., the environmental stability of SARS-CoV-2 is up to three hours in the air post-aerosolization, up to four hours on copper, up to 24 hours on cardboard and up to two to three days on plastic and stainless steel, albeit with significantly decreased titres . These findings are comparable with results obtained for environmental stability of SARS-CoV-1. These findings resulted from experiments in a controlled environment and should be interpreted with caution in the real-life environment. Moreover, different levels of environmental contamination have been detected in rooms of COVID-19 patients, ranging from 1 out of 13 to 13 out of 15 samples testing positive for SARS-CoV-2 before cleaning. No air samples were positive in these studies, but one sample from an air exhaust outlet was positive indicating that virus particles may be displaced by air and deposited on surfaces [4,5]. In a study of environmental contamination in a Chinese hospital during the COVID-19 outbreak, SARS-CoV-2 was detected in environmental samples from the COVID-19 dedicated intensive care units (ICU), the COVID-19 dedicated obstetric isolation ward and the COVID-19 dedicated isolation ward. SARS-CoV-2 was also detected on objects such as the self-service printers used by patients to self-print the results of their exams, desktop keyboards and doorknobs. Virus was detected most commonly on gloves (15.4% of samples) and rarely on eye protection (1.7%) . This evidence shows the presence of SARS-CoV-2 in the environment of a COVID-19 patient, therefore reinforcing the belief that fomites play a role in transmission of SARS-CoV-2; however, the relative importance of this route of transmission compared to direct exposure to respiratory droplets is still unclear. The general guidelines outlined in the Codex Code of Hygienic Practice for the Transport of Food in Bulk and Semi-Packed Food.1 should be followed, in addition to ensuring that employees delivering foods are free from COVID-19, coughing/sneezing etiquette is practiced by all involved in food transport and that frequent hand washing/sanitizing is practiced and staff practice physical distancing. See also other Codes of Hygienic Practice for various groups of food. The general guidelines outlined in the General Principles of Food Hygiene for food processing and manufacture premises should be followed. If a suspected or confirmed case of COVID-19 is identified in a food premises then there is a requirement to completely clean the area with a neutral detergent, followed by decontamination of surfaces using a disinfectant effective against viruses. All surfaces that the infected employee has come into contact with must be cleaned, including all surfaces and objects which are visibly contaminated with body fluids/respiratory secretions, and all potentially contaminated high-contact areas such as toilets, door handles, telephones. Alcohol based sanitizers/surface disinfectants should be used for cleaning purposes. In general, alcohol-based disinfectants (ethanol, propan-2-ol, propan-1-ol) have been shown to significantly reduce infectivity of enveloped viruses like SARS-CoV-2, in concentrations of 70-80% with one-minute exposure time. Chlorine-based disinfectants (sodium hypochlorite) are effective for surface decontamination, as are disinfectants with active ingredients based on quaternary ammonium compounds (QUATS). All staff should wash their hands thoroughly for 20 seconds after any contact with someone who is unwell with symptoms consistent with coronavirus infection. Staff engaged in environmental cleaning should wear PPE when performing cleaning activities, such as overalls or uniform, single-use plastic aprons, gloves and a face mask. Protective clothing (e.g. uniforms, overalls, etc.) should be frequently washed at 60°C or above. WHO guidance for food businesses

https://www.who.int/news-room/questions-and-answers/item/coronavirus-disease-covid-19-food-businesses

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Molluscum contagiosum is a skin infection caused by a poxvirus known as the molluscum contagiosum virus. It typically results in benign, mild skin lesions (growths) that can appear anywhere on the body. These lesions, called Mollusca, are characterized by the following features: - Appearance: Small, raised, and usually white, pink, or flesh-colored with a dimple or pit in the center. They often have a pearly appearance and are smooth and firm. - Size: In most cases, the lesions range from about the size of a pinhead to as large as a pencil eraser (approximately 2 to 5 millimeters in diameter). - Location: Mollusca may occur anywhere on the body, including the face, neck, arms, legs, abdomen, and genital area, either alone or in groups. However, they are rarely found on the palms of the hands or the soles of the feet. Transmission of molluscum contagiosum can occur through: - Direct skin-to-skin contact with an infected person. - Contact with contaminated objects such as toys and towels. - Scratching or rubbing the bumps, which can spread the infection to nearby skin. - Sexual contact with an infected person. - Participation in contact sports or using shared sports equipment. Is it bad to have molluscum contagiosum Molluscum contagiosum is generally not considered serious or harmful. Here are some key points: - Benign Condition: Molluscum contagiosum is a benign (non-cancerous) skin infection caused by the molluscum contagiosum virus (MCV). - Self-Limiting: In most cases, it tends to resolve on its own within 6-12 months without causing significant harm. - Minimal Symptoms: The characteristic lesions (Mollusca) are small, raised bumps that may be slightly itchy or sore. However, they usually do not cause severe discomfort. - Treatment Options: While treatment is not always necessary, options include topical creams, cryotherapy, or surgical removal if desired. - Preventive Measures: To prevent spread, avoid scratching or picking at the lesions and practice good hygiene. Can molluscum contagiosum be cured Molluscum contagiosum is usually self-limiting, meaning it tends to resolve on its own within approximately 6 to 12 months. However, there are treatment options available to manage the condition and accelerate healing: - Observation: In many cases, healthcare providers recommend watchful waiting without active treatment. The lesions may gradually disappear without intervention. - Topical Treatments: - Imiquimod Cream: This cream helps stimulate the immune system to fight the virus. - Podophyllotoxin Solution: Applied directly to the lesions, it can help remove them. - Tretinoin Cream: Promotes skin cell turnover and may aid in lesion resolution. - Physical Removal: - Cryotherapy: Freezing the lesions using liquid nitrogen. - Curettage: Scraping off the lesions with a small instrument. - Laser Therapy: Precise removal using laser technology. - Preventive Measures: - Avoid scratching or picking at the lesions to prevent spread. - Practice good hygiene and avoid sharing personal items. Can antibiotics cure molluscum Antibiotics are not effective in treating molluscum contagiosum. This skin condition is caused by the molluscum contagiosum virus (MCV), which belongs to the poxvirus family. Unlike bacterial infections that respond to antibiotics, MCV is a virus, and antibiotics do not target viruses. The primary treatment options for molluscum contagiosum include: - Observation: Many cases resolve on their own without intervention. - Topical Treatments: - Imiquimod Cream: Stimulates the immune system to fight the virus. - Podophyllotoxin Solution: Directly applied to the lesions for removal. - Tretinoin Cream: Promotes skin cell turnover. - Physical Removal: - Cryotherapy: Freezing the lesions. - Curettage: Scraping off the lesions. - Laser Therapy: Precise removal using lasers. Consult a healthcare provider for personalized advice and appropriate management strategies. Antibiotics are not part of the recommended treatment for molluscum contagiosum. Can you put lotion on molluscum Yes, you can apply lotion to molluscum contagiosum lesions, but it’s essential to choose the right type of lotion and follow proper precautions: - Non-Irritating Lotion: Opt for a gentle, non-irritating moisturizing lotion. Look for products that do not contain harsh chemicals or fragrances. These lotions can help keep the skin hydrated and prevent excessive dryness around the bumps. - Avoid Fragrances and Harsh Ingredients: Avoid lotions with strong fragrances or ingredients that may further irritate the skin. Fragrance-free or hypoallergenic lotions are preferable. - Apply Sparingly: Apply the lotion sparingly to the affected areas. Gently massage it into the skin without causing friction or pressure on the bumps. - Avoid Direct Contact with Lesions: Be cautious not to touch the bumps directly with your hands while applying the lotion. Use a cotton swab or clean cloth to avoid spreading the virus. - Consult a Healthcare Provider: Before using any specific lotion, consult a healthcare provider. They can recommend appropriate options based on your individual case and any other existing skin conditions. How do I get rid of molluscum contagiosum permanently Molluscum contagiosum is a common skin infection caused by a poxvirus. It results in round, firm, painless bumps that can appear anywhere on the body. Here are some treatment options for molluscum contagiosum: - Physical Removal: - Cryotherapy: Freezing the lesion with liquid nitrogen. - Curettage: Piercing the core and scraping off the cheesy material. - Laser Therapy: Using laser rays to destroy the bumps. - These procedures should be performed by a trained healthcare provider and may result in post-procedural pain, irritation, and scarring. - Oral Therapy: - Gradual removal of lesions using oral medications. - Oral cimetidine is an alternative treatment for children who are afraid of painful procedures or want to avoid scarring. However, facial mollusca may not respond as well as lesions elsewhere on the body. - Topical Therapy: - Cantharidin topical solution (0.7%): FDA-approved treatment for molluscum. Administered by a healthcare professional. - Podophyllotoxin cream (0.5%): Reliable home therapy for adults but not recommended for pregnant women. - Other options include iodine, salicylic acid, potassium hydroxide, tretinoin, and imiquimod (T cell modifier). Imiquimod is not recommended for children due to possible adverse events. - Avoid touching, scratching, or rubbing the bumps. - Do not share objects or clothing. - Cover the bumps with a watertight bandage. - Avoid using swimming pools. How do you stop molluscum contagiosum from spreading To prevent the spread of molluscum contagiosum, follow these guidelines: - Avoid Scratching or Picking: Refrain from scratching or picking at the bumps. This can rupture the lesions and increase the risk of spreading the virus to other areas of your skin. - Cover the Bumps: Use a watertight bandage or adhesive tape to cover the molluscum bumps. This helps prevent direct contact with the virus and reduces the chances of transmission. - Avoid Sharing Objects: Do not share towels, clothing, or personal items with others. The virus can survive on surfaces, so sharing objects can lead to transmission. - Practice Good Hygiene: - Wash your hands thoroughly after touching the bumps. - Use separate towels for drying the affected area and the rest of your body. - Avoid Swimming Pools and Hot Tubs: Molluscum contagiosum can spread through water. Avoid swimming in pools or hot tubs until the lesions have healed completely. - Isolate Infected Areas: If you have multiple bumps, try to keep them isolated from each other. This reduces the risk of autoinoculation (spreading the virus from one area to another on your own skin).

https://gidiwap.com/2024/03/17/what-type-of-std-is-molluscum-contagiosum/

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Ahead of his time is putting it moderately for Charles Darwin. The father of evolution had conjectures that were only proved, or greatly substantiated, decades after his death in 1882, in some cases not until recently. Today, evidence that unequivocally supports his theory of evolution by natural selection, as well as other surmises he had, comes from an array of scientific disciplines, including paleontology, geology, biochemistry, genetics, molecular biology, and, most recently, evolutionary developmental biology, or "evo devo." "The notion that all these lines of evidence could converge and give a common answer to the question of where we came from is truly powerful," says Brown University biologist Kenneth Miller. "This is the reason why scientific support for the theory of evolution is so overwhelming." Here, bone up on Darwin's most prophetic ideas.—Peter Tyson Darwin wasn't the first to suggest the theory of evolution—that all living things originate from ancestral forms and that their distinguishable differences are due to modifications in successive generations. But no one gave it more thought, or provided more evidence for it, or more deeply ingrained the theory into our collective consciousness than Charles Darwin. Today, researchers using the genetic techniques of "evo devo" can trace the evolution of the various kinds of organisms that Darwin fit into his "tree of life" (here, from an 1837 notebook, his first such tree). As the geneticist Theodosius Dobzhansky once wrote, "Nothing in biology makes sense except in the light of evolution." Evolution happens through natural Darwin was not content to say that organisms evolve. The theory of evolution, he wrote, "even if well founded, would be unsatisfactory until it could be shown how the innumerable species inhabiting this world have been modified so as to acquire that perfection of structure and coadaptation that most justly excites our admiration" [italics added]. In what has been called "the greatest idea anyone ever had," Darwin theorized how those modifications occurred—through a process he called natural selection, which holds that individuals within a species that are best suited to their environment will survive and reproduce more than those less suited, thereby passing on their more useful traits and genetic qualities to successive generations. "Nothing that we have learned in the intervening 175 years," writes paleontologist Niles Eldredge of the time since Darwin first started formulating his theory, "has contravened Darwin's basic description of how natural selection works." Evolution happens through natural selection. (continued) Suitably, one of the most striking examples of natural selection in action concerns the very Galapagos finches that Darwin made famous. Since 1973, biologists Peter and Rosemary Grant, working on the tiny island of Daphne Major in the Galapagos, have studied a species of finch called Geospiza fortis (upper right in illustration, which appeared in Darwin's 1839 book about his five-year journey aboard the Beagle). After a drought in 1977 devastated plants bearing small seeds, more than 1,000 of the 1,200 G. fortis finches on the island died. The Grants discovered that larger G. fortis, which could break open larger seeds than smaller G. fortis could, survived better. The survivors mated in 1978, and, on average, their offspring had beaks 4 percent larger than those of the previous generation. Following another drought in 2003, G. fortis with smaller beaks survived better, in part because of stiff competition for bigger seeds after a larger finch species, G. magnirostris, settled the island. Between 2003 and 2005, the Grants found, G. fortis beaks shrank by 5 percent. Evolution by natural selection must have a mechanism. Darwin knew in his heart that evolution by natural selection happened, but he didn't know how. In fact, he proposed a mechanism of heredity that proved to be dead wrong, something he called pangenesis. Ironically, the actual mechanism of heredity—genetics—was revealed in Darwin's lifetime, though he never knew it. Working with pea plants, the Austrian priest Gregor Mendel discovered the fundamental laws of genetics in 1865. But Mendel's work was neglected until 1900, and it wasn't until the 1940s that scientists identified DNA as the genetic material (here, Francis Crick's first sketch of DNA's double helix structure). Today, the clear focus of the revolutions now under way in genetics, medicine, and other fields is on the genomes of living organisms. The mechanism—whatever it is—is natural, not supernatural. Darwin held off on publishing his theory for 20 years, until forced to by fellow naturalist Alfred Russel Wallace, who had independently come up with the same idea. One of the reasons for Darwin's delay was he knew what a shock his theory would represent to Christians, including his beloved wife Emma, who believed that God had created all living things, whole and independent of all others. Darwin didn't hold this view. His friend, the biologist T. H. Huxley, agreed. "As a natural process of the same character as the development of a tree from its seed, or of a fowl from its egg," Huxley wrote, "evolution excludes creation and all other kinds of supernatural intervention." Of course, many people around the world still believe in a divine instrument of creation. Embryology is "the strongest single class of facts in favor of change of forms." Darwin considered the process that a fertilized egg goes through on the way to becoming a multibillion-celled adult as crucial to understanding how basic anatomical parts of both animals and plants change over evolutionary time. The new science of evolutionary developmental biology, "evo devo," is revealing the truth behind Darwin's assertion quoted above. Until recently, scientists could say that forms do change, but they couldn't say exactly how, because they didn't know which genes were essential for the development of any organism. They now know that, remarkable as it may seem, all organisms on Earth, from microbes to man (a human embryo is seen here), share a common "tool kit" of so-called master genes, which govern how bodies and body parts form. When and which of these genes are turned "on" or "off" during the embryonic stage determines how each organism is built. Sexual selection also drives The peacock posed an enigma to Darwin. How could its extravagant tail feathers have come about? How do they aid in the "survival of the fittest" (a phrase coined by the philosopher Herbert Spencer)? Darwin proposed an answer in his book Descent of Man, in which he introduced a novel concept—sexual selection, the critical role that the opposite sex plays in the evolution of traits. Over time, Darwin believed, peahen choices about which peacocks constituted the finest mates could have led to the males' absurdly ostentatious tails. In the 1990s, biologist Marion Petrie of the University of Newcastle-upon-Tyne showed Darwin's hunch to be true. On average, peacocks have 150 "eyes" on their tails. By clipping off just a few of those eyes, Petrie found he could significantly reduce a male's chances of mating; males with fewer than 130 eyes rarely mated at all. Petrie reasoned that the healthier a peacock was, the more he could invest in the production of eyes—something that peahens clearly saw for All animals, including humans, descend from a common ancestor. Darwin knew the idea that man was just another animal would go over like a lead balloon in Victorian society. But in the Origin of Species, he was unequivocal on this notion, writing that "I should infer from analogy that probably all the organic beings which have ever lived on this earth have descended from one primordial form, into which life was first breathed." Evidence supporting this view has accumulated ever since, with arguably the strongest support coming from evo devo. Scientists comparing the genomes of members of the three domains of life—archaea, bacteria, and the eukaryotes (animals, plants, fungi, and protists)—have discovered about 500 genes that all living things share. These "immortal" genes have survived essentially unchanged for over two billion years (including the portion of a protein's sequence seen here, with shared amino acids indicated by shading). Says Brown's Ken Miller: "Despite the extraordinary diversity of life, all living organisms share a nearly identical set of essential genes, reflecting their evolutionary development from a common ancestor." Humans evolved from an ape-like Fearing that many of his contemporaries would be deeply offended if he suggested that humans and apes share a common ancestor, Darwin barely touched on human evolution in the 1859 Origin of Species. But by the 1871 Descent of Man, he was ready, stating baldly that "man is descended from a hairy, tailed quadruped, probably arboreal in its habits." He also maintained that the difference between the mind of man and that of a chimpanzee or gorilla is a matter of degree, not of kind. Summing up, Darwin wrote, "We must … acknowledge, as it seems to me, that man with all his noble qualities … still bears in his bodily frame the indelible stamp of his lowly origin." Today, many a schoolchild can cite the figure perhaps most often called forth in support of this view—namely, that we share almost 99 percent of our DNA with our closest living relative, the chimpanzee. (The illustration shown here appeared in T. H. Huxley's 1863 book Man's Place in Nature. All skeletons are to scale except the gibbon, which is shown twice natural size.) Modern humans arose in Africa. In Darwin's day, virtually no fossils of early humans were known—one of the few was Neanderthal Man, discovered in Germany's Neander Valley in 1856—nor could anyone date them reliably. But noticing our close anatomical relationship to chimps and gorillas, Darwin surmised that Homo sapiens had evolved in Africa. In his customary careful way, he wrote, "It is somewhat more probable that our early progenitors lived on the African continent than elsewhere." Today, the fossil known as Lucy is only the most famous of numerous fossils of human and human-like species whose age and other particulars confirm the notion that modern humans first came into existence in Africa. Here, a 1999 evolutionary tree based on DNA shows how the five great apes, including us, arose from a common ancestor. Branch length indicates how far the genes of each population have diverged from those of near relatives. The Earth is at least several hundred million years old. In 1658, based on his reading of the Bible and on historical records, the Irish clergyman James Ussher declared that God had created the Earth on October 22, 4004 B.C. Geologists of Darwin's day begged to differ, arguing for a far older Earth. Darwin, knowing that evolution required vastly more time than just six millennia, concurred. In the first edition of the Origin of Species, he estimated our planet to be at least several hundred million years old. In fact, as is well known today, it is far more primeval. In the 1900s, after Marie and Pierre Curie discovered radioactivity, physicists learned how to use the half-life of uranium and other radioactive elements to estimate the age of rocks. The oldest minerals found on Earth are about 4.1 to 4.2 billion years old, indicating our planet is at least that old. But meteorites, which scientists believe formed at the same time as the planets and which, unlike the Earth, are not geologically active and therefore retain evidence of their formation, date even further back. Using several different dating methods on dozens of different kinds of meteorites, scientists have, in instance after instance, come up with an age of roughly 4.5 billion years—the current widely accepted estimate of our planet's age. Gaps in the fossil record will be filled in with key transitional fossils. In his notebooks, Darwin worried about the many gaps in the fossil record that then existed, "like pages torn from a book." Perhaps the most glaring was the complete lack of fossils before the Cambrian Period (544-510 million years ago). "To the question why do we not find rich fossiliferous deposits belonging to these assumed earliest periods before the Cambrian system, I can give no satisfactory answer," he wrote. If his theory of evolution was right, he knew such gaps would eventually be filled in. Only in the past half century have paleontologists unearthed fossils from the Precambrian, and it's a huge and ever-growing trove, with the oldest fossils dating to about 3.5 billion years ago. Moreover, they continue to unearth key fossils that bridge those gaps Darwin bemoaned, including Archaeopteryx, shown here. To see a range of such transitional fossils, go to An insect with a foot-long tongue must exist to pollinate this orchid. Not all of Darwin's conjectures were so broad in scope or so earth-shaking; some were simple predictions. Take the case of this species of orchid, Angraecum sesquipedale, from Madagascar. When Darwin saw this orchid in 1862, he, like anyone who saw it, was astonished by the length of its spur, which can reach over a foot in length. (See long, slim tube in photo.) "Astounding," he wrote. "What insect could suck it?" For some as-yet unknown insect must, he insisted, and it had to have a foot-long tongue to get at the plant's nectar, which pools at the very base of the spur. Entomologists of his day were skeptical, for no such creature had ever turned up. But several decades after Darwin's death in 1882, scientists discovered a giant hawk moth in Madagascar, and it lapped the orchid's nectar with, yes, a foot-long tongue. The moth was named Xanthopan morganii praedicta in honor of his prediction. Once again, Darwin was right. Selected sources for this article We recommend you visit the interactive version. The text to the left is provided for printing purposes.

http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/nova/id/pred-nf.html

Religion

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PLAY IS ESSENTIAL TO ALL CHILDREN! Disabilities challenge how affected individuals and their families go to school, go to work, and even spend time at a playground. Do you remember what recess was like when you were in school? For most kids, it is their favorite time of the day. Unfortunately, many students do not have the opportunity to experience recess the way their peers do. Have you ever noticed how many playground surfaces are covered with mulch… or pebbles… or even sand? How is a child in a wheelchair supposed to move across that space? Even most playgrounds that have “handicap friendly surfaces” have little to no equipment that a child in a wheelchair can even access. Play is an essential component in the lives of children. Play directly affects our physical, mental, emotional, and social well being. Through play, we are able to define who we are and who we want to be. We are able to improve our physical fitness, build skills, work on problem solving, practice communication, set goals, share expectations, understand roles, and develop friendships. Just because a child has a disability, does not mean their need for play is lessened. Through inclusion we are able to develop greater understanding of one another, our similarities, our differences, our likes, our dislikes. We are able to develop a sense of value for each individual as we grow the skills and attitudes needed to live in a culturally diverse, enriched community. Inclusive play facilitates a non-threatening environment that enables us to develop, grow and learn from one another at various paces. While one child may not be able to climb or swing as high as another, an inclusive, accessible play area will still enable both children to communicate and learn about one another and from one another. The point where the play area stops being accessible, is also the point where their ability to continue learning from one another stops. This also becomes the point where misperceptions have greater ability to grow. Our goal was to design and create an inclusive playground for everyone… one that addresses the needs of typically developing children as well as children with neurological, intellectual and physical disabilities. Our goal was to provide an inclusive playground that accommodates all children and challenges each of them at their own developmental levels. There is a huge difference between a playground that is simply ADA compliant and one that is truly inclusive. Just because the equipment on a playground may be considered ADA compliant doesn’t necessarily enable a child with a disability to actually use or interact with any of it. We set out to create a truly inclusive playground that went far beyond ADA compliance in that it was designed to encourage children of all abilities to play with one another. This is a playground that has better surfacing, enabling a child using a wheelchair to maneuver through the playground easier, has activities to challenge children and is rich in sensory activities, social experiences and physical play. Seeing the joy and excitement on the faces of the children and families who come here to experience this playground is beyond description.

https://sarasgarden.org/extremely-premature-abundantly-blessed/I

Health

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What is neurology? Neurology is a branch of medicine that is related to the study of disorders of the nervous system. The nervous system is a complex system in the human body that coordinates the other functions of the body. It is categorized into two major types: central nervous system, which includes the brain and spinal cord Peripheral nervous system: this includes the other neural elements of the body like nerves, neuromuscular junctions, muscles, and "sensory receptors" in the eyes, ears, skin, etc. A medical practitioner who has expertise in neurology is known as a neurologist. Big Apollo Spectra, the renowned advance neuro hospital Patna, hosts the best neurologist in Patna. Symptoms that need a neurologist's consultation: Here are a few major symptoms that require a neurologist's consultation: In addition, people suffering from complications related to senses like touch, vision, or smell may have to consult a neurologist. Common Neurological Disorders: The neurologist offers medical treatment for the disorders caused in the brain, spinal cord, and nerves. Here are a few disorders that neurologists treat: Cerebrovascular disorders like stroke Multiple sclerosis and other demyelinating diseases affect the central nervous system. Infections that occur in the brain or peripheral nervous system Movement disorders like Parkinson's disease Neurodegenerative disorders like Alzheimer's disease, Amyotrophic Lateral Sclerosis (Lou Gehrig's disease), and Parkinson's disease Seizures or epilepsy In order to reach a diagnosis that explains your symptoms, neurologists inquire about the history of the presenting complaints. They might ask about your prior medical history, family history, medication history, and any other relevant information. They also perform neurological examinations that are aimed at evaluating your Cognition and mental status Vision, hearing, and speech Coordination, balance, reflexes, and gait Investigations for neurological disorders: Neurologists may recommend several investigations to support the clinical diagnosis. It includes a variety of electrophysiological tests and imaging studies of the nervous system. Blood, urine, or other body fluid tests may be recommended to analyze the seriousness of the condition and prescribe necessary medications. Genetic testing may be suggested if a genetic or inherited condition is suspected to be responsible for your symptoms. Some of the common tests that are recommended by neurologists are listed below: Imaging Studies: Computed Tomography (CT) and Magnetic Resonance Imaging (MRI), Positron Emission Tomography (PET), Single-Photon Emission Computed Tomography (SPECT), Electromyography (EMG): This test measures the electrical function in muscles and aids in knowing the disorders in nerves and muscles, spinal root compression, and motor neuron disorders like amyotrophic lateral sclerosis. Evoked potentials: This is a test that gives a picture of how swiftly the electrical signals reach the brain from your eyes, ears, or touch to your skin. The test can help diagnose multiple sclerosis, acoustic neuromas, and spinal cord injuries. Angiography: Angiography helps in diagnosing if the blood vessels in your brain, head, or neck have blockages, damage, or abnormalities. It helps in analyzing aneurysms and blood clots. Cerebrospinal fluid analysis: This test includes the removal of a fluid sample that surrounds the patient’s brain and spinal cord. The test helps in diagnosing whether there is a brain bleed, infection, multiple sclerosis, or metabolic disease. Biopsy: A biopsy is about removing a tissue from the human body, which may be a muscle, nerve, or brain tissue. Neurologists prescribe patients medications, physical therapy, or other approaches. The Big Apollo Spectra Neurologist in Patna gives the best consultation and treatment advice but does not perform surgery. If any patient needs surgery, they are referred to a neurosurgeon. For certain people, a multi Speciality team strategy is used, which includes a neurologist, neurosurgeon, physiotherapist, and other medical practitioners as appropriate. Depending on your condition, your treatment may include one or more of the following: Medicines: Modern-day medicines are quite effective in treating neurological disorders. The treatment plan is individualized by your doctor depending on both the disease and the patient's characteristics. Physical or occupational therapy This is therapy performed by an occupational therapist to improve movement symptoms and prevent further complications. For instance, proper movement of the arms and legs may curb muscle tightness and weakness in cases of paralysis or mobility loss. The gradual increase in exercise may boost your capacity to move. Speech therapy. If you have complications related to speech or swallowing, a consultation with a speech therapist may be helpful. Stress reduction or distraction techniques Stress reduction techniques comprise progressive muscle relaxation, respiratory exercises, physical movement, and workouts. Distraction techniques such as music, conversation, and deliberately changing the walking style also help. Mental health options: Functional Neurological problems are not everything about what is in your head; the way you think also has an impact on the signs of the disorders and recovery. Psychiatric treatment choices are: Cognitive behavioral therapy (CBT): This is a kind of psychotherapy that indicates the negative thought process and inaccurate thinking, which can aid you in analyzing situations better and responding effectively. CBT also helps you manage stressful lifestyles, situations, and symptoms. It is a very helpful treatment if you suffer from epileptic seizures. A few other kinds of psychotherapy may help in treating interpersonal problems, trauma, or abuse histories. Treating other mental health conditions. Anxiety, depression, or other mental health complications worsen neurological disorders. Treating mental health along with functional neurologic disorders helps in quick recovery. If you are in search of a head specialist doctor near you, Big Apollo Spectra Patna is your one-stop trustworthy multi Speciality hospital to get the best neurological treatment.

https://bigapollospectra.com/service/neurology

Health

en

An anal abscess is a painful condition in which a collection of pus develops near the anus. Most anal abscesses are a result of infection from small anal glands. The most common type of abscess is a perianal abscess. This often appears as a painful boil-like swelling near the anus. It may be red in color and warm to the touch. Anal abscesses located in deeper tissue are less common and may be less visible. Surgical incision and drainage is the most common treatment for all types of anal abscesses and is usually successful. About 50% of patients with an anal abscess will develop a complication called a fistula. A fistula is a small tunnel that makes an abnormal connection between the site of the abscess and the skin. In some cases, an anal fistula causes persistent drainage. In other cases, where the outside of the tunnel opening closes, the result may be recurrent anal abscesses. Surgery is needed to cure almost all anal fistulas. Causes of Anal Abscesses An anal abscess can have many different causes. These include: - An anal fissure, a tear in the anal canal, that becomes infected - Sexually transmitted infections - Blocked anal glands Risk factors for anal abscesses include: - Inflammatory bowel disease such as Crohn's disease or ulcerative colitis - Pelvic inflammatory disease - Being the receptive partner in anal sex - Use of medications such as prednisone For adults, using condoms during sexual intercourse, including anal intercourse, can help prevent anal abscesses. For infants and toddlers, frequent diaper changes and proper cleaning during diaper changes can help prevent anal fistulas and perianal abscesses. Symptoms of Anal Abscesses Superficial anal abscesses are often associated with: - Pain, which is usually constant, throbbing, and worse when sitting down - Skin irritation around the anus, including swelling, redness, and tenderness - Discharge of pus - Constipation or pain associated with bowel movements Deeper anal abscesses may also be associated with: Sometimes, fever is the only symptom of deep anal abscesses. Diagnosis of Anal Abscesses Usually, a clinical evaluation -- including a digital rectal exam -- is sufficient to diagnose an anal abscess. But some patients may require additional tests to screen for: - Sexually transmitted infections - inflammatory bowel disease - Diverticular disease - Rectal cancer In rare cases, an examination may be done under anesthesia. The doctor may also ask for an ultrasound, a CT scan, or an MRI. Treatment of Anal Abscesses Prompt surgical drainage is important, preferably before the abscess erupts. Superficial anal abscesses can be drained in a doctor's office using a local anesthetic. Large or deeper anal abscesses may require hospitalization and the assistance of an anesthesiologist. After the procedure, most people are prescribed medications for pain relief. For otherwise healthy people, antibiotics are usually not needed. Antibiotics may be required, though, for some people, including those with diabetes or decreased immunity. Sometimes, fistula surgery can be performed at the same time as abscess surgery. However, fistulas often develop four to six weeks after an abscess is drained. Sometimes a fistula may not occur until months or even years later. So fistula surgery is usually a separate procedure that can be performed on an outpatient basis or with a short hospital stay. After abscess or fistula surgery, discomfort is usually mild and can be controlled with pain medications. People can expect to lose only a minimal amount of time from work or school. People are usually advised to soak the affected area in a warm water (sitz) bath three or four times per day. Stool softeners may be recommended to ease the discomfort of bowel movements. Some people may be advised to wear a gauze pad or mini-pad to prevent the drainage from soiling their clothes. Complications after surgery can include: - Anal fissure - An abscess returning After an anal abscess or fistula has properly healed, it's unlikely that the problem will come back. To prevent one from doing so, however, it's important to follow the advice of your doctor or colon and rectal surgeon.

https://www.webmd.com/a-to-z-guides/anal-abscess

Health

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Walking while wearing it can power small electronic devices like a watch or torch. Researchers in China have developed a backpack that turns the energy of walking into electricity. Backpacks that can generate energy have been made before, but previously they have been relatively inefficient - meaning the power output was low. This new prototype generates enough electricity from walking to power an electric watch. It has “promising potential to be a power source for small-scale wearable and portable electronics, GPS systems, and other self-powered health care sensors,” according to the study. Zhong Lin Wang, Jia Cheng and their colleagues wanted to create something that also made it easier to carry a heavy bag. Alongside generating energy to power a torch or even your smartwatch on a long hike, the prototype also makes whatever you are carrying feel around 20 per cent lighter. Once the efficiency of the backpack is improved, the researchers believe that it could be useful for athletes, explorers and even those involved in disaster rescue efforts where there is no access to electricity. How to generate electricity from human movement The tech that makes this possible is called a triboelectric nanogenerator (TENG). It’s a small scale generator that can turn movements like human motion, vibration from machines or vehicles, wind and wave energy into electricity. TENGs make use of an effect we all typically experience in our daily lives, usually when taking our clothes out of a dryer. Two pieces of material, usually plastic, rub together from these low frequency movements creating a static charge. This charge is then harvested and can be used to charge low-power devices. Aside from potentially meaning you may never have to charge your smartwatch again, it has some useful applications for renewable energy. TENGs are low cost and mean all kinds of otherwise wasted energy can be put to use. In 2019 scientists added them to solar panels to allow them to generate electricity at night from rainfall. Similar electromagnetic generators have also been used to turn pavements, roads and even dancefloors into energy sources. Experts say that it would be “impossible to power the world on human energy alone”, but they believe the tech has applications in the future. With smart cities being built around the world, they are confident that more and more urban planners will start to look into the possibility of harvesting the energy of movement.

https://www.euronews.com/living/2021/02/04/this-backpack-harvests-wasted-energy-from-human-movement

Phones

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In this article, we’re going to look at the tools of smartphone connectivity (Bluetooth WiFi and Infrared). Smartphones are devices designed for communication and connectivity. Thus their primary function is communication. Smartphones come with a range of tools that help them carry out this function. Communication and connectivity entail being able to access mobile broadband, as well as the Internet. It also means connecting to other electronic devices such as smartphones, Bluetooth headsets, smartwatches, smart TVs etc. Read: USB VERSIONS AND SPEED STANDARDS The main connections used by phones include Internet/mobile broadband, USB, Bluetooth WiFi, and Infrared technology. Bluetooth WiFi and Infrared technology As you may have noticed, all of the following except one are wireless. The shift from using wired communications to wireless started as far back as the 1980s. Modern smartphones today are almost all wireless except for their charging ports (the high-end phones have wireless charging). These were all made possible by the addition of radios and modems to the smartphone. Sometimes, these radios are embedded into the SoC. Other times they are attached to the motherboard outside of the SoC. Bluetooth is a wireless standard used for exchanging data between devices. This could be between fixed (e.g. Personal Computers) and/or mobile devices (e.g. smartphones) over short distances. It was introduced in 1989. Bluetooth was first used in phones in 2001 appearing in the Ericsson T36. It quickly became popular and replaced the older and slower Infrared means of inter-device communication. 1. File sharing: Its major use was for file transfer e.g. documents, multimedia, etc. It is only used to transfer small files these days. This is because file sizes have gotten larger and it is impracticable to send them via Bluetooth. 2. Interconnectivity between devices: this is now the primary use of Bluetooth technology especially in this age of IoT (Internet of Things). The inter-device connection includes a headset to a smartphone, a smartphone to a smartwatch, and a printer to a PC. It also includes smartphones to PCs or printers, video game consoles to controllers (gamepads), etc. The first generation Bluetooth radios, Bluetooth version 1.0 was released in 1999. It had a speed of 1 Mbps (megabit per second) which is equivalent to 0.125 megabytes per second. Its range was very short (10 meters) and it consumed a lot of battery. It could also only connect to one device at a time. Bluetooth 1.0B (2001), Bluetooth 1.1 (2001), and Bluetooth 1.2 (2003) only came with very minor improvements. The second generation Bluetooth 2.0+ EDR (Enhanced Data Range) was released in 2004. It was an improvement on the first generation. It could transfer data at 2 to 3 Mbps (0.25 to 0.375 MB/s) but it didn’t improve on the range or battery consumption. A slight upgrade known as Bluetooth 2.1+ EDR was released in 2007. The third generation promised much and delivered on its promise. Well, at the expense of huge battery consumption. The version 3.0+ HS (High Speed) is still used by many headphones today because it transfers data at speeds of up to 24Mbps (3 MB/s) and consumes a lot of battery as well. The fourth generation took a different approach. It was aimed at low-energy devices like fitness trackers, smartwatches, mice and keyboards, true wireless (TWS) earbuds, etc. The version 4.0 LE (Low Energy) was released in 2010. Version 4.0 transfers data at 1Mbps. Further revisions included the 4.1 (2013) and 4.2 (2014). The current generation is the 5th Bluetooth generation (i.e. Bluetooth 5.0). It improves on 4.0 by increasing data transmission speeds but maintaining low power consumption. Bluetooth 5.0 has data transmission speeds of 2 Mbps and a range of 240 meters which when compared to the old 10-meter range is massive. In addition, Bluetooth 5.0 consumes less battery and has lower latencies when compared to its predecessors. The Current iterations include Bluetooth 5.1, 5.2, and 5.3. This is a family of wireless network protocols based on the IEE802.11 family of standards for Local Area Networks (LAN) and Internet Alliance. It is the wireless equivalent of Ethernet (a wired internet connection). Wi-Fi uses a radio antenna and bands (just like Bluetooth) to transmit data (files or internet). Wi-Fi can send data over very large areas. It works best if there is no obstruction between the access point (or hotspot) and the receiver. A smartphone’s Wi-Fi hotspot has a range of 20 to 150 meters. Like any wireless network, it is less secure than wired connections. This is why most people are advised against using insecure Wi-Fi connections in public places. This is to prevent them from being hacked and their data stolen. Inter-device connectivity: Wi-Fi is used to connect two devices wirelessly. File Sharing: A lot of apps have been developed to take advantage of this. The most popular of these is Xender which took over from a one-time favorite, Flash Share. Wi-Fi can be used to send large amounts of data within a fairly short time. Internet Sharing: Wi-Fi can also be used to share internet connectivity between two devices with one acting as a hotspot (host) and the other acting as a receiver. Examples include phone-to-phone internet data sharing via hotspot as well as a Wi-Fi router to a Smartphone or PC. Screencasting: Newer smart TVs come equipped with Wi-Fi. The regular TVs that do not come with Wi-Fi can be fitted with a Wi-Fi receiver to which audiovisual data from your smartphone or laptop can be streamed to your TV set. City-wide Internet: Many cities in first-world countries have city-wide Internet where the Internet is transmitted to the populace by the means of powerful routers strategically placed all over the city. These could be free, subsidized, or paid for. Geolocation: The position of a phone can be pinpointed by locating the nearest Wi-Fi to which a phone is connected. Infrared ( or IR for short) wireless is the use of wireless technology to send/transfer data. It is used for short and medium-range connections. Infrared rays are generated by the phone as pulses of light which are focused through a piece of semi-transparent plastic called an IR blaster. This piece of plastic is then aimed at the receiving device which accepts the information. The IR blaster is usually found at the top of the phone. IR technology is very old and was once used on phones as the primary method of file sharing but it was painfully slow and was soon replaced by Bluetooth in the early 2000’s. it is used these days to turn smartphones into universal remotes for household and/or car appliances. Bluetooth WiFi and Infrared are now indispensable to smartphone connectivity. We simply can’t do without them. This brings us to the very end of this post, thank you for reading to the end. Please leave a comment if you have any difficulty and remember to: - Subscribe to our YouTube channel - Follow on Facebook - Join our Telegram community - Participate on Reddit - Find us on Quora - Follow us on Instagram - Check out the Clubhouse as well As always, it’s always a blast visiting your site and reading the updated are ways informative. Keep up the good work. Thank you very much. Hope you had a great time?

https://inquisitiveuniverse.com/2020/09/20/smartphone-connectivity-bluetooth-wifi-and-infrared/

Phones

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Easter is one of the most important holidays in Christianity, celebrated by billions of people around the world. However, the spiritual significance of Easter goes far beyond just bunnies, eggs, and candy. At its core, Easter commemorates the resurrection of Jesus Christ, which is central to the Christian faith. But what does this event represent on a deeper, spiritual level? The Symbolism of Easter The celebration of Easter holds deep spiritual significance for Christians, as the holiday commemorates the resurrection of Jesus Christ. At the heart of this event lies a profound symbolic narrative that resonates across many religious and spiritual traditions. The resurrection of Jesus is viewed by Christians as a triumph over the powers of sin and death. Through his crucifixion and rising from the grave, Jesus conquered the forces of evil and opened the path to eternal life for as many that believe in him. This core narrative of death and rebirth is a powerful symbol that speaks to the human experience of overcoming adversity, transforming our limitations, and discovering new possibilities. The timing of Easter, which falls on the first Sunday after the full moon following the spring equinox, further enhances the symbolic richness of the holiday. The spring equinox represents a point of balance and equilibrium in the natural world, as day and night become equal in length. Similarly, Easter signifies a spiritual rebirth and renewal, as the darkness of sin and death gives way to the light of salvation and new life. Many of the iconic Easter symbols also carry deep spiritual undertones. Eggs, for instance, are seen as a symbol of fertility, new life, and transformation. The egg’s hard shell represents the tomb from which Jesus emerged, while the newly hatched chick symbolizes the resurrection and the dawning of a new era. Rabbits and hares, too, are associated with springtime and the idea of abundance and proliferation, reflecting the theme of renewal and the proliferation of life. Even the vibrant colors of Easter, such as pastels and bright whites, evoke a sense of freshness, hope, and divine radiance. These hues stand in contrast to the somber tones of Lent, the 40-day period of fasting and reflection that precedes Easter, and signify the triumph of light over darkness. In the end, the symbolism of Easter serves as a reminder that even in the face of life’s greatest challenges, there is always the possibility of transformation and the dawning of a new, brighter chapter. It is a timeless message of hope, redemption, and the boundless potential of the human spirit. The Invitation of Easter “Therefore, if anyone is in Christ, the new creation has come: The old has gone, the new is here!” (2 Corinthians 5:17) At the core of the Easter celebration lies a profound invitation – one that transcends the boundaries of any single religious tradition and speaks to the universal yearnings of the human spirit. This invitation is rooted in the central narrative of the resurrection of Jesus Christ, which Christians believe represents a triumph over the powers of sin and death. For Christians, the resurrection of Jesus is a testament to the transformative power of faith and the promise of eternal life. Through his crucifixion and rising from the grave, Jesus is believed to have conquered the forces of evil and opened the path to redemption and salvation for all who believe in him. This core narrative of death and rebirth is a powerful symbol that resonates across many spiritual traditions, inviting us to confront our own mortality and to embrace the possibility of spiritual renewal. But the invitation of Easter extends far beyond the Christian faith. The universal themes of overcoming darkness, finding light, and experiencing renewal that are so central to the Easter story offer a powerful invitation to all of us, regardless of our religious affiliation or spiritual orientation. At its heart, the message of Easter is one of redemption, forgiveness, and the possibility of spiritual transformation. It invites us to let go of the “old self” – our burdens, our mistakes, our fears – and to embrace the promise of a “new life” filled with grace, love, and the potential for profound growth. By contemplating the deeper meaning behind the holiday’s rituals and symbols, we can uncover profound insights that can nourish our souls and inspire us to live with greater purpose, meaning, and connection. The vibrant colors of Easter, the symbols of new life and abundance, and the narrative of resurrection all beckon us to shed the weight of the past and to step into a future filled with hope and possibility. Whether we are facing personal struggles, navigating the complexities of the modern world, or simply seeking a deeper sense of meaning and purpose, the invitation of Easter offers a wellspring of wisdom and inspiration. It reminds us that even in the face of life’s greatest challenges, there is always the possibility of transformation and the dawning of a new, brighter chapter. By embracing this invitation, we open ourselves to the possibility of spiritual renewal and the rediscovery of our own innate wholeness and resilience. We are invited to let go of the limitations and burdens that have weighed us down, and to step into the light of a new, more expansive way of being. In the end, the invitation of Easter is not just a call to commemorate a historical event, but a timeless invitation to embark on a journey of personal and spiritual growth. It challenges us to let go of the past, to confront our fears, and to embrace the boundless potential of the human spirit. And in doing so, it holds the promise of a deeper, more meaningful and fulfilling life. Easter is a time of year when we are encouraged to look beyond the material trappings of the holiday and to explore the rich spiritual tapestry that lies beneath. By reflecting on the resurrection narrative and the archetypal themes of death, rebirth, and transformation, we can uncover a wellspring of wisdom that has the power to uplift, enlighten, and transform us. In doing so, we may just find that the true miracle of Easter resides not only in the past, but also in the eternal, sacred unfolding of our own lives.

https://faithfulhome.com.ng/spiritual-meaning-of-easter/

Religion

en

File Transfer Simplified: A file transfer is the process of copying a file from one computer to another. File transfers can be done over a network, such as the Internet, or they can be done locally, such as between two computers connected by a cable. There are many different methods of file transfer, including: Local file transfer: This is the most common type of file transfer, and it is the simplest. When you copy a file from one computer to another, you are doing a local file transfer. The file is first copied to a temporary location on the first computer, and then it is copied from the temporary location to the second computer. Remote file transfer: A remote file transfer is one that is done over a network. The file is first copied to a server, and then it is downloaded from the server to the second computer. FTP: FTP, or File Transfer Protocol, is a common method of remote file transfer. FTP is a standard protocol that is used by many file transfer programs. HTTP: HTTP, or Hypertext Transfer Protocol, is another common method of remote file transfer. HTTP is the protocol that is used by web browsers to request web pages from web servers. Bitcoin: Bitcoin is a decentralized digital currency that can be used for peer-to-peer file transfer. There are several things to consider when choosing a file transfer method: Speed: How fast do you need the file to be transferred? Security: How important is security? Ease of use: How easy is it to use the file transfer method? Compatibility: Is the file transfer method compatible with the computers and software that you are using? Cost: Is the file transfer method free, or is there a charge for using it? There are many different methods of file transfer, and each has its own advantages and disadvantages. The best method of file transfer for you will depend on your needs and preferences.

https://shrinkme.cc/JAYLeqc

Health

en

A new set of Dead Sea Scrolls, ancient fragments of biblical texts dating back almost 2,000 years and thought to have been hidden during a Jewish revolt against Rome, have been found in an Israeli desert. The Israel Antiquities Authority announced Tuesday that a four-year archaeological project uncovered portions of the Book of the Twelve Minor Prophets, including the books of Zechariah and Nahum. It was the first such discovery in 60 years. Also uncovered was a 6,000-year-old skeleton of a partially mummified child and a 10,500-year-old basket, which Israeli authorities said could be the oldest in the world. A CT scan revealed the child's age was between 6 and 12 — with the skin, tendons and even hair partially preserved. Among the recovered texts, which are all in Greek, is Nahum 1:5–6, which says: "The mountains quake because of Him, And the hills melt. The earth heaves before Him, The world and all that dwell therein. Who can stand before His wrath? Who can resist His fury? His anger pours out like fire, and rocks are shattered because of Him." The authority said these words differ slightly from other Bible versions, shedding a rare light on how biblical text changed over time from its earliest form. The first set of Dead Sea Scrolls to be discovered were found by a Bedouin shepherd in the same area in 1947 and are considered among the most important archaeological finds of the 20th century, although biblical scholars disagree on their authorship. Download the NBC News app for breaking news and politics Most of those scrolls are in the Israel Museum in Jerusalem but both Jordan and the Palestinian Authority have disputed their ownership. Qumran in the West Bank, the site where the first scrolls were found, is part of land seized by Israel in the 1967 war and would be part of a future Palestinian state. "It is very exciting to see these finds and expose them to the public, finds which shed great light on our history," Avi Cohen, CEO of the Ministry of Jerusalem and Heritage, said. "These finds are not just important to our own cultural heritage, but to that of the entire world." Other items include a cache of coins bearing Jewish symbols, including a harp and a date palm, arrowheads and spearheads, woven fabric, sandals and lice combs — all thought to date from the end of the Bar Kokhba Revolt (132-136 A.D.), in which Jews fought against Roman rule in Judea. The treasures were found in what the Antiquities Authority called the "Cave of Horror" in the Judean Desert. The area's unique dry climate means documents found there have survived in unusually good condition. Using methods more likely to be seen in a Hollywood movie than in an archaeological project, researchers had to rappel down a precarious cliff face to reach the cave opening, which is 262 feet below a cliff top and flanked by gorges on either side. Drones were also used to survey hard-to-reach parts of caves. The authority was keen to point out in its announcement Tuesday that accessing the cave is forbidden on safety grounds. The remarkable discoveries were made during an Israeli project to prevent looting in the Holy Land, which experts says has been a constant threat to undiscovered artifacts since the first Dead Sea Scrolls discovery. Antiquities Authority Director Israel Hasson, who launched the operation, urged the Israeli government to do more to protect other undiscovered treasures. "The newly discovered scroll fragments are a wake-up call to the state. Resources must be allocated for the completion of this historically important operation," he said. "We must ensure that we recover all the data that has not yet been discovered in the caves, before the robbers do. Some things are beyond value." CORRECTION: (March 18, 2021, 09:30 a.m. ET): A previous version of this article misstated when the Cave of Horror was discovered. It was first excavated in the 1960s, not in 2017. CORRECTION: (March 18, 2021, 12:35 p.m. ET): An earlier version of this article misstated the location of the cave where the new Dead Sea scrolls were found. The cave is in Israel, not the West Bank.

https://www.nbcnews.com/news/amp/ncna1261182

Religion

en

How African-Americans and African Immigrants Differ The rift between African-Americans and recent African immigrants to the United States. November 16, 2013 As an immigrant to the United States from Sierra Leone, I perceive a huge chasm between African-Americans and African immigrants in the United States. That chasm has widened over the years. It has caused deep animosity between many African-Americans and their African immigrant cousins. The chasm has prevented African-Americans from participating in the current economic boom in Africa and it has shut many African immigrants out of opportunities for economic advancement here in the United States. The problem stems from deep misconceptions, sometimes fueled by the U.S. media. Astonishingly, many African-Americans believe that Africans are backward and primitive. Some make crude jokes about Africans or do not acknowledge the great contribution Africa has made to the world. For their part, many African immigrants buy into the erroneous notion that African-Americans are lazy and violent. They do not appreciate the great sacrifice African-Americans made, through advocating for their civil rights, to lay the foundation for Africans to be able to come to the United States and live in a country where both blacks and whites have equal rights, at least in theory if not always in practice. The different experiences of the two groups To understand the deep division that exists between African Americans and Africans, one first has to examine the background of the two groups. Before migrating to the United States, most Africans have typically dealt with white Americans who went to Africa as Peace Corps volunteers, missionaries, doctors or teachers. These Americans acted as mentors and guardians to the Africans and developed positive relationships with them. When they come to the United States, it has been my experience that Africans can easily identify with white Americans because they understand each other. Before migrating to the United States, the majority of Africans have had little to no direct negative experiences with whites. They simply do not hate them. On the other hand, most African-Americans grew up in black neighborhoods where they learned from older generations the history of slavery and the cruelty it inflicted on the black race. Furthermore, they have usually experienced firsthand and in their communities the legacies of racism that still exist in the United States. With this background, many African-Americans are not generally predisposed to trust white Americans, and they look down on those African immigrants who express respect or admiration for white Americans. How they react to racism and discrimination A fundamental difference between African Americans and African immigrants is the way they react to racism and discrimination. African Americans usually see racism as the main cause of poverty among their people. They are also quick to point out instances of perceived racism, even in circumstances where it is ambiguous, unclear or more complex than simple racial bigotry or discrimination. A classic example is the currently large African-American population in prison. Most African-Americans feel that the only reason there are so many African Americans incarcerated is their race. They blame police discrimination and lawmakers who make laws weighted to punish blacks. For Africans, after suffering many years in civil wars, military coups and other problems, they are happy to be in a country that offers them freedom. They are ready to integrate into the American culture without getting involved in the lingering racial conflicts. They do not typically get involved in the ongoing civil rights struggle – and that has angered many African-Americans. How they react to adversity Perhaps the greatest difference I have seen between African immigrants and African-Americans is how they react to adversity. Most African immigrants to the United States came here for economic advancement. They do not have any political agenda. They are willing to take any job and do not blame the “system” when they fail in their endeavors. Most African immigrants to the United States often live in mixed neighborhoods instead of black neighborhoods and they easily integrate. African immigrants know who they are. They are not easily offended when someone tries to put them down. They know where they come from and why they are here. For African-Americans, there is often a tendency to blame slavery for most of the problems they face today. For instance, when African American students fail in school, some educators blame slavery and do not look for other factors. However, the time has come for African Americans to realize that while racism still persists, the best thing they can do for their children is to teach them to take full responsibility for their actions. Fathers need to take care of their children and young women need to stay in school instead of having children. It is only when black people, be they from Africa or America, unite to instill discipline and respect for each other that the chasm that has divided us will narrow. Then we can finally work together to remove poverty from our people both here in the United States and Africa.

https://www.theglobalist.com/african-americans-african-immigrants-differ/

Culture

en

Female genital mutilation (FGM) exacts a crippling economic as well as the human cost, according to the World Health Organization (WHO). “FGM is not only a catastrophic abuse of human rights that significantly harms the physical and mental health of millions of girls and women; it is also a drain on a country’s vital economic resources,” said Dr Ian Askew, Director of WHO’s Department of Sexual and Reproductive Health and Research. “More investment is urgently needed to stop FGM and end the suffering it inflicts.” New modeling reveals that the total costs of treating the health impacts of FGM would amount to USD 1.4 billion globally per year if all resulting medical needs were addressed. For individual countries, these costs would near 10% of their entire yearly expenditure on health on average; in some countries, this figure rises to as much as 30%. The interactive modeling tool that generated these data was launched on the International Day of Zero Tolerance for Female Genital Mutilation. Severe physical and mental health impacts for women and girls Women and girls living with FGM face serious risks to their health and well-being. These include immediate consequences after being cut, such as infections, bleeding or psychological trauma, as well as chronic health conditions that can occur throughout life. Women who have undergone the procedure are more likely to experience life-threatening complications during childbirth. They may face mental health disorders or suffer chronic infections. They may also have pain or problems when they menstruate, urinate or have sexual intercourse. All of these conditions warrant much-needed medical attention and care. “High healthcare costs for countries mount because of the tragic personal impacts on women and girls. Governments have a moral responsibility to help end this harmful practice,” says Dr Prosper Tumusiime, Acting Director for Universal Health Coverage and the Life Course in the African Regional Office of WHO. “FGM hurts girls, imposes lifelong health risks on the women they become, and strains the healthcare systems that need to treat them.” Preventing FGM brings major benefits for women, girls, communities, and economies Using data from 27 high-prevalence countries, the Cost Calculator demonstrates clear economic benefits from ending FGM. If it were abandoned now, it shows that the associated savings in health costs would be more than 60% by 2050. In contrast, if no action is taken, it is estimated that these costs will soar by 50% over the same time period, as populations grow and as more girls undergo the procedure. Since 1997, great efforts have been made to end FGM, through work within communities, research, and changes in legislation and policy. 26 countries in Africa and the Middle East now explicitly legislate against FGM, as well as 33 other countries with migrant populations from FGM-practicing countries. WHO is also working with countries to raise awareness of the harmful impacts of the practice among their health workers, and to engage them in prevention efforts. “Many countries and communities are showing that abandoning female genital mutilation is possible,” states Dr. Christina Pallitto, a scientist at WHO. “If countries invest to end female genital mutilation, they can prevent their girls from undergoing this harmful practice and promote the health, rights, and well-being of women and girls.” Female genital mutilation is internationally recognized as a human rights violation. It has no medical benefits and causes only harm. WHO’s position is that FGM must never be carried out.

https://brandspurng.com/2020/02/07/treating-female-genital-mutilation-costs-usd-1-4-billion-per-year-globally-who/

Health

en

Franklin D. Roosevelt Our editors will review what you’ve submitted and determine whether to revise the article. - PBS - American Experience - Biography of Franklin Delano Roosevelt - GlobalSecurity.org - Franklin D. Roosevelt (1933- April 1945) - University of Houston - Digital History - President Roosevelt and the WPA - Brown University Library - Center For Digital Scholarship - “Roosevelt Corollary,” Theodore Roosevelt (1904) - United States Holocaust Memorial Museum - Holocaust Encyclopedia - Franklin Delano Roosevelt - Legends of America - President Franklin D. Roosevelt - The American Presidency Project - Fireside Chats (F. Roosevelt) - The White House - Biography of Franklin D. Roosevelt When was Franklin D. Roosevelt born? When did Franklin D. Roosevelt die? What is Franklin D. Roosevelt best known for? Where did Franklin D. Roosevelt go to school? When did Franklin D. Roosevelt get married? (born January 30, 1882, Hyde Park, New York, U.S.—died April 12, 1945, Warm Springs, Georgia) was the 32nd president of the United States (1933–45). The only president elected to the office four times, Roosevelt led the United States through two of the greatest crises of the 20th century: the Great Depression and World War II. In so doing, he greatly expanded the powers of the federal government through a series of programs and reforms known as the New Deal, and he served as the principal architect of the successful effort to rid the world of German National Socialism and Japanese militarism. Roosevelt was the only child of James and Sara Delano Roosevelt. The family lived in unostentatious and genteel luxury, dividing its time between the family estate in the Hudson River valley of New York state and European resorts. Young Roosevelt was educated privately at home until age 14, when he entered Groton Preparatory School in Groton, Massachusetts. At Groton, as at home, he was reared to be a gentleman, assuming responsibility for those less fortunate and exercising Christian stewardship through public service. In 1900 Roosevelt entered Harvard University, where he spent most of his time on extracurricular activities and a strenuous social life; his academic record was undistinguished. It was during his Harvard years that he fell under the spell of his fifth cousin, Pres. Theodore Roosevelt, the progressive champion who advocated a vastly increased role for the government in the nation’s economy. It was also during his Harvard years that he fell in love with Theodore Roosevelt’s niece, Eleanor Roosevelt, who was then active in charitable work for the poor in New York City. The distant cousins became engaged during Roosevelt’s final year at Harvard, and they were married on March 17, 1905. Eleanor would later open her husband’s eyes to the deplorable state of the poor in New York’s slums. Roosevelt attended Columbia University Law School but was not much interested in his studies. After passing the New York bar exam, he went to work as a clerk for the distinguished Wall Street firm of Carter, Ledyard, and Milburn, but he displayed the same attitude of indifference toward the legal profession as he had toward his education. At a glance: the Roosevelt presidency Early political activities Motivated by his cousin Theodore, who continued to urge young men of privileged backgrounds to enter public service, Roosevelt looked for an opportunity to launch a career in politics. That opportunity came in 1910, when Democratic Party leaders of Dutchess county, New York, persuaded him to undertake an apparently futile attempt to win a seat in the state senate. Roosevelt, whose branch of the family had always voted Democratic, hesitated only long enough to make sure his distinguished Republican Party relative would not speak against him. He campaigned strenuously and won the election. Not quite 29 when he took his seat in Albany, he quickly won statewide and even some national attention by leading a small group of Democratic insurgents who refused to support Billy Sheehan, the candidate for the United States Senate backed by Tammany Hall, the New York City Democratic organization. For three months Roosevelt helped hold the insurgents firm, and Tammany was forced to switch to another candidate. In the New York Senate Roosevelt learned much of the give-and-take of politics, and he gradually abandoned his patrician airs and attitude of superiority. In the process, he came to champion the full program of progressive reform. By 1911 Roosevelt was supporting progressive New Jersey Gov. Woodrow Wilson for the Democratic presidential nomination of 1912. In that year Roosevelt was reelected to the state senate, despite an attack of typhoid fever that prevented him from making public appearances during the campaign. His success was attributable in part to the publicity generated by an Albany journalist, Louis McHenry Howe. Howe saw in the tall, handsome Roosevelt a politician with great promise, and he remained dedicated to Roosevelt for the rest of his life. For his work on behalf of Wilson, Roosevelt was appointed assistant secretary of the navy in March 1913. Roosevelt loved the sea and naval traditions, and he knew more about them than did his superior, navy secretary Josephus Daniels, with whom he was frequently impatient. Roosevelt tried with mixed success to bring reforms to the navy yards, which were under his jurisdiction, meanwhile learning to negotiate with labor unions among the navy’s civilian employees. After war broke out in Europe in 1914, Roosevelt became a vehement advocate of military preparedness, and following U.S. entry into the war in 1917, he built a reputation as an effective administrator. In the summer of 1918 he made an extended tour of naval bases and battlefields overseas. Upon his return, Eleanor Roosevelt discovered that her husband had been romantically involved with her social secretary, Lucy Mercer. She offered him a divorce; he refused and promised never to see Mercer again (a promise he would break in the 1940s). Although the Roosevelts agreed to remain together, their relationship ceased to be an intimate one.

https://www.britannica.com/biography/Franklin-D-Roosevelt/The-Second-New-DealThanks

Politics

en

Cascading Style Sheets — or CSS — is the first technology you should start learning after HTML. While HTML is used to define the structure and semantics of your content, CSS is used to style it and lay it out. For example, you can use CSS to alter the font, color, size, and spacing of your content, split it into multiple columns, or add animations and other decorative features. You should learn the basics of HTML before attempting any CSS. We recommend that you work through our Introduction to HTML module first. Once you understand the fundamentals of HTML, we recommend that you learn further HTML and CSS at the same time, moving back and forth between the two topics. This is because HTML is far more interesting and much more fun to learn when you apply CSS, and you can't learn CSS without knowing HTML. Before starting this topic, you should also be familiar with using computers and using the web passively (i.e., just looking at it, consuming the content). You should have a basic work environment set up, as detailed in Installing basic software, and understand how to create and manage files, as detailed in Dealing with files — both of which are parts of our Getting started with the web complete beginner's module. It is also recommended that you work through Getting started with the web before proceeding with this topic, especially if you are completely new to web development. However, much of what is covered in its CSS basics article is also covered in our CSS first steps module, albeit in a lot more detail. This topic contains the following modules, in a suggested order for working through them. You should start with the first one. - CSS first steps CSS (Cascading Style Sheets) is used to style and layout web pages — for example, to alter the font, color, size, and spacing of your content, split it into multiple columns, or add animations and other decorative features. This module provides a gentle beginning to your path towards CSS mastery with the basics of how it works, what the syntax looks like, and how you can start using it to add styling to HTML. - CSS building blocks This module carries on where CSS first steps left off — now you've gained familiarity with the language and its syntax, and got some basic experience with using it, it's time to dive a bit deeper. This module looks at the cascade and inheritance, all the selector types we have available, units, sizing, styling backgrounds and borders, debugging, and lots more. The aim here is to provide you with a toolkit for writing competent CSS and help you understand all the essential theory, before moving on to more specific disciplines like text styling and CSS layout. - CSS styling text With the basics of the CSS language covered, the next CSS topic for you to concentrate on is styling text — one of the most common things you'll do with CSS. Here we look at text styling fundamentals, including setting font, boldness, italics, line and letter spacing, drop shadows, and other text features. We round off the module by looking at applying custom fonts to your page, and styling lists and links. - CSS layout At this point, we've already looked at CSS fundamentals, how to style text, and how to style and manipulate the boxes that your content sits inside. Now it's time to look at how to place your boxes in the right place with respect to the viewport, and one another. We have covered the necessary prerequisites so we can now dive deep into CSS layout, looking at different display settings, modern layout tools like flexbox, CSS grid, and positioning, and some of the legacy techniques you might still want to know about. Use CSS to solve common problems provides links to sections of content explaining how to use CSS to solve very common problems when creating a web page. From the beginning, you'll primarily apply colors to HTML elements and their backgrounds; change the size, shape, and position of elements; and add and define borders on elements. But there's not much you can't do once you have a solid understanding of even the basics of CSS. One of the best things about learning CSS is that once you know the fundamentals, usually you have a pretty good feel for what can and can't be done, even if you don't know how to do it yet! CSS works a bit differently from most programming languages and design tools you'll come across. Why does it work the way it does? In the following video, Miriam Suzanne provides a useful explanation of why CSS works as it does, and why it has evolved as it has: - CSS on MDN The main entry point for CSS documentation on MDN, where you'll find detailed reference documentation for all features of the CSS language. Want to know all the values a property can take? This is a good place to go.

https://developer.mozilla.org/en-US/docs/Learn/CSS

Programming

en

Chances are you've heard about horsepower. Just about every car ad on TV mentions it, people talking about their cars bandy the word about and even most lawn mowers have a big sticker on them to tell you how much horsepower the engine has. But what is horsepower, and how much horsepower does a horse have? What does the horsepower rating mean in terms of power output, and why are car enthusiasts obsessed with horsepower? Here, you'll learn exactly what horsepower is and how you can apply it to your everyday life. The term horsepower was invented by the engineer James Watt. Watt lived from 1736 to 1819 and is most famous for his work on improving the power output of steam engines. We are also reminded of him every day when we talk about 60-watt light bulbs. How Much Horsepower Does a Horse Have? In short, 1 horsepower is equal to 33,000 foot-pounds per minute. The story goes that Watt was working with ponies lifting coal at a coal mine, and he wanted a way to talk about the power available from one of these animals. He found that, on average, a draft horse could do 22,000 foot-pounds of work in a minute. He then increased that number by 50 percent and pegged the measurement of one horsepower at 33,000 foot-pounds of work in one minute. It is that arbitrary unit of measure that has made its way down through the centuries from steam engines and now appears on your car, your lawn mower, your chain saw and even in some cases your vacuum cleaner. Although the steam engine is no longer relevant, all other engines and motors are subject to the same laws of physics, and that makes horsepower handy as a measurement standard. So, imagine a draft horse raising coal out of a coal mine as shown in this illustration. An average horse exerting one horsepower can theoretically raise 33,000 pounds of coal one foot in a minute, or 33 pounds of coal 1,000 feet in one minute, or 1,000 pounds 33 feet in one minute. Horsepower can be converted into other units as well. For example: 1 horsepower is equivalent to 746 watts. So if you took a 1-horsepower horse and put it on a treadmill, it could operate a generator producing a continuous 746 watts. 1 horsepower (over the course of an hour) is equivalent to 2,545 BTU (British thermal units). If you took that 746 watts and ran it through an electric heater for an hour, it would produce 2,545 BTU (where a BTU is the amount of energy needed to raise the temperature of 1 pound of water 1 degree F). One BTU is equal to 1,055 joules, or 252 gram-calories or 0.252 food calories. Presumably, a horse producing 1 horsepower would burn 641 Calories in one hour if it were 100 percent efficient. Some countries use a similar but distinct unit of power measurement known as the metric horsepower. This unit is officially defined as the amount of power it takes to raise a 75-kilogram mass one meter upwards in one second, and one metric horsepower is roughly equal to 98.6 percent of a standard horsepower unit. To find how much power an engine makes, you hook the engine up to a dynamometer. A dynamometer places a load on the engine and measures the amount of power that the engine can produce against the load. You can get an idea of how a dynamometer works in the following way: Imagine that you turn on a car engine, put it in neutral and floor it. The engine would run so fast it would explode. That's no good, so on a dynamometer you apply a load to the floored engine and measure the load the engine can handle at different engine speeds. You might hook an engine to a dynamometer, floor it and use the dynamometer to apply enough of a load to the engine to keep it at, say, 7,000 rpm. You record how much load the engine can handle. Then you apply additional load to knock the engine speed down to 6,500 rpm and record the load there. Then you apply additional load to get it down to 6,000 rpm, and so on. You can do the same thing starting down at 500 or 1,000 rpm and working your way up, giving you an impression of total engine output. What dynamometers actually measure is torque (in pound-feet), and to convert torque to horsepower you simply multiply torque by rpm/5,252. If you plot the average horsepower versus the rpm values for the engine, what you end up with is a horsepower curve for the engine. A typical horsepower curve for a high-performance engine might look like this (this happens to be the curve for the 300-horsepower engine in the Mitsubishi 3000 twin-turbo): What a graph like this points out is that any engine has a peak horsepower — an rpm value at which the power available from the engine is at its maximum output. An engine also has a peak torque at a specific rpm. You will often see this expressed in a brochure or a review in a magazine as "320 HP @ 6500 rpm, 290 lb-ft torque @ 5000 rpm" (the figures for the 1999 Shelby Series 1). When people say an engine has "lots of low-end torque," what they mean is that the peak torque occurs at a fairly low rpm value, like 2,000 or 3,000 rpm. Another thing you can see from a car's horsepower curve is the place where the engine has maximum power. When you are trying to accelerate quickly, you want to try to keep the engine close to its maximum horsepower point on the curve. That is why you often downshift to accelerate: By downshifting, you increase engine rpm, which typically moves you closer to the peak horsepower point on the curve. Imagine that you have a big socket wrench with a 2-foot-long handle on it, and you apply 50 pounds of force to that 2-foot handle. What you are doing is applying a torque, or turning force, of 100 pound-feet (50 pounds to a 2-foot-long handle) to the bolt. You could get the same 100 pound-feet of torque by applying 1 pound of force to the end of a 100-foot handle or 100 pounds of force to a 1-foot handle. From Steam Engines to High-performance Cars A car is considered to be "high performance" if it has a lot of power relative to the weight of the car, which makes sense. The more weight you have, the more power it takes to accelerate it. For a given amount of power you want to minimize the weight in order to maximize the acceleration. The following table shows you the horsepower and weight for several high-performance cars (and one low-performance car for comparison). In the chart you can see the peak horsepower, the weight of the car, the power-to-weight ratio (horsepower divided by the weight), the number of seconds the car takes to accelerate from zero to 60 mph, and the price. 0 to 60 mph (seconds) Ferrari 355 F1 Shelby Series 1 Lotus Esprit V8 Mitsubishi 3000GT twin-turbo You can see a very definite correlation between the power-to-weight ratio and the 0-to-60 mph time; in most cases, a higher ratio indicates a quicker car. If you want a fast car, you want a good power-to-weight ratio, meaning you want lots of power and minimal weight. So the first place to start is cleaning out your trunk. Why is it called horsepower? The term horsepower was invented by the engineer James Watt in order to market his new steam engines. The story goes that Watt was working with ponies lifting coal at a coal mine, and he wanted a way to talk about the power available from one of these animals compared to the power needed from a contemporary steam engine.. How do you calculate horsepower? If you want to know the horsepower of an engine, you hook the engine up to a dynamometer. A dynamometer places a load on the engine and measures the amount of power that the engine can produce against the load. What is one horsepower equal to? In Watt's judgement, one horse can do 33,000 foot-pounds of work every minute. What is engine horsepower? Horsepower rates the engine performance of cars. What is the use of horsepower in cars? A car is considered to be "high-performance" if it has a lot of power relative to the weight of the car, aka horsepower. For a given amount of power you want to minimize the weight in order to maximize the acceleration. Please copy/paste the following text to properly cite this HowStuffWorks.com article:

http://www.howstuffworks.com/horsepower.htm

Car Talk

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Although a wide variety of dermatological conditions and illnesses can cause itchy skin at night, most often the condition is due to xerosis, abnormally dry skin. Xerosis is most common in the winter, when there is little moisture in the air. The condition is not serious and can be treated with moisturizers. If itchy skin at night is chronic or accompanied by a rash, inflammation or scales, the cause may be an underlying illness and treatment should be sought from a dermatologist, a physician that specializes in diseases of the skin. Allergic dermatitis, or contact dermatitis, is caused when a person comes in contact with irritating lotion, soap, chemicals, plants or even jewelry. Besides causing itchy skin at night, the condition can be very unsightly, with bumps, scabs and oozing. Laundry detergent or bleach used to wash sheets and linens can also be the source of the irritant. It is possible for a person to suddenly develop an allergy to a certain chemical, even though it has been used numerous times in the past. Bedbugs are small, blood-feeding insects that can infest homes and hotels. Mattresses are a favorite hiding spot for bedbugs and their eggs. At night, the insects bite and feed on their human hosts. Even clean and spotless homes can house bedbugs, since the tiny insects move freely through walls and pipes. According to the Harvard School of Public Health, bedbugs leave behind a skin lesion similar to that of a mosquito bite. For up to 50 percent of elderly adults, itchy skin at night may be caused by a serious underlying condition such as Hodgkin's lymphoma, chronic liver disease or kidney failure, according to an article in the September 2003 issue of “American Family Physician” by Dr. Scott Moses. Thirty percent of Hodgkin's lymphoma patients reported severe and chronic itchy skin prior to their diagnoses, says Moses, adding that about 25 percent of patients with chronic kidney failure report itchy skin. A patient with a poorly functioning liver can experience itch skin at night due to the buildup of bile acid on the surface of the skin. Sydney Hornby specializes in metabolic disease and reproductive endocrinology. He is a graduate of Claremont McKenna College and Drexel University College of Medicine in Philadelphia, where he earned his M.D., and has worked for several years in academic medical research. Writing for publication since 1995, Hornby has had articles featured in "Medical Care," "Preventive Medicine" and "Medical Decision Making."

http://www.livestrong.com/article/212650-what-causes-itchy-skin-at-night/#page=1Best

Health

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Honey has been valued as a natural sweetener long before sugar became widely available in the 16th century. Honey production flourished in ancient Greece and Sicily, for instance, while animals other than humans – bears, badgers, and more – have long raided honey bee hives, risking stings for the sweet reward. Honey is truly a remarkable substance, made even more extraordinary by the process with which it is made. This blend of sugar, trace enzymes, minerals, vitamins, and amino acids is quite unlike any other sweetener on the planet. And while honey is high in fructose, it has many health benefits when used in moderation (assuming you're healthy). Before I delve into those, should we discuss how honey is made? Nah! Some other time! 1. HONEY MAKES EXCELLENT COUGH "MEDICINE" The World Health Organization (WHO) lists honey as a demulcent, which is a substance that relieves irritation in your mouth or throat by forming a protective film. Research shows honey works as well as dextromethorphan, a common ingredient in over the counter cough medications, to soothe cough and related sleeping difficulties due to upper respiratory tract infections in children. 2. HONEY CAN TREAT WOUNDS Honey was a conventional therapy in fighting infection up until the early 20th century, at which time its use slowly vanished with the advent of penicillin. Now the use of honey in wound care is regaining popularity, as researchers are determining exactly how honey can help fight serious skin infections. Honey has antibacterial, antifungal, and antioxidants activities that make it ideal for treating wounds. In the US, Derma Sciences uses Manuka honey for their Medihoney wound and burn dressings. Manuka honey is made with pollen gathered from the flowers of the Manuka bush (a medicinal plant), and clinical trials have found this type of honey can effectively eradicate more than 250 clinical strains of bacteria, including resistant varieties such as: MRSA (methicillin-resistant Staphyl) 3. HONEY IMPROVES YOUR SCALP Honey diluted with a bit of warm water was shown to significantly improve seborrheic dermatitis, which is a scalp condition that causes dandruff and itching. After applying the solution every other day for four weeks, "all of the patients responded markedly." According to the researchers: "Itching was relieved and scaling disappeared within one week. Skin lesions were healed and disappeared completely within 2 weeks. In addition, patients showed subjective improvement in hair loss." 4. HELP BOOST YOUR ENERGY A healthy, whole-food diet and proper sleep is the best recipe for boundless energy, but if you're looking for a quick energy boost, such as before or after a workout, honey can suffice. This is particularly true for athletes looking for a "time-released fuel" to provide energy over a longer duration. 5. REDUCE ALLERGY SYMPTOMS Locally produced honey, which will contain pollen spores picked up by the bees from local plants, introduces a small amount of allergen into your system. Theoretically, this can activate your immune system and over time can build up your natural immunity against it.

https://www.healthismy.name.ng/2015/07/5-things-you-didnt-know-about-honey_7.html

Food

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Sinusitis is an inflammation, or swelling of the tissue lining your sinuses (spaces in your forehead, cheeks and nose usually filled with air). It causes facial pain, a stuffy or runny nose, and sometimes a fever and other symptoms. It’s usually caused by the common cold, but other viruses, bacteria, fungi and allergies can also cause sinusitis. Sinusitis itself isn’t contagious. But the viruses and bacteria that can cause it are. Inflammation can occur because of conditions such as structural issues in the nose or a sinus infection. The terms “sinusitis” and “sinus infection” are sometimes used interchangeably. Your sinuses are four paired cavities (spaces) in your head. Narrow passages connect them. Sinuses make mucus that drains out of the passages in your nose. This drainage helps keep your nose clean and free of bacteria, allergens and other germs (pathogens). Table of Contents - Sinusitis is inflammation of the lining of sinuses in the face. It mainly causes pain and too much mucus production. - It may follow a cold or allergies. - Inflammation caused by a virus may resolve in about 10 days and won’t need antibiotics. - Inflammation caused by bacteria needs antibiotics. - Treatment aims to relieve the pain and discomfort, and reduce inflammation and mucus production. - Make sure to take all antibiotics as prescribed and to finish the prescription. The symptoms of sinusitis may also depend on age. Common symptoms of a sinus infection include: - Runny nose that lasts longer than 7 to 10 days. The discharge is often thick green or yellow, but can also be clear. - Cough at night - Occasional daytime cough - a fever above 102.2°F (39°C), which is considered a high fever - Swelling around the eyes Older children and adults - Runny nose or cold symptoms that last longer than 7 to 10 days - Complaints of drip in the throat from the nose - Facial pain - Bad breath - Sore throat - Swelling around the eyes, worse in the morning The symptoms of sinusitis may look like other conditions or health problems. Always talk to your healthcare provider, if you notice you have a sinus infection. There are different types of sinusitis, and they all have similar symptoms. The severity and duration of the symptoms also vary. - Acute sinusitis. Acute sinusitis has the shortest duration. It may last up to 4 weeks. A viral infection brought on by the common cold can cause symptoms that typically last up to 10 days. Viral infections eventually lead to most cases of acute sinusitis, but seasonal allergies are another possible source. - Subacute sinusitis. Subacute sinusitis symptoms can last up to 12 weeks. This condition commonly occurs with seasonal allergies or bacterial infections. - Recurrent acute sinusitis. In recurrent acute sinusitis, you have at least four episodes of acute sinusitis over the course of 1 year. Each episode of acute sinusitis must last at least 7 days. - Chronic sinusitis. Symptoms of chronic sinusitis last for more than 12 weeks. Chronic sinusitis symptoms are often less severe than acute sinusitis symptoms, and fever is rare. Bacterial infection may be to blame in these cases. Additionally, chronic sinusitis commonly occurs alongside persistent allergies or structural nasal issues. Bacterial and viral sinusitis Viruses, like the ones that cause the common cold, cause most cases of sinusitis. Bacteria can cause sinusitis, or they can infect you after a case of viral sinusitis. If you have a runny nose, stuffy nose and facial pain that don’t go away after ten days, you might have bacterial sinusitis. Your symptoms may seem to improve but then return and are worse than the initial symptoms. Antibiotics and decongestants usually work well on bacterial sinusitis. Sinus infections caused by fungus are usually more serious than other forms of sinusitis. They’re more likely to happen if you have a weakened immune system. Viruses, bacteria, fungi causes sinusitis. A sinus infection can happen after a cold. The cold inflames the nasal passages. This can block the opening of the sinuses and lead to infection. Allergies can also cause the nasal tissue to swell and make more mucus and cause sinusitis. Specific triggers for sinusitis include: - The common cold. - The flu (influenza). - Streptococcus pneumoniae bacteria. - Haemophilus influenza bacteria. - Moraxella catarrhalis bacteria. - Nasal and seasonal allergies. Other conditions that can lead to sinusitis include: - Abnormalities in the structure of the nose - Enlarged adenoids - Diving and swimming - Tooth infections - Nose injury - Foreign objects that are stuck in the nose - Secondhand smoke If mucus drainage is blocked, bacteria may start to grow. This leads to a sinus infection, or sinusitis. The most common viruses and bacteria that cause sinusitis also cause the flu or certain kinds of pneumonia. Sinusitis often occurs when something, such as mucus, blocks the openings of your sinuses. Anyone can develop sinusitis or a sinus infection. However, certain health conditions and risk factors can increase your chances. Some people are more likely to get sinusitis than others. Risk factors include: - Nasal allergies. - Nasal polyps (growths). - Deviated septum. Your septum is a line of tissue that divides your nose. A deviated septum isn’t straight, narrowing the passage on one side of your nose. This can cause a blockage. - A weakened immune system. This can be from illnesses like HIV or cancer, or from certain medications. You don’t necessarily need to treat sinusitis, it often goes away on its own. Very rarely, untreated sinus infections can lead to life-threatening infections. This happens if bacteria or fungi spread to your brain, eyes or nearby bone. Sinus infection may cause rare complications, such as: - an abscess, which is a walled-off collection of pus in the sinus cavity - meningitis, a life threatening infection that can cause brain and spinal cord damage - orbital cellulitis, an infection of the tissue surrounding the eyes Take these steps to lower the risk of getting sinus infection: - Protect your health. Try to stay away from people who have colds or other infections. Wash your hands often with soap and water, especially before meals. - Eat nutritious foods. Eating nutritious foods such as fruits and vegetables. - Manage allergies. Work with your health care provider to keep symptoms under control. Stay away from things you’re allergic to when possible. - Avoid cigarette smoke and polluted air. Tobacco smoke and other pollutants can irritate the lungs and inside the nose, called the nasal passages. - Use a humidifier. If the air in your home is dry, adding moisture to the air with a humidifier may help prevent sinusitis. Be sure the humidifier stays clean and free of mold with regular, complete cleaning. - Using saline. Rinsing your nose with saline (salt water) as directed by your provider. - Using nasal sprays. Using steroid nasal sprays if your provider recommends them. Healthcare providers diagnose sinus infection based on your symptoms and health history. A provider will check your ears, nose and throat for swelling, draining or blockage. They might use an endoscope (a small, lighted instrument) to look inside your nose. A primary care provider may also refer you to a specialist, like an otolaryngologist, also called an ENT (an ear, nose and throat specialist). Specific tests your provider might order to diagnose sinus infection include: - Nasal endoscopy. A health care provider inserts a thin, flexible tube, known as an endoscope, into the nose. A light on the tube allows a care provider to see inside the sinuses. - Nasal swabs. Your provider may use a soft-tipped stick to get a fluid sample from your nose. They’ll test it for viruses or other germs that might be causing your symptoms. - Imaging. In some cases, your provider might order a computed tomography (CT) scan, X-ray or MRI to better understand what’s happening inside your sinuses. - Allergy testing. If you have chronic sinusitis, your provider may test you for allergies that could be triggering it. - Biopsy. Rarely, a provider may take a tissue sample from your nose for testing. - Blood tests. A blood test can check for conditions that weaken the immune system, such as HIV. Most sinusitis cases are caused by viral infections and may not require treatment. Over-the-counter (OTC) medications and home remedies may help ease your symptoms. Nasal congestion is one of the most common symptoms of sinusitis. Try these tips to help reduce nasal congestion: - To help relieve the feeling of pain from sinus pressure, apply a warm, damp cloth to your face and forehead several times a day. - Perform a nasal saline rinse to help clear the thick and sticky mucus from your nose. - Drink water and juice to stay hydrated and help thin the mucus. You can use an OTC medication, such as guaifenesin, that thins mucus. - Use a humidifier in your bedroom to add moisture to the air. Turn on the shower and sit in the bathroom with the door closed to surround yourself with steam. - Consider using an OTC nasal corticosteroid spray. There are decongestants available over the counter, but you may want to consider asking a doctor before trying one. In rare cases, sinusitis can trigger a sinus headache or pressure in your forehead and cheeks. OTC medications such as acetaminophen (Tylenol) and ibuprofen (Advil, Motrin) can help if you’re in pain. If you need an antibiotic, which one your provider prescribes depends on your specific situation. Some options include: - Augmentin (amoxicillin/clavulanate). If your symptoms do not improve within a few weeks, you likely have a bacterial infection and should see a doctor. You may need antibiotic therapy if you have symptoms that do not improve, including: - runny nose - continued facial pain or headaches - eye swelling If you receive an antibiotic, you must take it for at least 10 to 14 days, depending on the doctor’s instructions. Do not stop taking your medication earlier than directed, as this can allow the bacterial infection to fester and possibly not fully resolve. The doctor may have you schedule another visit so they can monitor your condition. If your sinusitis does not improve or gets worse by your next visit, the doctor may refer you to an ear, nose, and throat specialist. Your healthcare provider may also order additional tests to determine whether allergies are triggering your sinusitis. If your chronic sinusitis does not improve with time and medication, you may undergo surgery to: - clear the sinuses - repair a deviated septum - remove polyps Sinusitis is treatable, and most people recover without seeing a doctor or taking antibiotics. However, tell a doctor if you have repeat or chronic sinus issues. You could have an underlying medical condition, such as nasal polyps. For sinusitis caused or made worse by allergies, allergy shots might help. This is known as immunotherapy. - Medmichihealthcare New posts - Download Free Medical PDFs Notes - Read All causes of disease short notes - Read All diagnosis of disease short notes - Read All treatment of disease short notes - Subscribe Medmichihealthcare YouTube channel

https://medmichihealthcare.com/what-is-sinusitis/

Health

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Diarrhea is a common condition in children and can be concerning for parents. It is characterized by frequent loose or watery stools and can be caused by various factors such as infections, food allergies, or changes in diet. While diarrhea can be uncomfortable for children, most cases can be managed effectively at home with proper care and attention. - One of the most important aspects of managing diarrhea in children is to ensure adequate hydration. Diarrhea can lead to fluid loss, which can quickly lead to dehydration, especially in young children. - Encourage your child to drink plenty of fluids such as water, well prepared oral rehydration solutions (ORS) and diluted fruit juices. These fluids help replace lost electrolytes and prevent dehydration. Avoid carbonated drinks alcoholic drinks or energy drinks. - Offer small, frequent sips of fluids rather than large quantities at once, as this may be better tolerated by children with diarrhea. Avoid Certain Foods: - Certain foods and beverages can exacerbate diarrhea and should be avoided until your child's symptoms improve. These include dairy products, fatty or fried foods, spicy foods, and sugary snacks. - Stick to bland, easily digestible foods until your child's stomach settles and their stools return to normal. - The BRAT diet (bananas, rice, applesauce, toast) is often recommended for children with diarrhea. These bland, easily digestible foods can help firm up stools and provide essential nutrients. - Offer small servings of these foods throughout the day to help settle your child's stomach and provide necessary nourishment. Maintain Good Hygiene: - Diarrhea is often caused by infections that can spread easily from person to person. To prevent the spread of illness, ensure good hand hygiene practices in your home. - Encourage frequent handwashing with soap and water, especially after using the bathroom and before eating or preparing food. Teach children proper handwashing techniques to reduce the risk of infection. - Keep a close eye on your child's symptoms and monitor for signs of dehydration, such as dry mouth, decreased urination, lethargy, or irritability. - If your child's diarrhea persists for more than a few days, is accompanied by high fever, severe abdominal pain, or bloody stools, or if you notice signs of dehydration, seek medical attention immediately. Rotavirus, a highly contagious virus, is the leading cause of severe diarrhea in infants and young children worldwide, responsible for significant morbidity and mortality, particularly in developing countries. However, the introduction of rotavirus vaccines has been a game-changer in combating this infectious disease. These vaccines, administered orally, have demonstrated remarkable effectiveness in reducing the incidence and severity of rotavirus gastroenteritis, hospitalizations, and deaths among children. By stimulating the body's immune response, the vaccines help protect against rotavirus infection and its associated complications. Widely recommended by health authorities, including the World Health Organization (WHO), the rotavirus vaccine stands as a crucial tool in safeguarding children's health and preventing the spread of this viral illness. Managing diarrhea in children at home requires patience, diligence, and attention to detail. By following these tips, parents can help alleviate their child's discomfort, prevent dehydration, and promote a speedy recovery. However, if diarrhea persists or worsens despite home care measures, it's important to seek medical advice to rule out any underlying medical conditions and ensure proper treatment. With proper care and monitoring, most cases of childhood diarrhea can be effectively managed at home, allowing children to quickly return to their normal activities.

https://blog.mascothealthcare.com/2024/04/09/managing-diarrhea-in-children-at-home-tips-for-parents/

Health

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Drug Addiction is a serious and worrisome situation. A situation whereby the individual involved does not have the willpower and ability to stop consuming the chemical substances. The substances could be in the form of drugs, certain behavioral patterns, and activity. Even though his health is degenerating psychologically, physically, and mentally. Drug addiction can also be defined as a chronic, relapsing brain disease that is characterized by compulsive drug seeking and use. Despite harmful consequences to the drug addict and those around them. Drug addiction is a brain disease. Due to the fact that drug abuse leads to changes in the structure and function of the brain. Although it is true that for most people the initial decision to take drugs is voluntary. Over time the changes in the brain caused by repeated drug abuse can affect a person’s self-control and ability to make sound decisions. And at the same time create an intense impulse to take drugs. Many people underestimate the complexity of drug abuse that which is a disease that affects the brain. As a result that stopping drug addiction or abuse is not simply a matter of willpower, personal or concerted efforts. But as a result of scientific advances in medical technology. A lot of treatments can be administered depending on the type of drugs or substance used. Habit-forming drugs include alcohol, morphine, heroin, steroids, cocaine, opium, and such synthetic drugs as Demerol. Marijuana, cocaine and amphetamines are also widely used today. Thousands of people die every year because of poisoning as a result of incorrect drug use. Most of these being suicide attempts. Drug Addiction, Reasons why people take drugs. - To escape the harsh realities of life. A lot of people are faced with the harsh realities of life ranging from, jobs losses, economic and financial crises. And the inability to secure a well-paid job. - Marital and failed relationship problems could put a toll on the emotional stability of a lot of individuals. - Young people are also faced with peer pressure. Poor grades crises, low self-esteem. - To Feel good and on top of the world. Drugs give this feeling of intense confidence and boldness. For example drugs such as cocaine. Actions that ordinarily cannot be taken under normal conditions. Drugs addicts will resolve to take drugs to derive some confidence in executing such actions and behavior. Symptoms of Drug Addiction Friends and family may be among the first to recognize the signs of substance abuse. Early recognition increases the chances of successful treatment. Early signs to watch for, includes the following: - Giving up past activities such as sports homework or hanging out with friends. - Poor grades in the case of a student. - Aggressiveness and irritability. - Forgetfulness loss of memory. - Disappearing money or valuables, to meet up with the addiction i.e buying the drugs or substances. - Feeling rundown hopeless, stressed, or even suicidal sounding selfish and not caring about others. - Increased movements (i.e. hyperactivity) - Effusive enthusiasm - Lack of concentration or changes in concentration. - Suspension from school or work for an alcoholic or drug-related incident. - Having to drink more to get the same high. - Believing that in order to have fun you need to drink or use other drugs. - Increased promiscuity, taking sexual risks. Demanding for drugs in exchange for free sex. - Drunk driving. Side Effects of Drug Addiction May Include - memory loss. - lack of coordination and deficits in thinking and motor skills. - unpredictable behavior, aggressive or violent behavior. - mood swings and disturbances. - severe dental problems. - Hallucinations are a situation whereby the individual tends to experience or perceive something that is not real or present. He seems to be communicating with some spiritual or unidentified persons, objects, exhibiting weird behavior. - Organ damage because a lot of strain is put on the liver. Which could lead to liver damage. - Reduction of blood flow in the gastrointestinal tract. - Loss of appetite and undernourishment. This could lead to weight loss and rapid degeneration of one health - Extreme chest pain, which could lead to lung diseases - Increased risk for stroke and seizures, other neurological problems can occur. Treatments for Drug Addiction Proper treatment depends upon the type of drugs being used, the age of the patient. And how long he has been addicted to the substance. Usually the younger the patient the better the results of treatment. But it is advisable to treat most stubborn complications in the hospital. However, the following points can help the patients’ considerable to get out of drug addiction: - Avoid using drugs indiscriminately, drugs must be taken under the supervision of health personnel. - Stay drug-free, excluding old associates, friends that could influence your addiction. - Engage yourself in some form of productive activities. Such as social and community work. Be in the company of good friends and family members. - Detoxification. This involves the Medical treatment of an alcoholic or drug addict. Involving abstention from drink or drugs or anything that could induce addiction again, until the bloodstream is free of toxins. - Behavioral counseling. Don’t miss a date with your behavioral counselor to help you out of your drug addiction. With his/her years of experience and the use of different therapies. They can help you change certain behaviors. - Medication (especially for tobacco, or alcohol addiction). Should be taken religiously. - Evaluation and treatment for co-occurring mental health issues such as depression and anxiety. - Avail yourself for long-term follow-up to prevent relapse. You can also Read Depression Ten Natural Ways you can Treat it. Developing a Positive Outlook In all these different forms of mental illness, it is most important to develop a happy outlook towards life. Many patients act like spoilt children. They feel deeply hurt when they cannot get their own way all the time. This tendency breeds anxiety and depression with drug addiction as the resultant effect. Mature people never act like spoilt or pampered children. They resolved to face life issues and realities, backed with optimism and action. Knowing fully well that nothing good comes easily. It takes time, effort, and patience. “Time Heals”. In spite of our different points of view, it’s so easy to make mistakes that raise tensions within us, leaving the mind troubled and distressed. Laughter and tears are the best antidotes for failure. These are nature’s ways of releasing our inner tensions and bringing us back to a more normal way of life. Don’t pretend to be a superman, allow nature to take its course, share your deepest trouble with a trusted friend. Knowing fully well that everyone has his own share of life troubles. “You can’t defeat the darkness by keeping it caged inside of you.” – Seth Adam Smith Try and be strong and face life’s difficulties and challenges headlong don’t shy away from the truth. Respond to life issues accordingly. Rather than with fear, self-pity, inferiority complex, or low self-esteem. While life can be very challenging, an important step in becoming more resilient is to develop the habit of positive affirmation. And to remind yourself that you are strong and you can grow stronger and wiser as you handle life’s challenges. READ: 25 Proven ways you to be Happy Rather than depending on drugs and other performance-enhancing substances. Drugs can only give you temporal relief but comes with a lasting and damaging effect.

https://bnethub.com/drug-addiction-symptoms-effect-treatment/

Health

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Is social media bad for you? The evidence and the unknowns What the science suggests so far about the impact of platforms such as Facebook, Twitter or Instagram on your mental well-being. A special series about social media and well-being This month, BBC Future is exploring social media’s impact on mental health and well-being – and seeking solutions for a happier, healthier experience on these platforms. Stay tuned for more stories, coming soon… Share your tips for a happy life on social media with the hashtag #LikeMinded on Facebook, Twitter and Instagram. Three billion people, around 40% of the world’s population, use online social media – and we’re spending an average of two hours every day sharing, liking, tweeting and updating on these platforms, according to some reports. That breaks down to around half a million tweets and Snapchat photos shared every minute. With social media playing such a big part in our lives, could we be sacrificing our mental health and well-being as well as our time? What does the evidence actually suggest? Since social media is relatively new to us, conclusive findings are limited. The research that does exist mainly relies on self-reporting, which can often be flawed, and the majority of studies focus on Facebook. That said, this is a fast-growing area of research, and clues are beginning to emerge. BBC Future reviewed the findings of some of the science so far: People use social media to vent about everything from customer service to politics, but the downside to this is that our feeds often resemble an endless stream of stress. In 2015, researchers at the Pew Research Center based in Washington DC sought to find out if social media induces more stress than it relieves. In the survey of 1,800 people, women reported being more stressed than men. Twitter was found to be a “significant contributor” because it increased their awareness of other people’s stress. But Twitter also acted as a coping mechanism – and the more women used it, the less stressed they were. The same effect wasn’t found for men, whom the researchers said had a more distant relationship with social media. Overall, the researchers concluded that social media use was linked to “modestly lower levels” of stress. In 2014, researchers in Austria found that participants reported lower moods after using Facebook for 20 minutes compared to those who just browsed the internet. The study suggested that people felt that way because they saw it as a waste of time. A good or bad mood may also spread between people on social media, according to researchers from the University of California, who assessed the emotional content of over a billion status updates from more than 100 million Facebook users between 2009 and 2012. Bad weather increased the number of negative posts by 1%, and the researchers found that one negative post by someone in a rainy city influenced another 1.3 negative posts by friends living in dry cities. The better news is that happy posts had a stronger influence; each one inspired 1.75 more happy posts. Whether a happy post translates to a genuine boost in mood, however, remains unclear. Researchers have looked at general anxiety provoked by social media, characterised by feelings of restlessness and worry, and trouble sleeping and concentrating. A study published in the journal Computers and Human Behaviour found that people who report using seven or more social media platforms were more than three times as likely as people using 0-2 platforms to have high levels of general anxiety symptoms. That said, it’s unclear if and how social media causes anxiety. Researchers from Babes-Bolyai University in Romania reviewed existing research on the relationship between social anxiety and social networking in 2016, and said the results were mixed. They concluded that more research needs to be done. While some studies have found a link between depression and social media use, there is emerging research into how social media can actually be a force for good. Two studies involving more than 700 students found that depressive symptoms, such as low mood and feelings of worthlessness and hopelessness, were linked to the quality of online interactions. Researchers found higher levels of depressive symptoms among those who reported having more negative interactions. A similar study conducted in 2016 involving 1,700 people found a threefold risk of depression and anxiety among people who used the most social media platforms. Reasons for this, they suggested, include cyber-bullying, having a distorted view of other people’s lives, and feeling like time spent on social media is a waste. However, as BBC Future will explore this month in our #LikeMinded season, scientists are also looking at how social media can be used to diagnose depression, which could help people receive treatment earlier. Researchers for Microsoft surveyed 476 people and analysed their Twitter profiles for depressive language, linguistic style, engagement and emotion. From this, they developed a classifier that can accurately predict depression before it causes symptoms in seven out of 10 cases. Researchers from Harvard and Vermont Universities analysed 166 people’s Instagram photos to create a similar tool last year with the same success rate. Humans used to spend their evenings in darkness, but now we’re surrounded by artificial lighting all day and night. Research has found that this can inhibit the body’s production of the hormone melatonin, which facilitates sleep – and blue light, which is emitted by smartphone and laptop screens, is said to be the worst culprit. In other words, if you lie on the pillow at night checking Facebook and Twitter, you’re headed for restless slumber. Last year, researchers from the University of Pittsburgh asked 1,700 18- to 30-year-olds about their social media and sleeping habits. They found a link with sleep disturbances – and concluded blue light had a part to play. How often they logged on, rather than time spent on social media sites, was a higher predictor of disturbed sleep, suggesting “an obsessive ‘checking’”, the researchers said. The researchers say this could be caused by physiological arousal before sleep, and the bright lights of our devices can delay circadian rhythms. But they couldn’t clarify whether social media causes disturbed sleep, or if those who have disturbed sleep spend more time on social media. Despite the argument from a few researchers that tweeting may be harder to resist than cigarettes and alcohol, social media addiction isn’t included in the latest diagnostic manual for mental health disorders. That said, social media is changing faster than scientists can keep up with, so various groups are trying to study compulsive behaviours related to its use – for example, scientists from the Netherlands have invented their own scale to identify possible addiction. And if social media addiction does exist, it would be a type of internet addiction – and that is a classified disorder. In 2011, Daria Kuss and Mark Griffiths from Nottingham Trent University in the UK have analysed 43 previous studies on the matter, and conclude that social media addiction is a mental health problem that “may” require professional treatment. They found that excessive usage was linked to relationship problems, worse academic achievement and less participation in offline communities, and found that those who could be more vulnerable to a social media addiction include those dependent on alcohol, the highly extroverted, and those who use social media to compensate for fewer ties in real life. Women’s magazines and their use of underweight and Photoshopped models have been long maligned for stirring self-esteem issues among young women. But now, social media, with its filters and lighting and clever angles, is taking over as a primary concern among some campaigning groups and charities. Social media sites make more than half of users feel inadequate, according to a survey of 1,500 people by disability charity Scope, and half of 18- to 34-year-olds say it makes them feel unattractive. A 2016 study by researchers at Penn State University suggested that viewing other people’s selfies lowered self-esteem, because users compare themselves to photos of people looking their happiest. Research from the University of Strathclyde, Ohio University and University of Iowa also found that women compare themselves negatively to selfies of other women. But it’s not just selfies that have the potential to dent self-esteem. A study of 1,000 Swedish Facebook users found that women who spent more time on Facebook reported feeling less happy and confident. The researchers concluded: “When Facebook users compare their own lives with others’ seemingly more successful careers and happy relationships, they may feel that their own lives are less successful in comparison.” But one small study hinted that viewing your own profile, not others, might offer ego boosts. Researchers at Cornell University in New York put 63 students into different groups. Some sat with a mirror placed against a computer screen, for instance, while others sat in front of their own Facebook profile. Facebook had a positive effect on self-esteem compared to other activities that boost self-awareness. Mirrors and photos, the researchers explained, make us compare ourselves to social standards, whereas looking at our own Facebook profiles might boost self-esteem because it is easier to control how we’re presented to the world. In a study from 2013, researchers texted 79 participants five times a day for 14 days, asking them how they felt and how much they’d used Facebook since the last text. The more time people spent on the site, the worse they felt later on, and the more their life satisfaction declined over time. But other research has found, that for some people, social media can help boost their well-being. Marketing researchers Jonah Berger and Eva Buechel found that people who are emotionally unstable are more likely to post about their emotions, which can help them receive support and bounce back after negative experiences. Overall, social media’s effects on well-being are ambiguous, according to a paper written last year by researchers from the Netherlands. However, they suggested there is clearer evidence for the impact on one group of people: social media has a more negative effect on the well-being of those who are more socially isolated. If you’ve ever been talking to a friend who’s pulled their phone out to scroll through Instagram, you might have wondered what social media is doing to relationships. Even the mere presence of a phone can interfere with our interactions, particularly when we’re talking about something meaningful, according to one small study. Researchers writing in the Journal of Social and Personal Relationships tasked 34 pairs of strangers with having a 10-minute conversation about an interesting event that had happened to them recently. Each pair sat in private booths, and half had a mobile phone on the top of their table. Those with a phone in eyeshot were less positive when recalling their interaction afterwards, had less meaningful conversations and reported feeling less close to their partner than the others, who had a notebook on top of the table instead. Romantic relationships aren’t immune, either. Researchers at the University of Guelph in Canada surveyed 300 people aged 17-24 in 2009 about any jealousy they felt when on Facebook, asking questions such as, ‘How likely are you to become jealous after your partner has added an unknown member of the opposite sex?’. Women spent much more time on Facebook then men, and experienced significantly more jealousy when doing so. The researchers concluded they “felt the Facebook environment created these feelings and enhanced concerns about the quality of their relationship”. In a study involving 600 adults, roughly a third said social media made them feel negative emotions – mainly frustration – and envy was the main cause. This was triggered by comparing their lives to others’, and the biggest culprit was other people’s travel photos. Feeling envious caused an “envy spiral”, where people react to envy by adding to their profiles more of the same sort of content that made them jealous in the first place. However, envy isn’t necessarily a destructive emotion – it can often make us work harder, according to researchers from Michigan University and the University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee. They asked 380 students to look at “envy-eliciting” photos and texts from Facebook and Twitter, including posts about buying expensive goods, travelling and getting engaged. But the type of envy the researchers found is “benign envy”, which they say is more likely to make a person work harder. A study published in the American Journal of Preventive Medicine last year surveyed 7,000 19- to 32-year-olds and found that those who spend the most time on social media were twice as likely to report experiencing social isolation, which can include a lack of a sense of social belonging, engagement with others and fulfilling relationships. Spending more time on social media, the researchers said, could displace face-to-face interaction, and can also make people feel excluded. “Exposure to such highly idealised representations of peers’ lives may elicit feelings of envy and the distorted belief that others lead happier and more successful lives, which may increase perceived social isolation.” It’s clear that in many areas, not enough is known yet to draw many strong conclusions. However, the evidence does point one way: social media affects people differently, depending on pre-existing conditions and personality traits. As with food, gambling and many other temptations of the modern age, excessive use for some individuals is probably inadvisable. But at the same time, it would be wrong to say social media is a universally bad thing, because clearly it brings myriad benefits to our lives. We’ll be exploring this tension more over the next month, in a series of articles and videos in our special series #LikeMinded – and hopefully providing solutions that could help us all live a happier, healthier digital life. If you liked this story, sign up for the weekly bbc.com features newsletter, called “If You Only Read 6 Things This Week”. A handpicked selection of stories from BBC Future, Culture, Capital, and Travel, delivered to your inbox every Friday.

http://www.bbc.com/future/story/20180104-is-social-media-bad-for-you-the-evidence-and-the-unknowns

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31.8.2: Casualties of World War II Some 75 million people died in World War II, including about 20 million military personnel and 40 million civilians, many of whom died because of deliberate genocide, massacres, mass-bombings, disease, and starvation. Assess the losses and damages of World War II - World War II was the deadliest military conflict in history in terms of total dead, with some 75 million people casualties including military and civilians, or around 3% of the world’s population at the time. - Many civilians died because of deliberate genocide, massacres, mass-bombings, disease, and starvation. - The Soviet Union lost around 27 million people during the war, including 8.7 million military and 19 million civilians. This represents the most military deaths of any nation by a large margin. - Germany sustained 5.3 million military losses, mostly on the Eastern Front and during the final battles in Germany. - Of the total number of deaths in World War II, approximately 85 percent were on the Allied side and 15 percent were on the Axis side, with many of these deaths caused by war crimes committed by German and Japanese forces in occupied territories. - Nazi Germany, as part of a deliberate program of extermination, systematically killed over 11 million people including 6 million Jews. - In addition to Nazi concentration camps, the Soviet gulags (labor camps) led to the deaths of 3.6 million civilians. - “unworthy of life” - In German, “Lebensunwertes Leben,” this term was a Nazi designation for the segments of the populace which, according to the Nazi regime of the time, had no right to live. - Executive Order 9066 - A United States presidential executive order signed and issued during World War II by the United States President Franklin D. Roosevelt on February 19, 1942, authorizing the Secretary of War to prescribe certain areas as military zones, clearing the way for the deportation of Japanese Americans and Italian-Americans to internment camps. - The government agency that administered the main Soviet forced labour camp systems during the Stalin era, from the 1930s until the 1950s. Casualties and War Crimes Estimates for the total number of casualties in the war vary because many deaths went unrecorded. Most suggest that some 75 million people died in the war, including about 20 million military personnel and 40 million civilians. Many civilians died because of deliberate genocide, massacres, mass-bombings, disease, and starvation. The Soviet Union lost around 27 million people during the war, including 8.7 million military and 19 million civilian deaths. The largest portion of military dead were 5.7 million ethnic Russians, followed by 1.3 million ethnic Ukrainians. A quarter of the people in the Soviet Union were wounded or killed. Germany sustained 5.3 million military losses, mostly on the Eastern Front and during the final battles in Germany. Of the total number of deaths in World War II, approximately 85 percent—mostly Soviet and Chinese—were on the Allied side and 15 percent on the Axis side. Many deaths were caused by war crimes committed by German and Japanese forces in occupied territories. An estimated 11 to 17 million civilians died either as a direct or as an indirect result of Nazi ideological policies, including the systematic genocide of around 6 million Jews during the Holocaust and an additional 5 to 6 million ethnic Poles and other Slavs (including Ukrainians and Belarusians), Roma, homosexuals, and other ethnic and minority groups. Hundreds of thousands of ethnic Serbs, along with gypsies and Jews, were murdered by the Axis-aligned Croatian Ustaše in Yugoslavia, and retribution-related killings were committed just after the war ended. In Asia and the Pacific, between 3 million and more than 10 million civilians, mostly Chinese (estimated at 7.5 million), were killed by the Japanese occupation forces. The best-known Japanese atrocity was the Nanking Massacre, in which 50 to 300 thousand Chinese civilians were raped and murdered. Mitsuyoshi Himeta reported that 2.7 million casualties occurred during the Sankō Sakusen. General Yasuji Okamura implemented the policy in Heipei and Shantung. Axis forces employed biological and chemical weapons. The Imperial Japanese Army used a variety of such weapons during its invasion and occupation of China and in early conflicts against the Soviets. Both the Germans and Japanese tested such weapons against civilians and sometimes on prisoners of war. The Soviet Union was responsible for the Katyn massacre of 22,000 Polish officers and the imprisonment or execution of thousands of political prisoners by the NKVD in the Baltic states and eastern Poland annexed by the Red Army. The mass-bombing of civilian areas, notably the cities of Warsaw, Rotterdam and London, included the aerial targeting of hospitals and fleeing refugees by the German Luftwaffe, along with the bombings of Tokyo and the German cities of Dresden, Hamburg, and Cologne by the Western Allies. These bombings may be considered war crimes. The latter resulted in the destruction of more than 160 cities and the death of more than 600,000 German civilians. However, no positive or specific customary international humanitarian law with respect to aerial warfare existed before or during World War II. Concentration Camps, Slave Labor, and Genocide The German government led by Adolf Hitler and the Nazi Party was responsible for the Holocaust, the killing of approximately 6 million Jews, 2.7 million ethnic Poles, and 4 million others who were deemed “unworthy of life” (including the disabled and mentally ill, Soviet prisoners of war, homosexuals, Freemasons, Jehovah’s Witnesses, and Romani) as part of a program of deliberate extermination. About 12 million, mostly Eastern Europeans, were employed in the German war economy as forced laborers. In addition to Nazi concentration camps, the Soviet gulags (labor camps) led to the death of citizens of occupied countries such as Poland, Lithuania, Latvia, and Estonia, as well as German prisoners of war (POWs) and Soviet citizens who were thought to be Nazi supporters. Of the 5.7 million Soviet POWs of the Germans, 57 percent died or were killed during the war, a total of 3.6 million. Soviet ex-POWs and repatriated civilians were treated with great suspicion as potential Nazi collaborators, and some were sent to the Gulag upon being checked by the NKVD. Japanese POW camps, many of which were used as labor camps, also had high death rates. The International Military Tribunal for the Far East found the death rate of Western prisoners was 27.1 percent (for American POWs, 37 percent), seven times that of POWs under the Germans and Italians. While 37,583 prisoners from the UK, 28,500 from the Netherlands, and 14,473 from the United States were released after the surrender of Japan, the number of Chinese released was only 56. According to historian Zhifen Ju, at least five million Chinese civilians from northern China and Manchukuo were enslaved between 1935 and 1941 by the East Asia Development Board, or Kōain, for work in mines and war industries. After 1942, the number reached 10 million. The US Library of Congress estimates that in Java, between 4 and 10 million rōmusha (Japanese: “manual laborers”), were forced to work by the Japanese military. About 270,000 of these Javanese laborers were sent to other Japanese-held areas in South East Asia, and only 52,000 were repatriated to Java. On February 19, 1942, Roosevelt signed Executive Order 9066, interning about 100,000 Japanese living on the West Coast. Canada had a similar program. In addition, 14,000 German and Italian citizens who had been assessed as being security risks were also interned. In accordance with the Allied agreement made at the Yalta Conference, millions of POWs and civilians were used as forced labor by the Soviet Union. Hungarians were forced to work for the Soviet Union until 1955. - Casualties of World War II

https://courses.lumenlearning.com/suny-hccc-worldhistory2/chapter/casualties-of-world-war-ii/

Education

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Vitiligo is a chronic skin condition that affects millions of people worldwide. Characterized by the loss of pigment-producing cells, it can result in the development of white patches on the skin, hair, and even the eyes. While vitiligo isn’t a life-threatening condition, it can significantly impact a person’s self-esteem and quality of life. In this article, we will delve into all the essential aspects of vitiligo, including its causes, symptoms, diagnosis, treatment options, and coping strategies. What Causes Vitiligo? The exact cause of vitiligo remains uncertain, but several theories exist. One leading theory suggests that it’s an autoimmune disorder, where the immune system mistakenly attacks and destroys melanocytes, the cells responsible for producing pigment. Genetic factors may also play a role, as it tends to run in families. Additionally, environmental factors and oxidative stress could contribute to its development. Symptoms of Vitiligo The primary symptom of vitiligo is the appearance of depigmented (white) patches on the skin. These patches can vary in size and location and often occur symmetrically on both sides of the body. While vitiligo primarily affects the skin, it can also affect the hair, leading to premature graying or loss of color in the affected areas. In rare cases, vitiligo can affect the eyes and the mucous membranes. Diagnosing vitiligo typically involves a visual examination by a dermatologist. Sometimes, a skin biopsy or blood tests may be necessary to rule out other conditions. Dermatologists may use a Wood’s lamp, which emits ultraviolet (UV) light, to examine the skin for depigmented patches more clearly. There is no one-size-fits-all treatment for the condition, and the choice of therapy depends on the extent and location of the depigmented areas, as well as individual preferences. Some common treatment options include: a. Topical Corticosteroids: These creams or ointments can help repigment the skin, particularly in mild cases. b. Topical Calcineurin Inhibitors: These medications, such as tacrolimus and pimecrolimus, can be used on the face and neck to help restore pigment. c. Phototherapy: Exposure to UVB light can stimulate melanocytes to produce pigment. This can be done in a clinic (narrowband UVB) or at home (with a UVB lamp). d. Excimer Laser: This targeted laser therapy is used to treat small areas of vitiligo and may be more effective than traditional phototherapy. e. Skin Grafting: In severe cases, where large areas are affected, skin grafting may be an option. Coping with Vitiligo Living with vitiligo can be emotionally challenging due to its impact on appearance. There are famous and successful persons who dealt with and are dealing with it who thrived in spite of their skin condition, such Michael Jackson, Winnie Harlow and Big Krizz Kaliko. To cope with the condition support from friends, family, and mental health professionals is crucial. Some individuals choose to embrace their unique skin and may not pursue treatment. Makeup and camouflage products can be used to cover depigmented areas temporarily.

https://www.crispng.com/all-you-need-to-know-about-vitiligo/

Health

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This article may contain some affiliate links. This means that if you click on the link and make a booking or purchase, we may earn a commission without any extra cost to you. Many clients have had positive experiences with these products and services, but it is essential to do your research, consult with your dietitian or healthcare provider where necessary, and only spend money on what suits your needs. The Burden of Chronic Diseases Chronic diseases are a growing concern for individuals, healthcare providers, and governments worldwide. Medical professionals typically manage chronic diseases with proper treatment and care, because they are long-term medical conditions that cannot typically be cured completely. The prevalence of chronic diseases is on the rise globally, and they are currently the leading cause of death and disability worldwide. Understanding the complexities of chronic diseases is vital to effectively manage and treat them. The complexity of chronic diseases stems from their multifaceted nature, which can be influenced by a combination of genetic, environmental, and lifestyle factors. Additionally, chronic diseases may have various symptoms and complications that can affect every aspect of an individual’s daily life, including emotional and mental health. Therefore, it is imperative to approach chronic diseases holistically, considering both the physical and emotional well-being of the individual. This blog post aims to provide insights into the complexities of chronic diseases and the importance of a comprehensive approach to their management. “Chronic diseases are illnesses that progress slowly over a long period of time. Some common examples include heart disease, cancer, and diabetes.” Diet and Health The role of diet in maintaining good health has long been recognised. Early research in nutrition aimed at identifying which nutrients in foods could prevent common diseases caused by deficiencies, such as rickets and scurvy, which are caused by not getting enough vitamins D and C. This knowledge has allowed developed countries to successfully prevent such diseases. However, in developing countries, hunger and nutrient deficiencies are still a major threat to health, despite the existing knowledge of nutrition. More recently, nutrition research has shifted towards studying chronic diseases caused by excessive energy and nutrients. These types of diseases, once thought to only affect wealthy countries, have become widespread in developing countries too, and are responsible for three out of five deaths globally. “What you eat today can determine your health tomorrow. Focus on eating a balanced diet and engaging in regular physical activity to help manage chronic diseases and live a healthier life.” The table below outlines the top ten causes of death in the United States. However, these causes are not always a result of a single condition, such as heart disease. Instead, chronic diseases often develop from a combination of factors that accumulate over a long period of time. For example, an individual who passed away from heart disease may have also been overweight, had high blood pressure, smoked cigarettes for years, and followed a diet that was high in saturated fats while not getting enough exercise. Of course, not all individuals who die from heart disease share these characteristics, and not all individuals with these traits will die from heart disease. Although death can come from various factors, researchers have found a correlation between specific diseases and certain behaviours and conditions. Studies show that five out of the top six causes of death are associated with diet or alcohol consumption. Over the past three decades, as research has shed light on the links between diet and disease, death rates for heart disease, cancers, strokes, and accidents have all decreased. However, the rate of diabetes-related deaths has increased as this chronic disease is closely connected to obesity. It is important to understand how our lifestyle choices can impact our health outcomes. “Studies show that five out of the top six causes of death are associated with diet or alcohol consumption.” Risk Factors for Chronic Diseases A risk factor does not directly cause a disease, but it is a condition or behaviour that increases the likelihood of developing one. The most significant risk factors for chronic diseases are obesity, smoking cigarettes, having high blood pressure or high blood cholesterol, not being physically active, and having a diet that is high in saturated fats and low in vegetables, fruits, and whole grains. The table below shows the major factors contributing to deaths in the United States. A strong connection between a risk factor and a disease means that having that factor makes it more likely for a person to develop the disease, but it does not guarantee it. Similarly, not having risk factors does not ensure that a person won’t develop the disease. On average, people with more risk factors have a greater chance of developing the disease while those with fewer risk factors have a better chance of staying healthy. Risk Factors Persist Risk factors for chronic diseases are likely to last for a long time. If a young person has high blood pressure, for example, it’s probable that they will still have it when they’re older. To reduce the harm caused by these risk factors, it’s best to act early and intervene as soon as possible. Risk Factors Cluster Risk factors often have a tendency to occur together. For instance, an individual who is obese may also have high blood pressure and high blood cholesterol, which are all factors that increase the likelihood of heart disease. When an intervention targets one of these risk factors, it can often have a positive impact on others as well. For example, engaging in physical activity can aid in weight loss, which can in turn help to lower blood pressure and cholesterol levels. Risk Factors in Perspective Tobacco use is the leading cause of death in the United States, followed by poor dietary habits and a lack of physical activity, with alcohol use coming in third place. These are all behaviours that individuals have control over and can change. Choosing not to smoke, maintaining a healthy diet, staying physically active, and consuming alcohol in moderation (or abstaining completely) all contribute to better overall health. “Cigarette smoking is a leading cause of death, responsible for nearly 20% of all deaths annually.” Although genetics, age, and gender contribute to the development of chronic diseases, we cannot change them. Health recommendations focus on changeable factors, and for the majority of Americans who do not excessively smoke or drink, diet is the most significant contributor to long-term health outcomes. Recommended: Breaking the Cycle: Strategies for Preventing and Treating Chronic Diseases Several articles on our website delve into the intricacies of various nutrients and their role in promoting overall well-being. Drawing connections between diet and contemporary ailments, our discussions highlight the importance of adhering to dietary guidelines. By examining each nutrient’s impact on health, our posts underscore the significance of healthy eating habits. Following our professional recommendations can lead to significant health benefits and enable you to maintain good health well into your senior years. Read Also: Breaking Down Barriers: Addressing the Stigma of Chronic Illness Your dietary choices have a significant impact on your long-term health, within the limits set by your genetic makeup. Although diet does not affect some diseases, others have a close relationship with them. Additionally, your lifestyle choices, including physical activity and substance use, can either improve or worsen your overall health. Key Assignments For You! - Identify the chronic disease risk factors and conditions mentioned in the risk factor definition discussed in this article that you or your loved ones may have. - Outline the lifestyle modifications you can implement to increase your likelihood of maintaining good health. My Health Affirmations 1. I am in control of my health and wellbeing. 2. I nourish my body with healthy, nutrient-dense foods. 3. I exercise regularly to keep my body strong and active. 4. I pay attention to early signs of chronic diseases and take action to prevent them. 5. I make conscious decisions to prioritise my health and wellbeing. 6. I am actively taking steps to improve my physical and mental health. 7. I am determined to keep myself healthy and prevent chronic disease. 8. I am mindful of my diet and nutrition and take all necessary measures to maintain a healthy lifestyle. 9. I am open to trying new activities and making changes that will benefit my health. 10. I am making conscious decisions to prevent chronic diseases from entering my life. - There you go! That was our round-up of “Understanding the Complexities of Chronic Diseases.” What do you think? - If you enjoyed this article, have any questions, or have any health concerns requiring our attention, then make sure to comment below and let us know. - If you desire to have a personal conversation with a physician, consider scheduling an individual consultation. - Follow DASHING HEALTH on Facebook, Twitter, Instagram, Youtube, LinkedIn, Pinterest - Do well to click the “share buttons” below and share this post with your social media community. - Consider subscribing to our rich newsletter to keep up with our rich health info. Thank you. Secure the services of a personal physician who can cater to the medical requirements of you and your loved ones. Take the first step by supporting us on Patreon today! Next Read: 10 Lower Back Pain Stretches You Can Do At Work Disclosure: The article above contains some affiliate links. This means that if you click on the link and make a booking or purchase, we may earn a commission without any extra cost to you. Many clients have had a positive experience with these products and services, but it is essential to do your research and only spend money on what suits your needs.

https://dashinghealth.com/chronic-diseases/

Health

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Easy Crafting Tips for Kids: Unleashing Creativity Children can use their imagination, improve their fine motor skills, and take pride in what they make by hand. Children of all ages can enjoy and learn from crafts, whether they do it on a rainy day or as part of their daily routine. This article discusses simple craft ideas for kids, as well as ways to make crafting fun, educational, and stress-free. Crafts include many different things, from painting to architecture and sculpture. This allows children to use their creativity to create something new. But the best way to make crafts with your kids is to make them easy, fun, and doable. 1. Start with a simple project Start with a simple project that doesn't require many steps or supplies. This approach can make things less frustrating and increase self-confidence. Making masks from paper plates, beads, or paintings are all simple crafts and a great place to start. As your child's crafting skills improve, you can slowly move on to more difficult projects. 2. Use available materials You don't have to spend a lot of money on a craft kit to have fun. There are many projects you can make with things you already have around the house, such as old magazines, cardboard boxes, scraps of fabric, and egg cartons. These steps not only save money but also teach children to be creative and recycle. 3. Accept the chaos Making crafts can get messy, but that's part of the fun. Give kids a craft area where they can play and make things without worrying about making a mess. Use washable items, cover the surface with newspaper or plastic wrap, and make sure you have cleaning tools on hand. 4. Focus on the Process, Not the Product When you create something with your kids, the experience should be more important than the result. Let children take charge of their projects and encourage them to try new things. This helps them be creative and express themselves, and regardless of the outcome of the craft, it is important to praise their hard work and creativity. 5. Follow the Child's Interests Create craft projects that suit your child's interests. If they love animals, you can do some projects with them that involve making animal statues or houses. If your children are interested in space, you can build planets or rockets. This personal approach ensures that they become interested and enthusiastic about handicrafts. 6. Add learning opportunities Crafting can teach you something. Arts and crafts techniques can be used to teach children numbers, names, colors, and shapes. For older children, crafting can involve more complex ideas such as geometry, symmetry, or even basic engineering. 7. Safety first Check that all tools and products are safe for use by children. Small children can choke on small parts, so be careful when using scissors or other sharp tools. Materials that are safe for children and do not cause harm are necessary to keep crafting fun and safe. 8. Let people work and share You can do crafts with other people. Children should share their materials and ideas and complete projects. This encourages people to work together, talk to each other, and appreciate the work and spaces of others. 9. Set aside a certain amount of time for crafting If you make crafts part of their daily lives, they will always have something to look forward to. Regular craft time, whether on the weekends or a small block of time every day, helps build patterns and excitement. 10. Keep a plan or folder for your art Tell children to record or record what they do. This not only allows them to feel good about themselves and their growth but also allows them to see how their skills change over time. Crafts are great for kids because they help them be creative, improve their small motor skills, and teach them patience and problem-solving. If parents and teachers follow these simple craft tips, they can provide children with a fun and educational experience that will help them learn important life skills. It should be fun to learn new things while you're making it, and the process should be just as important as the result. Every child should be able to enjoy the sensation that arises when his ideas become reality. 1. What are the best programs for young children just starting? For beginners, choose projects that require simple skills, such as finger painting, tearing paper, or stringing together large beads. These tasks can be performed easily and help improve fine motor skills. 2. How do I teach my children through crafts? Add fun to learning by using art projects to teach counting, color recognition, and shape recognition. For older children, you can add work that requires them to measure, cut to specific lengths, or trace complex patterns to help them think more clearly. 3. What should I always have on hand for projects that kids can do? Gather a bunch of things you'll need, like glue, scissors, crayons, markers, washable paint, construction paper, and modeling clay. Having an array of supplies on hand can make meetings more spontaneous and creative. 4. What can I do to keep my crafting time from becoming too confusing? If possible, use washable and non-hazardous materials and make sure you have an easy-to-clean place to make your crafts. Giving people aprons or overalls can also help keep clothes clean. Place items in bins to make them easier to find and put away. 5. How do you choose age-appropriate programs for your children? Choose crafts for your children based on their growth stage. Toddlers need simple tasks and big things that they can handle easily. Older children can work on more complex projects that require fine motor skills, such as gluing, cutting, and assembling small parts. 6. Will making things help my child grow emotionally? Yes, children can express their feelings through crafts, and it can also be a relaxing and healing exercise. It allows them to express feelings they can't express out loud, and doing something they are proud of can boost their self-esteem.

https://exe.io/wxfW0LkT

Health

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Warning signs of oral cancer Each and every cancer that appears in any of the mouth's component parts is referred to as mouth cancer (oral cavity). Mouth cancer can develop on the following: - The cheeks' internal surface - Roofing of the mouth - Your mouth's floor (under the tongue) Oral cancer, also known as oral cavity cancer, refers to cancer that develops on the inside of the mouth. One of many cancers included in the category known as head and neck cancers is mouth cancer. Other head and neck tumors are frequently treated similarly to mouth cancer. A mouth cancer's warning signs and symptoms may also - An untreated lip or mouth sore - A spot on the inside of your mouth that is white or red - Crooked teeth - An internal growth or bump in your mouth - A sore mouth - Ear pain - Swallowing issues or pain consult a doctor If you experience any bothersome, lingering indications or symptoms that continue longer than two weeks, schedule a visit with your doctor or dentist. Your physician will probably look at less unusual possibilities for your symptoms, such as an infection, first. Mouth cancers arise when DNA alterations (mutations) occur in cells that line the lips or line the mouth. The instructions a cell needs to function are encoded in its DNA. When healthy cells would stop dividing and grow, the mutations tell the cells to keep growing and multiplying. It is possible for a tumor to develop as abnormal mouth cancer cells accumulate. They might eventually expand from the inside of the mouth to other parts of the head, neck, or entire body. Squamous cells, which are flat, thin cells that line the lips and the inside of your mouth, are where mouth cancers typically start. Squamous cell carcinoma is the most common type of oral cancer. It is unclear what causes the squamous cell mutations that result in mouth cancer. The risk of mouth cancer has been detected by medical Your risk of developing mouth cancer may be affected by the - Any type of tobacco use, such as smoking cigarettes, cigars, pipes, chewing tobacco, and snuff, among others - Heavy alcohol consumption - Excessive lip sun exposure - Human papillomavirus is a sexually transmitted disease (HPV) - Having a compromised immune system There is no known method to stop mouth cancer from occurring. You can, though, lessen your chance of mouth cancer if you: or refrain from starting Stop using cigarettes if you do. Don't start smoking if you don't already. Smoking or chewing tobacco exposes the cells in your mouth to potentially harmful substances that can cause cancer. do consume alcohol, do it in moderation Chronically consuming too much alcohol might irritate your mouth's cells, increasing your risk of developing mouth cancer. If you decide to consume alcohol, do so sparingly. That means that for healthy individuals, women of all ages and men older than 65 can have up to one drink per day, while males 65 and younger can have up to two drinks per day. sure your lips don't get too much sun By seeking out shade whenever you can, you may protect the skin of your lips from the sun. Put on a hat with a wide brim so that it may effectively block the sun from your entire face, including your mouth. Include a lip sunscreen cream in your regular sun protection routine. visit the dentist Ask your dentist to examine every area of your mouth as part of a routine dental examination for any abnormalities that could be signs of precancerous or cancerous changes in the mouth. Post a Comment

https://www.healthlifekit.com/2023/02/early-stage-mouth-cancer-symptoms.html

Health

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We don’t know what causes most mouth or oropharyngeal cancers. But there are some risk factors that can increase your risk of developing it. These include smoking, drinking alcohol, and Mouth (oral cavity) cancer can start in different parts of the mouth, including the lips, gums, or soft sides. Oropharyngeal cancer starts in the oropharynx. This is the part of the throat (pharynx) just behind the mouth. It includes tonsil cancer and cancer in the back part of the tongue. What is a risk factor? Anything that can increase your risk of getting a disease is called a risk factor. Different cancers have different risk factors. Having one or more of these risk factors doesn't mean you will definitely get that cancer. Smoking tobacco increases your risk of developing mouth and oropharyngeal cancer. This includes cigarettes, pipes and cigars. Research suggests that around 17 out of 100 (17%) of mouth cancers in the UK are caused by smoking. People who smoke are more at risk if they also drink alcohol and chew betel quid with tobacco. Exposure to environmental tobacco smoke for a long time causes a small increase in the risk of mouth and oropharyngeal cancer. This is also called passive smoking. Drinking alcohol increases your risk of mouth and oropharyngeal cancer. It causes around 35 out of 100 (around 35%) of mouth cancers in the UK. Smoking and drinking together further increase the risk of mouth and oropharyngeal cancer. UK guidelines recommend a maximum of 14 units of alcohol a week for both men and women. Chewing tobacco or betel quid Smokeless tobacco is linked with causing mouth cancer. It includes: - chewing tobacco - betel quid (gutkha or paan) with or without tobacco It is not a safe alternative to cigarettes. Human papillomavirus (HPV) The human papillomavirus (HPV) is a type of virus that infects the skin and the cells lining body cavities. Around 80 out of 100 people (around 80%) will be infected with HPV at some time during their lifetime. For most people, HPV causes no harm and gets better on its own. You don't catch cancers like an infection. But the virus can cause changes in the mouth and throat. These changes are more likely to become cancerous in the future. HPV spreads through close skin to skin contact, usually during sexual activity. The virus is very common. But only a very small number of people with HPV develop mouth or oropharyngeal cancer. There are about 100 types of HPV and each one has a number. The main type of HPV found in mouth and oropharyngeal cancer is HPV 16. The link to HPV is much stronger for oropharyngeal cancers than it is for mouth cancers. HPV causes around 50 out of every 100 (around 50%) of oropharyngeal cancers in the UK. In recent years there has been an increase in HPV positive oropharyngeal cancer. Compared to HPV negative oropharyngeal cancer, people with HPV positive oropharyngeal cancers: - are generally younger - do not usually smoke - drink little or no alcohol People with HPV positive oropharyngeal cancer usually have a better outlook (prognosis). This is compared to those with HPV negative oropharyngeal cancers. Weak immune system Your body's immune system fights infection. Some illnesses and medications can weaken your immune system. Research shows an increased risk of mouth and oropharyngeal cancer in people: - with HIV/AIDS - there are higher rates of Human papillomavirus (HPV) infection in people with HIV - taking medicines to suppress the immune system after an organ transplant Changes can happen in the cells in the lining of the mouth. They can appear as red or white patches. The red patches are called erythroplakia, and the white patches leukoplakia. In some people, these conditions may develop into cancer over some years. Doctors call these conditions precancerous. Dentists can spot these patches during dental appointments. So, it is important to go for regular checkups. Head and neck cancer risk is higher in people with a brother or sister (sibling) who had head and neck cancer. This is linked to having shared: - lifestyle factors - environmental factors - genetic factors People who have the following cancers are also at increased risk of mouth cancer: - a type of cervical cancer called squamous cell cancer - cancer of the food pipe (oesophageal squamous cell cancer) - lung cancer Factors that might reduce the risk Non starchy fruit and vegetables might reduce your risk of mouth and oropharyngeal cancer. Choosing a healthy diet might also reduce the risk of mouth and oropharyngeal cancer. The risk of mouth cancer is lower in people who do moderate or high levels of physical activity. This is compared to those who do very little or no physical activity. Other possible causes There are often stories about potential causes in the media. It isn’t always clear which ideas are supported by evidence. There might be things you have heard of that we haven’t included here. This is because either there is no evidence about them or it is less clear. Reducing your risk There are ways you can reduce your risk of cancer. More information on risk factors for mouth or and oropharyngeal cancer We have more detailed information for health professionals about mouth and oropharyngeal cancer risks and causes.

https://www.cancerresearchuk.org/about-cancer/mouth-cancer/risks-causes

Health

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Staph infections are caused by staphylococcus bacteria. These types of germs are commonly found on the skin or in the nose of many healthy people. Most of the time, these bacteria cause no problems or cause relatively minor skin infections. But staph infections can turn deadly if the bacteria invade deeper into your body, entering your bloodstream, joints, bones, lungs or heart. A growing number of otherwise healthy people are developing life-threatening staph infections. Treatment usually involves antibiotics and cleaning of the infected area. However, some staph infections no longer respond, or become resistant, to common antibiotics. To treat antibiotic-resistant staph infections, health care providers may need to use antibiotics that can cause more side effects. Staph infections can range from minor skin problems to life-threatening illness. For example, endocarditis, a serious infection of the inner lining of your heart (endocardium) can be caused by staph bacteria. Signs and symptoms of staph infections vary widely, depending on the location and severity of the infection. Skin infections caused by staph bacteria include: Boils. The most common type of staph infection is the boil. This is a pocket of pus that develops in a hair follicle or oil gland. The skin over the infected area usually becomes red and swollen. If a boil breaks open, it will probably drain pus. Boils occur most often under the arms or around the groin or buttocks. - Impetigo. This contagious, often painful rash can be caused by staph bacteria. Impetigo usually has large blisters that may ooze fluid and develop a honey-colored crust. - Cellulitis. Cellulitis is an infection of the deeper layers of skin. It causes redness and swelling on the surface of your skin. Sores or areas of oozing discharge may develop, too. - Staphylococcal scalded skin syndrome. Toxins produced by the staph bacteria may cause staphylococcal scalded skin syndrome. Affecting mostly babies and children, this condition includes a fever, a rash and sometimes blisters. When the blisters break, the top layer of skin comes off. This leaves a red, raw surface that looks like a burn. Staph bacteria are one of the most common causes of food poisoning. The bacteria multiply in food and produce toxins that make you sick. Symptoms come on quickly, usually within hours of eating a contaminated food. Symptoms usually disappear quickly, too, often lasting just half a day. A staph infection in food usually doesn't cause a fever. Signs and symptoms you can expect with this type of staph infection include: - Nausea and vomiting - Low blood pressure Also known as a bloodstream infection, bacteremia occurs when staph bacteria enter the bloodstream. A fever and low blood pressure are signs of bacteremia. The bacteria can travel to locations deep within your body to cause infections that affect: - Internal organs, such as your brain (meningitis), heart (endocarditis) or lungs (pneumonia) - Bones and muscles - Surgically implanted devices, such as artificial joints or cardiac pacemakers Toxic shock syndrome This life-threatening condition results from toxins produced by some strains of staph bacteria. The condition has been linked to certain types of tampons, skin wounds and surgery. It usually develops suddenly with: - A high fever - Nausea and vomiting - A rash on your palms and soles that looks like a sunburn - Muscle aches - Stomach pain Septic arthritis is often caused by a staph infection. The bacteria often target the knees, shoulders, hips, and fingers or toes. Artificial joints may also be at risk of infection. Signs and symptoms may include: - Joint swelling - Severe pain in the affected joint When to see a doctor Go to your health care provider if you or your child has: - An area of red, irritated or painful skin - Pus-filled blisters You may also want to talk to your provider if: - Skin infections are being passed from one family member to another - Two or more family members have skin infections at the same time Many people carry staph bacteria on their skin or in their nose and never develop staph infections. However, if you develop a staph infection, there's a good chance that it's from bacteria you've been carrying around for some time. Staph bacteria can also be spread from person to person. Because staph bacteria are so hardy, they can live on objects such as pillowcases or towels long enough to transfer to the next person who touches them. Staph bacteria can make you sick by causing an infection. You can also become sick from the toxins produced by the bacteria. Staph bacteria can survive: - Extremes of temperature - Stomach acid Many factors — including the health of your immune system or the types of sports you play — can increase your risk of developing staph infections. Underlying health conditions Certain disorders or the medications used to treat them can make you more likely to get staph infections. People who may be more likely to get a staph infection include those with: - Diabetes who use insulin - Kidney failure requiring dialysis - Weakened immune systems — either from a disease or medications that suppress the immune system - A transplant - Cancer, especially those who are being treated with chemotherapy or radiation - Skin damage from conditions such as eczema, insect bites or minor trauma that opens the skin - Lung (respiratory) illness, such as cystic fibrosis or emphysema Current or recent hospitalization Despite strong attempts to get rid of them, staph bacteria stay present in hospitals, where they can infect people who are most at risk of infection. This can include people with: - Weakened immune systems - Surgical wounds Sometimes people admitted to the hospital may be screened to see if they're carrying staph bacteria. Screening is done using a nasal swab. Treatment to get rid of the bacteria may be given to help prevent infection and decrease the spread to others. Invasive and implanted devices Staph bacteria can get into the body by traveling along medical tubing. These devices make a connection between the outside and the inside of your body. Examples are: - Urinary catheters - Tubing placed in a vein (intravenous catheters) Also, staph bacteria are attracted to implanted devices, where they grow on the surface and cause infection. These include surgically implanted devices such as: - Artificial joints - Cardiac pacemakers Staph bacteria can spread easily through cuts, scrapes and skin-to-skin contact. Staph infections may also spread in the locker room through shared razors, towels, uniforms or equipment. Unsanitary food preparation Food handlers who don't properly wash their hands can transfer staph bacteria from their skin to the food they're preparing. The bacteria multiply in the food and produce toxins that make you sick. Cooking can kill the bacteria. But the toxins are still in the food. Foods that are contaminated with staph bacteria do not look or taste differently. If staph bacteria invade your bloodstream, you may develop a type of infection that affects your entire body. Called sepsis, this infection can lead to septic shock. This is a life-threatening episode when your blood pressure drops to an extremely low level. Staph infections can also turn deadly if the bacteria invade deep into your body, entering your bloodstream, joints, bones, lungs or heart. These commonsense precautions can help lower your risk of getting staph infections: Wash your hands. Thorough hand washing is your best defense against germs. Wash your hands with soap and water briskly for at least 20 seconds. Then dry them with a disposable towel and use the towel to turn off the faucet. If your hands aren't visibly dirty or you aren't able to wash your hands, you can use an alcohol-based hand sanitizer. Wash your hands with soap and water regularly, such as before, during and after making food; after handling raw meat or poultry; before eating; after using the bathroom; and after touching an animal or animal waste. - Keep wounds covered. Keep cuts and scrapes clean and covered with sterile, dry bandages until they heal. The pus from infected sores often contains staph bacteria. Keeping wounds covered will help keep the bacteria from spreading. - Reduce tampon risks. Toxic shock syndrome is caused by staph bacteria. Tampons left in for long periods can grow staph bacteria. You can reduce your chances of getting toxic shock syndrome by changing your tampon frequently — at least every 4 to 8 hours. Use the lowest absorbency tampon you can. Try to alternate tampons with sanitary napkins whenever possible. - Keep personal items personal. Avoid sharing personal items such as towels, sheets, razors, clothing and athletic equipment. Staph infections can spread on objects, as well as from person to person. - Wash clothing and bedding. Staph bacteria can spread on clothing, towels and bedding. To remove bacteria, wash and dry items at the warmest temperature recommended by the items' labels. It's OK if you can't use hot water, as using detergent in your wash is enough to make items clean and safe for use. You can use bleach on any bleach-safe materials. - Take food safety precautions. Wash your hands before handling food. If food will be out for a while, make sure that hot foods stay hot — above 140 F (60 C). Make sure that cold foods stay at 40 F (4.4 C) or below. Refrigerate leftovers as soon as possible. Wash cutting boards and counters with soap and water. May 25, 2022

https://www.mayoclinic.org/diseases-conditions/staph-infections/symptoms-causes/syc-20356221Notice

Health

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The Large Hadron Collider (LHC) is the world’s largest and most powerful particle accelerator. It first started up on 10 September 2008, and remains the latest addition to CERN’s accelerator complex. The LHC consists of a 27-kilometre ring of superconducting magnets with a number of accelerating structures to boost the energy of the particles along the way. Inside the accelerator, two high-energy particle beams travel at close to the speed of light before they are made to collide. The beams travel in opposite directions in separate beam pipes – two tubes kept at ultrahigh vacuum. They are guided around the accelerator ring by a strong magnetic field maintained by superconducting electromagnets. The electromagnets are built from coils of special electric cable that operates in a superconducting state, efficiently conducting electricity without resistance or loss of energy. This requires chilling the magnets to ‑271.3°C – a temperature colder than outer space. For this reason, much of the accelerator is connected to a distribution system of liquid helium, which cools the magnets, as well as to other supply services. Thousands of magnets of different varieties and sizes are used to direct the beams around the accelerator. These include 1232 dipole magnets, 15 metres in length, which bend the beams, and 392 quadrupole magnets, each 5–7 metres long, which focus the beams. Just prior to collision, another type of magnet is used to "squeeze" the particles closer together to increase the chances of collisions. The particles are so tiny that the task of making them collide is akin to firing two needles 10 kilometres apart with such precision that they meet halfway. All the controls for the accelerator, its services and technical infrastructure are housed under one roof at the CERN Control Centre. From here, the beams inside the LHC are made to collide at four locations around the accelerator ring, corresponding to the positions of four particle detectors – ATLAS, CMS, ALICE and LHCb.

http://public.web.cern.ch/public/en/lhc/lhc-en.html

Religion

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It has long been thought that the word ‘Druid’ probably came from the Greek drops, which means ‘oak’, therefore suggesting that the Druids would be the priests of the god or gods identified with the oak tree. However, it may also be derived from the word vid, meaning ‘to know’, which would lead one to believe that the Druids were considered to be the wise ones of the community. The History of the Druids While Druids are mentioned frequently in ancient scripts, little is truly known of their way of life because their traditions were principally oral and yet secret. In their society they were accepted as the teachers of moral philosophy and science; public and private disputes were referred to them for arbitration. Their authority was as much social as religious and they enjoyed many privileges, including in Gaul – though not in Ireland – exemption from military service and the payment of taxes. Many received great honors. There were three principal classes of Druids: bards, prophets, and priests, although religious teachers, judges, and civil administrators would often also be Druids. They were adept at understanding the movement of the planets, the mysterious powers of plants and animals , and the art of natural magic. It is for this last reason that they could be considered the wise ones – that is, knowing nature herself. They regarded the oak tree and the mistletoe, especially when the latter grew on oak trees, with great awe, and usually held their rituals in oak forests. These rituals seem also to have been associated with stone circles and other natural groves. The Druids were often assisted by female prophets or sorcerers who did not always enjoy the same powers and privileges. From evidence unearthed in modern times, it is thought that Celtic Druids may have been the linear descendants of the megalithic builders of the late Neolithic and Bronze Age periods in Europe. The Druids were also educators, particularly of the nobility, and it is almost certain that Merlin in the story of King Arthur, rather than being just a magician, was also a Druid. Their instruction was very wide-ranging and far-reaching. One component was the learning by heart of a large quantity of verse, which presumably meant that their memories were honed at the same time as they learned the traditions of their calling and their community. When the Druidic tradition died out in approximately the 1st to 3rd centuries CE, largely as a result of ferocious Roman oppression, their store of bardic sacred songs, prayers, rules of divination, and magic was lost. Much of the information we have today comes from translations made at a much later date, often as late as the 13th century. Julius Caesar noted that the Gauls held a tradition that Druids were of British origin. He had made as extensive a study as he could of the latters’ doctrine and concluded that the principal point was that the soul did not die and that after death it passed from one body into another. Some Greek writers are said to have believed that the Druids had borrowed this idea from the philosopher Pythagoras or one of his disciples. Certainly, the Druids had a philosophy, but it is more than likely that the belief in the continuation of life arose as much from observation of the cyclical pattern of nature as from anything else. They do not appear to have feared death, regarding it simply as a transition stage in the immortality of the soul. Indeed, they sometimes seemed to have welcomed death – particularly if it was a courageous one – to the puzzlement of those who struggled to

https://blackheartbrotherhood.family.blog/2023/12/27/uncovering-the-mysteries-of-druidism-a-beginners-guide/

Religion

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Elder abuse is a social problem that is devastating for victims and their families. It is fairly common and indeed a worldwide issue. Global organizations such as the World Health Organization and International Network for Prevention of Elder Abuse (INPEA) have brought worldwide interest to the issue of elder abuse. As adopted by WHO, elder abuse is defined as “a single or repeated act, or lack of appropriate action, occurring within any relationship where there is an expectation of trust, which causes harm or distress to an older person.” The problem of elder abuse is pervasive, showing up in various ways and forms across cultures and nations. It can come from various sources, such as people the older person knows, or has a relationship with such as spouses, family members, neighbours or friends, and indeed people the senior relies on for support services. Regardless of the form of abuse, one thing is very typical among all manner of abuse, which is the use of control and power by an individual to affect the status and well-being of an older individual. In Africa, nay Nigeria, the issue of elder abuse has been on the front burner for a while now. Indeed it has become an important discourse, as family dynamics continue to change. In the past couple of decades, young economic migrants leaving their homes for other cities or countries in search of greener pastures, often keep their elderly loved ones in the care of other relations, paid domiciliary care or nursing homes. This has raised questions bordering on the quality of care and issues of abuse and neglect as it concerns their elderly loved ones. Suffice it to say, the incidence of elder abuse in Nigeria is on the increase, although there seems to be no reliable data on this societal problem. The issue of elderly abuse continues to gain traction, especially with the advent of social media and the installation and use of monitoring equipments, like CCTV’s in private homes and elderly care facilities. Abuse of older people comes in several ways, and these include: Knowing the warning signs: Recognizing the signs of abuse in the elderly is very key to preventing it and mitigating its effects through appropriate interventions. The different types of abuse have defining features associated with them. Asides knowing the signs of abuse, it is also important for families, caregivers and service providers (e.g nursing care homes) to know what risk factors can predispose a senior to abuse, or increase their chances of being abused. Families and caregivers should be well adjusted, with positive attitudes about aging, good coping strategies and social support. In addition, their mental, financial and emotional health is important, as a deficiency of these essential components can set the stage for elderly abuse. Service providers, such as nursing care homes should be mindful of factors that can predispose the seniors in their care to abuse. These factors are multifaceted, revolving around operators (management) and staff. Meticulous hiring practices should be engaged at all times, to ensure adequate personnel, so that employees are not overworked, to prevent shoddy care, exhaustion and dissatisfaction. In addition, elderly care operators should guard against stressful working conditions for their personnel, high staff turnover rates and be wary of staff who act coldly or negatively towards the senior residents. Preventing elder abuse may not always be possible at all times, but families and concerned adults can take proactive steps towards reducing the risk of abuse in the elderly, whether at home or in care facilities. At home, abuse can stem from many reasons, and when the primary caregiver is stressed, overworked or untrustworthy, it makes abuse even more likely to happen. Therefore, it becomes imperative that families and friends should constantly reach out to both the senior and the caregiver. Families and friends can offer support in the following ways to reduce risk of elder abuse; In an elderly care facility, families may not be able to monitor their elderly loved ones as closely as family caregivers, but they can still take steps to check abuse in such facilities. These steps include: On their part, elderly care facilities can prevent elder abuse by: (1) Installing quality monitoring systems. (2) Creating policies that engender robust patient care and promote zero tolerance for elder abuse. (3) Regular trainings for personnel on abuse and neglect issues in the elderly. (4) Encouraging regular visits from social workers, volunteers and families. In Nigeria, Rockgarden homes have been in the vanguard of elderly care services and a regular advocate against abuse and neglect in the elderly. At Rockgarden homes, we pride ourselves as a home away from home for the elderly, and a trail blazer, when it comes to elderly care and support services. With our cutting edge elderly care services and support for families, Rockgarden homes, with its sister organization, Rockgarden Homecare Agency has carved a niche for itself for their unrivalled and unparalleled elderly care and support services. With absolutely no tolerance for elderly abuse in any form, the Rockgarden Homecare Agency has a painstaking recruitment process, where thorough background checks of potential staff are carried out. Employees also undergo regular trainings on elder abuse and neglect issues. These, in addition to quality monitoring systems such as CCTV’s and its very innovative Care Control mobile app, easily accessible to families, ensures that abuse and neglect are prevented from happening, as much as possible. Rockgarden Homecare Agency is a standard and well-coordinated domiciliary care service provider. We offer preventive, curative, rehabilitative and palliative healthcare services to seniors in a systematic way that simulates bringing the hospital to the comfort of your home.

https://rockgardenhomecareagency.com/preventing-abuse-in-the-elderly

Family

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How to Write a Book Report Successfully Writing book report projects is important for students. They learn how to make a review of the book they have read, make summary and comments. This work encourages them to think critically, make their own opinion, explain book characters, write down their thoughts. Are you required to write this paper? If you have no idea how to write a book report successfully, in this article you will find a lot of information and useful tips. We understand that most of the students can feel confused how to write a book report college level.Go ahead and follow our guide! We recommend starting with basic format guidelines because students may feel stuck which information they need to put there. What is most important to include, and which information can be skipped? We know how to how to write a book report college level, we want to share some basic guidelines how to start a book report. - Start your work by mentioning your teacher's name, book title, and author's name. - Write additional information about the book – this can be information about publishing this book (date, publisher, etc). - Describe the plot of the book, and write a couple of sentences summary of the book. - Describe and discuss main characters of the book, define why the author wrote this book and formulate their goal of publishing. You can trace different characters' experience and analyze book's plot and compare various characters of the book. You need to make the clear and simple description of these elements. All information in book report should be well-organized. You have to use descriptive language to show a lot of details to readers to explain your major points. How to Write a Book Report: Making a Good Outline We already told you how to start a book report. It's time to move forward and make an outline for your future paper. Some people may say they don't need to do extra work and they can write a paper without making an outline. The outline is a clear plan for your book report. You may try to start it without the plan, and we guarantee you would spend much more time, plus your finished book review won't be strong. Writing paper without a plan is the same as drive an unknown road without a map. If you want to get advice how to write a book report without getting lost in the middle, follow our advice. This is how your outline should be made. - Introduction – this is the first paragraph of your book report where you should give basic information about the book (title, author, genre, information about publishing). In this paragraph you have a chance to make your audience interested in reading the entire work: write why you have chosen this book to read, describe its genre, why it seemed interesting to you. Specify if it is a bestseller and if the author is a well-known person. - Body part – this is the main part of your book review that can be divided into more paragraphs. We suggest making three paragraphs where you will include a summary of the book and describing book details. - Summary – this part should be started with a short overview of the story. Describe book genre (fiction, non-fiction), atmosphere of story, tell reader about impression you have got from this book. - Character details – describe specific characters of the story and main problem they need to solve in their life. - Plot details – focus on the main sequence. Don't try to describe every detail of the book. If you analyze plot details, it's important to point main themes and explain how the author used various literary devices in their book. - Conclusion – in this paragraph you should give your opinion about this book. Mention reasons why you would recommend the book to your friends. Final Steps - How to Write a College Level Book Report You have got our useful tips how to organize information and how to write a book report college level on the high level. We still have more ideas how to do a book report; if you are interested in making successful and interesting book review, keep reading! - Choose an interesting and exciting book you can easily describe to the reader of your review. Make notes while you read the book. After reading you can view your notes, and it will help you to understand which important information you should include in your book review. - Try to follow your teacher's recommendations. If you were not provided with detailed instructions, feel free to ask your teacher or professor about it. - Feel hard to start? Try to find good book report example on the Internet and read it carefully. This will help you to realize things you should write in work, how to organize paragraphs and include quotations. Read several examples and compare them to similarities and differences. - Create a detailed outline, it will help you to write clear work without thinking about things you should write next and how to make your report exciting to readers. - Make sure your writing is clear and you used examples from the book to support your own opinion. If you use quotes, cite them according to your teacher's instructions. - Proofread your book review when it's done, this step is important because your grade depends on your book reports quality. You need to correct all mistakes. You have to make your book report look professional and clean. You can use online software to check your work, we suggest re-reading it at least 2-3 times to avoid logical errors. Ask your friend, relative, colleague to read and check your book report. It is a good idea. You will get their opinion about your book review, and get chance to change some places to make it better. Get Professional Help With Your Book Report Feel stuck with your book report projects? Spending time making homework and other tasks, the deadline is close, and your book report is undone? Writing book review is not an easy job. Don't worry, you have a chance to get the brilliant paper – just visit the website and order your work in just a couple of minutes. Still, hesitate if you should order your book report? These are some reasons why you should choose us. - We cooperate with most experienced writers all over the world, and they will be ready to fulfill your assignment in shortest terms. - We understand that students mostly live on a tough budget; check out our affordable prices, we offer special discounts for students. - We use most reliable sources for writing. Our writing service has access to many online libraries, so we guarantee your book report will be done at a high level, all sources will be cited in accordance to instructions and the most reliable academic resources will be used. - You will get plagiarism-free paper that will match your requirements. Our best experts will make their best in writing, revising and correcting your work to take care you will receive perfect book review to impress your audience. We hope this article was helpful for you, and we wish you good luck in writing your book review. Remember that writing is hard work that requires a lot of time, patience and skills. Follow our writing tips and create quality paper!

https://paperovernight.com/blog/writing-book-report

Education

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Mental illness, also called mental health disorders, refers to a wide range of mental health conditions — disorders that affect your mood, thinking and behavior. Examples of mental illness include depression, anxiety disorders, schizophrenia, eating disorders and addictive behaviors. Many people have mental health concerns from time to time. But a mental health concern becomes a mental illness when ongoing signs and symptoms cause frequent stress and affect your ability to function. A mental illness can make you miserable and can cause problems in your daily life, such as at school or work or in relationships. In most cases, symptoms can be managed with a combination of medications and talk therapy (psychotherapy). Products & Services Signs and symptoms of mental illness can vary, depending on the disorder, circumstances and other factors. Mental illness symptoms can affect emotions, thoughts and behaviors. Examples of signs and symptoms include: - Feeling sad or down - Confused thinking or reduced ability to concentrate - Excessive fears or worries, or extreme feelings of guilt - Extreme mood changes of highs and lows - Withdrawal from friends and activities - Significant tiredness, low energy or problems sleeping - Detachment from reality (delusions), paranoia or hallucinations - Inability to cope with daily problems or stress - Trouble understanding and relating to situations and to people - Problems with alcohol or drug use - Major changes in eating habits - Sex drive changes - Excessive anger, hostility or violence - Suicidal thinking Sometimes symptoms of a mental health disorder appear as physical problems, such as stomach pain, back pain, headaches, or other unexplained aches and pains. When to see a doctor If you have any signs or symptoms of a mental illness, see your primary care provider or a mental health professional. Most mental illnesses don't improve on their own, and if untreated, a mental illness may get worse over time and cause serious problems. If you have suicidal thoughts Suicidal thoughts and behavior are common with some mental illnesses. If you think you may hurt yourself or attempt suicide, get help right away: - Call 911 or your local emergency number immediately. - Call your mental health specialist. - Contact a suicide hotline. In the U.S., call or text 988 to reach the 988 Suicide & Crisis Lifeline, available 24 hours a day, seven days a week. Or use the Lifeline Chat. Services are free and confidential. - Seek help from your primary care provider. - Reach out to a close friend or loved one. - Contact a minister, spiritual leader or someone else in your faith community. Suicidal thinking doesn't get better on its own — so get help. Helping a loved one If your loved one shows signs of mental illness, have an open and honest discussion with him or her about your concerns. You may not be able to force someone to get professional care, but you can offer encouragement and support. You can also help your loved one find a qualified mental health professional and make an appointment. You may even be able to go along to the appointment. If your loved one has done self-harm or is considering doing so, take the person to the hospital or call for emergency help. Mental illnesses, in general, are thought to be caused by a variety of genetic and environmental factors: - Inherited traits. Mental illness is more common in people whose blood relatives also have a mental illness. Certain genes may increase your risk of developing a mental illness, and your life situation may trigger it. - Environmental exposures before birth. Exposure to environmental stressors, inflammatory conditions, toxins, alcohol or drugs while in the womb can sometimes be linked to mental illness. - Brain chemistry. Neurotransmitters are naturally occurring brain chemicals that carry signals to other parts of your brain and body. When the neural networks involving these chemicals are impaired, the function of nerve receptors and nerve systems change, leading to depression and other emotional disorders. Certain factors may increase your risk of developing a mental illness, including: - A history of mental illness in a blood relative, such as a parent or sibling - Stressful life situations, such as financial problems, a loved one's death or a divorce - An ongoing (chronic) medical condition, such as diabetes - Brain damage as a result of a serious injury (traumatic brain injury), such as a violent blow to the head - Traumatic experiences, such as military combat or assault - Use of alcohol or recreational drugs - A childhood history of abuse or neglect - Few friends or few healthy relationships - A previous mental illness Mental illness is common. About 1 in 5 adults has a mental illness in any given year. Mental illness can begin at any age, from childhood through later adult years, but most cases begin earlier in life. The effects of mental illness can be temporary or long lasting. You also can have more than one mental health disorder at the same time. For example, you may have depression and a substance use disorder. Mental illness is a leading cause of disability. Untreated mental illness can cause severe emotional, behavioral and physical health problems. Complications sometimes linked to mental illness include: - Unhappiness and decreased enjoyment of life - Family conflicts - Relationship difficulties - Social isolation - Problems with tobacco, alcohol and other drugs - Missed work or school, or other problems related to work or school - Legal and financial problems - Poverty and homelessness - Self-harm and harm to others, including suicide or homicide - Weakened immune system, so your body has a hard time resisting infections - Heart disease and other medical conditions There's no sure way to prevent mental illness. However, if you have a mental illness, taking steps to control stress, to increase your resilience and to boost low self-esteem may help keep your symptoms under control. Follow these steps: - Pay attention to warning signs. Work with your doctor or therapist to learn what might trigger your symptoms. Make a plan so that you know what to do if symptoms return. Contact your doctor or therapist if you notice any changes in symptoms or how you feel. Consider involving family members or friends to watch for warning signs. - Get routine medical care. Don't neglect checkups or skip visits to your primary care provider, especially if you aren't feeling well. You may have a new health problem that needs to be treated, or you may be experiencing side effects of medication. - Get help when you need it. Mental health conditions can be harder to treat if you wait until symptoms get bad. Long-term maintenance treatment also may help prevent a relapse of symptoms. - Take good care of yourself. Sufficient sleep, healthy eating and regular physical activity are important. Try to maintain a regular schedule. Talk to your primary care provider if you have trouble sleeping or if you have questions about diet and physical activity. Dec. 13, 2022

http://www.mayoclinic.com/print/mental-illness/DS01104/METHOD=print&DSECTION=allTo

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A SUPER Pink Moon lit up skies around the world tonight in a rare spectacle once linked to 'the end of days'. The phenomenon was captured around the world, dwarfing the Shard in London and glowing over the Empire State Building in New York City. It was also captured in parts of Germany, Spain and Italy, as onlookers marvelled at the spectacle. Although called "Pink", there's no noticeable colour difference in tonight's moon. It is a northern Native American reference to an early-blooming wildflower, which starts to pop up in the US and Canada at the beginning of spring. 'END OF THE WORLD' Some ancient peoples thought the cosmic event was linked to the appearance of beautiful flowers, while others claim it signifies the end of the world as we know it. In some other cultures, the pink moon is known as the sprouting grass moon, the egg moon, and the fish moon. Stargazers can catch it at its best in the early hours of tomorrow morning - set to peak at 3.35am. As it is a supermoon, it should look up to 14 per cent bigger and 30 per cent brighter as it reaches its closest point to Earth, known as its perigee. April's supermoon is the third of the year, following the worm moon on March 9. The next full moon is referred to as the Flower Moon, which takes place on May 7. What is a Pink Moon? A Pink Moon is the rare result of several space phenomena occurring at once. The name is slightly deceiving because rather than pink, the Moon will actually appear a slightly pale orange. Why is it called a Pink Moon? The phrase "Pink Moon" comes from Northern Native Americans, according to the Old Farmer's Almanac. They named it after a spring flower called Wild Ground Phlox, which is native to the eastern USA and one of the earliest widespread flowers of Spring. It's got a pink hue and blossoms around the same time as April's full moon. This natural phenomenon is always linked to the date of Easter because it appears after the spring equinox. In other parts of the world, the celestial phenomenon is referred to as the Egg Moon, Full Sprouting Grass Moon, Growing Moon or the Full Fish Moon. Ancient beliefs about the Pink Moon Among Native Americans, the Pink Moon signifies rebirth and renewal, according to Elite Daily. It flags that brighter times are ahead following the cold, dark months of winter. The Pink Moon is a sign that life goes through cycles - bright flowers may die but they always come back again each year. According to spiritualist Cherokee Billie, the Pink Moon "brings the stability and security to crystallise recent changes and make them permanent improvements." Other cultures view the Pink Moon a little differently. In the Hebrew lunisolar calendar the months change with the new Moon and full Moons fall in the middle of the lunar months. This full Moon is in the middle of Nisan. According to one Rabbi, the Moon becoming as large as the Sun is an "injustice" to God. "This injustice will be rectified in the end of days,” Rabbi Berger said, according to BreakingIsraelNews. "In the end of days, the sun and the moon will be equally ‘great’." The full Moon - of which the Pink Moon is one form of - means different things to different religions. According to Nasa: "There are a number of variations of the Hindu lunisolar calendar, but for many this full Moon corresponds with the Hanuman Jayanti festival celebrating the birth of Lord Sri Hanuman. "Every full Moon is a holiday in Sri Lanka," it continues. "For Buddhists in Sri Lanka, this full Moon is Bak Poya, commemorating when the Buddha visited Sri Lanka and avoided a war by settling a dispute between chiefs." Pink Moon effects on Earth Some scientists believe the Pink Moon can cause small increases in tectonic activity. That's because of the effects of the gravitational pull of Earth's rocky satellite. A Super Moon may also bring the largest tides of the year. That's because a closer Moon exerts a stronger gravitational pull and creates more variation between the tides. What causes a Pink Moon? A Pink Moon occurs when Earth's rocky neighbour makes a close approach to our planet. Because the Moon's orbit is off-centre, its distance to the Earth is greater at one end than the other. A Super Moon refers to either a new or full Moon that occurs within 90 per cent of "perigee", its closest approach to Earth in a given orbit. Not every Super Moon is a Pink Moon. “When the moon is near the horizon, it can look unnaturally large when viewed through trees, buildings, or other foreground objects," say NASA. "The effect is an optical illusion, but that fact doesn’t take away from the experience." What is a Super Moon? - Super Moons are a rare and stunning lunar event that only takes place a handful of times a year. - The sky is filled by a bright and giant Moon, which is a real treat for stargazers. - A Super Moon is a combination of two different astronomical effects. - It's when a new or full Moon coincides with a perigee – the Moon's closest point to Earth in its monthly orbit. - A Moon has to come within 90 per cent of its closest approach to Earth to be formally defined as a Super Moon. - That means the Moon needs to come within 224,865 miles of Earth and be a full Moon to boot. When a large full moon is seen low in the sky it is being viewed through a greater thickness of the Earth's atmosphere. Earth's oxygen and nitrogen-rich atmosphere filter out the bluer wavelengths of moonlight when the Moon is close to the horizon as it rises. This filtering process, known as light refraction, results in more of the red component of moonlight travelling directly into your eye. Therefore the Moon will appear red or orange to you. The Moon can only really appear to have turned pink during a total lunar eclipses. This is often referred to as a a Blood Moon. When are all of the Full Moons this year? Wolf Moon - January 10 Snow Moon - February 9 Worm Moon - March 9 Pink Moon - April 8 Flower Moon - May 7 Strawberry Moon - June 6 Buck Moon - July 5 Sturgeon Moon - August 3 Full Corn Moon - September 2 Hunter's Moon - October 1 Beaver Moon - November 30 Cold Moon - December 30 In other space news, Nasa has revealed some of its plans for colonising the Moon. If you've ever wanted to see a shooting star you stand a good chance this month. And, the Hubble Space Telescope has revealed new data about what may be the most powerful cosmic storm in the universe. Would you like to live on the Moon one day? Let us know in the comments... We pay for your stories! Do you have a story for The Sun Online Tech & Science team? Email us at [email protected]

https://www.thesun.co.uk/tech/11344706/pink-moon-meaning-conspiracy-theory/amp/

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A brain tumour is an abnormal cell growth or mass somewhere in the brain. There are many different types of brain tumours, some of which are benign (noncancerous) and others cancerous (malignant). Brain malignancies can arise in the brain (primary brain tumours) or spread to the brain from elsewhere in the body (metastatic brain tumours). The rate of growth of a brain tumour varies greatly. The size and location of the growth determine how it will affect the function of your nervous system. The roots of a primary brain tumour are in the brain. The majority of initial brain tumours formed are mostly harmless. A secondary brain tumour, also known as a metastatic brain tumour, happens when cancer cells from another organ, such as your lung or breast, travel to your brain. Though benign brain tumours can cause various problems, they are not malignant, meaning they develop slowly and seldom spread to other parts of the body. They also tend to have more well-defined borders, making surgical excision easier, and they rarely return following removal. On the other hand, malignant brain tumours are malignant, develop quickly, and have the potential to spread to different sections of the brain or central nervous system, creating a life-threatening situation. READ ALSO: 6 Ways To Protect Yourself From Stress Symptoms of brain tumour The signs and symptoms of a brain tumour vary greatly depending on the tumour’s size, location, and rate of growth. Here are some of them: Causes of brain tumour Primary brain tumours develop in the brain or nearby tissues, such as the meninges (brain covering membranes), cranial nerves, pituitary gland, or pineal gland. Primary brain tumours are caused by alterations (mutations) in the DNA of normal cells. A brain tumour is diagnosed by a physical examination and studying your medical history. The physical examination includes a complete neurological evaluation. Your doctor will test to see if your cranial nerves are healthy. Your doctor will inspect the inside of your eyes with an ophthalmoscope. That shines a light through your pupils and into your retinas. As a result, your doctor will be able to see how your pupils react to light. It also enables your doctor to see straight into your eyes to check for any optic nerve swelling. As the pressure inside the skull rises, changes in the optic nerve can develop. The most common therapy for brain tumours is surgery, and in many situations, it is the only option. Depending on the size and location of the tumour, there are various surgical options for removing it. Radiation therapy is a type of treatment that uses X-rays and other forms of light energy to kill cancer cells in malignant tumours or stop the growth of benign brain tumours. Learn more about radiation therapy or look into the many types of radiation therapy for brain tumours. Chemotherapy treatments are cancer-killing medications. Chemo is rarely used alone to treat brain tumours; instead, it is used in conjunction with surgery and/or radiation. Chemotherapy medications are delivered to the brain in various ways, including surgically implanted wafers like Gliadel. Surgeons use these wafers to fill the region left behind after a tumour is removed to mop up any residual cancer cells Targeted drug therapies are drugs that target certain cell characteristics to stop a tumour from spreading. These therapies, unlike chemotherapy, spare healthy tissue, resulting in fewer and milder adverse effects.

https://getreliancehealth.com/blog/brain-tumour-all-you-need-to-know/

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Device improves survival in rats after severe infections. Researchers have developed a high-tech method to rid the body of infections — even those caused by unknown pathogens. A device inspired by the spleen can quickly clean blood of everything from Escherichia coli to Ebola, researchers report on 14 September in Nature Medicine1. Blood infections can be very difficult to treat, and can lead to sepsis, an often-fatal immune response. More than 50% of the time, physicians cannot diagnose the cause of an infection that has prompted sepsis, and so they resort to antibiotics that attack a broad range of bacteria2. This approach is not always effective, and can lead to antibiotic resistance in bacteria. In search of a way to clear any infection, a team led by Donald Ingber, a bioengineer at the Wyss Institute for Biologically Inspired Engineering in Boston, Massachusetts, developed an artificial 'biospleen' to filter blood. The device uses a modified version of mannose-binding lectin (MBL), a protein found in humans that binds to sugar molecules on the surfaces of more than 90 different bacteria, viruses and fungi, as well as to the toxins released by dead bacteria that trigger the immune overreaction in sepsis. The researchers coated magnetic nanobeads with MBL. As blood enters the biospleen device, passes by the MBL-equipped nanobeads, which bind to most pathogens. A magnet on the biospleen device then pulls the beads and their quarry out of the blood, which can then be routed back into the patient. To test the device, Ingber and his team infected rats with either E. coli or Staphylococcus aureus and filtered blood from some of the animals through the biospleen. Five hours after infection, 89% of the rats whose blood had been filtered were still alive, compared with only 14% of those that were infected but not treated. The researchers found that the device had removed more than 90% of the bacteria from the rats' blood. The rats whose blood had been filtered also had less inflammation in their lungs and other organs, suggesting they would be less prone to sepsis. The researchers then tested whether the biospleen could handle the volume of blood in an average adult human — about 5 litres. They ran human blood containing a mixture of bacteria and fungi through the biospleen at a rate of 1 litre per hour, and found that the device removed most of the pathogens within five hours. That degree of efficacy is probably enough to control an infection, Ingber says. Once the biospleen has removed most pathogens from the blood, antibiotics and the immune system can fight off remaining traces of infection — such as pathogens lodged in the organs, he says. Ingber says that the biospleen could also help to treat viral diseases such as HIV and Ebola, in which survival depends on lowering the amount of virus in the blood to a negligible level. His group is now testing the biospleen on pigs. Nigel Klein, an infection and immunity expert at University College London, says that the biospleen could also allow diagnosticians to collect samples of a pathogen from the blood and then culture it to identify it and determine what drugs will best treat it. As blood transfusion and filtration are already common practices, he expects that the biospleen could move into human clinical trials within a couple of years. Related links in Nature Research Related external links About this article Cite this article Reardon, S. Artificial spleen cleans up blood. Nature (2014). https://doi.org/10.1038/nature.2014.15917

http://www.nature.com/news/artificial-spleen-cleans-up-blood-1.15917

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Coronavirus smell loss 'different from cold and flu' - Author, Michelle Roberts - Role, Health editor, BBC News online The loss of smell that can accompany coronavirus is unique and different from that experienced by someone with a bad cold or flu, say European researchers who have studied the experiences of patients. When Covid-19 patients have smell loss it tends to be sudden and severe. And they usually don't have a blocked, stuffy or runny nose - most people with coronavirus can still breathe freely. Another thing that sets them apart is their "true" loss of taste. It's not that their taste is somewhat impaired because their sense of smell is out of action, say the researchers in the journal Rhinology. Coronavirus patients with loss of taste really cannot tell the difference between bitter or sweet. Experts suspect this is because the pandemic virus affects the nerve cells directly involved with smell and taste sensation. The main symptoms of coronavirus are: - high temperature - new, continuous cough - loss of smell or taste Anyone with these symptoms should self-isolate and arrange to have a swab test to check if they have the virus. Members of their household should isolate too to prevent possible spread. Lead investigator Prof Carl Philpott, from the University of East Anglia, carried out smell and taste tests on 30 volunteers: 10 with Covid-19, 10 with bad colds and 10 healthy people with no cold or flu symptoms. Smell loss was much more profound in the Covid-19 patients. They were less able to identify smells, and they were not able to discern bitter or sweet tastes at all. Prof Philpott, who works with the charity Fifth Sense, which was set up to help with people with smell and taste disorders, said: "There really do appear to be distinguishing features that set the coronavirus apart from other respiratory viruses. "This is very exciting because it means that smell and taste tests could be used to discriminate between Covid-19 patients and people with a regular cold or flu." He said people could do their own smell and taste tests at home using products like coffee, garlic, oranges or lemons and sugar. He stressed that diagnostic throat and nose swab tests were still essential if someone thought they might have coronavirus. The senses of smell and taste return within a few weeks in most people who recover from coronavirus, he added. Prof Andrew Lane is an expert in nose and sinus problems at Johns Hopkins University in the US. He and his team have been studying tissue samples from the back of the nose to understand how coronavirus might cause loss of smell and have published the findings in the European Respiratory Journal. They identified extremely high levels of an enzyme which were present only in the area of the nose responsible for smelling. This enzyme, called ACE-2 (angiotensin converting enzyme II), is thought to be the "entry point" that allows coronavirus to get into the cells of the body and cause an infection. The nose is one of the places where Sars-CoV-2, the virus that causes Covid-19, enters the body. Prof Lane said: "We are now doing more experiments in the lab to see whether the virus is indeed using these cells to access and infect the body. "If that's the case, we may be able to tackle the infection with antiviral therapies delivered directly through the nose." More to explore Content is not available

https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/amp/health-53810610

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The EPA, on the other hand, allows its widespread use as a germ killer in clothing, bedding, cosmetics, electric shavers, baby bottles, and food containers. Silver has been used as an antimicrobial for thousands of years—that’s why forks, spoons, and platters were traditionally made out of silver. Nanosilver, however, sprang out of the new science of nanomaterials, which involves creating objects smaller than 100 nanometers. (A nanometer is a billionth of a meter.) For example, the period at the end of this sentence is a million nanometers wide. Objects this small can penetrate parts of the body that larger sizes of silver cannot and thus potentially increase silver’s antimicrobial effect. The new size however also poses potential risks of misuse. The Natural Resources Defense Council (NRDC) filed a lawsuit in January 2012 to block the EPA from allowing nanosilver on the market without the legally required data about possible harmful effects. Australian microbiologist Gregory Crocetti adds that important clinical uses of silver “will be diminished by completely hysterical and frivolous uses” such as nanosilver being used in bedding and clothing simply to prevent odors and keep linens fresher longer between washings. He implicitly acknowledges, as the FDA will not, that nanosilver has important therapeutic applications. Silver kills all kinds of bacteria, attacking them in three distinct ways: - Weakening the cell wall, thus causing the bacteria to collapse or burst; - Interfering with the enzymes the bacteria need to metabolize nutrients, starving them; and - Disrupting the ability of bacteria to replicate. This triple-pronged attack makes it unlikely that bacteria could develop resistance to silver—although it cannot be completely ruled out. (Bacteria would have to mutate in all three ways.) For this reason, critics of using silver in clothes and similar products are right. Because silver weakens the wall of the bacteria, it also allows conventional antibiotics to enter more easily. Research on mice at Boston University showed that with silver added, lower doses of antibiotic drugs were needed to kill bacteria. Silver was also able to reverse the antibiotic resistance of E. coli bacteria, making them once more susceptible to tetracycline. The mice were left unharmed by the silver. This is huge, if only because it may force medical authorities to recognize silver as a therapeutic agent. It could also be the answer to the growing problem of antibiotic resistant diseases that are becoming endemic. Individual studies have confirmed silver’s powerful therapeutic effects against thrush, pericoronitis (infection of the gums around the back teeth), E.coli, and Staphylococcus aureus. Silver nanoparticles in blood serum from cattle showed “highly potent antibacterial activity” toward certain bacterial strains. The FDA does not recognize colloidal silver (silver suspended in a liquid) as a safe and effective antibiotic and believes there is no evidence to support its use. This has been the agency’s position since 1996. This led the authors of this study to want to evaluate the mineral’s antimicrobial efficacy (and therefore the FDA’s claim). They found that, contrary to the agency’s claim, ionic colloidal silver is highly effective in killing bacteria. Another study similarly concluded: “Silver particles could offer a great potential for application as [an] antibacterial agent with low human toxicity.” An epidemic of tuberculosis is currently ravaging Myanmar, with 9,000 new multi-drug-resistant TB infections every year. The normal strain of TB is easy to treat with a simple and cheap drug regimen, but when patients skip doses, the bacteria can fight back by mutating in ways that sidestep the drugs’ assault. Now, the drugs that are needed to fight this resistant strain of TB are highly toxic, one hundred times more expensive, and must be taken for longer periods of time. As we reported in 2012, the “miracle drugs” and vaccines of the mid-to-late 1900s are not standing the test of time. Where is silver in the treatment plan for multi-drug-resistant TB in Myanmar? There are no known cases of silver-resistant bacteria, and as more “modern” antibiotics are rendered useless by bacteria that have learned to outsmart them, silver is an obvious answer. Silver nanoparticles also show promise in fighting viral infections. The Journal of Virological Methods reported in 2011 that silver nanoparticles inhibit the human immunodeficiency virus (HIV), the hepatitis B virus, and the H1N1 influenza A virus. That was confirmed in studies here and here. Condoms coated with silver nanoparticles have been shown to inactivate the infectiousness of both HIV and the herpes simplex virus. Water disinfection systems using silver nanoparticles were shown to exhibit antiviral properties, and silver applied to a water filter more than doubled its effectiveness in removing viruses from drinking water. Although this is providing important information, using silver in this way is untested and might also jeopardize silver’s continuing use as a potent antimicrobial agent. How about using silver against fungal infections? There is mounting evidence for its antifungal effects, including four recent studies from universities and research institutes the world over (1) (2) (3) (4). This is heartening news. Is colloidal silver safe for use by individuals and families? The evidence is that it is, but that care must be taken to follow the manufacturer’s directions in order to avoid an overdose. In general, it is better to avoid using silver for everyday infections such as teenage acne, but instead reserve it for more serious infections. Meanwhile the FDA continues to keep its head buried in the sand. It ignores mounting evidence that silver is an important general antimicrobial, an important tool especially against resistant infections and pandemic, while ignoring the proliferation of nanosilver in consumer goods. The agency appears to be trying to protect drug company products. The difference between drug company products and silver is of course that the latter is natural. As such, it is not easily patented, and not being patentable, no one can afford to spend $1 billion on FDA approval. This is a scandalous situation. How many millions of people will have to die as a result?

http://www.anh-usa.org/fda-declares-silver-has-no-therapeutic-value/

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A Thousand Years of Bunyoro-Kitara Kingdom - The People and the Rulers (Fountain Publishers, 1994, 153 p.) | As shown in the foregoing pages, the Kings of Bunyoro-Kitara, had constant feuds with Ankole and Buganda and displayed remarkable appetite for quarrelling among themselves. This led to the collapse of the kingdom mostly from around 1650 onwards. Ankole extended its frontiers at Kitara's expense, while Busoga maintained a slippery sort of independence paying tribute now to Kitara than to Buganda, according to its shrewd estimation of where power lay. The sons of Nyamutukura proceeded to dismember what was left out of the kingdom, after complaining that their father had ruled for a long period of time. Kaboyo, the favourite prince carved out Toro where he was Saza Chief. While Princes Isagara Katiritiri and Kacope seized control of Chope in Northern Kitara and divided it among themselves. The attempt by the fourth prince Karasama Bugondo Bwamusungu to cut off his Saza of Bugungu on the eastern side of Lake Albert failed but the Omukama's authority for sometime remained ineffective. Any hope of giving the kingdom a new lease of life appeared illusory until Omukama Chwa II Kabalega( 1870-1899) made a determined bid to stop the rot. This is the major importance of Kabalega in the history of Bunyoro-Kitara and why he merits to be regarded as the greatest Omukama of Bunyoro-Kitara. Kabalega was born in about 1850 of Mukama Kyebambe IV Kamurasi. His mother, a Muhuma lady of the Abayonza clan from Mwenge was called Kanyange Nyamutahingurwa. Kabalega spent his early days in Bulega where he and his mother had taken refugee when some rebellious Bito princes had temporarily chased his father from the throne. It is probable that this incident left a strong impression on the mind of the boy. It is believed that when he was brought back to the palace he was given the name "Akana Kabalega", meaning a child of the Balega and this was shortened to Kabalega. Kabalega grew up in the palace with his brother, prince Kabigumire. They played together and like all younger boys discussed their ambitions and aspirations with each other. Kabigumire's ambition was to slaughter all his father's servants when he became king and replace them with those of his own choice. Kabalega's ambition was to turn these servants into soldiers. There was no point in killing them he argued. As soldiers, they could be profitably used in maintaining internal stability and in raiding neighbouring kingdoms. Moreover, successful raids would make them rich and contented. During this period, Kabigumire and Kabalega were placed under the care of Kamihanda Omudaya, the brother of Kamurasi. He was instructed to study them and note who exhibited kingly characteristics. At the same time, he taught them court etiquette and the history of the kings of Kitara. It soon became apparent that Omudaya was impressed with Kabigumire. He found him more royal and refined in behaviour. Kabalega, on the other hand, was impulsive, headstrong, proud, opinionated and short tempered. He devoted a lot of attention to the royal cattle and the court pages. Despite the views of Kamihanda, Kamurasi named Kabalega as his successor in his will, because of his younger son's single-mindedness, aggressive qualities and obvious interest in the people - the common people Kabalega used to chat with them and give them gifts. They adored him. But the majority of the royal family hated him. They appear to have been apprehensive of him and to have made their minds that he would never be their king. As a young man, Kabalega was slim like his father but slightly shorter. He was about 5 feet 10 inches in height and very light in complexion. With age, however, he added a lot of weight to the extent that he is generally described as a stout man. He had sharp, big, bright eyes, a large mouth, prominent but very white teeth, the upper of which became missing in the later life. He spoke with a deep, refined voice but occasionally roared like a lion. He had the curious mannerism of speaking with a stem countenance when in good humour and a smile when in a rage. He was extremely neat and clean and his hands were neatly kept. He was a very cheerful man and as a soldier demanded explicit obedience, strict discipline and efficiency. He was merciless towards those of his royal guards who showed no dedication of duty. He spoke these languages - Runyoro, Swahili and Arabic - and he may have also spoken Luo. The kingdom of Bunyoro-Kitara was unstable. The instability resulted into the decline of the kingdom as against the more centralized and organised kingdoms of Buganda and Ankole. Kabalega grew amidst this political instability and grasped the cause of his kingdom's importance more than his predecessors. According to reports given by one of his sons Aramanzani Mwirumubi, Kabalega made up his mind to reassert the authority of royal power, quell dissident and rebellious elements, centralize the kingdom, undertake a policy of national reconstruction and reconciliation and restore the fortunes of the once powerful and famous empire of Kitara by reconquering the rebellious princes. In short, Kabalega had taken the task of founding a strong, united, and centralized state, modelled on these initiatives. Any one who prevented his realization of this goal was an enemy and must be resisted. Kabalega's ideals would remain dreams so long as he was not a king. So he had to establish himself on the throne. This proved to be a very difficult task. In 1869, Kamurasi died. Kabigumire at once seized the body of the king. According to Nyoro custom, the prince who buried his father's body and killed his opponent became king. Civil wars were inevitable. The chief contenders were Kabigumire and Kabalega. It was an unusual succession war because normally aristocratic support tended to be evenly balanced between the opposing candidates. This time it was different. Given the views of Kabalega regarding centralization and the surbodination of the aristocracy, it was not surprising that practically all the Bito and the other important people in the kingdom supported Kabigumire who emerged as the aristocratic candidate. Only two Bito, Kabagonza and Nyaika, supported Kabalega. Of the important chiefs only Nyakamatura Nyakatura, Saza Chief of Bugahya is known to have supported him. The majority of the chiefs opposed him. Initially his prospects of success appeared slim but soon became clear that Kabalega had the enthusiastic support of the royal guards of Kamurasi as well as that of the Bairu (common people) agriculturalists. The Arab traders divided their support between the two opponents. So , the stage was set for a bitter struggle. Nyaika who was left by Kamurasi to look after his favourite Kabalega, sent words secretly to Kabalega asking him not to forget his father's words and not to wait for his father's body to be buried if he was not to be sacrificed as a mock king, (Omuragwa Ngoma). Isabalega took up the advice and travelled at night to Nyabaleba, Macunda and arrived at Ngangi. Kamihanda Omudaya and other members of the royal family who possessed the king's body, (Omuguta), learnt of Kabalega's disappearance from his household. They prepared for war. Kamihanda Omudaya sent a regiment commanded by Katabandaka Kigoye to find the whereabouts of Kabalega. He also sent Biremeseze bya Kikonge and Kwezi as spies to make him informed of Kabalega's preparations for war. A battle was fought at Kinoga and Kabalega carried the day by overwhelmingly defeating his adversaries. When Muhangi ya Nyakairu led another regiment against Kabalega, a pitched battle was fought and Kabalega defeated and killed Muhangi. Kabalega also engaged Kamihanda Omudaya who was trying to escape with the royal herd. He was arrested at Musaija Mukuru hill, Buhimba, but luckily escaped with the omuguta. He captured a large booty of cattle. He then decided to consult Ruhanga Rwa Kyagwire for divination because Rubanga had extreme experience and reputation as possessor of reliable spirits. Kabalega sent for help from Mukabya which he received. Mukabya sent an army commanded by Kangawo Kyegulumiza which fought along with Kabalega. Nyaika who camped at Kasingo, befriended an Egyptian trader called Sulaiman Kirimani and sent word to Kabalega who was in Kyankwanzi. Kabigumire was at Kitaihuka. Kabalega invaded him at Buziba and in the resultant battle Kabigumire was defeated. Kabigumire escaped to Kyegayuka. The elders, who had been exhausted by war and a long feud that had lasted six months advised Kabalega to bury his father, ascend the throne and stop fighting. Kamurasi was buried at Ngangi, Bwamiramira Gombolola, Buyanja (formerly in Buyaga county). Kabalega built at Kikangahara Kisagara. A mock King called Kabagungu was placed on the throne for nine days and was named Olimi VI. He was the Omuragwa Ngoma. He was taken to Buziba and killed. His tomb is at Buziba in Buyaga. He died instead of Kabigumire who was still on the run. Babigumire returned after mobilising a Banyankore dominated force given to him by Mutambuka the Omugabe of Ankole. Kabalega entirely wiped the alien force. Kabigumire escaped back to Ankole to seek more help. The Omugabe of Ankole refused to give him more assistance saying: "Engoma Yo Neyowanyu Nekibwa Erikate, Yamarize Abantu Baitu kandi Nosubira Tutekeyo Abandizo, Eri Nihano." Meaning that the Bunyoro throne had consumed many people (including Banyankole and it is still unsettled and you expect us to send in more people to be sacrificed, that is a strange expectation. Kabigumire, however, managed to return to Kitara via Bwiru, Kahanga, Rugonjo and arrived in Chope. Kabalega was at Buruko in Bugangaizi. At this time Nyaika advised Kabalega to allow his brother to rule pan of Bunyoro if he never wanted to kill him. The feud lessened peoples numbers, so if he was determined he (Kabalega) should give a spear to Nyaika to spear Kabigumire to death. Kabalega did so and Nyaika led an army together with Nyakamutura. Kabigumire was confronted and killed. Kabalega emerged victorious. He became the undisputed King of Bunyoro-Kitara, and chose the name of Chwa II Rumoma Mahanga. Kabalega inherited a Kingdom which was crumbling. It was a period during which the European penetration into present Uganda was pressing from two directions - the East Coast and Cairo - and carried with it the seeds of imperialism. Because Kabalega chose to re-organise his Kingdom so as to save it from internal collapse and external threat, he had little to do with the bothersome whitemen who called at his palace (Mparo). In Bunyoro-Kitara Kabalega is remembered for his political and military reforms which have only been compared to Shaka the Zulu King. In the early years of his reign, he set out to impose his new ideas and order. His opponents had either to cross to his side, flee or wait to be destroyed. Japari who had fought for Kabigumire, was praised by Kabalega for his military skill and settled down comfortably in the Kingdom. OMUKAMA CWA II KABALEGA On the other hand, those who refused to accept their reduced political role or continued to intrigue against Kabalega were either killed or escaped. Seven important Biito princes plus two of Kabalega's sisters who had acted as spies for Kabigumire were executed at Kibwona. He established an intelligence network to check upon potential causes. In Nyoro tradition Kabalega is known as Ekituli Kyangire Abemi, he who hates the rebellious. His other praise names were: Rukolimbo Nyantalibwa Omugobe, Rwoota Mahanga. On creation of order, he embarked on administrative reforms which were closely tied with military reforms. He reduced the power of the aristocracy which had been a thorn in the flesh of Bunyoro's political establishment. The civil wars, succession disputes and intrigues had emanated from this faction. He appointed Army Generals as territorial chiefs. The post of the chief was made appointive rather than hereditary. Greater centralisation and efficiency ensued because all chiefs were now answerable to the King. New chiefdoms were created for able commoners and these could be promoted on merit. Below are the names, clans and villages of county chiefs who ruled during the time of Kabalega: 1. Bugahya County | Ruled by Nyakamatura rwa Nyakatura. His capital was at Kihaguzi on Kabyerya Hill and was a Mumooli by clan (bush back totem). Citizen of Kihaguzi, Bugahya. | 2. Busindi County | Ruled by Bikamba rwa Kabale, his capital was at Kibwona. A Muranzi by clan (owe Nkobe in Buganda). Native of Butengesa Rugonjo. His county extended from Kasokwa Ntoma to Nyabuzarla and Kafo. | 3. Bugungu or Kicwante | Ruled by Mwangarwa Kagwa. His capital at Kinywambeho Bugungu. A Mucwa (bushbuck). Bungungu citizen. | 4. Chope | Ruled by Kihukya Katongole Rukidi. Had his capital at Panyadoli. Mucwa clan. | 5. Kibanda Chope | Ruled by Masura rwa Mnteru, with capital at Koki. He was a Munyonza by clan, born in -Mwenge. | 6. Buruli county | Now in Buganda, was ruled by Kadyebo rwa Bantawa. Capital at Kamunina Kigweri. Mugonya clan (mushroom totem). From Buruli. | 7. Bunyara Bugerere | Ruled by Mutenga rwa Ikwambu. Capital al Ibale Ntenjeru. Mubiito and grandson of King Olimi I. Born in Bunyara. | 8. Rugonjo Butengesa- | Ruled by Mutengesa rwa Ololo. Has his capital at Kicucu. Mubiito, grandson of King Winyi II. Native of Rugonjo. | 9. Bugangaizi | Kikukule son of Runego. Capital at Kasa-Bukuumi (at the parish) Mwiruntu (Elephant totem). Native of Bugangaizi. | 10. Buyaga County | Rusebe, son of Rukumba Rukira Banyoro, grand-son of Kyebambe Nyamutukura. Capital at Nkeirwe Pacwa. | 11. Nyakabimba County | Ruled by Mugerwa son of Zigijja, Omubopi. Capital at Bucubya. King's guard and protector of the royal tombs of Bunyoro. He was leader of Babiito in the region of Kyaka, Mubende, Mwenge and Buyaga. Mubopi (Lion totem). Native of Nyakabemba. His county was hereditary since the reign of Ndahura the Cwezi King who gave it to Rubumbi after he (Ndahura) had been rescued from drowning in river Muzizi. | 12. Kyaka County | Ntamara, son of Nyakabwa. Had capital at Karwenyi, Munyonza. Born at Mwenge. | 13. Mwenge County | Mugarura, son of Kabwijamu. Had his capital at Bugaki, Mwenge, Munyonza. | 14. Toro County | Ruburwa son of Mirundi. Capital at Kamengo Kibimba, Munyonza. Born at Mwenge. He begun ruling there when Kabalega re-incorporated it into Kitara. | 15. Kitagwenda | Bulemu son of Rwigi. Had capital at Kanyamburara, Mubiito. Grandson of Isansa. | 16. Busongora | Rukara, son of Rwamagigi. Capital at Katwe salt place. He came from Bukidi. His clan was Muranzi. | 17. Bwamba | Rukara rwa Itegeiraha. Had capital at Bironga. | A Mucwa by clan. Born in Kibanda Chope. From his enclosure was born Yosia. W. Karukara Kitehimbwa, 1887. | 18. Mboga County | Now in Zaire, was ruled by Ireta rwa Byangombe, a Musaigi. His capital was at Kayera, Butuku. He was a commander of Kabalega's regiments, known as Ekirwana, ekiporopyo, ekikweya, ekibangya and ekikube. His duty was to protect the border with Zaire. He would sometimes command in the battle and was very brave. When Mwanga fled to Bunyoro it was Ireta who met him in the forest at Biso. Ireta died in 1906. | 19. Busongora Makara | Ruled by Kagambire son of Kajura Ruyumba. Had capital at Kanamba, Mulisa by clan. Born in Chope Kibanda. | 20. Buzimba | Nduru son of Nyakairu, Mulisa. Had his capital at Kanyamburara. This county is now in Ankole taken in 1900. | 21. Buhweju County | Ndibalema of Balisa clan. Taken to Ankole in 1900. Hereditary county of the Balisa because they were mothers to King Winyi Rubagira Masega. This arrangement survived until the end of the 19th Century, when the whiteman intervened to destroy it. | Nyoro sources unanimously assert that the greatest achievement of Kabalega was military. His major task on assuming the throne was to reform and reorganize the army which had fought so well for him during the succession war. He called his new army the Abarusura. This army was different from the traditional one known as obwesengeze. With this army, Kabalega became not only the head of state but also the commander in chief of all the Armed Forces. The institution of the Abarusura had a modem ring in it because it involved the transfer of military leadership from the Saza Chiefs to a new group of men who were professional soldiers and who took order from the King. This was a very important change in the base of political power in the land. The army was divided into regiment/battalions each with 1500 men. Each battalion was put under the command of a royal, courageous and well trained soldier. People could become commanders irrespective of birth. That is why his force was led by the Bairu commanders such as Rwabudongo, Kikukule and Ireta. Battalions were given task names such as Ekidoka, Ekihukya, Ekiporopyo, Ekigwera, Ekikabya, Ekihabya and the like. The commanders of each of these battalions were appointed from their respective battalions. This was different from the traditional Army 'obwesengeze', which consisted volunteers from each province of the Kingdom and were commanded by their respective provincial chiefs. These were in most cases Biito princes and were not directly responsible to the King. The political and military implications which these two systems of recruitment bore on the strength of the Kingdom can be understood. The regimental system of which Kabalega introduced meant that the Abarusura was a state army which derived its powers from the King . It suited the centralised political system which he had introduced. While the volunteer system which operated before, made provincial chiefs to be semi-autonomous. These provincial chiefs hardly took orders from the King. That is why secessionism and intrigues had retarded the political development of Bunyoro-Kitara for a long time and had almost led to her collapse by the middle of the 19th Century. However, by 1890 Bunyoro was a power to reckon with in the whole of the interlacustrive region. It had conquered Toro and subdued all other provinces which attempted to secede such as chope and Bugungu. It posed as a potential threat to Buganda and Nkore which through centuries had gradually extended their borders at its expense. With the administrative and military reforms, Omukama Kabalega had-consolidated his power and rallied all his people together. The Kingdom of Bunyoro Kitara became once united and all elements of rebellion and intrigue which had existed were curbed out. With internal peace, any form of development takes off and it was the case in Bunyoro-Kitara during Kabalega's reign, particularly in the field of economic-development. After the session of Toro, Bunyoro had lost the vast salt resources of Lake Katwe and Kasenyi. With internal instability its own salt working industry had declined. When Kabalega re-organized the Kingdom and installed hope and confidence into his people, the human and natural resources were utilized to the full. Toro which had been re-conquered in 1870 and the salt works at Katwe and Kasenyi coupled with those of Kibiro earned the Kingdom the capacity of supplying salt throughout the interlacustrine region. The iron working industry revived and Bunyoro became the main supplier of hoes to all areas north of the Lake Kyoga. In fact some accounts reveal that regular markets were established along the northern shores of Lake Kyoga. Bunyoro market masters were appointed to run these markets. The markets were established purposely to trade in Bunyoro hoes, which would be exchanged for foodstaffs from the neighbouring region. Equally so, the salt markets which had been in operation before Kabalega were re-organised, and many were established to trade in salt and other products throughout the kingdom. Kabalega did not only encourage internal trade but also stimulated external trade. The old slave trade was replaced by the ivory trade and Bunyoro benefited from having two exits to the international market. Bunyoro's ivory could be exported either through Cairo or the East African coast. Ivory was exchanged for guns and ammunition, brought by Khartoumers and Swahili Arab traders. Unlike the salt and iron trade which was an occupation of the peoples, ivory trade was the King's preserve. All the ivory throughout the Kingdom would be collected and brought to the king's palace. It would be traded there. Since it was exchanged for guns and ammunition, the concentration of its sale at the King's palace was intended to prevent lawlessness in the Kingdom. Also they never wanted ivory to be smuggled to the neighbouring areas without the King's notice. Kabalega introduced the public works system (oruharo), in order to rehabilitate what had been destroyed during the war. People could work on state farms for production of food like millet. The surplus food would be stored in underground granaries, 'enguli'. The stored food would be used during times of famine. Kabalega was very much concerned with problems of national unity and reconciliation. He urged his people to pull together and work together towards a common destiny. He used the Ganda threat to appeal for unity as the following song sung by a Murusura in front of Kabalega testifies: I own goats and the Ganda Are planning to come over and size them. The Ganda are vowing to help each other and fight. When the Ganda come over, we should aid each other; we should love each other. I, the omurusura of omukama, By your highness, I will have to do something -1 swear, I will beat them off. I vow to die with his Highness. There were many similar songs devoted to the theme of national unity and reconciliation. Indeed Kabalega was a remarkable nation builder. He encouraged intermarriages between the three historical social groups of Bunyoro, to forge greater unity. Kabalega set the fashion where he married a Mwiru lady. She was called Achanda (affectionately remembered by her family as Elizabeth). She hailed from the Ritwanga village of Chope (now Kibanda county). It is worth nothing that Achanda's family had refused to identify themselves with Mupina's rebellion and had migrated southwards. Kabalega met her at Bugahya Hoima and made her his Queen. He rewarded her parents with presents including servants. Altogether Kabalega had 150 wives and 150 children. They came from all groups and according to oral evidence they were all beautiful. Whether or not Kabalega was completely successful in his efforts at national reconciliation is difficult to tell. But what is certain is that during his period there were no rebellions. The country enjoyed peace and stability. This equilibrium was upset by the Anglo-Ganda combination against Bunyoro in the 1890's. Kabalega's great power and influence gave his people that self-confidence and pride in them selves which they had not known for some generations past. To all Banyoro, he was a focal point and a symbol of unity. With the Abarusura Army of 10 main battalions (bitongole) each between 1,000 and 2,000 men and 5 minor (Bitongole), each between 400 and 500 strong, all stationed in strategic positions inside the kingdom and on the borders of the Kingdom, Kabalega felt he was in position to fulfill yet another of his ambition namely to regain if not all of the former Bacwezi, empire. The change of events at the time, however, worked against him. He attempted without success to play a role of broker in the Buganda civil war. Moreover his name had been spoilt on the European side by reports of Baker and Stanley. KABALEGA AND THE EUROPEANS Europeans, as mentioned before, first came to Bunyoro during the reign of Kamurasi. Speke and Grant, the first two Europeans were given a warm welcome by Kamurasi and when they were going away he sent along some people (messengers to look after them until they reached his boundary). These were followed by Samuel Baker in 1864. He came back in 1872. When he returned, he was no longer a private explorer, but Sir Samuel Baker, the Governor - General of the Equatoria Province. He had been appointed by Khedive Ismail of Egypt to fulfill for him his imperial ambitions in the Sudan and northern Uganda. By 1872 Baker had already established his headquarters at Gondokoro and was carrying the Egyptian flag and commanding an Egyptian Army. Baker understood northern Uganda to include the whole of Bunyoro and hence part of the Equatorial province. He was to annex it formally. When he arrived to annex the territory, he found that his friend Kamurasi had died and it was his son Kabalega in control of the Kingdom. The relations between Bunyoro and the governor rapidly deteriorated. In 1872 he (Baker) publicly annexed Kabalega's country to the Egyptian Empire. The young monarch was now fully convinced that his fears were justified. He attacked Baker's garrison at Masindi ... Forced to withdraw ignominiously to northern Uganda, Baker published, in 1874, his Ismaili in which, in an attempt to justify his failure he deliberately poisoned his countrymen's minds against Kabalega and his Kingdom.1 It was from that angle in time that the imperialists conception of Bunyoro hostility to themselves was accepted for a fact and British officials attitude to Bunyoro came to be conditioned against this background. Kabalega never wrote his own version of the events, but even if he had done so, his would be side stepped as that of a native against the whiteman's version. Therefore, without exaggeration Baker's most remarkable achievement in Uganda was the creation of lasting misunderstanding between Bunyoro and the British officials. The consequences and importance of this clearly unfolds and becomes apparent as the story progresses. Contrary to what Baker reported and according to reports given by Birigirwa Kabonerwa, the jester to King Kabalega and Jardeen Omubali (soldier in casati's Army), Kabalega had no enemity against Europeans, as long as his independence was kept intact. In the reports Kabonerwa and Omubali made to King Sir Tito Winyi, it is stated that when Baker returned to Bunyoro on the 25th April, 1872 Kabalega was very happy to see the friend of his late father back again. He showed every hospitality to him. He had no doubt that Baker would extend his friendship to him and hoped to remain on peaceful terms. Kabalega was not barring his people to go to foreign lands or of sending some of his people to Egypt to acquire new knowledge. In doing this, Kabalega was being assisted by an Arab Mr. Ebrahim (known in Bunyoro as Burahi). He had stayed in Bunyoro, since Kamurasi's times. Burahi had already understood Baker and Khadive Ismail's intentions on Bunyoro. So Burahi sent word to Kabalega that Baker had planned to add Bunyoro to the Egyptian Empire. That is why he came with a powerful Army to fight the King if he tried to resist his will. Burahi also advised Kabalega to be careful when talking and not to put up a fight against Baker because the latter had a very superior Army. The Arab advised Kabalega that if ever Baker gives you a pistol with its muzzle pointing at you, do not lake it from his hands. He will have loaded it, so that you might shoot yourself. Ask him to place it down first. Kabalega kept all these things in heart and watched. BUNYORO - KITARA KINGDOM When Baker came, Kabalega watched him and found that he was pursuing the same plan that Burahi had mentioned. Kabalega adhered to the Arabs advice, without showing any sign that he knew Baker's plans. Generous as he was, he went on to give food and heads of cattle for meat to Baker's soldiers. This act of generosity forced Baker's soldiers to disclose their master's intentions on Kabalega. The soldiers were of Bari, Bagingo and Bameka tribes. What they disclosed was exactly what Kabalega had learnt earlier. Kabalega had already given orders that wherever in the country Sir Samuel Baker and his lady passes, people should help them as best as they can by feeding them, their people and so on, until they reach him. A few days afterwards. Baker who had been lodged near the King's palace (600 yards away), sent to the King that he should order for the gathering of all his people because he (Baker) had an important message to deliver. This was at Bulyasojo (Masindi 1872). The King then passed the information to the chiefs. All chiefs, subchiefs and heads of clans and other personalities gathered together in a big council. The King came and informed the people that Baker had asked him to call all the people for an important message. The King then sent for Baker to come and say what he wanted to say. Samuel Baker came with all his soldiers stood on guard outside while he entered into the council hall. When he entered, he proclaimed that, the Kingdom of Bunyoro-Kitara was under the Equatorial administration, and therefore the King and his people were subjects of Egypt. In this instance, he never declared that Bunyoro was to be put under her majesty's Empire but just mentioned that it was under the Egyptian government. The chiefs, in return asked Baker whether there were to be two Kings in Bunyoro. Baker could not respond. He instead ordered his soldiers to hoist the Egyptian flag and put down the Bunyoro-Kitara flag. The King sent a messenger Mbogo Omumizi (the interpreter) to Baker to ask him to explain what all this meant. He ordered him to ask Baker that if there was any change in the Kingdom Baker should call him and his advisers and agree to the change, or he should come and discuss the matter with him, or if he could not come, he should ask the King to go to him (Baker) together with his advisers to discuss the matter and make it clear to every body, showing the reason why Bunyoro was to be added to Sudan and the Equatorial administration. But Samuel Baker could not send any reply and for this reason the King sent the messenger to him again that he and his advisers might see Baker. Baker insisted that only the King was to see him. According to the customs of Bunyoro, the King could not move alone. He had to move with his servants. When Baker saw them, he could not let the chiefs in, but only the King. The King refused to enter the lent unless he was allowed to go in with his chiefs. He knew what Baker was all about. Then Baker rebuked the King saying: "What a proud little child you arc." The King replied, "I am a king and you call me a child". But Mrs. Baker begged her husband to let them in and Baker accepted. When they had sat down. Baker brought a loaded pistol and handed it to the King with the muzzle pointing to him (Kabalega). Kabalega refused to take it and instead asked Baker to place it on the ground, from where he would pick it. Baker's intention in this plan was to ensure that if Kabalega handled the pistol with a muzzle pointing to his direction, he would touch the trigger and shoot himself. When Kabalega had picked it he observed that it was loaded. Baker, on realising that Kabalega had unfolded his intentions, he pretended that he had forgotten and handed loaded pistol to the King. Besides that Baker's soldiers had already started committing many acts of annoyance to the people in order to provoke war against Kabalega. They entered chiefs enclosures and raped their wives. They looted properly and forced Kitara men into sodomy with them. These unbearable acts were reported to the King and the King requested Baker to prevent his soldiers from doing such things. This he did not do. Still trying to find out whether Baker was for peace or war, Kabalega again sent his usual messenger Mbogo Omumizi to establish whether an agreement was to be made or not. Baker just arrested and executed Mbogo at once. When the King heard that Mbogo had been executed, he sent another messenger called Bagunywa to ask why his messenger was killed. He met Baker on the way coming to attack Kabalega. Bagunywa did his best to tell Baker what the King had sent him for, but no success was met. A man who had accompanied Bagunywa rushed immediately and informed the King of the forthcoming Baker's attacks. Although Kabalega had heard the attack he did not prepare for war at once. But his chiefs advised him to leave the palace, which he did. He left one of his chiefs Bikamba s/o Kabale to wait and ask Baker why he came to attack him when he was not prepared to go to war. Baker did not listen to Bikamba. Bikamba was about to be put to death had he not escaped cunningly. He set fire on the palace and burnt down everything before him. The King's granaries were all destroyed. When the people were annoyed beyond measure, they decided to attack the foreigner who had burnt down their King's palace and waged war against an innocent King. Baker escaped into northern Uganda. The King's soldiers who delayed to surround his camp hoped that Baker after destroying the palace kept inside his tent. Two days after wailing in vain for him to come out, they decided to go in but found none. Because of the emptiness, the battle was coined, 'Ekya Muleju Baligota Isansa,' meaning that to fight Baker you will fight nothing. When he was fleeing, he passed via Chope to Gulu where he established a fort. There he remained and ordered for the reinforcement so that he could go back and fight Kabalega. He prepared the second attack because he had promised Ruyonga that he would overthrow Kabalega and put him on the throne. This proved to be very difficult for him to fulfill. Ruyonga county chief and appointee of Kabalega had told lies to Baker that he had been King of Bunyoro, but Kabalega had deposed him. In 1876, another European, colonel Gordon replaced Baker as Governor of the Equatorial. He established his forts in Buruli near River Kafo. Gordon's knowledge of Kabalega was solely and absolutely obtained from Baker's reports - the worst possible source by any standard. He put soldiers in the fort. His chief commander was called Nuahr Aga. This caused a great deal of anxiety to the omukama and the people because it was done without the knowledge of the King. During the same year Gordon brought Nubian soldiers and established forts in Bunyoro at Bugungu, Kibyama, Kisuga near Masindi. All these were provocative acts but the King decided not fight. In 1878 Gordon was succeeded by another curious and complex German Doctor, Emin Pasha. Emin Pasha got on well with Kabalega. He seemed not to have swallowed Baker's reports wholesale. He spoke highly of Kabalega: Kabalega is cheerful, laughs readily and much, talks a great deal and does not appear to be bound by ceremony the exact opposite to Mutesa the conceited ruler of B Uganda. He is thoroughly hospitable and intelligent.2 However Emin Pasha, further observed that Kabalega was suspicious of all Europeans, an observation which was accurate because Kabalega had already understood the intentions of Europeans on his country. The Europeans had to look for a pretext to attack Kabalega, because Kabalega was a powerful ruler in East Africa whose power would render the establishment of colonial rule in the region very difficult. THE CONVENTIONAL WAR AGAINST BUNYORO The next phase in the Anglo-Bunyoro relations opened in 1890 following the arrival of captain Fredrick .F. Lugard, the representative of the Imperial British East African Company (I.B.E.A.). He arrived in Buganda on 18th December 1890. He was sent by the British government to secure control of Buganda by means of an agreement and extend the territorial claims of the IBEA Co. to the west of Buganda. Lugard who had Baker's reports in mind, got further prejudiced against Kabalega when the Baganda informed him that Kabalega was a very hostile King, who never welcomed foreigners and hated Europeans. They misrepresented Kabalega in the eyes of Europeans. From Lugard's own writing, it is exposed that he never considered the possibility of negotiating with Kabalega, the latter was irrevocably cast as villain of peace. He regarded Kabalega as having lost any claim to indulgence. In 1891, Lugard moved towards western Uganda, hoping to raise more troops to defend his company. He left Captain Williams in charge of Kampala. When he reached Ankole, he signed a treaty with the Omugabe Ntare on 1/7/1891. This was because he believed Nkore was of strategic value, since some of the arms reaching Kabalega were ferried through Nkore. The arrival of Lugard in Toro proved a great tragedy for Kabalega. Lugard destroyed Kabalega's forces at Muhokya, Katooke and Butanuka. On 15th August 1891, he restored Kasagama. He had moved along with him from Buganda where Kasagama had been a refugee. After a treaty of protection, Lugard continued to Kavalli at the southern tip of Lake Albert. At Kavalli, Lugard's forces armed with modem weapons found it easy to beat an unprepared force of Kabalega. Kabalega was expelled from Toro and a line of forts was built along the Toro-Bunyoro border, purposely to stop Kabalega from reinvading Toro. Kabalega did not keep quiet but kept on attacking the British Forts. He interrupted communications and stopped the British from getting the necessary supplies. When Lugard returned to Britain and Portal came in, a policy of withdrawing forces from Toro Forts was pursued. This gave chance to Kabalega to invade Toro and expel the British puppet Kasagama. Kasagama was chased by Ireta and Rwabudongo into the foothills of the Rwenzori mountains. Owen the British officer was compelled to evacuate Toro. Unfortunately Portal was succeeded by Macdonald and Colonel Colville who discarded Portal's policy. These officers were determined to restore British prestige wherever possible and silence men like Kabalega. Macdonald concluded that a full scale invasion of Bunyoro and the subjugation of Kabalega was the only way open for British influence to be secured in the region. Owen was instructed to prepare for the invasion of Bunyoro after Colville himself was convinced that nothing short of a military expedition could pacify Bunyoro into accepting British supremacy. When the British had spread their military preparedness, military invasion of Bunyoro was accordingly planned to be undertaken with the help of Baganda. In 1893, Colville issued an ultimatum to Kabalega notifying him that: Unless in the meantime, you send me guarantee for your good conduct in future and substantial indemnity for damage done in the past, I and my army would cross your frontier within 21 days of the date of writing. Kabalega never sent a reply and in December 1893, Colville invaded Bunyoro with a force of eight European officers, 400 Sudanese and 1,500 Baganda. Kabalega who would have stayed more serious resistance made a mistake and divided his force into four scattered divisions. He was forced to abandon his capital Mparo and retreated to Budongo forest to organise his forces. In his retreat, he was so tactical enough that he did not offer Colville any chance of a pitched battle Colville had thought. He however, slipped back towards Mparo and fought the Anglo-Ganda force at Kisabagwa. He was chased to Kisindizi, then to Kibanda. Having realised that Kabalega could not easily be captured Colville decided to divide the kingdom into portions, so that Kabalega could be confined to the norther portion. The Barusura who had been forced to get scattered, started to resist in hide-outs under Kabalega's distant leadership. Although Kabalega had been chased out of Bunyoro into Lango, he started a guerilla warfare in which he continuously attacked British forts. In 1895, Kabalega slipped back to Bunyoro and attacked the British at Kijunjubwa near Masindi. It is estimated that he beat a twenty-thousand British-Ganda-Nubian strong force in which one British officer by the name of Dunning was slain. The British led troops were forced to return to Hoima for re-organisation. The return of Kabalega encouraged all those enemies of Britain to gather and fight Mwanga of Buganda too joined Kabalega and was met at Biiso by Ireta. However, in the battle which ensued Kabalega was attacked by the British at a place called Harukungu, in which many people were killed. Among those who died were two of Kabalega's brothers and many of his sons. Prince Karukara, the Queen mother Kanyange Nyamutahingurwa and princes Victoria Mukabagabo were taken into captivity. Kabalega continued his guerilla warfare throughout 1897. In 1898, he returned to Northern Bunyoro and the British post at Hoima was destroyed. Mwanga who had joined Kabalega to fight against British colonialism, split his forces into three groups; the first was dispersed in north Ankole, the second in southwest Bunyoro and the third in the region of Kijunjuba. Ireta deployed his forces between Budongo forest and Fajao and Jasi moved his force from Foweira towards Masindi port. A number of minor engagements took place. Between June and July, 1898 the 27th Bombay Light Infantry Force rigorously patrolled northern Bunyoro and cleared the area of Ireta and Kikukule's forces. Fajao and Foweira were re-occupied. Ireta and Kikukule were confined to the east bank of the Nile. Kitahimbwa, son of Kabalega, who had been imposed as a new Omukama by the British travelled to Masindi in September, accompanied by Lewin of the Church Missionary Society, and Thomas Senfuna a Muganda Evangilist, where they established a church of reeds and grass. Senfuna was left to continue with missionary work in Masindi while Lewin returned to Bulemezi. At this lime, Bunyoro was truly in pitiful state. War had been followed by plague, pestilence and famine. The food supply of the country was perilously near starvation level. Cultivation had almost ceased. In October 1898, Kabalega's forces crossed the Nile from Lango into Buganda and ambushed a patrol in north Buruli. Reinforcements later dispersed them and they retreated towards the Bugoma forest. Columns operated in southwest Bunyoro until December when Ireta was attacked in the Budongo forest by the British. By January 1899 most of Kabalega's forces had given up themselves and it was estimated that only thirty remained on the west bank and seventy on the east bank of the Nile. The end was almost near. In March 1899, Lt. Col. Evatts moved into Lango to discover where Kabalega was and break up the resistance. When Kabalega realised that Evatts had crossed, he re-organised a strong rear guard to resist him. He was assisted by chief Adora of Lango. Mwanga, whom they had fled together, realised that things were worsening and suggested to Kabalega to surrender, but Kabalega answered: Everything has its own time appointed; a woman travelling with a child reaches a time of deliverance; so does a cow; the banana is planted and takes root; but when it arrives at fruition, it must fall; and now we have reached the hour of our fate; and if so be that our appointed time to die has come, let us not be faint-hearted. On 9th April, 1899 the two leaders were discovered at Oyom near Kangai in Dokolo county of Lango where they were driven into a swamp by Evatts troops. Kabalega, although, he had an infection of the eyes, resisted courageously. He was only forced to drop his gun after bullets struck his right arm and his left hand thumb. After his capture, Kabalega persuaded his son Duhaga to tear the bandages from his injured arm so that he might bleed to death in order to fulfill the Kinyoro tradition that an incapacitated Mukama should die. But the attempt was frustrated. Eventually the arm had to be amputated. Kabalega and Mwanga were taken to Kismayu and later to the Seychelles, where Mwanga died in 1903. Kabalega spent 23 years in exile and was guarded by a British officer and local constables. He learnt to read and write and was Baptized John. By Baptism and literacy, the British thought that this could be - potential weapons by which they would reconcile their adversary to the new colonial subjection. Kabalega died in 1923 at about 70 years of age while on his way back to Bunyoro. His death paralysed the Banyoro. Every activity came to a standstill and laughter at that time was considered a national insult. His body was brought and buried at Mparo (Royal Village) where an imposing grass structure protects his grave. Although the Europeans boast that even Kabalega passed through the ritual of colonialism, the ritual was not entirely effective since he requested that no European type of roofing should ever be used to cover his corpse. Omukama Kabalega (in bandage) after his capture in 1899 1. G.N. Uzoigwe: Op. cit. p. 2-132. J.W. Nyakatura Op. cit. p. 123-171 3. Report by the department of antiquities: titled:- Kabalega in the History of Uganda: G EAU (81/02) (02) [1973:1/2 p. 1-5.4. S.R. Karugire: Op. cit. p.57-58 5. The Bunyoro's Claim of their Lost lands, NO C.3, East African Standard Limited Nairobi, 8th March 1948 P.4-22.

http://www.nzdl.org/gsdlmod?e=d-00000-00---off-0unescoen--00-0----0-10-0---0---0direct-10---4-------0-1l--11-en-50---20-about---00-0-1-00-0--4----0-0-11-10-0utfZz-8-10&cl=CL2.6.2&d=HASHc3697d0c37be5024d365b7.9&x=1

Politics

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By Odili Ogochukwu – The role of mass media in the development of education cannot be underscored. It has fiddled a crucial fraction in impacting on the less privilege as well as the socio-economic downturn of the society by recognizing educational implications. Various forms of mass media such as newspapers, Magazine, Radio, Television, Internet, fliers and so on have largely contributed in spreading amongst the masses the belief that they should concentrate on the development of the basic literacy skills of reading, writing and arithmetic, in order to make a living more meaningful. - Education: Ezekwesili, African Leaders Move To Tackle Learning Crisis - Debt: Court Orders CBN To Deduct N40 Billion Ebonyi Allocation - How Nigerian Government Justifies The Claim That Education Is A Scam - We Will Partner PTA To Resuscitate Education – Delta Commissioner Individuals who are not educated and do not recognize its distinction experience dire consequences. In the development of education, mass media and technology is not just limited to the classroom setting, it is extensive, it makes provision of equal opportunities to learn, and it is so much the part of the real world that to limit its use within the classroom is to limit the ability of the students to compete themselves in the world. The main purpose of this material is to explore the position of media in the development of education. Other areas been taken into account are, the significance of mass media, tools of mass media, learning with mass media and technologies, mass media in development communication, the effect of mass media on motivation and the positive effect of mass media upon the societies. The role of mass media has been considered valuable not only in the improvement of education, but also other areas such as, communication, motivation, social welfare, work opportunities and understanding how to make effective use of technology.

https://afimag.com/the-justification-of-mass-media-in-educational-advancement-1/

Education

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In Alaska, wood frogs freeze for seven months, thaw and hop away Each September, the wood frogs of Alaska do a very strange thing: They freeze. They do not freeze totally solid, but they do freeze mostly solid. Two-thirds of their body water turns to ice. If you picked them up, they would not move. If you bent one of their legs, it would break. Inside these frozen frogs other weird physiological things are going on. Their hearts stop beating, their blood no longer flows and their glucose levels sky rocket. “On an organismal level they are essentially dead,” said Don Larson, a graduate student at the University of Alaska, Fairbanks who studies frogs. “The individual cells are still functioning, but they have no way to communicate with each other.” The craziest thing of all may be that in this frozen state, they can withstand temperatures as low as zero degrees Fahrenheit for as long as seven months, and then, when spring arrives, thaw out and hop away. Biologists have known for decades that some frogs freeze in the winter and thaw in the spring, but a paper published in the Journal of Experimental Biology reports that they can freeze longer and tolerate cooler temperatures than previously thought. “There have been some studies, largely in the lab, that show frogs can stay frozen for a couple of weeks at temperates of about 20 degrees Fahrenheit,” said Brian Barnes, director of the Institute of Arctic Biology at the University of Alaska, Fairbanks. “But up here in Alaska, we know these frogs are common all the way into the Arctic circle where it gets a lot colder than that. That’s what kicked off our interest.” Adult wood frogs are about the size of the palm of your hand. A juvenile is the size of your thumbnail. According to Barnes, their lifespan is four to six years. To see how these frogs were surviving the winter in the extreme Alaskan environment, the researchers used super glue to attach small radio transmitters about the size of a nickel to the backs of 16 frogs over two years. The radio transmitters allowed the researchers to see where the frogs made their hibernacula -- divots in the leaf litter near a lake or pond, where they planned to spend the winter. Once the frogs were settled, the researchers placed little cages over the divots and stuck a wire thermometer in there to record the temperature at regular intervals. “The snow provides a nice insulated layer for them, but we knew from previous studies that it still gets very cold beneath the snow,” said Larson, the lead author of the study. “It was the survival that was surprising. We didn’t see any die off, and that was the big shock.” Over the course of two years, none of the frogs in the study died. The researchers also discovered that the frogs don’t freeze once and stay frozen. Instead they spend a week or two freezing at night and thawing during the day, until the temperature drops permanently below freezing. Larson thinks this thawing and freezing patterns helps the frogs convert more of the glycogen stored in their liver into glucose. This is essential because it is the high levels of glucose in the frogs’ cells that keep them alive throughout the long, cold winter. The glucose’s main function is to keep water inside the cells. Frostbite in humans is caused when the water in our blood outside turns to ice. That hyperconcentrates the fluid around the cells and tissues, which in turn draws water out of the cells. Eventually the cells get so dehydrated that they die. Larson offers this analogy: “If you put a potato in salty water, the whole potato kind of shrivels up because all the water from the potato goes to the higher concentration of salinity, but if you add a bunch of salt to a potato, it would retain its water,” he said. By making the cells super sweet with glucose, the frogs keep the water from leaving their cells. When spring comes and the frogs thaw, they turn as much of the glucose as they can back into glycogen, and they pee out the rest. Then they hurry to the nearest pond or lake to start mating. After all, they only have five months to make babies and gather all the food that they can before the freezing process starts again. And now, there are more questions to answer. “So we have these amazing frogs that survive seven months frozen,” Larson said. “I’m asking, what about the parasites and all the cool things that live in its mouth and its butt? Is freeze tolerance its own protection against disease? Can it rid animals of parasites?” There’s still a lot to learn. For more amazing science news, follow me @DeborahNetburn and “like” Los Angeles Times Science & Health on Facebook

http://www.latimes.com/science/sciencenow/la-sci-sn-alaskan-frozen-frogs-20140723-story.html

Health

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A scientific theory is a structured explanation to explain a group of facts or phenomena in the natural world that often incorporates a scientific hypothesis and scientific laws. The scientific definition of a theory contrasts with the definition most people use in casual language. "The way that scientists use the word 'theory' is a little different than how it is commonly used in the lay public," said Jaime Tanner, a professor of biology at Emerson College in Boston. "Most people use the word 'theory' to mean an idea or hunch that someone has, but in science the word 'theory' refers to the way that we interpret facts." Related: 5 sci-fi concepts that are possible (in theory) The process of becoming a scientific theory Every scientific theory relies on the scientific method. A scientist may make an observation and devise a hypothesis to explain that observation, then design an experiment to test that hypothesis. If the hypothesis is shown to be incorrect, the scientist will develop a new hypothesis and begin the process again. If the hypothesis is supported by the results of the experiment, it will go on to be tested again. If the hypothesis isn't disproven or surpassed by a better explanation, the scientist may incorporate it into a larger theory that helps to explain the observed phenomenon and relates it to other phenomena, according to the Field Museum. A scientific theory is not the end result of the scientific method; theories can be proven or rejected, just like hypotheses. And theories are continually improved or modified as more information is gathered, so that the accuracy of the prediction becomes greater over time. Theories are foundations for furthering scientific knowledge and for putting the information gathered to practical use. Scientists use theories to develop inventions or find a cure for a disease. Furthermore, a scientific theory is the framework for observations and facts, Tanner said. Theories may change, or the way that they are interpreted may change, but the facts themselves don't change. Tanner likens theories to a basket in which scientists keep facts and observations that they find. The shape of that basket may change as the scientists learn more and include more facts. "For example, we have ample evidence of traits in populations becoming more or less common over time (evolution), so evolution is a fact, but the overarching theories about evolution, the way that we think all of the facts go together might change as new observations of evolution are made," Tanner told Live Science. Characteristics of a good theory The University of California, Berkeley, defines a theory as "a broad, natural explanation for a wide range of phenomena. Theories are concise, coherent, systematic, predictive, and broadly applicable, often integrating and generalizing many hypotheses." According to Columbia University emeritus professor of philosophy Philip Kitcher, a good scientific theory has three characteristics. First, it has unity, which means it consists of a limited number of problem-solving strategies that can be applied to a wide range of scientific circumstances. Second, a good scientific theory leads to new questions and new areas of research. This means that a theory doesn't need to explain everything in order to be useful. And finally, a good theory is formed from a number of hypotheses that can be tested independently from the theory itself. The difference between theories, facts and laws Any scientific theory must be based on a careful and rational examination of the facts. Facts and theories are two different things. In the scientific method, there is a clear distinction between facts, which can be observed and/or measured, and theories, which are scientists' explanations and interpretations of the facts. Some think that theories become laws, but theories and laws have separate and distinct roles in the scientific method. A law is a description of an observed phenomenon in the natural world that holds true every time it is tested. It doesn't explain why something is true; it just states that it is true. A theory, on the other hand, explains observations that are gathered during the scientific process. So, while law and theory are part of the scientific process, they are two different aspects, according to the National Center for Science Education. A good example of the difference between a theory and a law is the case of Gregor Mendel. In his research, Mendel discovered that two separate genetic traits would appear independently of each other in different offspring. "Yet, Mendel knew nothing of DNA or chromosomes. It wasn't until a century later that scientists discovered DNA and chromosomes — the biochemical explanation of Mendel's laws," said Peter Coppinger, an associate professor of biology and biomedical engineering at the Rose-Hulman Institute of Technology. "It was only then that scientists, such as T.H. Morgan working with fruit flies, explained the Law of Independent Assortment using the theory of chromosomal inheritance. Still today, this is the universally accepted explanation [theory] for Mendel's Law." - When does a theory become a fact? This article from Arizona State University says you're asking the wrong question! - Learn the difference between the casual and scientific uses of "theory" and "law" from the cartoony stars of the Amoeba Sisters on Youtube. - Can a scientific theory be falsified? This article from Scientific American says no. Kenneth Angielczyk, "What Do We Mean by "Theory" in Science?" Field Museum, March 10, 2017. https://www.fieldmuseum.org/blog/what-do-we-mean-theory-science University of California, Berkeley, "Science at multiple levels." https://undsci.berkeley.edu/article/0_0_0/howscienceworks_19 Philip Kitcher, "Abusing Science: The Case Against Creationism," MIT Press, 1982. National Center for Science Education, "Definitions of Fact, Theory, and Law in Scientific Work," March 16, 2016 https://ncse.ngo/definitions-fact-theory-and-law-scientific-work Sign up for the Live Science daily newsletter now Get the world’s most fascinating discoveries delivered straight to your inbox.

http://www.livescience.com/21491-what-is-a-scientific-theory-definition-of-theory.html

Religion

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Then Erebus slept with Night, who gave birth to Ether, the heavenly light, and to Day the earthly light. Then Night alone produced Doom, Fate, Death, Sleep, Dreams, Nemesis, and others that come to man out of darkness. Meanwhile Gaea alone gave birth to Uranus, the heavens. Uranus became Gaea's mate covering her on all sides. Together they produced the three Cyclopes, the three Hecatoncheires, and twelve Titans. However, Uranus was a bad father and husband. He hated the Hecatoncheires. He imprisoned them by pushing them into the hidden places of the earth, Gaea's womb. This angered Gaea and she ploted against Uranus. She made a flint sickle and tried to get her children to attack Uranus. All were too afraid except, the youngest Titan, Cronus. Gaea and Cronus set up an ambush of Uranus as he lay with Gaea at night. Cronus grabed his father and castrated him, with the stone sickle, throwing the severed genitales into the ocean. The fate of Uranus is not clear. He either died, withdrew from the earth, or exiled himself to Italy. As he departed he promised that Cronus and the Titans would be punished. From his spilt blood came the Giants, the Ash Tree Nymphs, and the Erinnyes. From the sea foam where his genitales fell came Aphrodite. Cronus became the next ruler. He imprisoned the Cyclopes and the Hecatoncheires in Tartarus. He married his sister Rhea, under his rule the Titans had many offspring. He ruled for many ages. However, Gaea and Uranus both had prophesied that he would be overthrown by a son. To avoid this Cronus swallowed each of his children as they were born. Rhea was angry at the treatment of the children and ploted against Cronus. When it came time to give birth to her sixth child, Rhea hid herself, then she left the child to be raised by nymphs. To concel her act she wrapped a stone in swaddling cloths and passed it off as the baby to Cronus, who swallowed it. This child was Zeus. He grew into a handsome youth on Crete. He consulted Metis on how to defeat Cronus. She prepaired a drink for Cronus design to make him vomit up the other children. Rhea convinced Cronus to accept his son and Zeus was allowed to return to Mount Olympus as Cronus's cupbearer. This gave Zeus the opertunity to slip Cronus the specially prepaired drink. This worked as planned and the other five children were vomitted up. Being gods they were unharmed. They were thankful to Zeus and made him their leader. Cronus was yet to be defeated. He and the Titans, except Prometheus, Epimetheus, and Oceanus, fought to retain their power. Atlas became their leader in battle and it looked for some time as though they would win and put the young gods down. However, Zeus was cunning. He went down to Tartarus and freed the Cyclopes and the Hecatoncheires. Prometheus joined Zeus as well. He returned to battle with his new allies. The Cyclopes provided Zeus with lighting bolts for weapons. The Hecatoncheires he set in ambush armed with boulders. With the time right, Zeus retreated drawing the Titans into the Hecatoncheires's ambush. The Hecatoncheires rained down hundreds of boulders with such a fury the Titans thought the mountains were falling on them. They broke and ran giving Zeus victory. Zeus exiled the Titans who had fought against him into Tartarus. Except for Atlas, who was singled out for the special punishment of holding the world on his shoulders. However, even after this victory Zeus was not safe. Gaea angry that her children had been imprisoned gave birth to a last offspring, Typhoeus. Typhoeus was so fearsome that most of the gods fled. However, Zeus faced the monster and flinging his lighting bolts was able to kill it. Typhoeus was burried under Mount Etna in Sicily. Much later a final challenge to Zeus rule was made by the Giants. They went so far as to attempt to invade Mount Olympus, piling mountain upon mountain in an effort to reach the top. But, the gods had grown strong and with the help of Heracles the Giants were subdued or killed.

http://www.desy.de/gna/interpedia/greek_myth/creation.html

Religion

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Scholars believe a copy of the Koran held in England may be even older than the Prophet Muhammad. Carbon dating of a fragment from a Koran stored at a Birmingham library suggests that the book was produced between 568 and 645 A.D., said scientists at the University of Oxford, but Islamic scholars generally believe Muhammad lived between 570 and 632 A.D. If the carbon dating is accurate, the Koran was made before the first formal text was assembled on orders from the caliph Uthman in 653 -- and it could date from Muhammad's childhood or even before his birth, reported The Times of London. That's comparable to the discovery of gospel sayings dating from Jesus Christ's infancy, academics say. YOU MIGHT ALSO LIKE: NASA creates self-healing ‘Terminator’ material that can seal up a bullet hole in 2 seconds "According to Muslim tradition, the Prophet Muhammad received the revelations that form the Qur’an, the scripture of Islam, between the years AD 610 and 632, the year of his death," explained Professor David Thomas, Professor of Christianity and Islam and Nadir Dinshaw Professor of Interreligious Relations at the University of Birmingham. "At this time, the divine message was not compiled into the book form in which it appears today. Instead, the revelations were preserved in 'the memories of men.' Parts of it had also been written down on parchment, stone, palm leaves and the shoulder blades of camels," Thomas said. "Caliph Abu Bakr, the first leader of the Muslim community after Muhammad, ordered the collection of all Qur’anic material in the form of a book. The final, authoritative written form was completed and fixed under the direction of the third leader, Caliph Uthman, in about AD 650." Muslim scholars strongly dispute the findings, which contradict most accounts of the prophet's life, but some historians say evidence was mounting that traditional accounts of Islam's origins are unreliable. “It destabilizes, to put it mildly, the idea that we can know anything with certainty about how the Koran emerged — and that in turn has implications for the historicity of Mohammed and the Companions [his followers],” said Tom Holland, the author of In The Shadow of the Sword. Other very old Korans suggest that holy verses circulated in written form before Muhammad's death. Keith Small, of Oxford's Bodleian Library, cautioned that carbon dating was done only on the Koran's parchment and not its ink, but he said the dates were probably accurate. “If the dates apply to the parchment and the ink, and the dates across the entire range apply, then the Koran — or at least portions of it — predates Mohammed, and moves back the years that an Arabic literary culture is in place well into the 500s,” he said. Small said that would lend credibility to the historical view that Muhammad and his followers collected text that was already in circulation to fit their own political and theological agenda, rather than receiving revelations from heaven. “This would radically alter the edifice of Islamic tradition and the history of the rise of Islam in late Near Eastern antiquity would have to be completely revised, somehow accounting for another book of scripture coming into existence 50 to 100 years before, and then also explaining how this was co-opted into what became the entity of Islam by around AD700," Small said. Muslim scholars, however, said the dates confirm that the Koran had faithfully preserved for more than 1,350 years the words passed on by Muhammad to his followers. “If anything, the manuscript has consolidated traditional accounts of the Koran’s origins,” said Mustafa Shah, from London's School of Oriental and African Studies.

https://www.rawstory.com/2015/08/carbon-dating-suggests-worlds-oldest-koran-is-even-older-than-the-prophet-muhammad/A

Religion

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The first modern Britons, who lived about 10,000 years ago, had “dark to black” skin, a groundbreaking DNA analysis of Britain’s oldest complete skeleton has revealed. The fossil, known as Cheddar Man, was unearthed more than a century ago in Gough’s Cave in Somerset. Intense speculation has built up around Cheddar Man’s origins and appearance because he lived shortly after the first settlers crossed from continental Europe to Britain at the end of the last ice age. People of white British ancestry alive today are descendants of this population. It was initially assumed that Cheddar Man had pale skin and fair hair, but his DNA paints a different picture, strongly suggesting he had blue eyes, a very dark brown to black complexion and dark curly hair. The discovery shows that the genes for lighter skin became widespread in European populations far later than originally thought – and that skin colour was not always a proxy for geographic origin in the way it is often seen to be today. Tom Booth, an archaeologist at the Natural History Museum who worked on the project, said: “It really shows up that these imaginary racial categories that we have are really very modern constructions, or very recent constructions, that really are not applicable to the past at all.” Yoan Diekmann, a computational biologist at University College London and another member of the project’s team, agreed, saying the connection often drawn between Britishness and whiteness was “not an immutable truth. It has always changed and will change”. The findings were revealed ahead of a Channel 4 documentary, which tracked the ancient DNA project at the Natural History Museum in London as well as creating a new forensic reconstruction of Cheddar Man’s head. To perform the DNA analysis, museum scientists drilled a 2mm-diameter hole into the ancient skull to obtain a few milligrams of bone powder. From this, they were able to extract a full genome, which held clues about this ancient relative’s appearance and lifestyle. The results pointed to a Middle Eastern origin for Cheddar Man, suggesting that his ancestors would have left Africa, moved into the Middle East and later headed west into Europe, before eventually crossing the ancient land bridge called Doggerland which connected Britain to continental Europe. Today, about 10% of white British ancestry can be linked to this ancient population. The analysis also ruled out an ancestral link with individuals inhabiting Gough’s Cave 5,000 years earlier, who appear to have performed grisly cannibalistic rituals, including gnawing on human toes and fingers – possibly after boiling them – and drinking from polished skull cups. Britain was periodically settled and then cleared during ice ages until the end of the last glacial period about 11,700 years ago, since when it has been continuously inhabited. Until now, though, it hasn’t been clear whether each wave of migrants was seeded from the same population in mainland Europe; the latest results suggest this was not the case. The team homed in on genes known to be linked to skin colour, hair colour and texture, and eye colour. For skin tone, there are a handful of genetic variants linked to reduced pigmentation, including some that are very widespread in European populations today. However, Cheddar Man had “ancestral” versions of all these genes, strongly suggesting he would have had “dark to black” skin tone, but combined with blue eyes. Scientists believe that populations living in Europe became lighter-skinned over time because pale skin absorbs more sunlight, which is required to produce enough vitamin D. The latest findings suggest pale skin may have emerged later, possibly when the advent of farming meant people were obtaining less vitamin D though dietary sources like oily fish. Cheddar Man would have lived a hunter-gatherer lifestyle, making sharp blades from flints for butchering animals, using antlers to whittle harpoons for spear fishing and carving bows and arrows. - First Brit: Secrets of the 10,000 Year Old Man will air on Channel 4 on 18 February Sign in or create your Guardian account to join the discussion

https://www.theguardian.com/science/2018/feb/07/first-modern-britons-dark-black-skin-cheddar-man-dna-analysis-reveals

Culture

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Ask the doctors I've been feeling tired lately. My doctor suggested I exercise more. How will this help my energy level? Won't it make me feel more tired? A. It might sound strange, but it's true that moving more can help give you more energy, through several mechanisms. To begin with, cellular-level changes occur inside your body when you exercise. Exertion spurs your body to produce more mitochondria inside your muscle cells. Mitochondria are known as the powerhouses of cells, because they create fuel out of glucose from the food you eat and oxygen from the air you breathe. Having more of them increases your body's energy supply. Exercising also boosts oxygen circulation inside your body. This increase in oxygen not only supports the mitochondria's energy production, it allows your body to function better and to use its energy more efficiently. Plus, your body gets a boost from an exercise-induced increase in hormone levels that makes you feel more energized. In addition to helping your body create and use energy, regular exercise promotes better nighttime sleep. Deep sleep is crucial to your overall health and to feeling well rested and energetic when you wake up in the morning. As a service to our readers, Harvard Health Publishing provides access to our library of archived content. Please note the date of last review or update on all articles. No content on this site, regardless of date, should ever be used as a substitute for direct medical advice from your doctor or other qualified clinician.

https://health.harvard.edu/exercise-and-fitness/does-exercise-really-boost-energy-levels

Health

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With coronavirus outbreaks in Europe and the Middle East, the covid-19 virus appears to be going pandemic. As public concern increases worldwide, unscientific and unreliable advice on how to protect yourself is now rife, proliferating on social media and through messaging apps. Here’s what you really need to know. How bad is the infection? More than 80 per cent of people infected develop only mild symptoms, such as a fever and a cough. Only around 1 in 100 people die – those who do are usually older and have existing health problems, such as heart disease or diabetes. No deaths have been reported in children under 9 years old. How do people catch it? The virus is thought to be transmitted by droplets emitted when people sneeze, cough or even just talk, says David Heymann at the London School of Hygiene and Tropical Medicine, who led the global efforts to contain SARS. If you are within 2 or 3 metres of an infected person, you can breathe in those droplets directly. The longer you are near them, the greater the risk. Surfaces can be contaminated by falling droplets, or by people coughing into their hand before pressing a button, say. If you touch a contaminated surface and then touch your eyes, nose or face, you can become infected. Faeces from infected people might also be infectious. How can I avoid catching it? You can minimise your risk of catching the coronavirus through “social distancing” and good hygiene. Move at least a metre away from anyone who appears ill if you can. Don’t shake hands, hug or kiss people as a greeting. Wash your hands often with soap and water, or use an alcohol hand rub, especially after touching surfaces that might be contaminated. The World Health Organization (WHO) says there is no need for healthy people to wear face masks. It also says there is no evidence that pets can get and spread covid-19, or that the virus can be passed on via letters, packages or food. How can I protect myself? It is being claimed all kinds of things can protect you from the covid-19 virus, from vitamins to garlic. There is no evidence to support most of these claims. However, there is evidence that moderate exercise, adequate sleep and a healthy diet help keep your immune system in shape generally. We don’t know if smoking increases the risk of people with covid-19 becoming severely ill because China hasn’t been reporting if infected people are smokers, but previous studies have shown that smoking increases the risk of being hospitalised if you get flu. Now is a great time to go on a health kick. It might also be worth getting the flu and pneumococcal vaccines if you can still do so safely. In some countries these vaccines are now being sent to people to inject at home. These vaccines won’t prevent infection with the covid-19 virus, but the pneumococcal one can reduce the chances of getting bacterial infections after developing covid-19. Fewer people coming down with diseases with similar symptoms to covid-19 will also make the situation easier to control, says Jennifer Nuzzo at Johns Hopkins Center for Health Security in Baltimore, Maryland. How can I avoid infecting others? If you are ill and think you might have covid-19, don’t go to a doctor or to a hospital because you might infect others. Stay at home and call your local heath authority. If you have a fever, cough and difficulty breathing, you should seek medical attention, the WHO says. If you absolutely have to go out, wear a face mask. Cover your mouth and nose with a tissue when you cough, and throw it away afterwards. If you don’t have a tissue, cough into your bent elbow, not your hand. There are various winter viruses circulating in the northern hemisphere right now, and if you come down with norovirus, for example, it is a good idea to stay at home until several days after symptoms finish. This will help reduce the spread of infections that would exacerbate the strain on health services, and make it easier to track those who really have covid-19. What happens if my family or flatmates get sick? Now is the time to think about what happens if you or people you care about become ill. “Plan who will check up on who,” says Michael Osterholm at the University of Minnesota. There is a high risk of the virus spreading among people who live together. Ideally, people who are ill should stay in a separate room and use a different bathroom, although this will be difficult in many situations. If ill people require care, both they and the carer should wear masks, says Heymann. The carer should also wear gloves. Should I stockpile food or medicine? Fears of shortages have prompted some people to stockpile, and several covid-19 affected areas have seen panic buying. There are differing views on stockpiling among experts. “I don’t think it is necessary, and I certainly don’t advise it,” says Mark Woolhouse at the University of Edinburgh, UK. But Nuzzo thinks there is no harm in people ensuring they have at least three days’ food supply to hand, as is advised during hurricanes. “I’m not saying it’s specifically necessary in this case,” she says. Virology blogger Ian Mackay recommends slowly building up a “pandemic stash”. “[But] don’t buy things you won’t eat later, don’t hoard and don’t buy more than you’ll need for a 2 week period,” he writes. “We’re not talking zombie apocalypse and we very probably won’t see power or water interruptions either.” Osterholm says people shouldn’t try to stock up on prescription medicines. “You might create a shortage for others who need it,” he says. How bad could the pandemic get? Where efforts to contain the virus are successful, as appears to be the case in China and South Korea, your chances of being infected at all will be low. Where efforts to contain the virus fail, most of the population could be infected eventually. Health systems will struggle to cope. Shortages of beds, oxygen and ventilators could increase the death rate, while people with other conditions may get substandard treatment. However, there should be enough people well enough to keep the lights on and food in the shops. What’s the best way to keep informed? There are many untrue claims about covid-19 spreading on social media. Some confusion is also inevitable because there is still much we don’t know about the virus, and the situation varies greatly from place to place and is changing rapidly. So be extra careful about what you share. Look for and follow the latest advice from the WHO and local authorities such as the National Health Service in the UK. Each of us has a part to play in tackling this outbreak, says Heymann. “We are all in this together,” he says.

https://www.newscientist.com/article/2235539-coronavirus-what-you-need-to-know-to-prepare-for-a-covid-19-pandemic/#ixzz6FH33W6vxlalasticlala

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One in every 10 children has an immune system – similar to that of a monkey – that stops Aids from emanating in them, says a new study. Published in the journal of Science Translational Medicine, the virus was found to be unable to wipe out the immune system. “These children have low immune activation, including less chemokine receptor CCR5 expression on central memory CD4 T cells, similar to sooty mangabeys infected with SIV. The immune mechanisms described in these patients shed light on HIV pathogenesis, which may help develop future treatments”, a summary of the study said. The blood of 170 children from South Africa who had HIV, had never had antiretroviral therapy and yet had not developed Aids – were analysed by researchers. Tens of thousands of human immunodeficiency viruses were found in every millilitre of their blood. Ordinarily, their immune system should struggle to fight the infection, or make them seriously ill, but none of both scenarios happened. The scientists were led to believe that the 10% of children whose immune systems cope with the virus have striking similarities to the way more than 40 non-human primate species cope with simian immunodeficiency virus (SIV). SIVs are retroviruses able to infect at least 45 species of African non-human primates Philip Goulder, a professor and one of the researchers from the University of Oxford, told the BBC that, “Waging war against the virus is in most cases the wrong thing to do.” Goulder added: “Essentially, their immune system is ignoring the virus as far as possible. One of the things that comes out of this study is that HIV disease is not so much to do with HIV, but with the immune response to it.” “Natural selection has worked in these cases, and the mechanism is very similar to the one in these kids that don’t progress,” Copyright 2024 TheCable. All rights reserved. This material, and other digital content on this website, may not be reproduced, published, broadcast, rewritten or redistributed in whole or in part without prior express written permission from TheCable. Follow us on twitter @Thecablestyle

https://lifestyle.thecable.ng/immune-system-of-one-in-10-children-can-ignore-hiv/

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Scientists at CERN in Switzerland and in the US have been developing a new kind of computer system that is already being described as the successor to the World Wide Web. Known as the Worldwide Grid, it would give users access to the computing power of all the machines connected to a network no matter where they are in the world. The technology could turn desktop computers into supercomputers and is now being adapted to allow mobile devices such as phones and tablets to connect. Physicists at CERN already have access to the world’s biggest Grid computing network, combining more than 200,000 computers together. Ian Bird, LHC Computing Grid project leader at CERN, said: “The Grid that we have implemented for physics is a mechanism to allow scientists to share data and collaborate. “It brings together disparate resources from around the world so that they are working as if they are single system. “It solves a problem where we do not have the money to build a big computer centre. “With a single credential I can use computer resources in the UK, or the US or in Europe. “You don’t need to know where that computer is located though as you just go into your web browser and look for a service you want to buy. “All the user sees is that there is a lot of computing available to them.” It is now undergoing an upgrade as the rest of the LHC is similarly upgraded to increase its power. Based on the past three years of use, scientists are intending to improve the efficiency of the system while also decreasing its complexity. physicists have also recently been able to access CERNs grid using mobile devices like iPhones and iPads to submit work, monitor results and control processes. Mr Bird said the computing power of the mobile devices themselves does not contribute greatly to the resources available in the Grid, but this may change in the future. The average iPhone now contains more computing power than early supercomputers. Another computing Grid being developed by IBM and University of California, Berkley, is also already attempting to tap into the computing power of mobile devices The World Community Grid now allows Google’s Android devices to work on the Grid. Last month researchers began using the combined power of volunteer’s handsets to search for new drug candidates against HIV. Around 20,000 smartphones are now on the network, along with 500,000 personal computers. David Anderson, a researcher at the University of Berkeley’s space sciences laboratory, said: “There are about a billion Android devices right now, and their total computing power exceeds that of the largest conventional supercomputers. “Mobile devices are the wave of the future in many ways, including the raw computing power they can provide to solve computationally difficult problems.” There are currently several other Grid computing systems in operation around the world that are being used by groups of scientists to help them with research, including the search for extraterrestrial life and identifying potential new drugs. Experts hope that as more computers join the systems and they link together, a Worldwide Grid will be created, giving access to resources around the world at the touch of a button. It would mean weather forecasters could have access to far greater computing power than current supercomputers allow while schools could access resources capable of performing tasks that can currently only be performed at universities. Businesses would also be able to perform detailed analysis on data that they currently cannot. For home users, it would mean no longer having to upgrade their machines every couple of years to ensure they are powerful enough to run the current software. They could also pay to use software and resources as they needed them rather than having to buy expensive licenses. Mr Bird added: “The technology is evolving. If you look at what we have done is created a way to collaborate in computing and share resources between different organisations.”

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/technology/news/10242837/How-CERNs-Grid-may-place-the-power-of-the-worlds-computers-in-your-hands.htmlScientists

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As the Covid-19 continues to spread across the world, parents are concerned, more than anything else, about the welfare of their kids. Although reports show that the elderly and people with underlying health conditions are more vulnerable to the disease. But the big question is, how can parents protect their kids from the disease? The Centre for Disease Control and Prevention has the answer: Q: How can I protect my child from COVID-19 infection? - You can encourage your child to help stop the spread of COVID-19 by teaching them to do the same things everyone should do to stay healthy. - Clean hands often using soap and water or alcohol-based hand sanitizer - Avoid people who are sick (coughing and sneezing) - Clean and disinfect high-touch surfaces daily in household common areas (e.g. tables, hard-backed chairs, doorknobs, light switches, remotes, handles, desks, toilets, sinks) - Launder items including washable plush toys as appropriate in accordance with the manufacturer’s instructions. If possible, launder items using the warmest appropriate water setting for the items and dry items completely. Dirty laundry from an ill person can be washed with other people’s items. As a parent or educator, we know you’re also dealing with the challenges caused by COVID-19. This is a trying period, and we’re committed to supporting you in every way possible. We’ll get through this together and emerge more formidable than ever before. Let’s keep safe!

https://brandspurng.com/2020/03/19/how-can-i-prevent-my-child-from-corona-virus-covid-19/

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This article has been fact checked by a Board Certified Pediatrician. Sources of information for the article are listed at the bottom. For any content issues please Contact Us. Assistive technology and adaptive equipment for children with cerebral palsy include any device or equipment to help perform an activity or improve the ability to function. For a child with cerebral palsy, many different types of devices can be used to allow for participation in more activities, enhance learning, improve communication, hearing, and mobility, and make life easier. Assistive technology is crucial in helping a child succeed and transition into independent adulthood. What Is Assistive Tech and Adaptive Devices for Cerebral Palsy? Assistive technology and adaptive equipment or devices include anything that helps a disabled child function better. This can include mobility devices like walkers and braces. It can also include communication tools, like computers or tablets. These devices and technologies aim to improve access and help children function more independently and with greater confidence. How Children Can Benefit from Technology Cerebral palsy causes several different types of disabilities, from issues with walking to hearing difficulties and the ability to communicate or even hold a pencil. The severity of these disabilities ranges from mild to severe and can impair quality of life, independence, and all aspects of health, from physical to emotional and social. The use of assistive technology devices can provide a child with several benefits, including: - Better academic performance - More inclusion in activities and recreation - A more engaged social life - Improved communication with others and a better response to a child’s needs as a result - Increased ability to express emotions - Enhanced self-confidence - Greater independence and self-sufficiency - More opportunities While the symptoms and complications of cerebral palsy can vary widely from one individual to the next, most children with this condition have some degree of limited mobility. Many children cannot walk, while others can walk with assistance and some without support. Aids that enhance mobility can be low-tech, including walkers and non-electric wheelchairs. There are also aids that use more technology, such as electric wheelchairs. These help children who struggle to use their arms and hands get around with just the touch of a button or joystick. Lifts can help a child move between floors in the home, into and out of vehicles, and from sitting to standing positions. A power scooter is another option for mobility. An exciting technology that holds great promise for helping disabled individuals gain more mobility is called functional electrical stimulation. A small device is used to deliver electrical impulses to stimulate specific muscles. It works by activating the nerves, causing the muscles to move, and training them to function better over time. Children with spastic cerebral palsy can benefit from being able to walk more easily and with less pain. This device will not work for every child, but many who walk with difficulty may benefit. Technology for Communication For many children with cerebral palsy, communication is an issue. A child may have muscles in the throat and mouth affected by the condition, creating difficulty forming words. This makes it challenging to express emotions and needs, to learn in school, and to be social with others. Children can work with speech and language therapists to improve communication skills, and these professionals often use assistive technology: - Electronic communication boards. A communication board presents the child with a choice of letters, words, numbers, and pictures. The child can then select them to communicate with others. Depending on a child’s ability, they may need instruction from a speech/language therapist to use a communication board successfully. - Low-tech communication boards. The low-technology version of this is simply using a pencil and paper to express oneself. This is only useful for a child who can grip a writing implement and use it to write words or draw pictures clearly. There are also boards containing photographs of objects a child can point to, such as a glass of water or a toilet. This way, a child who is too young or is unable to deal with the complexity of a tablet may indicate their needs. - Speech-generating devices. There is a more advanced version of an electronic communication board that functions to generate speech. The child types or taps words and sentences, and the device formulates them into speech that others can understand clearly. - Eye-tracking devices. This type of device is best used with children who cannot use their arms, hands, or fingers to tap at images on a communication board. These individuals can benefit from an eye-tracking device, which follows where the eyes are moving and looking. When the child looks at a specific word or image on the communication board, it is selected without actively tapping on the surface. Typing and Writing Devices Many children with cerebral palsy struggle with the fine motor skills needed to hold a pen or pencil and to hit individual keys on a keyboard. Written communication is essential for children who cannot speak easily or at all and is also necessary for academic work. Several devices are available to facilitate writing. Simple, low-technology grips or specially designed pencils are adaptive devices that enable a child to hold a writing implement and manipulate it. For instance, a weighted pen or pencil can help a child get more leverage and more easily manage the tool while learning how to write. A steadying device can be attached to a pen or pencil to help a child with shaky movements. Having a desk with a surface that can be adjusted for height and angle can also help a child get the proper alignment and most comfortable position for writing. A child who struggles to use traditional writing implements may benefit from the opportunity to type, but some children also have difficulty using keyboards. A simple adaptive device is a pointer that is attached by Velcro to the hand or wrist, allowing a child to press small buttons on keyboards, tablets, or phones. Other typing technologies that help children communicate more effectively include word prediction software and spelling and grammar checks. Hearing loss is an issue that many children with cerebral palsy struggle with, but technology has come a long way in providing devices to improve the ability to hear. Hearing aids, for instance, can facilitate hearing for those who are not deaf but have some hearing loss. A cochlear implant may be a good option for children with more severe hearing deficits. Cochlear implants have a small device inserted beneath the skin inside the ear and an outer piece behind the ear. It works by stimulating the auditory nerve and bypassing damaged parts in the ear that prevent hearing. Getting this device requires surgery, and it can take several weeks before it is ready to use and for the child to be able to hear. Getting a cochlear implant is not recommended for all children with hearing difficulties. It is expensive, requires surgery, and comes with some rare but serious health risks. It is particularly recommended for those children who have multiple special needs and complications from cerebral palsy. Improving hearing can be a significant benefit for a child struggling with several disabilities. Other devices that can help children who are hard of hearing include assistive listening systems. These are devices that capture sound, amplify it, and deliver it to the ear. A good device can help a child hear their teacher speaking in the classroom, for instance, even with a lot of background noise. Technology to Help with Daily Activities In addition to the assistive technology devices that help children with specific issues, like hearing, writing, or communicating, several adaptive tools help with daily living activities. These devices can make life easier, make a child more self-sufficient, and help them achieve greater independence. Some of these specially adapted devices are: - Specialized toilet seats, safety bars, and bathing benches in the bathroom - Sponges and brushes with longer handles - Eating utensils with grips or that are weighted - Plates and bowls with non-slip bottoms - Non-skid rugs - Dressing aids - Tables that can be moved up and down - Adaptive scissors and art supplies - Key turners - Aids for positioning in bed or on couches and chairs A child with cerebral palsy can benefit significantly from using assistive technology and adaptive devices. Parents can advocate for what their children need by working with public schools. With an evaluation, a child can get an individualized education program (IEP) through the special education department. This may include assistive devices that the school will then provide. Parents or adults with cerebral palsy can contact government organizations, advocacy groups, and community groups to seek assistance with paying for and getting these much-needed devices. - Wu, F.G., Chang, E., Chen, R. and Chen, C.H. (2004). Assistive Drawing Device Design for Cerebral Palsy Children. Technol. Disabil. 15(4), 239-46. Retrieved from: https://doi.org/10.3233/tad-2003-15405 - Steven, R.A., Green, K.M.J., Broomfield, S.J., Henderson, L.A>, Ramsden, R.T., and Bruce, I.A. (2011, November). Cochlear Implantation in Children with Cerebral Palsy. Int. J. Otorhinolaryngol. 75(11), 1427-30. Retrieved from: https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/21893352

https://www.cerebralpalsyguidance.com/cerebral-palsy/causes/traumatic-brain-injury/As

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Have you ever wondered why Nigeria is practicing a federal system of government and not any other system? Do you know the reasons for federalism in Nigeria? If you answer to the above questions is no, then you lucky to be here. In this article, i will comprehensively discuss the reasons for federalism in Nigeria. Nigeria did not choose federal system of government because it is the best or most practiced system of government in the world. There are other political systems the country could have adopted but because of some reasons which I am going to share with you today, federalism seemed to be the best idea. But before moving to the crux of this article, we will be looking briefly at the meaning and history of federalism in Nigeria. So, without wasting much time, what is a federal system of government? Also read: Pillars of democracy: 7 Essential pillars of democracy Meaning of federalism? Federalism can be defined as a system of government in which political powers of the state are shared between the central government and other component units. In light of this, a constitution is said to be federal when its operates two levels of government, that is the federal and state, and each of this level exercise its different powers without interference by the other level. On the other hand; a constitution is unitary when there are created by the law made by the central legislature and their existence depends upon the government to control, supervision of the central government. From the above explanation, one can rightly say that the constitution of Nigeria and United States of America are federal constitutions while the constitution of France and the Republic of Ireland are Unitary constitutions. Federalism therefore involves the linkage of individuals, groups and policies in lasting but limited union in such a way as to provide for the energetic pursuit of common goals while maintaining the respective integrities of all parties. For a better explanation of the theory of federalism, I highly recommend that you watch the video below. Also read: Highest paying law firms in Nigeria The origin of federalism in Nigeria can be traced to the colonial era. Parliamentary and Unitary system of government were in operation in Nigeria between 1914 and 1946. In 1939 sir Bernard Bourdillion made a serious constitutional proposal which concluded having regional councils with a central council in Lagos. Nigeria as a result was divided into three provinces. sir Arthur Richards strengthened this proposal in 1945 and regionalism was introduced by his administration in 1946. In the words of Richards, regionalism was introduced to strengthen unity in diversity. Rt. Hon. Justice Udo Udoma is of the view that regionalism was introduced by the colonialists in order to divide and rule, and weaken true national unity in Nigeria. The 1951 constitution gave more strength to regionalism with the creation of two chamber legislation in the northern and western Nigeria. This regional arrangement gave rise to ethnic sentiment and political struggle for the center among the three major ethnic groups in Nigeria. The contradictions generated by this rigional arrangement threatened Nigeria unity. Instead of designing a government that should unite the different elements in Nigeria, the colonialists fully adopted federal stem of government in 1954 and created greater regional autonomy. It was under the 1954 constitution that federal system of government was fully adopted. It was believed that federal system of government would take care of the interest of the minority and human rights that had been the fear of the minority under colonial rule. The constitution emphasized areas of authority between the central government and the regions. Matters, enumerated in the exclusive list are selected for the federal authority, while matters that fall within the concurrent list are selected for the federal government, and the regions. However, where there is a conflict of authority between the federal government and regional government, the federal authority supersedes. The regional government had power over matters that are listed under the residual list. Since 1954 successively Nigerian constitution had adopted the federal system of government without much emphasis on the unity or disunity it has accorded to Nigeria. Many Nigerian ethnic groups began to agitate for their own states. In 1963 Midwestern region was created and Nigeria became a nation of four regions. Again, in 1967 twelve states were created to appease the interest of those clamoring for states and weaken the geo-political holds of Biafra. 19 more states were created in 1976 in order to score more political advantage by the Murtala-Obasanjo regime against those that favor General Yakubu Gowon. The Babangida administration followed the same step and created 21 states and more local governments. The states were later increased to 30 states. Abacha regime, added more states making Nigeria a federation of 36 states and Federal capital Territory at Abuja. The military were able to create more states because military decrees do not pass the same rigorous method bills pass in a democratic government. Military administration does not apply the principle of federation. The first military head of state was dethroned for adopting unitary system of government yet successive military administration in practice follow unitary principle instead of federal system. It has been suggested that the creation of more states and local government have helped in the distribution of national cake. On the contrary it has also been suggested that is created more diversity and conflict for the nation to grapple with. The states too have no resources for development but depended on federal grants. Naturally, federal system of government has some distinctive features namely: 1. There must be a formal decision of government powers by the constitution between the federal and state government. 2. There must exist supremacy of the constitution, which implies that laws passed by the authority in the federal arrangement, if contrary to the constitution shall be declared to be ultra votes. 3. The constitution must be rigid to avoid frequent and unnecessary changes. Fourthly, there shall be the existence of court to interpret the constitution as it applies to cases and conflicts among the tiers of government. By and large, it is the nature of the relationship of the federal and state governments that determines whether a state is federal or unitary. The powers that exist between the federal and state government also depends on the constitution. Top 7 Reasons for federal system of government in Nigeria Below are the reasons why Nigeria adopted a federal system of government: 1. Historical experience The major reason for the adoption of federal system of government in Nigeria is borne out of the historical experience that brought all the ethical groups together under one Nigeria. It has severally been emphasized by both the Northern and Western politicians that God did not create Nigeria but the British. The British in their quest for economic wealth and geo-political edges over other Europeans in Africa made Nigeria the largest British colony in Africa. The Emergence of Nigeria as a political entity under colonial rule was not an easy affair. It came about following the necessity for administrative convenience and managerial expenses. Moreover, it is important to note that most of the ethnic groups in Nigeria had strong political inter-group relationship before colonial rule. The history of Ijaw, Edo, Igala, Yoruba, Igbo, Nupe and Hausa Kingdoms are enriched with social-political relationships that existed before the emergence of the white man. Political institutions, Kinship ties, Origin of towns and their cultural antecedents are enriched with similar history. All these strengthen political bonds and gave Rice to unity in diversity. 2. Unity of the country: This is also one of the reasons for federal system of government in Nigeria. Federalism was basically introduced to bring about peace and unity in the different regions of the country. In many countries of the world, federalism has emerged as a means of accommodating the growing desire of people to preserve or revive the intimacy of small societies and the growing necessity for larger combinations to mobilize the utilization of common resources. The unity here is brought about by the desire of the component units of the federation to form union in respect of some matters. Mere desire to unite is not enough but there must be the desire to remain separate in respect to other matters. If the desire to remain separate does not exist, the the association will not be federal but unitary with some delegation of powers to local government. Also see: Differences between 1960 and 1963 constitution of Nigeria 3. Political culture of Nigeria: Another important factor that necessitated federalism in Nigeria was the political culture of the country. Evidently, Nigeria’s political culture was federalism friendly and that gave rise to easy adoption of federalism. As I have already explained, Nigeria is an amalgamation of three different regions with beliefs and customs. Federalism was the only solution to ensure peace and unity amongst the leaders and the citizens and that was why federalism was adopted into the Nigerian political system. In the same way, the political culture of the United States is civic, republican and participatory. It represents a synthetic between two perspectiveneess; one is that politics of the United States should produce the good commonwealth and the other is that the principal task of politics is to create an open political market. Also see: Reasons why lawyers wear wigs to court 4. Ethnic, Religious and Geographical Factor: No doubt, the Ethnic, Religious and Geographical nature of Nigeria also contributed to the reason why federalism was adopted. This is so because where federal principles apply, the various ethnic groups that cannot or don’t form majority to produce large part may have the opportunity of governing themselves within their federating unit controlled by them. Common national, racial, religious, cultural linguistic or social ties have often contributed to the unification of political unit. In some areas where major communal or other social antagonism cuts across territorial boundaries, ranging through all the federating units, communities or classes have been driven to seek to protect or strengthen their position by inter-territorial union. The fear of ethnic groups overlapping regional boundaries and the loyalties of castes cutting of some extent across provincial political boundaries also encourage some groups to support wider federal unions. There is no doubt that geographical factored are one of the influential reasons for federalism in Nigeria. The effectiveness of linking communications has been a vital factor in geographical unit. Also see: Historical constitutional development in Nigeria explained 5. Minority Marginalization: Another cogent reason for federalism in Nigeria is the fear of marginalization. In other not to control only some parts of the big country, Nigeria, the colonial masters thought it wise to divide the country into different component units that will be represented in the government. This helped to solve the problem of marginalization in the leadership. The fear of marginalization by the minority in a unitary system of government has, to a great extent, influenced the majority state support for federating states. In a Unitary system, the minority states cannot govern the entire region which is controlled by majority. Thus, federalism seemed to be the only option left for Nigeria because it allows for popular participation in government. Here, both the majority and minority are represented in the government. 6. Resource control: The availability of resources in a particular region and the need for that area to control the resources has also been seen as a reason for a federal system in Nigeria. This has nexus with the particular sharing formula adopted. In a unitary constitution which opposes federal principles, everything belongs to the central government; the federating unit does not exist, let alone agitating for resource control. However, that is not so in a federal government system. Take for example, in the Nigerian case of Attorney General of Federation v Attorney General of Abia and others (2002) 3 NCLR 1ar p 54, the issue of resource control in a true federalism was the bone of contention in that matter. Here, the Attorney General of the Federation Instituted the case to test the true position so that the federal government would be guided on the varying issues of derivation formula. The Attorney General sought to know whether the 13% sharing formula of the oil producing states should include revenue from oil producing states should include revenue from oil production activities off shore. It should be noted that the Federal Military Government had earlier by fiat taken proceeds from offshore prospecting and drilling activities directly under federal eminent domain. In his judgment, Ogundare JSC agreed that the provisions to Sections 162(2) of the constitution re-stabilized the principle of derivation. This particular corroborated federalism in Nigeria. It established that the resources of a particular state is not totally owned by the federal government. Also see: Differences between Cross-offers and counter-offers 7. Fear of insecurity and the desire for a Union: Another factor that prompted the adoption of federalism in Nigeria is the fear of insecurity and the desire for union. The United States, Canada, India, France and Australia adopted federalism because of the desire for security by the various ethnic units. In Nigeria, it could be argued that our federal system of government is the creation of British colonialism. However, it is also fact that since independence Nigeria has promulgated several constitutions and that if Nigeria wanted an alternative system of government, she could have opted for it. It is also an undisputed fact that the Hausas and Yorubas fought Biafra to keep the unity of Nigeria. Insecurity and the desire for union are the main reasons for the shift from unitary system of government to federal system of government in 1954. The Hausa Fulani and the Minorities feared the domination of political powers by the Igbos and Yorubas. It is important to also reason that small states are prone to domination and sometimes control by the big ones. To avert this domination, states unite to form a strong, virile and stable union capable of withstanding external attacks. The USA and Canada were formed with the above interest at heart. - Problems facing the legal profession in Nigeria - History of the legal profession in Nigeria - Problems of Local Government in Nigeria And Solutions - 5 important Characteristic of customary law - Sources of Nigerian Law: everything you need to know By way of conclusion, it is imperative to know that the reason why Nigeria is still practicing federalism today is because the system seems to be suitable for our political value and culture. Since Nigeria is a heterogeneous nation and Federalism is more practicable in such kind of nation, it is an ideal system of government. In my view, federalism is a good system for Nigeria. It allows for popular participation in politics at every level of government. Even the masses in the rural areas of the country are allowed to participate in politics by electing their representatives into office. Edeh Samuel Chukwuemeka, ACMC, is a lawyer and a certified mediator/conciliator in Nigeria. He is also a developer with knowledge in various programming languages. Samuel is determined to leverage his skills in technology, SEO, and legal practice to revolutionize the legal profession worldwide by creating web and mobile applications that simplify legal research. Sam is also passionate about educating and providing valuable information to people. It was helpful, thank you . But nigeria today became the proudable and bearable country, we are proud to nigeria our inherited country,god bless nigeria. I love this article,very educating and interesting Keep it up ✨✨ thanks a lot f or this it really helped me Yes , I love it and I was sentitize on those reasons.

https://bscholarly.com/reasons-for-federalism-in-nigeria/

Politics

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How Do Hybrid Electric Cars Work? Hybrid electric vehicles are powered by an internal combustion engine and one or more electric motors, which uses energy stored in batteries. A hybrid electric vehicle cannot be plugged in to charge the battery. Instead, the battery is charged through regenerative braking and by the internal combustion engine. The extra power provided by the electric motor can potentially allow for a smaller engine. The battery can also power auxiliary loads and reduce engine idling when stopped. Together, these features result in better fuel economy without sacrificing performance. Learn more about hybrid electric vehicles. Key Components of a Hybrid Electric Car Battery (auxiliary): In an electric drive vehicle, the low-voltage auxiliary battery provides electricity to start the car before the traction battery is engaged; it also powers vehicle accessories. DC/DC converter: This device converts higher-voltage DC power from the traction battery pack to the lower-voltage DC power needed to run vehicle accessories and recharge the auxiliary battery. Electric generator: Generates electricity from the rotating wheels while braking, transferring that energy back to the traction battery pack. Some vehicles use motor generators that perform both the drive and regeneration functions. Electric traction motor: Using power from the traction battery pack, this motor drives the vehicle's wheels. Some vehicles use motor generators that perform both the drive and regeneration functions. Exhaust system: The exhaust system channels the exhaust gases from the engine out through the tailpipe. A three-way catalyst is designed to reduce engine-out emissions within the exhaust system. Fuel filler: A nozzle from a fuel dispenser attaches to the receptacle on the vehicle to fill the tank. Fuel tank (gasoline): This tank stores gasoline on board the vehicle until it's needed by the engine. Internal combustion engine (spark-ignited): In this configuration, fuel is injected into either the intake manifold or the combustion chamber, where it is combined with air, and the air/fuel mixture is ignited by the spark from a spark plug. Power electronics controller: This unit manages the flow of electrical energy delivered by the traction battery, controlling the speed of the electric traction motor and the torque it produces. Thermal system (cooling): This system maintains a proper operating temperature range of the engine, electric motor, power electronics, and other components. Traction battery pack: Stores electricity for use by the electric traction motor. Transmission: The transmission transfers mechanical power from the engine and/or electric traction motor to drive the wheels.

https://afdc.energy.gov/vehicles/how-do-hybrid-electric-cars-work

Politics

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Supply and Demand Supply and demand are one of the main pillars economics is standing upon. In economics, the term “demand” refers to the quantity of particular products people want to buy in the market at a particular price. Whereas supply refers to the availability of the products people want to buy or demand in the market at a certain price. The theory of supply and demand determine how the price of a particular product is fixed. There are some exceptional products that have no alternative and even after the hike in the price there will be no change in demand. Scarcity is the primary concept of the economics that refers to the availability of the limited resources that are necessary to meet our needs. Resources like technology, money, raw material, and manpower are limited in quantity in comparison to our unlimited demand. So, economics helps us to take important decisions to properly utilise these resources in order to meet the demand in the market. This sub-discipline of economics allows students to make the proper decision after analysing the demand in the market. Online tutor at the BookMyEssay provide economics dissertation writing help to further elaborate the concept to students Cost and Benefit Analysis Cost and benefit analysis involves achieving the set goal by comparing the cost and benefits of various alternatives to maximise the profit. Let’s take an example to further explain the concept. Suppose in a company ABC sends one of his employees to print out some papers on a daily basis. After a long period of time, ABC decides to buy a printer. Now ABC will perform the cost and benefit analysis to find out the profit or loss. In this situation, they will find out if the price of sending a person is more than purchasing a printer. Hence, cost and benefit analysis consider both qualitative and quantitative aspect of any project or investment. Students can hire economics assignment help to write an assignment on the cost and benefit analysis. Incentives are the source of motivation that encourages employees to follow their preferences in the economic sector. There are two types of incentives namely intrinsic incentives and extrinsic incentives. Intrinsic incentives originate within the person due to the good working environment. For instance:- if you work hard to bring a change in the working field then, it is an intrinsic incentive. Extrinsic incentives come from outside the person and further encourage him to accomplish a particular task. For instance: - a company announce to give the incentive on the sales of 100 bottles which is an extrinsic incentive. Economics Can be Divided Into Two Major Parts Known as This particular area of the economics deals with the behaviour of a single unit (individual or a business firm). If further explained this area help students to learn about the behaviour of a firm and individual in the market to take the better decision. In this sector of economics, students will learn about product pricing, the study of firms, factor pricing, and many more. BookMyEssay offers reliable economics assignment help to students dealing with microeconomics assignments. Unlike microeconomic, macroeconomics focus on the bigger picture to determine the decision-making process. The macroeconomics includes regional economy, national economy and the global economy. Hence, this sector of economics draws student’s attention toward the supply of goods and services that determine the price, GDP, unemployment, inflation, etc. In the macroeconomics, students learn about the investment, savings, general price level, economic growth and many other concepts. Core Concepts Covered in Economics for better Understanding on the Part of Students Beardly categorised, students seek Economics assignments on topics that fall under one or more categories detailed below: - History of Economics - Public Economics - Social & Economic Data - International Economics - Regression Modelling - Managerial Economics - Cost Curves Study - Health Economics - Business Economics - Labour Economics - Demand & Supply Analysis - Demand Forecasting - Game Theory - Qualitative Methods of Economics - Economic Development & Planning Apart from the topics discussed above, students assigned with economics coursework need to take up the subject with the intent of interest and learning.

https://www.bookmyessay.com.au/subject/economics-assignment-help/

Education

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Table of contents Précis comes from a French word meaning “precise explanation”. It is to some extent similar to an abstract and a summary. But these are not the same types of work. If you are looking for comprehensive writing guides to write a proper critical precise, check this article. It answers the questions: What is a rhetorical precis and its format? How to write a critical precis? What are some good examples of a precis? Whether you have never written a critical precis or know the basics but want to improve your skills, you will find insights in this article. Alternatively, you can leave a 'do my essay for me' request, and our pro academic writers will be happy to help you with a precis. What Is a Critical Precis? Critical or rhetorical précis is a type of academic writing which presents ideas of a book, abstract, or an article in a condensed form and is devoid of personal opinion. You should not criticize or question the author’s ideas and arguments or take a stand on the issue. The purpose is to acquaint a reader with the main points of the original work preserving its structure and arguments. Remember, you should not express your personal opinion about the analyzed work because you are not writing a book critique review. It means that you should retell the author’s opinion and ideas, using the writer’s word. Features of a Quality Precis To be able to write an informative, compelling, and objective paper, you should understand what features a good precis should have. Keep in mind that a critical precis is not a: Plan or outline of the original passage or article Retelling of the original source Simple abstract of the text Selection of the most prominent phrases and sentences Chain of facts and sentences that are not connected. On the other hand, a good precis has the following features: Is about ¼ of the original source length Is written in present tense Does not contain personal pronouns I, we. Is written in the third person Presents paraphrased ideas from the original source expressed in a concise form rather than copy-pasted sentences Is logically ordered and coherent Does not express your opinion or give additional information and details that are not mentioned in the original text It should be clear, concise, coherent, and objective. What Is the Proper Precis Format and Structure? Precis often contains direct quotes. Thus, all the citations and references should be formatted following the corresponding formatting style requirements. The most common are APA, MLA, Chicago, Harvard, and ASA format. However, you should always check the instructions given to you by your teacher. Rhetorical precis is short by nature. Its length depends on the size of the original text. It should be about ¼ of the piece analyzed. Regardless of this fact, precis has all the structural components of a typical essay. Precis outline includes an introduction, thesis, main body paragraphs, and conclusion. Let's find out what should be written in each part. Introduction: How to Start a Precis Correctly Essays usually start with a hook. In case of a precis, it is an open question. Some argue that it is a compulsory part; thus, it should be the first sentence. Others claim that we should get straight to the point and omit unnecessary details. However, the fact is that an introduction of a precis should contain a sentence introducing the original work. In this sentence, you should mention the author’s name, the name of the work, the publication date, and a power verb (such as claim, argue, criticize, recon, etc.), and thesis statement. A thesis statement might include one or a couple of sentences, but the critical precis introduction is usually short. Remember, when writing a precis, avoid providing details not mentioned in the original source. A thesis should also be the one stated by the author, not your opinion. Main Body Paragraphs In the main body, present the main ideas of the original piece of writing. Make sure to discuss only one issue per paragraph, as your precis should be logically organized and coherent. Also, do not forget that you are not supposed to either criticize the author's ideas, analyze them, take a stand on the issue, or provide additional details. You should present the ideas as they are in the original text. Convey the gist of the original work without distorting its meaning and structure. You may also add evidence used by the author and add direct quotes. However, make sure they are relevant and properly formatted. How to Conclude a Precis As in any essay type, in precis, conclusion summarizes the paper. You should restate the main idea of the work. Also, summarize the main points covered in the precis. However, avoid copy-pasting the sentences. Do not forget that a critical precis does not presuppose you analyzing the work, sharing your opinion, or taking a stand on the issue. How to Write an A+ Precis Step-by-Step Now when you know the peculiarities of the structure of a rhetorical precis, it’s high time to get to the writing process. It is rather easy. The main points you should consider while writing a précis are to keep to the original structure and avoid expressing your opinion. Read the text. First of all, take your time to read the original text carefully. Make sure you understand the content and the author’s purpose. If there are some unclear points, either try to find the answers by yourself or clarify the question with your friends or professor. Take notes. When reading the text, highlight the most important ideas. You may also highlight some examples and evidence the author presents. You will use all these details when writing a precis. Formulate a thesis statement and create an outline. After you have read and understood the text, create a plan. First of all, write down a thesis statement. Ensure it is devoid of your personal opinion and fully corresponds to the idea expressed in the original text. After this, draft an outline. Discuss one idea per paragraph. Otherwise, the paper might seem clumsy and illogical. Write your precis. With the outline ready, you only have to develop the ideas mentioned in it. Make sure that the paper is organized and developed logically. Be clear, specific, and concise. Revise your precis. The last step is proofreading. Check your paper for any inconsistencies and proofread it for any type of mistakes. Make sure you have preserved the original text structure and did not add any additional information or your opinion. Here are several good examples of precis introductory paragraphs. Tips on Writing a Compelling Precis Consider these tips when working on your critical precis. They will help you improve your paper. Take notes. Whether you are reading the text for the first time or re-reading it, write down the key ideas to analyze them later. Have proper structure. Although being short, precis should have an intro, main body, and conclusion. You may also add headings to make your paper even more clear. Don’t express your opinion. You write about the ideas from the original text in a critical precis. Do not share your opinion. Do not add new information. Even if you have something to say, there should be no information from additional sources. It will be a mistake. Use present tenses. Avoid using past tenses in a rhetorical precis. Talk about the issues in the present tense. Discuss one idea per paragraph. To make your paper clear and logical, discuss only one idea per paragraph. Make sure each idea is related to the thesis statement and presented as in the original text. Keep it simple, specific, and concise. Critical precis is a short type of writing. Thus, try to be succinct in expressing the ideas. Now that you know all the peculiarities of precis writing, you can do it fast and effectively. Just follow the 3 main rules: Introduce the original work, its author, and main idea. Do not add details not presented in paper Avoid expressing your opinion. There are the basic requirements. However, if you are not sure you will cope with this task, you may ask professionals for help. They will give answers to your questions and help you write an informative and engaging rhetorical precis.

https://writemyessay4me.org/blog/critical-precis

Education

en

Harmful effects of soft drinks on the human body Soft drinks and sodas have become increasingly popular beverages worldwide. However, their widespread consumption has raised concerns about their impact on our health. While they may be refreshing and enjoyable, the negative effects of soft drinks extend far beyond their taste. In this article, we will explore ten major reasons why you should consider avoiding soft drinks and sodas to safeguard your health and well-being. Soft drinks are notorious for their high sugar content. They are laden with added sugars, including high-fructose corn syrup, which contributes to excessive calorie intake. Regular consumption of sugary beverages can lead to weight gain, obesity, and an increased risk of chronic conditions such as type 2 diabetes, heart disease, and certain cancers. Soft drinks offer little to no nutritional value. They are often referred to as "empty calories" as they provide calories without essential nutrients like vitamins, minerals, and fiber. Consuming these empty calories can leave you feeling hungry and lead to overeating, further contributing to weight gain and nutritional deficiencies. Dental Health Issues Soft drinks are highly acidic and contain sugars that can erode tooth enamel, leading to dental cavities, tooth decay, and gum disease. The combination of acidity and sugars creates an ideal environment for harmful bacteria in the mouth, increasing the risk of oral health problems. Diet or "zero-calorie" sodas may seem like a healthier alternative, but they often contain artificial sweeteners such as aspartame or sucralose. While these sweeteners provide the taste of sweetness without the added calories, they have been linked to various health concerns, including metabolic disorders, altered gut microbiota, and increased cravings for sweet foods. ALSO READ: 13 Easy Ways to Stop Eating Lots of Suga Despite their liquid form, soft drinks can contribute to dehydration. Caffeinated sodas have diuretic properties, which can increase urine production and lead to fluid loss. Additionally, the high sugar content can affect the body's fluid balance. Opting for water or natural beverages is a more effective way to stay hydrated. Increased Risk of Metabolic Syndrome Regular consumption of soft drinks has been associated with an increased risk of metabolic syndrome—a cluster of conditions including abdominal obesity, high blood pressure, high blood sugar levels, and abnormal cholesterol levels. These factors significantly raise the risk of developing type 2 diabetes, heart disease, and stroke. Negative Impact on Bone Health Soft drinks contain phosphoric acid, which can interfere with calcium absorption and contribute to weakened bones and osteoporosis over time. The excessive consumption of soft drinks, especially during critical growth stages, can hinder proper bone development and increase the risk of fractures and skeletal disorders. Potential Carcinogenic Effects Some soft drinks contain caramel colorings, which are produced through chemical processes that have been linked to the formation of potentially carcinogenic compounds, such as 4-methylimidazole (4-MEI). Prolonged exposure to 4-MEI has been associated with an increased risk of cancer, particularly in animal studies. Negative Impact on Mental Health Studies have found a potential link between the consumption of sugary beverages and an increased risk of mental health issues such as depression. Excessive sugar intake can lead to blood sugar fluctuations, inflammation, and dysregulation of neurotransmitters, all of which can negatively affect mood and mental well-being. Soft drink production contributes to environmental degradation. The manufacturing processes, packaging materials, and transportation of these beverages result in significant carbon emissions, pollution, and waste generation. By reducing soft drink consumption, you can contribute to a more sustainable and eco-friendly lifestyle. ALSO READ: 5 Worst Foods That Cause Inflammatory Diseases alternatives to soft drinks that I can try When seeking healthier alternatives to soft drinks, there are numerous options available that can quench your thirst and provide nutritional benefits. Here are some healthier alternatives to consider: Water is the ultimate hydrating beverage. It has no calories, no added sugars, and is essential for optimal bodily functions. Infuse water with slices of fruits like lemon, cucumber, or berries to add a hint of flavor. Herbal teas, such as chamomile, peppermint, or ginger, are caffeine-free and offer various health benefits. They can be enjoyed hot or cold and provide soothing and refreshing flavors. Fruit Infused Water Create your own flavorful water by infusing it with slices of your favorite fruits like oranges, strawberries, or watermelon. This adds a subtle fruity taste without the added sugars found in commercial fruit juices. If you enjoy the fizziness of soft drinks, opt for sparkling water as a healthier alternative. It provides refreshing carbonation without added sugars and artificial ingredients. Freshly Squeezed Juices Instead of packaged fruit juices, opt for freshly squeezed juices at home. Choose whole fruits and juice them yourself to ensure you're getting the natural vitamins, minerals, and fiber without any added sugars or Coconut water is a natural, electrolyte-rich beverage that provides hydration and a mild, tropical flavor. It's a great choice for replenishing fluids after exercise or on hot days. ALSO READ: Health Benefits of Drinking Boiled Prekese Kombucha is a fermented tea beverage that offers probiotics and potential health benefits. It comes in various flavors and can be a good alternative if you are looking for a tangy and fizzy drink. Blend together a combination of fruits, vegetables, and a liquid base like water or almond milk to create a nutritious and flavorful smoothie. Smoothies provide fiber, vitamins, and minerals while allowing you to control the ingredients and avoid added sugars. Brew herbal teas and let them cool for a refreshing iced beverage. Add a squeeze of lemon or a natural sweetener like stevia if desired. Flavored Sparkling Water Many companies offer flavored sparkling water options with no added sugars or artificial sweeteners. Look for brands that use natural flavors or make your own by adding a splash of fruit juice or a few slices of fruit to plain sparkling water. Remember, while these alternatives are generally healthier than soft drinks, it's still important to consume them in moderation as part of a balanced diet. Pay attention to your overall sugar intake and choose options that align with your individual dietary needs and preferences. Soft drinks and sodas may be tempting, but their negative impact on our health and the environment cannot be ignored. From the high sugar content and empty calories to dental health issues, increased risk of diseases, and potential carcinogenic effects, the reasons to avoid soft drinks are compelling. Making healthier beverage choices such as water, herbal teas, and natural fruit juices can not only protect your health but also promote overall well-being and sustainability. Remember, moderation is key. If you occasionally indulge in a soft drink, do so sparingly and be mindful of the potential consequences. Prioritizing nourishing, nutrient-dense beverages will help you maintain optimal health and vitality in the long run. Post a Comment

https://www.healthlifekit.com/2023/08/10-major-reasons-to-avoid-soft-drinks.html

Food

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Vision, the most dominant of our senses, plays a critical role in every facet and stage of our lives. We take vision for granted, but without vision, we struggle to learn, to walk, to read, to participate in school and to work. Vision impairment occurs when an eye condition affects the visual system and its vision functions. Everyone, if they live long enough, will experience at least one eye condition in their lifetime that will require appropriate care. Vision impairment has serious consequences for the individual across the life course. Many of these consequences can be mitigated by timely access to quality eye care. Eye conditions that can cause vision impairment and blindness – such as cataract or refractive error – are, for good reasons, the main focus of eye care strategies; nevertheless, the importance of eye conditions that do not typically cause vision impairment – such as dry eye or conjunctivitis – must not be overlooked. These conditions are frequently among the leading reasons for presentation to eye care services. Globally, the leading causes of vision impairment and blindness are: - refractive errors - diabetic retinopathy - age-related macular degeneration. There is substantial variation in the causes of vision impairment between and within countries according to the availability of eye care services, their affordability, and the education of the population. For example, the proportion of vision impairment attributable to unoperated cataract is higher in low- and middle-income countries. In high income countries, diseases such as glaucoma and age-related macular degeneration are more common. Among children, congenital cataract is a leading cause of vision impairment in low-income countries, whereas in middle-income countries it is more likely to be retinopathy of prematurity. Uncorrected refractive error remains a leading cause of vision impairment in all countries amongst children and adult populations. Globally, at least 2.2 billion people have a near or distance vision impairment. In at least 1 billion – or almost half – of these cases, vision impairment could have been prevented or has yet to be addressed. Among this 1 billion people, the main conditions causing distance vision impairment or blindness are cataract (94 million), refractive error (88.4 million), age-related macular degeneration (8 million), glaucoma (7.7 million), diabetic retinopathy (3.9 million) (1). The main condition causing near vision impairment is presbyopia (826 million) (2). In terms of regional differences, the prevalence of distance vision impairment in low- and middle-income regions is estimated to be 4 times higher than in high-income regions (1). With regards to near vision, rates of unaddressed near vision impairment are estimated to be greater than 80% in western, eastern and central sub-Saharan Africa, while comparative rates in high-income regions of North America, Australasia, western Europe, and of Asia-Pacific are reported to be lower than 10% (2). Population growth and ageing are expected to increase the risk that more people acquire vision impairment. Impact of vision impairment Young children with early onset irreversible severe vision impairment can experience delayed motor, language, emotional, social and cognitive development, with lifelong consequences. School-age children with vision impairment can also experience lower levels of educational achievement. Vision impairment severely impacts quality of life among adult populations. Adults with vision impairment can experience lower rates of employment and higher rates of depression and anxiety. In the case of older adults, vision impairment can contribute to social isolation, difficulty walking, a higher risk of falls and fractures, and a greater likelihood of early entry into nursing or care homes. Vision impairment poses an enormous global financial burden with an estimate annual global productivity loss of about US$ 411 billion purchasing power parity (3). This figure far outweighs the estimated cost gap of addressing the unmet need of vision impairment (estimated at about US$ 25 billion). Strategies to address eye conditions to avoid vision impairment There are effective interventions covering promotion, prevention, treatment and rehabilitation which address the needs associated with eye conditions and vision impairment. While many vision loss cases can be prevented (such as those due to infections, trauma, unsafe traditional medicines, perinatal diseases, nutrition-related diseases, unsafe use or self-administration of topical treatment), this is not possible for all. For many eye conditions, e.g. diabetic retinopathy, early detection and timely treatment are crucial to avoid irreversible vision loss. Spectacle correction for refractive error and surgery for cataract are among the most cost-effective of all health-care interventions. Yet, globally only 36% of people with a distance vision impairment due to refractive error have received access to an appropriate pair of spectacles and only 17% of people with vision impairment or blindness due to cataract have received access to quality surgery. Treatment is also available for many eye conditions that do not typically cause vision impairment, such as dry eye, conjunctivitis and blepharitis, but generate discomfort and pain. Treatment of these conditions is directed at alleviating the symptoms and preventing the evolution towards more severe stages of those diseases. Vision rehabilitation is very effective in improving functioning for people with an irreversible vision loss that can be caused by eye conditions such as diabetic retinopathy, glaucoma, consequences of trauma, and age-related macular degeneration. WHO’s work is guided by the recommendations of the WHO World report on vision (2019) and the resolution on "integrated, people-centred eye care, including preventable blindness and vision impairment" adopted at the Seventy-third World Health Assembly in 2020. The key proposal is to make integrated people-centred eye care (IPEC) the care model of choice and to ensure its widespread implementation. It is expected that by shaping the global agenda on vision and eye care, the report and resolution will assist Member States and their partners in their efforts to reduce the burden of eye conditions and vision. Some of WHO’s key areas of work and activities in the prevention of blindness include: - Working with Member States and other partners in the field to monitor the global targets for 2030 on integrated people-centred eye care: - Observing and promoting World Sight Day as an annual advocacy event. - Supporting the integration of eye care in health systems through the implementation of a series of technical tools: - The development and implementation tools to support countries to assess the provision of eye care services such as: - The Eye care situation analysis tool - The Tool for the assessment of diabetic retinopathy and diabetes management services. - The Tool for the assessment of glaucoma services. - The Tool for the assessment of refractive services. - The Tool for the assessment of rehabilitation services and systems. - The development of materials and resources to raise awareness on eye care: - The MyopiaEd: a mobile health toolkit for myopia to increase health literacy. - A population-facing app for near and distance visual acuity testing. - Graphics promoting healthy eye habits. 1. GBD 2019 Blindness and Vision Impairment Collaborators; Vision Loss Expert Group of the Global Burden of Disease Study. Causes of blindness and vision impairment in 2020 and trends over 30 years, and prevalence of avoidable blindness in relation to VISION 2020: the Right to Sight: an analysis for the Global Burden of Disease Study. Lancet Glob Health. 2021 Feb;9(2):e144-e160. doi: 10.1016/S2214-109X(20)30489-7. 2. Fricke, TR, Tahhan N, Resnikoff S, Papas E, Burnett A, Suit MH, Naduvilath T, Naidoo K, Global Prevalence of Presbyopia and Vision Impairment from Uncorrected Presbyopia: Systematic Review, Meta-analysis, and Modelling, Ophthalmology. 2018 May 9. 3. Burton MJ, Ramke J, Marques AP, Bourne RR, Congdon N, Jones I, et al. The Lancet Global Health commission on Global Eye Health: vision beyond 2020. Lancet Glob Health. 2021; 9(4):e489–e551.

https://www.who.int/news-room/fact-sheets/detail/blindness-and-visual-impairment/?utm_campaign=organic%20L%20traffic&utm_medium=content_generation&utm_source=loveth-article

Health

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Scientists near sickle cell cure *Bioengineers correct mutation responsible for disease with gene editing in 40% of patients Scientists have successfully used gene editing to repair 20 to 40 percent of stem and progenitor cells taken from the peripheral blood of patients with sickle cell disease, according to Rice University, United States (U.S.), bioengineer Gang Bao. Bao, in collaboration with Baylor College of Medicine, Texas Children’s Hospital and Stanford University, is working to find a cure for the hereditary disease. A single Deoxy ribonucleic Acid (DNA)/genetic material mutation causes the body to make sticky, crescent-shaped red blood cells that contain abnormal hemoglobin and can block blood flow in limbs and organs. In his talk at the annual American Association for the Advancement of Science meeting in Austin, Bao revealed results from a series of tests to see whether CRISPR/Cas9-based editing can fix the mutation. His presentation was part of a scientific session titled “Gene Editing and Human Identity: Promising Advances and Ethical Challenges.” “Sickle cell disease is caused by a single mutation in the beta-globin gene (in the stem cell’s DNA),” he said. “The idea is to correct that particular mutation, and then stem cells that have the correction would differentiate into normal blood cells, including red blood cells. Those will then be healthy blood cells.” Bao’s lab collaborated with Vivien Sheehan, an assistant professor of pediatrics and hematology at Baylor and a member of the sickle cell program at Texas Children’s, to collect stem and progenitor cells (CD34-positive cells) from patients with the disease. These were then edited in the Bao lab with CRISPR/Cas9 together with a custom template, a piece of DNA designed to correct the mutation. The gene-edited cells were injected into the bone marrow of immunodeficient mice and tested after 19 weeks to see how many retained the edit. “The rate of repair remained stable, which is great,” Bao said. This engraftment study was carried out in the lab of Matt Porteus, an associate professor of pediatrics at Stanford. Another major finding of the study is that the CRISPR/Cas9 system could introduce large alterations to the genes in patients’ cells, in addition to small mutations or deletions. These off-target effects could cause a disease. The findings, part of an upcoming paper, are a step toward treating sickle cell disease. Obstacles in the way of a cure include optimizing the CRISPR/Cas9 system to eliminate off-target effects, as well as finding a way to further increase the amount of gene-corrected stem cells. Bao pointed out that researchers still don’t know whether repairing as much as 40 percent of the cells is enough to cure a patient. “We’d like to say, ‘Yes,'” he said, “but we don’t really know yet. That’s something we hope to learn from an eventual clinical trial.” *Adapted from Science News Get the latest news delivered straight to your inbox every day of the week. Stay informed with the Guardian’s leading coverage of Nigerian and world news, business, technology and sports. We will review and take appropriate action.

https://guardian.ng/features/health/scientists-near-sickle-cell-cure/

Health

en

Many cars today comes with automatic transmission drive or gear commonly known by most Nigerians. Matter of fact automatic driven transmission cars are the favourites of many people around the world today because of how simple it is to operate and how convenient it makes a driving experience. Understanding how automatic transmission works will help you troubleshoot some common problems which will save you expensive repair costs and make you appreciate this wonderful invention. Have you ever wonder how your automatic transmission knows when to shift gears? Why is it that when you stop, the engine doesn’t die? This consists of ingenious complex work of engineering but we will make it as simple as possible and make you see how this is possible. Your engine connects to your transmission at a place called a bell housing. The bell housing contains a torque converter for automatic transmission-equipped vehicles as opposed to a clutch on manual vehicles. The torque converter is a fluid coupling whose job it is to connect your engine to your transmission and thus to your driven wheels. The transmission contains planetary gearsets which are in charge of providing different gear ratios. To get a good understanding of how the whole automatic transmission system works, let’s have a look at torque converters and planetary gearsets. First and foremost, your engine’s flex plate (basically a flywheel for an automatic) connects directly to a torque converter. So when the crankshaft rotates, so does the torque converter housing. The goal of the torque converter is to provide a means by which to connect and disconnect the engine’s power to the driven load. The torque converter takes the place of a clutch on a conventional manual transmission. Have a look at the video below. It explains the basic principles behind a fluid coupling. Once you’ve watched that, continue reading to see how a torque converter differs from a standard fluid coupling. The major components of a torque converter are: the impeller, the turbine, the stator, and the lock-up clutch. The impeller is part of the torque converter housing, which is connected to the engine. It drives the turbine via viscous forces. The turbine is connected to the transmission input shaft. In essence, the engine turns the impeller which imparts forces on a fluid, which then rotates the turbine, sending torque to the transmission. The transmission fluid flows in a loop between the impeller to the turbine. The fluid coupling in the video above suffers from severe churning losses (and consequent heat buildup) as the fluid returning from the turbine has a component of its velocity that opposes the rotation of the impeller. That is, the fluid returning from the turbine works against the impeller’s rotation and thus against the engine. The stator sits between the impeller and turbine. Its goal is to minimize churning losses and to increase torque output by redirecting the fluid as it returns from the turbine to the impeller. The stator directs the fluid so that the majority of its velocity is in the direction of the impeller, helping the impeller move, and thus adding to the torque produced by the motor. This ability to multiply torque is why we call them torque converters, not fluid couplings. The stator sits on a one-way clutch. It can rotate in one direction only when the turbine and impeller are moving at approximately the same speed (like during highway driving). The stator either rotates with the impeller or not at all. Stators don’t always multiply torque, though. They provide you with more torque when you’re either at stall (applying the brakes at a stop light, for example) or while accelerating, but not during highway cruising. In addition to the one-way clutch in the stator, some torque converters contain a lock-up clutch whose job it is to lock the turbine with the torque converter housing so that the turbine and impeller are mechanically connected. Eliminating the fluid coupling and replacing it with a mechanical connection ensures that all of the engine’s torque is transmitted to the transmission input shaft. So, now that we’ve figured out how the engine sends power to the transmission, it’s time to figure out how in tarnation it changes gears. On a conventional transmission, changing gears is the job of a compound planetary gear set. Understanding how planetary gear sets work is a bit tricky, so let’s have a look at a basic planetary gear set. A planetary gearset (also known as an epicyclic gear set) consists of a sun gear in the center, planet gears that rotate around the sun gear, a planet carrier that connects the planet gears, and a ring gear on the outside that meshes with the planet gears. The basic idea behind a planetary gear set is this: using clutches and brakes, you can prevent certain components from moving. In doing so, you can alter the input and output of the system and thus change the overall gear ratio. Think of it this way: a planetary gear set lets you change gear ratios without having to engage different gears. They’re all already engaged. All you have to do is use clutches and brakes to change which components rotate and which stay stationary. The final gear ratio depends on which component is fixed. For example, if the ring gear is fixed, the gear ratio will be much shorter than if the sun gear is fixed. Knowing full well the risks associated with ploppin’ an equation on here, I’m gonna put one in anyway. The following equation will tell you your gear ratios depending on which component is fixed and which are in motion. R, C, and S represent the ring gear, carrier, and sun gear. Omega simply represents the angular speed of the gears, and N is the tooth count. The way it works is thus: let’s say we decided to keep the planet carrier stationary and make the sun gear our input (thus the ring gear is our output). The planets are able to rotate, but they cannot move since the carrier cannot move. Omega_c is zero, so the left side of the equation above is gone. This means that when we rotate the sun gear, it sends torque through the planet gears to the ring gear. To figure out what the gear ratio would be, we simply solve the above equation for Omega_r/Omega_s. We end up with -N_s/N_R, that is, the gear ratio when we fix the carrier and make the ring gear our output and the sun gear our input is simply the ratio of the number of teeth between the sun gear and ring gear. This is negative, since the ring spins in the opposite direction of the sun gear. You can also lock the ring gear and make the sun gear your input and you can lock the sun gear and make the carrier your input. Depending on what you lock, you’ll get different gear ratios, i.e. you’ll get different “gears.” To obtain a 1:1 gear ratio, you simply lock the components together (you only have to lock two to do this) so that the crankshaft spins at the same speed as the transmission output shaft. So how do the brakes and clutches move to change gears? Well, the torque converter is also in charge of driving the transmission fluid pump. The fluid pressure is what activates clutches and brakes in the planetary gearset. The pump is often a geroter type pump (a gear pump) meaning that a rotor spins in a pump housing and as it spins, it “meshes” with the housing. This “meshing” creates chambers that change in volume. When the volume increases, a vacuum is created- this is the pump inlet. When the volume decreases, the fluid is compressed or pumped by the meshing of the gears- this is the pump exit. A hydraulic control unit sends hydraulic signals to change gears (via band brakes and clutches) and to lock the torque converter. Note that most modern automatic transmissions use a Ravigneaux Compound Planetary Gearset. This gearset has two sun gears (a small and a large), two sets of planets (inner and outer), and one planet carrier. This is essentially two simple planetary gearsets in one. So now that we looked at torque converters and planetary gears, let’s have a look at the video below to see how it all goes together:

https://www.spotdem.com/2019/02/09/a-simple-understanding-how-automatic-transmission-works/

Car Talk

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Novel Coronavirus (2019-nCoV) advice for the public: When and how to use masks If you are healthy, you only need to wear a mask if you are taking care of a person with the suspected 2019-nCoV infection. Wear a mask if you are coughing or sneezing. Masks are effective only when used in combination with frequent hand-cleaning with alcohol-based hand rub or soap and water. If you wear a mask, then you must know how to use it and dispose of it properly. How to put on, use, take off and dispose of a mask Before putting on a mask, clean hands with alcohol-based hand rub or soap and water. Cover mouth and nose with mask and make sure there are no gaps between your face and the mask. Avoid touching the mask while using it; if you do, clean your hands with alcohol-based hand rub or soap and water. Replace the mask with a new one as soon as it is damp and do not re-use single-use masks. To remove the mask: remove it from behind (do not touch the front of the mask); discard immediately in a closed bin; clean hands with alcohol-based hand rub or soap and water. Necessary cookies are absolutely essential for the website to function properly. This category only includes cookies that ensures basic functionalities and security features of the website. These cookies do not store any personal information. Any cookies that may not be particularly necessary for the website to function and is used specifically to collect user personal data via analytics, ads, other embedded contents are termed as non-necessary cookies. It is mandatory to procure user consent prior to running these cookies on your website.

https://brandspurng.com/2020/02/07/coronavirus-should-i-wear-a-mask/

Health

en

A Need for Medicines Neglected Tropical Diseases Mectizan® (ivermectin)—donated by Merck & Co., Inc., Rahway, N.J., U.S.A.*—was the first drug donated for the control and elimination of a neglected tropical disease. Before Mectizan, the only safe and effective intervention for river blindness was vector control, achieved by aerial larviciding of the rivers where the blackflies that transmit the disease breed. Similarly, the co-administration of Mectizan and albendazole—donated by GSK—was recommended by the World Health Organization (WHO) for the elimination of lymphatic filariasis (LF) in African countries where the disease is co-endemic with river blindness. A Safe and Effective Treatment for River Blindness Mectizan Proven To Be Effective In the late 1970s, Nobel laureate Dr. William Campbell of Merck Research Laboratories (MRL) suggested the use of ivermectin (later named Mectizan) for river blindness (also called onchocerciasis) in humans. Following the breakthrough lab work by Dr. Campbell, another MRL researcher, Dr. Mohammed Aziz, championed the clinical development of Mectizan. Dr. Aziz led the collaboration with WHO in the early 1980s to design and implement field studies in West Africa that ultimately proved the effectiveness of the drug against river blindness. In 1987, Merck committed to donate Mectizan—as much as needed for as long as needed—for the control, and ultimately for the global elimination, of river blindness. In 1998, Merck expanded the donation of Mectizan to be co-administered with GSK’s donation of albendazole for the elimination of LF in African countries and Yemen where river blindness and LF co-exist. Eliminating Lymphatic Filariasis (LF) where River Blindness & LF are Co-endemic Mectizan (ivermectin) & Albendazole In Yemen and African countries where river blindness and LF are co-endemic, DEC is not considered a safe treatment due to its potential for severe ocular side effects. In these countries, Merck donates Mectizan to be co-administered with albendazole, donated by GSK, for LF elimination. A single annual dose of the two drugs has been found to effectively reduce microfilaremia for one full year after treatment. This regimen was designed to interrupt disease transmission after five rounds to a level that will result in elimination of the disease as a public health problem. Mectizan is effective against river blindness and LF because it kills the juvenile parasites (microfilariae) produced by the adult worm, thereby reducing and eventually suppressing the patient’s microfilarial load. Following a single-dose regimen, the microfilariae reduction is maintained for 12 months in river blindness- and/or LF-infected persons. The drug produces only mild, short-lived post-treatment effects in some individuals (e.g., itching, swollen lymph nodes, fever, etc.). This unique profile makes Mectizan well suited for annual, large-scale, mass treatment programs for the elimination of river blindness and LF. IDA or "Triple Therapy" Ivermectin, DEC, and Albendazole In 2017, in response to the new WHO-issued guidelines for “triple therapy”—ivermectin, diethylcabamazine (DEC), and albendazole—Merck further expanded its donation of Mectizan with up to 100 million treatments annually through 2025 to accelerate elimination of LF in countries where river blindness is not endemic. Known as “IDA,” the new strategy is implemented through the co-administration of ivermectin (Mectizan), DEC, and albendazole. GSK and Eisai are donating albendazole and DEC, respectively. The Mectizan Expert Committee published a set of guidelines designed to ensure fair and transparent allocation of this donation. *Merck & Co., Inc., Rahway, N.J., U.S.A., is known as MSD outside of the United States and Canada.

https://mectizan.org/medicines/

Health

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The elephant is one of the world’s most massive and well-known animals, and it can be found in large numbers in natural forest areas. And you’re all aware that elephants are extremely dangerous animals that no one can kill. And the use of the colours black and brown, as well as a wide body shape, have enhanced its appearance. One of the most serious threats to elephants is habitat loss. According to several experts, climate change predictions indicate that important parts of the elephant’s habitat will become significantly hotter and drier, resulting in poor feeding conditions and a risk to calf survival. To sustain itself, it typically consumes greenery foods such as leaves, grasses, bark, bamboo, roots, and a variety of other greenery foods. A herd is a matriarchal family group composed of related females who live in close proximity to one another due to strong family ties. It is also a highly intelligent animal with long-term memories that can last for many years. Because it emits a subsonic rumble, it can communicate over long distances because sound travels faster through the ground than through the air. Other wild animals are alarmed when they see elephants because elephants can easily kill them with their curved tusks. However, in the wild, one species is responsible for the elephants’ deaths; can you identify which animal it is? If you were unable to identify the animal, please see the information below. Who has the authority to put the elephant’s life in jeopardy? It goes without saying that the king cobra was the only animal capable of killing a full-grown elephant other than humans – and even then, it could only do so by biting it precisely at the end of its trunk. The king cobra is the largest poisonous snake on the planet, reaching lengths of up to 5.6 metres. How effective is a single Black Mamba bite in killing an elephant? In fact, some people believe that the Black Mamba is more lethal than the King Cobra, which is false. The combat abilities of the Black Mamba and the King Cobra can also be compared and contrasted. It also weighs about 6 kilogrammes (lbs.). Despite its size, the king cobra moves quickly, has ferocious strength, and deadly venom that is highly toxic to humans and animals. King cobras are responsible for thousands of fatalities each year, and they prefer to live in areas with lakes and streams to feed on. The Cobra only attacks the animal when it is irritated by other creatures. As a result, the elephants naturally irritate the cobra, prompting the cobra to attack the elephant in self-defense. Drop for drop, the venom of a king cobra is less lethal than that of a common cobra. A single bite, on the other hand, can deliver up to seven millilitres of venom, enough to kill an elephant. Even the king cobra will bite a person, so there is no doubt that it will be able to kill the world’s largest elephant without difficulty or complications.…..S££ MOR£ Leave a Reply

https://heathlinecare.com/5-signs-you-are-dating-an-immature-man/Can

Romance

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Emory Report | September 21, 1998 | Volume 51, No. 5 | First Person: Minerals are links between Earth and human health Even as we become increasingly aware of our power to change the earth's environment, we can say that, geologically, the earth is in great shape. Humankind, however, may not be doing as well. The earth is our primary life-support system, supplying our basic needs for minerals, water and air. Our increased interest in how the earth works is due, in part, to the connection between geology and health. First a question: What chemicals do you associate with the following conditions: osteoporosis, anemia, dizziness, and heat stress? Most people would probably answer calcium, iron, sodium and water, because we relate a deficiency in them with the corresponding condition. What is surprising is that, when asked where these chemicals come from, many people answer that our body "makes them." Sound incredulous? Well, consider the next question: When cell division takes place in the human body, where do the chemical elements come from that make up the new cells? Again, many people say that the body makes these chemicals. A more accurate answer is that these chemicals come from the cycling of air, water and minerals between the earth and the human body. In fact, the earth's crust contains most of the mineral nutrients our body needs, and the chemical composition of a rock, such as granite, is strikingly similar to the composition of the human body. However, the minerals in granite usually are not in a form easily assimilated and dissolved in the body. So, if you grind up a chunk of granite in hopes of getting your daily mineral supplement, you would probably end up either clogging your intestine or ripping the lining of your digestive tract. So instead of eating chunks of granite for our mineral nutrients, we rely on geologic processes such as weathering to chemically break down rocks into other natural materials, such as soil, that contain minerals more easily dissolved by the acid around roots of plants. The dissolved mineral elements are then incorporated into the plant and stored for our consumption or by some other animal that we later eat (top carnivores have choices!). What are these common chemical elements found in rocks and our body? We are mostly water, about 62 percent by weight, and we must replenish our water budget daily or our body functions will be affected. Our planet is called the "Blue" or "Water Planet" because about 75 percent of the surface of the earth is covered by water. The earth's crust contains most of the 100 or so chemical elements discovered thus far. Only eight of them make up more than 98 percent of the crust. These are, in order of abundance, oxygen, silicon, aluminum, iron, calcium, magnesium, sodium and potassium. In addition to water, we are composed of about 6 percent minerals: calcium, phosphorous, potassium, sulfur, sodium, chlorine, magnesium and iron. Do you see the similarity? Our body contains many additional chemical elements, like iodine and fluorine, in very small but functionally significant amounts. Some of them are easy to identify; teeth and bones are composed of calcium phosphate. Iron is a very common element in rocks and critical to our good health. When we inhale, the oxygen in the air is bonded to the iron contained in hemoglobin. In this way oxygen is transferred from our lungs to the bloodstream. We need to recycle iron on a daily basis because we lose some of it in our urine, feces and menstrual blood. Luckily our body has a nice storehouse for iron, the liver, that helps prevent short-term iron anemia. It is a hard enough job keeping up with our daily needs for the right balance of air, water and mineral nutrients to maintain good health. Now think about what happens when the air we breathe is fouled, the water we drink is polluted and the food we eat is tainted with contaminants. The maintenance of a good internal environment (homeostasis) is increasingly strained by the degradation of the earth's external environment. Try to picture yourself hooked up to the earth's life support with contaminated delivery systems. Our body has a defense mechanism working to destroy or neutralize this unwanted pollution, as well as viruses, bacteria and cancer cells. Our immune system is on surveillance duty all the time looking for these invaders. However, there is a limit to how effectively your immune system can work. For example, during a volcanic eruption, people living nearby may inhale volcanic ash. In children and the elderly, who have smaller lung capacities, this can lead to inflammation and chronic airway resistance or emphysema. Similarly, drinking water contaminated with sewage or animal waste runoff may spread cholera. The resulting diarrhea may result in severe loss of water and electrolytes, which can be fatal to those who already have an impaired immune system. And other contaminants, such as lead in drinking water and mercury in fish, are even more difficult to neutralize. These neurotoxins can accumulate in the body over a life span, causing various losses in our sensory systems. Certainly children, the elderly and people with impaired immune functions are the early targets for these contaminants, hence the relationship of high ozone levels and smog alerts with the number of emergency breathing disorders. But what about people who have strong immune systems and well-developed respiratory, digestive and circulatory systems? What happens to them when they inhale sulfur and sulfuric acid coming from coal-burning power plants? Or when they eat food containing trace amounts of arsenic, nickel or petrochemicals? The effect on them is probably more morbidity than mortality. They just do not feel well, are lethargic or have a certain malaise that does not go away. The good news in all of this is that the more we know and understand about chemical cycling and interactions between the earth and human body, the better position we will be in to make informed decisions about the environmental quality of where we choose to live and work, the food they choose to eat, the water we drink and the air we breathe. Some people have more opportunity to make changes and choices in these things, but everyone benefits from knowing more about how we and the earth work. Bill Size is associate professor and director of the Geosciences Program, interim director of the Human and Natural Ecology Program, and chairman of the Senate committee on the environment.

http://www.emory.edu/EMORY_REPORT/erarchive/1998/September/erseptember.21/9_21_98Size.html

Religion

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HISTORY OF DEVELOPMENT AND DEMOGRAPHIC CHANGE IN LAGOS STATE Background of the study Historical demography is commonly defined as the application of conventional and non-conventional demographic techniques to data sets from the past (Pressat and Wilson 1985; Smith 2003). Its primary aim is to obtain detailed demographic information and measure demographic changes such as changes in population size, age structure, sex ratio, fertility, mortality, and migration for populations in the past. While estimating the total population in a particular historical setting can be regarded as historical demography at its crudest level, the application of demographic methods to historical source materials and the information generated by such application can be far more elaborate. Historical demography is closely related to, but differs from, demographic or population history. The former concentrates largely on obtaining the detailed and accurate demographic information for historical populations that provides the foundation for the study of demographic or population history. The latter includes historical demography as a field of enquiry, but covers wider research areas. Demographic history investigates not only the process of past population changes, but also the interrelationship between these changes and a wide range of socio-economic, political, cultural and environmental factors. In general, historical demography tends be more involved in tackling the technical problems of measuring past demographic changes and developing effective methods of analysing historical population data, whereas demographic history is more concerned with the reasons, processes and consequences of major demographic events, especially their long-term impact on socio-economic changes and historical development. Population changes interact closely with, and play a major part in, political, social and economic changes. Through offering detailed and reliable demographic information about past societies, historical demography can greatly improve our knowledge of history and population history in particular. One of such examples is E. A. Wrigley and R. S. Schofield’s monumental work The Population History of England 1541-1871 (1981). This study, based on extensive empirical evidence and demographic estimates, systematically examines population trends in England over a period of more three hundred years and the population theory proposed by Thomas Robert Malthus (1766-1834). The comprehensive analysis presented in this book provides great insights into demographic patterns and their interplay with socio-economic conditions in the time before and during the industrial revolution. The impact of this work has been felt far beyond the disciplinary confines of historical demography or population history. While a distinction between historical demography and demographic history can be and has been made by some scholars, it is difficult in practice to draw a clear line between the two approaches and their practitioners. Demographic historians often need to have detailed and accurate demographic information as the foundation for their investigation into population history. Equally, historical demographers also want to examine socio-economic reasons for population changes and the impact of such changes on the society. Because of the close connection between the two disciplines, the discussion presented in this chapter will not be confined within the area narrowly defined by historical demography. Historical demography is a major component of demography that studies population changes, but it is primarily concerned with applying demographic methods to population data from the past. Demographers wishing to test a proposed hypothesis on contemporary population can, at least theoretically, always collect the data they need according to their research design. Historical demographers, however, have to use existing data – they cannot go back in time to collect the required data. The available data may not have been collected for the purpose of demographic research; they may suffer from various types of registration problems or biases that are often related to the rules or procedures applied in creating the data. This makes historical demographic research a more challenging task than the study of contemporary population issues. For this reason, historical demographers often need to develop new techniques or modify conventional demographic methods so that they can be effectively used in analysing surviving historical data – a point that will be further discussed in section four of this chapter. Historical demography has made a significant contribution to the development of demography. Through enriching the knowledge about demographic behaviour and population changes in the past, historical demography helps us to gain a better understanding of demographic trends in contemporary societies and future. Louis Henry (1911-1991), the founding father of historical demography, once suggested that, to answer the two questions about population changes that intrigued demographers in the mid-twentieth century, “Where are we?” and “Where are we headed?” we should begin by answering a third, “Where were we yesterday and the day before?”. This reference to the past is, he said, essential for it alone can tell us about the day after (Rosental 2003: 98). The importance of historical demography to the development of demography does not stop here, however. After the Second World War, there was a considerable increase in the interest in population issues throughout the world, and demography as an academic discipline entered a period of rapid development. Mortality and fertility, which had decreased notably in the nineteenth century and the first half of the twentieth century, fell to low levels in most developed countries. These countries had well-established vital registration systems and conducted regular censuses and population surveys. Population data obtained through these modern-day efforts were, however, simply insufficient for uncovering the process of demographic transition and people’s demographic behaviour in the pre-transition society – both of which were of overriding importance to the development of demographic theories and the understanding of population changes of the time. Even in countries where detailed mortality and fertility data had been collected during the process of their demographic transition, those available to researchers were usually limited to published census or survey results. Public release of original census or vital registration records was often prohibited for long periods after the records were taken, whilst some countries destroyed the records altogether because of privacy concerns. Such practices gave historical demography a unique opportunity to fill important gaps in demographic research. As we shall see, the investigation of population changes in the past has contributed to the development of many important and widely used population theories, analytical models and demographic techniques. Statement of the problem Demographic change is one of the key challenges today for urban development together with globalization, knowledge/technological shift, climate change and the development of the green economy, inclusiveness and poverty. Strategic solutions cannot be based on addressing one of these factors alone but must take into account the interplay of these elements within a particular local area of development (urban or rural). At the same time that there are important challenges to be addressed, there are also opportunities to be fostered such as the development of the “silver” economy of older entrepreneurs, the “white” economy for medical services for the elderly population, or the natural “green” advantage of shrinking areas. However, policy responses are still fragmented and there is no articulation of a sustainable answer to ensure and increase the quality of life in the light of these changes. 1.3 Objectives of the study 1. To deduce the history of development and its impact on the demographic change of Lagos state. 1.4 Research questions 1. Does development impacts on the demographic change of Lagos state? 1.5 Research hypothesis Ho: Development does not impact on the demographic change of Lagos state. Hi:Development impacts on the demographic change of Lagos state 1.6 Significance of the study Historical demography is an important component of demography. Its aim is to obtain detailed information about population changes and people’s demographic behaviour in the past through applying demographic methods to historical data. Historical demography has made a significant contribution to the development of demography. Through enriching the knowledge about demographic behaviour and population changes in the past, historical demography helps us to gain a better understanding of demographic trends in contemporary societies and future 1.7 Scope of the study This research work is on the history of development and demographic change in Lagos state. Lagos state is used as case study due to representative nature of Lagos state to other developing states in Nigeria and proximity to the researcher. 1.8 Limitations of the study This study has some limitations most especially in the area of data collection. Financial constraints as well as time available for the completion of the study are among other factors that would limit the scope of the study. 1.9 Definition of terms Development: The act or process of growing or causing something to grow or become larger or more advanced. Demography:The study of statistics such as births, deaths, income, or the incidence of disease, which illustrate the changing structure of human populations. Change:An act or process through which something becomes different. Lagos State: Is a state located in the southwestern geopolitical zone of Nigeria.

http://nairaproject.com/projects/1410.html

Career

en

The ancient Egyptian empire is actually one of the most powerful empires in the antiquity. Often regarded as the birth place of the world civilization, even when most people usually disregard this facts. Quite a lot is known about this land of Pharaohs, ranging form its huge pyramids, down to the bandaged mummies and to its golden treasures. But how much more do you actually know about this place? lets find out. They never used camels people believe that Egypt was a place where camels were dominant as a means of transportation. Being a place closed to the Sahara desert, it should be rich in those animals. But according to history ancient Egyptians never enjoyed the usage of camels. The animal arrived late in Egypt, it actually came after the decline of the empire. The most dominant and effective method of transportation before camels arrived was the use of donkeys. Animals they used for several activities including farming. They also used boat as a means of transportation in Not everyone was mummified To mummify means to preserve a dead body after burial. This was a very common practice among the Egyptians at that time which the whole world recognizes them for. Anyway the truth be told, the Egyptians never mummified everyone. Mummification was majorly the thing for the rich and the elites while the ordinary people who have died were taken to the deserts be to inhumed. The reason they mummified bodies was because they believed that there is life after death and that if a body is not completely decomposed the person could live again in the afterlife. Egyptian women had equal rights with men It seem Egypt was the birth place of feminism. That is quite wonderful though, considering the right all Egyptian women stood to enjoy. During the Egyptian empire you could barely differentiate between what men can do from what women can. The laws were made such that women enjoy the same right as the men, "no wonder Cleopatra could ascend the throne". Men and women of equal societal status at that time were treated equal before the law. Women could buy, sell, and inherit properties. Wives could preside over family issues and businesses when their husband were not around. When widowed or divorced, they could raise their own children alone. Women could become rulers and stake holders in the Don't you think they deserve an applaud? holding to the fact that one could say they were primitive if compared with our present society, yet still went that far to protect women's interest. That's pretty cool of a law, don't you think so? Women can be Pharaohs If the law could see both men and women as equal in everything, then what's the issue as to whom ascends the throne? In ancient Egypt It is ideal that the male son of the previous king is entitled to inherit the throne but this was not always the case. There have been several occasions where women were made Pharaohs. Example includes Cleopatra VII Philapator, Twosret, Hatshepsut, Nefertiti, Sobekneferu and MerNeith who were among the few women of antiquity to reign during Egypt's long history. Egyptian Kings married their siblings Incestuous marriages were a common practice among the Egyptians especially the in the royal family. Several of the Egyptian Pharaohs married their siblings and had several children with them. For example, Tutankhamun married his half-sister Ankhesenamun, and was himself the child of an incestuous union between Akhenaten and an unidentified sister-wife. incestuous marriages ensured that the queen was trained in her duties from birth, and that she remained entirely loyal to her husband and their children. They also do this in order to restrict potential claimants to the throne. The Great Pyramid was not built by slaves It is a common belief that the Egyptians used slaves to build the great pyramid of Giza, which is one of the seven wonders of the ancient world. Most historical pictures always depict this as well as in movies. There is also a popular belief that the Israelite during their persecution were the ones the Egyptians used in raising such an enigma. But according to archeological evidences, this is just a misconception. Archaeological studies have found that the Great Pyramid was in fact built by a workforce consisting of 5,000 permanent, salaried employees and around 20,000 temporary workers. The studies shows that these workers were free men, summoned under the corvée system of national service to put in a three- or four-month shift on the building site before returning home. Workers were provided food, shelter, and medical attention as a form of payment. And for those that died during the process, they were either buried in near by commentary or taking to their families for their funeral rites.

https://blog.obiaks.com/191025025353/unknown-facts-about-ancient-egypt

Culture

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Many people grapple with language use or usage and are at a loss on how to use certain words in English. One of such words is the word: only. How and When to Use ‘Only’ in a Sentence is put together to deal with this challenge! Table of Contents The Concept of Use and Usage Take note that in language, the concept of ‘use’ deals with ‘how a word should be used’, while the concept of ‘usage’ has to do with how a word is being used’. Constituent Elements of a Simple Sentence We have to lay some foundations for a proper understanding of the topic at hand. ‘Only’ belongs to the Part of Speech known as Adverb. An adverb, or an adverbial, is part of the syntactic elements that make up a simple sentence. See Syntactic Elements of the Simple Sentence. We also refer to an adverbial as an adjunct. In another vein, ‘Only’ also belongs to the word class we know as Adjective. Adjectives modify a noun, pronoun or a noun phrase as the case may be; and ‘only’ can serve in this capacity. Mobility of an Adjunct Of all the elements that make up a clause or a simple sentence, the adverbial is the most mobile. What this means, in effect, is that it can appear at the initial position in a sentence, it can also be at the medial or at the final position. - Strictly speaking, migrating from a developing nation status to a developed one is a herculean task. - Migrating from a developing nation status to a developed one, strictly speaking, is a herculean task. - Migrating from a developing nation status to a developed one is a herculean task, strictly speaking. Ubiquity of an Adjunct An adjunct can also appear more in a sentence than any other element like the subject, predicator or complement. There can be more than one subject like compound or plural subject, we can have a verbal group comprising four verbs e. g. could have been found (See Aspects in English). We can have more than a complement or object, but the adjunct can appear more times in one sentence than any of these other syntactic elements of a simple sentence! Consider this example: - Once upon a time, in a little town, King Adesuwa always collected tax from the residents forcefully, arbitrarily and excessively. Adjunct: Once upon a time Adjunct: in a little town Subject: King Adesuwa Complement: tax from the residents How and When to Use ‘Only’ in a Sentence As an Adverb, we can use ‘only’ to mean any of the following: This is to show reference to one thing or person that is specifically involved in a situation. For example: - The golf club admits club members only - They mandate the special force to rescue only the president’s daughter. - The new electricity tariff applies only to new buildings. We use ‘only’ in this context to signify the condition that must be in place for something to happen or be true. For instance: - I will learn a trade, but only if you will pay for it. - She promised to eat the food only if I would join her. - Only when you pay your fees would you come into the class. - He agreed to sign the letter only if we present the candidate. We also use ‘only’ to represent ‘merely’ which depicts ‘being nothing more than something specified’. For example: - She is only a child - We could only compile the names. - It was only part of the scene. - He was only making reference to your mistakes. - They regarded the loss as only a short-term hindrance. No more and no less That is, the exact amount specified. Examples of this include: - There are only 3.3 people at work for every person retired. - We have only four bottles of water remaining in the fridge. - For the advertised position, only two people were eligible. As recently as: considered as happening very recently - He came only last March. - She resigned only a week ago. - We ratified the decision only a few minutes ago. Indicating event happening immediately after This is used to introduce a surprising or unpleasant event that happens immediately after the one mentioned. For example: - We rushed to the kitchen, only to find all the pots empty. - The children went to the park only to find it closed. - Johnson did not see her maid for two days, only to discover she had run away with her money. How and When to Use “Only” in a Sentence As an Adjective, we can use ‘only’ to mean any of the following: Single person or thing This is used to indicate the lone person or thing involved in a situation. For instance: - He is the only independent candidate for the election. - The only challenge between him and the Director can be resolved - The only problem is lack of electricity. - She was the only survivor of the gruesome attack. - Jane was the only one who paid for the book. With no siblings; with no brothers or sisters - He is an only child in the family. - She is the man’s only daughter. - Christians affirm that Jesus is the only begotten Son of God. Position of ‘only’ Only sometimes functions as a limiting adverb and consequently, we must avoid any form of ambiguity in its placement as its position in a sentence can determine the meaning of the whole sentence. Usually, as a rule, we put ‘only’ next to the word we want it to modify. For example: - He had only a pen. - Only he had a pen - He only had a pen. Where to avoid putting only We must avoid using ‘only’ between a subject and a verb and between an auxiliary verb and the main verb. Look at these examples: - He only eats to please his mother. - He eats only to please his mother. - I will only start the repairs when you pay my fees. - I will start the repairs only when you pay my fees. The second and third sentences are more acceptable. ‘Only’ serves as modifier to a nominal group Consider the following sentence: - Only a military personnel can access the building. ‘Only’, as an adjective in this context, occurs in an environment where the nominal is also pre-modified by an article. Hence ‘only’ is either preceded by article ‘the’ or it is followed by any other article. For example: - Only a genius can pass without attending classes. This simply means that the person who will pass without class attendance must be a genius; and by implication, anyone who is not a genius cannot pass. On the other hand, we may have a sentence like this: - The only genius can pass without attending classes. This presupposes that there is no other genius except the one we are referring to. There could be several geniuses in other places though. Other uses of ‘Only’ In essence, ‘only’ in the adjective sense mostly occurs before the nominal group, not after it. Consider this sentence: - A cup of tea only is okay. (If we consider ‘a cup of tea’ as a whole unit (nominal group) - Only a cup of tea is okay (not more than a cup) However, note that A cup of tea only is okay may be correct for pragmatic or discourse purpose. We know that ‘tea’ refers to the ‘dry leaves’ (to which we could add sugar, milk, lemon, etc.). Therefore, A cup of tea only is okay would mean ‘tea without anything added to it’. Here, the focus then is on the quantified (tea) not the quantifier (cup). - A cup of tea is only okay. (A cup of tea is just okay). This is no longer adjectival but adverbial. Consider the following variations of ‘only’: - The only participant was forty years old. (There was no other participant; the focus is the participant) - The participant was only forty years old. (The participant was not more than forty years old; the focus is the age) - The participant only was forty years old. (There were other people [maybe observers, reporters, umpires…] but none of them was forty except the participant) I am sure reading and digesting this post, you will henceforth know how and when to use ‘only’ in a sentence This is really helpful, thanks.

https://akademia.com.ng/how-and-when-to-use-only-in-a-sentence/

Education

en

Oranmiyan – A warrior who ruled three different empires Oranmiyan, best known as Odede by the Ife indigenes, or Oranya was a hunter, warrior who ruled three different empires both in Yoruba and Benin kingdoms. He is believed to have lived between the 8-13th century. To define Oranmiyan, you must talk about his staff-stick, which is now an obelisk that is placed at the Oranmiyan Cenotaph entrance. The Obelisk is one of the tallest stone carvings in the world that has grown in size over time and the staff-stick, which is an art, is embedded with messages which have never been interpreted to modern language. The place of Oranyan in Yoruba history has come under several attacks since historians have been doing their research on Yoruba culture. Table of Contents He was the child of Lakanje, a woman who was rescued by Ogun during a Cold War in Yoruba kingdom Lakanje became one of Ogun’s concubine after her rescue before Oduduwa’s affair with her. She was pregnant rather too quick before she could differentiate who the father was. He was treated less favourite among Oduduwa’s children, especially, been light-skinned like Ogun, and spent most of his childhood at the Ogun shrine before going on an expedition , as advised by the Ifa Oracle. Early historians believed that Oranmiyan was not expected to return from the journey as Igodomigodo warriors were one of the fearful during the time. Oranmiyan led army stormed Igodomigodo bringing the indigenous village and all villages surrounding it under his control. He settled at a place called “Use,” where he ruled all the towns as a single kingdom later known as Bini (Benin) kingdom. He left “Use” after his leadership was facing many controversies and settled at a place called “Egor,” where his affair with the daughter of the Enogie of Egor resulted in his first son Eweka I. Enogie of Egor was one of the only few that supported his leadership and the reason why he was accepted to the village after he left “Use.” It is believed that Oranmiyan had left the Bini kingdom before the birth of Eweka I. After he left the Bini kingdom, Oranmiyan settled at Oyo-Ile, where he built the Oyo empire. He had an affair that resulted in the birth of his second-born, “Sango.” After many years, he returned to Ife and took over the throne from Ogun, who many believe was his father. Sango, who is Oranmiyan second-born, took similarities in Ogun’s spirituality symbols. It fuels the speculation that Sango inherited somethings from his grandfather. Oranmiyan died not long after he came back to Ife.

https://dakingsman.com/oranmiyan-a-warrior-who-ruled-three-different-empires/

Culture

en

Defeat malaria in a generation - here's how - Author, James Gallagher - Role, Health and science correspondent, BBC News The world could be free of malaria - one of the oldest and deadliest diseases to affect humanity - within a generation, a major report says. Each year there are still more than 200 million cases of the disease, which mostly kills young children. The report says eradicating malaria is no longer a distant dream, but wiping out the parasite will probably need an extra $2bn (£1.6bn) of annual funding. Experts say eradication is a "goal of epic proportions". What is malaria? Malaria is a disease caused by Plasmodium parasites. These are spread from person to person by the bite of female mosquitoes in search of a blood meal. Once infected, people become very sick with a severe fever and shaking chills. The parasites infect cells in the liver and red blood cells, and other symptoms include anaemia. Eventually the disease takes a toll on the whole body, including the brain, and can be fatal. Around 435,000 people - mostly children - die from malaria each year. How is it going so far? The world has already made huge progress against malaria. - the number of countries with malaria has fallen from 106 to 86 - cases have fallen by 36% - the death rate has fallen by 60% This is largely down to widespread access to ways of preventing mosquito bites, such as bed nets treated with insecticide, and better drugs for treating people who are infected. "Despite unprecedented progress, malaria continues to strip communities around the world of promise and economic potential," said Dr Winnie Mpanju-Shumbusho, one of the report authors. "This is particularly true in Africa, where just five countries account for nearly half of the global burden." Why is this report important? Eradicating malaria - effectively wiping it off the face of the planet - would be a monumental achievement. The report was commissioned by the World Health Organization three years ago to assess how feasible it would be, and how much it would cost. Forty-one of the world's leading malaria experts - ranging from scientists to economists - have concluded that it can be done by 2050. "For too long, malaria eradication has been a distant dream, but now we have evidence that malaria can and should be eradicated by 2050," said Sir Richard Feachem, one of the report authors. "This report shows that eradication is possible within a generation." However, he warned it would take "bold action" in order to achieve the goal. So what will it take? The report estimates that based on current trends, the world will be "largely free of malaria" by 2050. But there will still be a stubborn belt of malaria across Africa, stretching from Senegal in the north-west to Mozambique in the south-east. To reach eradication by 2050 will require current technologies to be used more effectively, and the development of new ways of tackling the disease, the report says. This could include the "game-changing potential" of gene-drive technologies. Unlike the normal rules of genetic inheritance, gene-drives force a gene (a piece of DNA) to spread through the population. It could in theory make mosquitoes infertile and cause their populations to collapse, or make them resistant to the parasite. King Mswati III of Eswatini (formerly Swaziland) and chair of the African Leaders Malaria Alliance said: "Malaria eradication within a generation is ambitious, achievable and necessary. "The struggle has been constant to keep up with the malaria mosquito and the parasite, both of which are evolving to evade the effect of malaria interventions. "We must make sure that innovation is prioritised." How much is this all going to cost? The report estimates around $4.3bn (£3.5bn) is spent on malaria every year at the moment. But it would need a further $2bn a year in order to rid the world of malaria by 2050. The authors say there is also a cost of business as usual, in terms of lives lost and the constant struggle against the malaria parasite and the mosquitoes evolving resistance to drugs and insecticides. The report concludes that getting an extra $2bn a year will be "challenging" but the social and economic benefits of eradicating malaria would "greatly exceed the costs". Will malaria be eradicated by 2050? Eradicating a disease is a challenge on a global scale (literally). It has happened only once before for an infection in people - smallpox was declared eradicated in 1980. It required a huge effort and a highly effective vaccine to get the job done. But there is a reason smallpox is the only one, and the history of poliovirus shows how challenging eradication can be. In the wake of the success with smallpox, there was widespread hope polio would be rapidly consigned to history too, and a target of eradication by the year 2000 was set. Two decades after that initial target and cases have been cut by 99%. However, the last 1% has proved to be incredibly difficult. Nigeria, and as a result the whole of Africa, is on the cusp of eliminating polio, but getting the vaccine to every child in the two remaining endemic countries (Pakistan and Afghanistan) is still proving difficult. What has the reaction been? "Eradicating malaria has been one of the ultimate public health goals for a century, it is also proving to be one the greatest challenges," said Dr Tedros Ghebreyesus, the director general of the World Health Organization. "But we will not achieve eradication within this timeframe with the currently available tools and approaches - most of which were developed in the past century or even earlier." Dr Fred Binka, from the University of Health and Allied Sciences in Ghana, said: "Malaria eradication is a goal of epic proportions. "It will require ambition, commitment and partnership like never before, but we know that its return is worth the investment, not only by saving lives in perpetuity, but also improving human welfare, strengthening economies and contributing to a healthier, safer and more equitable world." More to explore Content is not available

https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/amp/health-49592468#click=https:///fmiQaqKxb7Malaria

Health

en

Nearly everyone loves music and the ancient Greeks loved music as much as anyone. Many of the poems that have survived to us from ancient Greece are actually song lyrics that were originally meant to be sung. Unfortunately, nearly all ancient Greek music has been irretrievably lost; no one alive will ever hear the original choruses of Aischylos, Sophokles, or Euripides sung with their original melodies. Remarkably, though, a number of ancient Greek musical compositions have survived to the present day with musical notation, allowing us to reconstruct their original melodies—or at least something reasonably close to their original melodies. These few surviving compositions offer us a tiny window into a world of music that has been gone for well over a thousand years. Ancient Greek stringed instruments Before we discuss the surviving ancient Greek musical compositions, we should probably discuss what kinds of musical instruments were commonly used in ancient Greece. Probably the most prominent musical instrument in the ancient Greek world was the kithara (κιθάρα), a type of seven-stringed lyre. For nearly the entirety of classical Greek history, knowing how to play the kithara was widely seen as a vital skill. Most aristocratic Greek children were taught to play the kithara at a relatively young age. The kithara is also the instrument that is most commonly represented in works of ancient Greek art, indicating that it was probably the instrument that was most commonly played. According to Greek mythology, the kithara was invented by the god Hermes, who fashioned the first kithara from a tortoise shell as a gift for his older half-brother, the god Apollon. Apollon is closely associated with the kithara in both art and literature. In pottery and sculpture, he is often shown playing it and it appears in several myths as his signature instrument. The Greek word kithara is the root of our English word guitar. ABOVE: Tondo from a white-ground Attic red-figure kylix dating to c. 465 BC, discovered in Eretria depicting a Muse tuning a kithara In addition to the kithara, there were also many other stringed instruments that were used in ancient Greece. The phorminx (φόρμιγξ), for instance, was a kind of lyre that was popular during the Archaic Period (lasted c. 800 – c. 510 BC) but later fell out of popularity. Meanwhile, the barbiton (βάρβιτον) was a basically bass version of the kithara; the strings were longer and it generally had more of them than a kithara typically would. The barbiton was never very popular and it was always seen as a rather eccentric, foreign instrument. The ancient Greeks also had various kinds of harps. The Greek word for harp was ψαλτήριον (psaltḗrion). One type of harp that existed in ancient Greece was the epigonion (ἐπιγόνιον), which had many strings and was reputedly invented or introduced to Greece by the musician Epigonos of Ambrakia. ABOVE: Detail of an Attic red-figure pelike dating to between c. 320 and c. 310 BC or thereabouts, discovered in Anzi, Apulia, depicting a woman playing a triangular harp, or psalterion Ancient Greek wind instruments The most common wind instrument in ancient Greece was the aulos (αὐλός). Although the Greek word aulos is often translated into English as “flute,” the Greek aulos was actually double-reeded, making it more similar to a modern oboe than a modern flute. According to Greek mythology, the aulos was invented by the goddess Athena, but she was so humiliated by how it puffed out her cheeks when she played it that she threw it down to Earth and cursed it. The aulos was later found by the satyr Marsyas, who figured out how to play it and later became a master aulos-player. Unfortunately, Marsyas hubristically challenged Apollon to a music contest under the condition that whoever won would get to do whatever he wanted to the other. Marsyas played the aulos and Apollon played the lyre. Apollon won and he chose have Marsyas flayed alive as punishment for his hubris. ABOVE: Detail of a young man playing an aulos from a symposion scene on the tondo of an Attic red-figure kylix dating to roughly between c. 460 and c. 450 BC. As you can see, it has two reeds. In addition to the aulos, the ancient Greeks also had several other wind instruments. Most notable was the syrinx (σύριγξ), which consisted of a set of hollow reeds bound together in order of decreasing length that could be blown on to produce sound. The ancient Greeks believed the syrinx had been invented by the god Pan and today the syrinx is often known as the “Pan pipes.” According to a Greek story recounted in various sources, Pan once attempted to rape a nymph named Syrinx, but she fled to the river and transformed into a cane reed plant. Pan therefore harvested some of the reeds and fashioned them into the first set of Pan pipes, which he named the “syrinx” after the nymph who had managed to escape his lust. Ancient Greek percussion instruments One of the most common percussion instruments in ancient Greece was the tympanon (τύμπανον), a shallow, circular hand drum that was meant to be beaten with a hand or a stick. The tympanon was often associated with Dionysian revelry. In addition to being associated with Dionysos, the tympanon was also associated with the worship of the Phrygian goddess Kybele. The Greeks also had castanets, which were fashioned from split pieces of reed or cane that clattered together when shaken. The Greek word for a pair of castanets was κρόταλον (krótalon). In Greek mythology, Herakles is said to have used castanets to frighten off the Stymphalian birds as part of his sixth labor. ABOVE: First-century AD Roman mosaic of a tympanon-player from the Villa del Cicerone in Pompeii In later antiquity, during the Hellenistic and Roman Periods, more musical instruments were invented. Some of these instruments eventually rose to popularity. For instance, the Greek inventor and mathematician Ktesibios of Alexandria (lived c. 285 – c. 222 BC) is credited with the invention of the hydraulis (ὕδραυλις), an early form of hydraulic pipe organ. ABOVE: Roman mosaic from Nennig, Germany depicting a man playing a hydraulis, or water organ. The hydraulis was first invented in Alexandria in the third century BC. Stasimon from Euripides’s Orestes “Vienna Papyrus G 2315” is the name that has been given to a papyrus fragment that was discovered in Egypt in 1892. It dates to roughly the third century BC or thereabouts and records a fragment of a melody that was used for a performance of the first stasimon (i.e. a stationary song sung by the chorus) from Euripides’s tragedy Orestes. Here is the full, standard text of the stasimon as it has been transmitted to us through the manuscript tradition, from E. P. Coleridge’s 1938 edition of the text: τίς ἔλεος, τίς ὅδ᾽ ἀγὼν θοάζων σε τὸν μέλεον, ᾧ δάκρυα πορεύων τις ἐς δόμον ἀλαστόρων ματέρος αἷμα σᾶς, ὅ σ᾽ ἀναβακχεύει; ὁ μέγας ὄλβος οὐ μόνιμος ἐν βροτοῖς: ἀνὰ δὲ λαῖφος ὥς τις ἀκάτου θοᾶς τινάξας δαίμων κατέκλυσεν δεινῶν πόνων ὡς πόντου λάβροις ὀλεθρίοισιν ἐν κύμασιν. τίνα γὰρ ἔτι πάρος οἶκον ἕτερον ἢ τὸν ἀπὸ τὸν ἀπὸ Ταντάλου, σέβεσθαί με χρή;” Here is Coleridge’s prose translation of the standard text of the stasimon: “O Zeus! What pity, what deadly struggle is here, hurrying you on, the wretch on whom some avenging fiend is heaping tears upon tears, bringing to the house your mother’s blood, which drives you raving mad? Great prosperity is not secure among mortals. I lament, I lament! But some divine power, shaking it to and fro like the sail of a swift ship, plunges it deep in the waves of grievous affliction, violent and deadly as the waves of the sea. For what other family must I still revere, rather than the one from a divine marriage, from Tantalus.” Here is a photograph of Vienna Papyrus G 2315, with the musical notation on it. As you can possibly tell, only a tiny portion of the stasimon has been preserved on the papyrus: Euripides’s Orestes was originally performed in Athens in around 408 BC, but it is highly improbable that the melody recorded on Vienna Papyrus G 2315 is the melody that was originally written by Euripides himself. Instead, this melody is probably a later one that someone else wrote for the play long after the original was forgotten. Nonetheless, this relatively brief fragment may potentially reveal a lot about what choral odes in ancient Greek tragedies might have sounded like. Here is a YouTube video with a modern performance of the stasimon by the Spanish musician Gregorio Paniagua, using the melody from Vienna Papyrus G 2315: First Delphic Hymn to Apollon Perhaps the most famous of all the early fragmentary musical compositions are the Delphic Hymns to Apollon, two ancient Greek hymns in honor of the god Apollon, both of which are believed to have most likely been written for the performance as part of a Pythaid, an Athenian ritual procession in honor of Apollon at Delphi. The hymns were inscribed in stone at the Temple of Apollon at Delphi with complete musical notation. Although fragmentary, the surviving portions of the hymns are quite extensive. The dating of the First Delphic Hymn to Apollon is somewhat unclear; it was either performed in around 138 BC or in 128 BC. The author of the First Delphic Hymn is identified in the inscription as “Athenaios, son of Athenaios.” At first, the name Ἀθήναιος was mistaken by scholars for a designation of the author’s nationality as an Athenian, but it is now recognized that this can only possibly be the author’s name. Here is the inscription with the text and musical notation of the first hymn: Here is a modern performance of the First Delphic Hymn to Apollon by the Greek musician Christodoulos Halaris: Second Delphic Hymn to Apollon Unlike the First Delphic Hymn, we have a fairly exact impression of what the Second Delphic Hymn was composed. The Second Delphic Hymn was originally performed in 128 BC. The author of the Second Delphic Hymn to Apollon is identified in the inscription as “Limenios, son of Thoinos, an Athenian.” Although the Second Delphic Hymn may have been composed around a decade later than the First Delphic Hymn, it was inscribed in stone at Delphi alongside the first one. Here is a photograph of the inscription with the text and musical notation of the Second Delphic Hymn to Apollon: Here is a modern performance of the Second Delphic Hymn to Apollon by the Greek musician Petros Tabouris: Here is another performance of the same song by the music group De Organographia: All of the musical compositions that I have just described are, unfortunately, fragmentary. Although the surviving portions are substantial, parts of them are still missing. The oldest known complete surviving musical composition is the “Seikilos Epitaph,” an inscription on a burial cylinder discovered in a grave site in a Hellenistic town near the present-day city of Aydın, Turkey. The inscription probably dates to the late first or early second century AD, but it is difficult to date it exactly. The inscription is a four-line song written by a man named Seikilos and dedicated to his dead wife Euterpe. Ironically, the Seikilos Epitaph is much shorter than either of the Delphic Hymns, even though it is complete and they are not. The lyrics of the song encapsulate what I feel is a significant aspect of the ancient mentality: the idea that life is fleeting and we are all doomed to die eventually, but that we might as well make the most of our time while we are alive. It is your basic carpe diem message essentially, but expressed so beautifully in these few short lines of song. Here is the full, original Greek text of the song: Ὅσον ζῇς, φαίνου. μηδὲν ὅλως σὺ λυποῦ. πρὸς ὀλίγον ἔστι τὸ ζῆν. τὸ τέλος ὁ χρόνος ἀπαιτεῖ. Here is the same text transliterated: hóson zêis, phaínou. mēdèn hólōs sù lupoû. pròs olígon ésti tò zên. tò télos ho khrónos apaiteî. Here is the English translation: “While you live, shine. Never at all should you suffer. Only for a little while is there life. Time demands fulfillment.” Here is a photograph of the burial cylinder: Here is the inscription itself (digitally unrolled): Here is an approximate translation of the melody of the song into modern musical notation: The Seikilos Epitaph has found a great deal of appreciation from modern audiences. While it is likely that very few people in antiquity ever actually heard the song performed, it has been performed and recorded countless times in modernity, allowing millions of people to hear it. Here is a YouTube video with a performance of the Seikilos Epitaph song by Gregorio Paniagua: (NOTE: The video linked above incorrectly states in the beginning that the Seikilos Epitaph is the “only complete musical composition from ancient Greece.” That is not true, since the three surviving hymns of Mesomedes of Knossos, which are slightly later than the Seikilos Epitaph, are also complete. The video also says that the song was composed around 200 BC. That is possible, but it is more likely that the song dates to the early centuries AD.) Here is a performance of the Seikilos Epitaph by the San Antonio Vocal Arts Ensemble: Here is another modern performance of the Seikilos Epitaph: Hymns of Mesomedes All of the musical compositions that I have discussed so far are known only through their discovery by archaeology. Without archaeologists, we would not know about any of these songs. The oldest surviving musical compositions that have come down to us through the medieval manuscript tradition are three hymns written in Greek by the composer Mesomedes of Krete, who lived in the second century AD: the Hymn to Nemesis, the Hymn to the Sun, and the Hymn to the Muses. Like the Seikilos Epitaph, all three of these hymns are survive in their complete form. They are all, however, probably slightly later than the Seikilos Epitaph. Here is a modern performance of Mesomedes’s Hymn to Nemesis by the music group De Organographia: Here is a modern performance of Mesomedes’s Hymn to the Sun by Petros Tabouris: Here is a modern performance of Mesomedes’s Hymn to the Muses. Although the video below does not say who this performance is by, I believe it is by Christodoulos Halaris: Kontrapollinopolis instrumental music fragment An instrumental fragment with Greek musical notation was found on the verso side of a piece of papyrus dating to around the second or third century AD or thereabouts that was discovered at the site of Kontrapollinopolis, across the Nile from Edfu in Upper Egypt. The recto side of the papyrus has writing on it pertaining to a Roman legion that had been stationed at Kontrapollinopolis. The papyrus fragment is known as “Papyrus Berlin 6870,” because it is held in the Egyptian Museum in Berlin, Germany. Here is a performance of the musical fragment by Petros Tabouris: Here is a performance of the same fragment by Gregorio Paniagua: In the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries, two British archaeologists named Bernard Pyne Grenfell and Arthur Surridge Hunt excavated around half a million papyrus fragments from the rubbish dump of the Greek city of Oxyrhynchos in Egypt. These papyrus fragments date roughly between the third century BC and the seventh century AD. Most of the fragmentary texts Grenfell and Hunt uncovered are written in Greek. The fragments that were discovered by Grenfell and Hunt, known collectively as the “Oxyrhynchos Papyri,” offer us a unique insight into the ancient world because they include fragments of many texts that were not passed down through the medieval manuscript tradition. We have fragments of letters, wills, shopping lists, homework assignments, and even a sex manual. One piece of papyrus that was uncovered at Oxyrhynchos is Papyrus Oxyrhynchus XV 1786, which contains the text of an early Christian hymn composed in around the late third century AD, complete with musical notation. This hymn, known as the “Oxyrhynchos Hymn,” is probably the oldest Christian hymn for which any portion of the original melody has survived. Here is the text of the Oxyrhynchos hymn in the original Koine Greek. Unfortunately, the text is extremely fragmentary and large portions of it have been lost. The text I have given here is based on the version of the text given by Charles H. Cosgrove in his book An Ancient Christian Hymn with Musical Notation: Papyrus Oxyrhynchus 1786: Text and Commentary, published in 2011. Parts written in brackets are reconstructed: 1. “[. . . ] ὁμοῦ, πᾶσαι τε Θεοῦ λόγιμοι δε[. . .]ι [. . .]” 2. “ὐ τὰν ἠῶ σιγάτω, μηδ’ ἄστρα φαεσφόρα χ[. . .]δε—” 3. “[σ]θων, [ἐκ]λειπ[όντων] ῥ[ιπαὶ πνοιῶν, πηγαὶ] ποταμῶν ῥοθίων πᾶσαι. ὑμνούντων δ’ ἡμῶν” 4. “[Π]ατέρα χ’ Υἱὸν χ’ Ἅγιον Πνεῦμα, πᾶσαι δυνάμεις ἐπιφωνούντων· ἀμήν, ἀμήν. κράτος, αἶνος” 5. “[ἀεὶ καὶ δόξα Θεοὶ] δ[ω]τῆ[ρι] μόνῳ [πάν]των ἀγαθῶν· ἀμήν, ἀμήν.” Here is Cosgrove’s translation of the hymn: 1. “. . . together all the eminent ones of God. . .” 2. “. . . night] nor day (?) Let it/them be silent. Let the luminous stars not [. . .],” 3. “. . . [Let the rushings of winds, the sources] of all surging rivers [cease]. While we hymn” 4. “Father and Son and Holy Spirit, let all the powers answer, ‘Amen, amen. Strength, praise,” 5. “[and glory forever to God], the sole giver of all good things. Amen, amen.'” Here is a photograph of the actual papyrus fragment bearing the text of the Oxyrhynchos Hymn, with the original musical notation: Here is a YouTube video with a performance of the Oxyrhynchos Hymn by Gregorio Paniagua. Paniagua has clearly taken the liberty of filling in the many gaps in the text for the sake of his performance and his reconstruction of the texts differs in some respects from Cosgrove’s, but the performance still makes for interesting listening: A number of ancient Greek musical compositions have survived to the present day, but, unfortunately, most of them are fragmentary. Nonetheless, we can reconstruct enough of what ancient Greek music sounded like that, with a little creative license, modern musicians can perform some of these songs that were written, in some cases, over two thousand years ago. How accurate are these modern performances? How closely do they resemble the way these songs were originally performed in ancient Greece? Ultimately, we cannot really say. I am sure that not a single one of these performances I have shared here is completely accurate. Nonetheless, I think that these performances are at least close enough to the originals that the original authors of these songs would probably recognize them.

https://talesoftimesforgotten.com/2020/02/24/sorry-the-shroud-of-turin-is-definitely-a-hoax/What

Religion

en

The liver is the largest internal organ in the body. It's about the size of a football. It sits mainly in the upper right portion of the stomach area, above the stomach. Toxic hepatitis is an inflammation of your liver in reaction to certain substances to which you're exposed. Toxic hepatitis can be caused by alcohol, chemicals, drugs or nutritional supplements. In some cases, toxic hepatitis develops within hours or days of exposure to a toxin. In other cases, it may take months of regular use before signs and symptoms appear. The symptoms of toxic hepatitis often go away when exposure to the toxin stops. But toxic hepatitis can permanently damage your liver, leading to irreversible scarring of liver tissue (cirrhosis) and in some cases to liver failure, which can be life-threatening. Products & Services Mild forms of toxic hepatitis may not cause any symptoms and may be detected only by blood tests. When signs and symptoms of toxic hepatitis occur, they may include: - Yellowing of the skin and whites of the eyes (jaundice) - Abdominal pain in the upper right portion of the abdomen - Loss of appetite - Nausea and vomiting - Weight loss - Dark or tea-colored urine When to see a doctor See your doctor right away if you have any signs or symptoms that worry you. Overdoses of some medications, such as acetaminophen (Tylenol, others), can lead to liver failure. Get immediate medical care if you think an adult or a child has taken an overdose of acetaminophen. Signs and symptoms of a possible acetaminophen overdose include: - Loss of appetite - Nausea and vomiting - Upper abdominal pain If you suspect an acetaminophen overdose, immediately call 911, your local emergency services, or the poison help line. There are two ways to get help from Poison Control in the U.S: online at www.poison.org or by calling 800-222-1222. Both options are free, confidential, and available 24 hours a day. Do not wait for symptoms to develop. An acetaminophen overdose can be fatal but can be successfully treated if addressed early after ingestion. Toxic hepatitis occurs when your liver develops inflammation because of exposure to a toxic substance. Toxic hepatitis may also develop when you take too much of a prescription or over-the-counter medication. The liver normally removes and breaks down most drugs and chemicals from your bloodstream. Breaking down toxins creates byproducts that can damage the liver. Although the liver has a great capacity for regeneration, constant exposure to toxic substances can cause serious, sometimes irreversible harm. Toxic hepatitis can be caused by: - Alcohol. Heavy drinking over many years can lead to alcoholic hepatitis — inflammation in the liver due to alcohol, which can lead to liver failure. - Over-the-counter pain relievers. Nonprescription pain relievers such as acetaminophen (Tylenol, others), aspirin, ibuprofen (Advil, Motrin IB, others) and naproxen (Aleve, others) can damage your liver, especially if taken frequently or combined with alcohol. - Prescription medications. Some medications linked to serious liver injury include the statin drugs used to treat high cholesterol, the combination drug amoxicillin-clavulanate (Augmentin), phenytoin (Dilantin, Phenytek), azathioprine (Azasan, Imuran), niacin (Niaspan), ketoconazole, certain antivirals and anabolic steroids. There are many others. - Herbs and supplements. Some herbs considered dangerous to the liver include aloe vera, black cohosh, cascara, chaparral, comfrey, kava and ephedra. There are many others. Children can develop liver damage if they mistake vitamin supplements for candy and take large doses. - Industrial chemicals. Chemicals you may be exposed to on the job can cause liver injury. Common chemicals that can cause liver damage include the dry cleaning solvent carbon tetrachloride, a substance called vinyl chloride (used to make plastics), the herbicide paraquat and a group of industrial chemicals called polychlorinated biphenyls. Factors that may increase your risk of toxic hepatitis include: - Taking over-the-counter pain relievers or certain prescription drugs. Taking a medication or over-the-counter pain reliever that carries a risk of liver damage increases your risk of toxic hepatitis. This is especially true if you take multiple medications or take more than the recommended dose of medication. - Having a liver disease. Having a serious liver disorder such as cirrhosis or nonalcoholic fatty liver disease makes you much more susceptible to the effects of toxins. - Having hepatitis. Chronic infection with a hepatitis virus (hepatitis B, hepatitis C or one of the other — extremely rare — hepatitis viruses that may persist in the body) makes your liver more vulnerable. - Aging. As you age, your liver breaks down harmful substances more slowly. This means that toxins and their byproducts stay in your body longer. - Drinking alcohol. Drinking alcohol while taking medications or certain herbal supplements increases the risk of toxicity. - Being female. Because women seem to metabolize certain toxins more slowly than men do, their livers are exposed to higher blood concentrations of harmful substances for a longer time. This increases the risk of toxic hepatitis. - Having certain genetic mutations. Inheriting certain genetic mutations that affect the production and action of the liver enzymes that break down toxins may make you more susceptible to toxic hepatitis. - Working with industrial toxins. Working with certain industrial chemicals puts you at risk of toxic hepatitis. Healthy liver vs. liver cirrhosis A healthy liver, at left, shows no signs of scarring. In cirrhosis, at right, scar tissue replaces healthy liver tissue. The inflammation associated with toxic hepatitis can lead to liver damage and scarring. Over time, this scarring, called cirrhosis, makes it difficult for your liver to do its job. Eventually cirrhosis leads to liver failure. The only treatment for chronic liver failure is to replace your liver with a healthy one from a donor (liver transplant). Because it's not possible to know how you'll react to a particular medication, toxic hepatitis can't always be prevented. But you may reduce your risk of liver problems if you: - Limit medications. Take prescription and nonprescription drugs only when absolutely necessary. Investigate nondrug options for common problems such as high blood pressure, high cholesterol and arthritis pain. - Take medications only as directed. Follow the directions exactly for any drug you take. Don't exceed the recommended amount, even if your symptoms don't seem to improve. Because the effects of over-the-counter pain relievers sometimes wear off quickly, it's easy to take too much. - Be cautious with herbs and supplements. Don't assume that a natural product won't cause harm. Discuss the benefits and risks with your doctor before taking herbs and supplements. The National Institutes of Health maintains the LiverTox website, where you can look up medications and supplements to see if they're linked to liver damage. - Don't mix alcohol and drugs. Alcohol and medications are a bad combination. If you're taking acetaminophen, don't drink alcohol. Ask your doctor or pharmacist about the interaction between alcohol and other prescription and nonprescription drugs you use. - Take precautions with chemicals. If you work with or use hazardous chemicals, take all necessary precautions to protect yourself from exposure. If you do come in contact with a harmful substance, follow the guidelines in your workplace, or call your local emergency services or your local poison control center for help. - Keep medications and chemicals away from children. Keep all medications and vitamin supplements away from children and in childproof containers so that children can't accidentally swallow them.

https://www.mayoclinic.org/diseases-conditions/toxic-hepatitis/symptoms-causes/syc-20352202#HBOT

Health

en

Genes from sweet pepper arm banana against deadly wilt disease - August 4, 2010 - International Institute of Tropical Agriculture - In a major breakthrough, crop scientists have successfully transferred genes from green pepper to bananas that enable the crop to resist the Banana Xanthomonas Wilt (BXW), one of the most devastating disease of banana in the Great Lakes region of Africa. The researchers are now about to start confined field trials in Uganda. In a major breakthrough, crop scientists have successfully transferred genes from green pepper to bananas that enable the crop to resist the Banana Xanthomonas Wilt (BXW), one of the most devastating disease of banana in the Great Lakes region of Africa. Researchers are now about to start confined field trials in Uganda. The transformed banana, infused with plant ferredoxin-like amphipathic protein (Pflp) or hypersensitive response-assisting protein (Hrap) from green pepper, have exhibited strong resistance to BXW in the laboratory and screenhouses. Some of the findings of the research have been published in the Molecular Plant Pathology Journal. Scientists from the International Institute of Tropical Agriculture (IITA) and the National Agricultural Research Organization (NARO) of Uganda, in partnership with the African Agricultural Technology Foundation (AATF), would soon be evaluating these promising resistant lines under confined field trials after the Ugandan National Biosafety Committee approved the conduct of the tests. Dr Leena Tripathi, a biotechnologist with IITA and the lead author of the paper, says that although there is still a long way to go before the transgenic bananas find their way onto farmer's fields, this breakthrough is a significant step in the fight against the deadly banana disease. "The Hrap and Pflp genes work by rapidly killing the cells that come into contact with the disease-spreading bacteria, essentially blocking it from spreading any further. Hopefully, this will boost the arsenal available to fight BXW and save millions of livelihoods in the Great Lakes region," she said. "Furthermore, the mechanism- known as Hypersensitivity Response -- also activates the defense of adjacent and even distant uninfected plants leading to a systemic acquired resistance," she adds. The Hrap and Pflp are novel plant proteins that give crops enhanced resistance against deadly pathogens. They can also provide effective control against other BXW-like banana diseases in other parts of the world such as "Moko," Blood, and "Bugtok." The genes used in this research were acquired under an agreement from the Academia Sinica in Taiwan. The highly destructive BXW affects all varieties including the East African Highland bananas and exotic dessert, roasting, and beer bananas causing annual losses of more than US$500 million across East and Central Africa. African bananas are also under threat from another deadly disease, the banana bunchy top. Dr Tripathi adds that there are presently no commercial chemicals, biocontrol agents or resistant varieties that could control the spread of BXW. Even if a source of resistance is identified today, developing a truly resistant banana through conventional breeding would be extremely difficult and would take years, even decades, given the sterile nature and long gestation period of the crop. BXW was first reported in Ethiopia 40 years ago on 'Ensete', a crop relative of banana, before it moved on to bananas. Outside of Ethiopia, it was first reported in Uganda in 2001, then rapidly spread to the Democratic Republic of Congo, Rwanda, Kenya, Tanzania, and Burundi, leaving behind a trail of destruction in Africa's largest banana producing and consuming region. The disease causes yellowing and wilting of the leaves, uneven and premature ripening of the fruit, and withering and rotting of the whole plant. BXW can be managed by debudding the banana plant and sterilizing farm implements used. However, the adoption of these practices has been inconsistent at best as farmers feel that debudding affects the quality of the fruit and sterilizing farm tools is too tedious. The research to fortify banana against BXW using genes from sweet pepper was initiated in 2007. Materials provided by International Institute of Tropical Agriculture. Note: Content may be edited for style and length. - Leena Tripathi, Henry Mwaka, Jaindra Nath Tripathi, Wilberforce Kateera Tushemereirwe. Expression of sweet pepper Hrap gene in banana enhances resistance to Xanthomonas campestris pv. musacearum. Molecular Plant Pathology, 2010; DOI: 10.1111/j.1364-3703.2010.00639.x Cite This Page:

http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2010/08/100804080624.htm?utm_source=feedburner&utm_medium=feed&utm_campaign=Feed%3A+sciencedaily+

Politics

en

In our modern, fast-paced society, cultivating healthy eating habits in children has become increasingly important. Good nutrition is important for their growth, development, and overall well-being. However, introducing healthy eating habits to kids can be a challenging task. Children are often drawn to sugary snacks and processed foods, making it crucial for parents and caregivers to adopt a nurturing approach that balances education, role modeling, and creativity. In this article, we will explore effective strategies to help you introduce healthy eating habits to your children and set them on the path to a lifetime of wellness. Create a positive food environment Creating a positive food environment is key to promoting healthy eating habits and overall well-being. By making your home a haven for nutritious foods, you can set the stage for a lifetime of good choices. One of the first steps is to stock up on fresh fruits, vegetables, and whole foods while minimizing the presence of processed snacks and sugary beverages. These healthy options should be easily accessible, such as keeping cut-up fruits and vegetable sticks readily available for snacking. Involving your child in grocery shopping and meal planning is another effective strategy. By allowing them to make choices within healthy boundaries, you can foster a sense of ownership and empowerment. Take them with you to the grocery store, and encourage them to pick out their favorite fruits and vegetables. When planning meals, ask for their input and involve them in the preparation process. This not only teaches them about nutrition but also allows them to feel like active participants in their own health. Another way to create a positive food environment is by establishing regular family meals. Eating together as a family provides an opportunity for bonding and communication while also encouraging healthy eating habits. Make mealtime enjoyable by creating a relaxed atmosphere, free from distractions like screens or electronic devices. Use this time to engage in meaningful conversations and explore new foods together. Additionally, make healthy food choices the norm by being a positive role model. Children are more likely to adopt healthy eating habits when they see their parents or caregivers making those choices. Demonstrate your own enjoyment and appreciation for nutritious foods, and avoid negative comments or restrictions around certain foods. Instead, focus on the benefits of a balanced diet and the positive impact it has on overall health and well-being. Teach the basics of nutrition Teaching the basics of nutrition is essential for equipping children with the knowledge and skills they need to make healthy food choices. Here are some strategies to effectively teach children about nutrition. Firstly, introduce age-appropriate discussions about nutrition. Start by explaining that food provides fuel for the body and helps it grow strong and healthy. Use simple and engaging language that is easy for children to understand. For example, you can talk about how fruits and vegetables give us vitamins and minerals, while proteins help us build strong muscles. Next, emphasize the importance of different food groups and their role in maintaining good health. Teach children about the five major food groups: fruits and vegetables, grains, proteins, dairy, and fats/oils. Explain the benefits of each group and how they contribute to overall well-being. For instance, mention that fruits and vegetables provide essential vitamins and fibers, while grains give us energy for daily activities. Encourage questions from children and provide factual information without imposing strict rules or creating a negative association with certain foods. Be open to discussing different types of foods and their nutritional value. For example, explain that while sugary snacks may taste good, they should be enjoyed in moderation because they don’t provide the same nutritional benefits as whole foods. Make learning about nutrition fun and interactive. Use visual aids like colorful posters or charts to help children visualize the different food groups. Engage them in hands-on activities, such as creating a balanced plate using play food or involving them in meal preparation. Encourage them to experiment with new foods and flavors. Lastly, lead by example. Children are more likely to adopt healthy eating habits when they see their parents or caregivers practicing them. Demonstrate your own healthy choices and explain why you make them. Involve children in meal planning and preparation, allowing them to contribute their ideas and preferences. Teaching the basics of nutrition to children is crucial for their long-term health and well-being. By introducing age-appropriate discussions, emphasizing the importance of food groups, encouraging questions, making learning fun and interactive, and leading by example, we can empower children to make informed and healthy food choices. Make mealtime fun Mealtime doesn’t have to be a mundane routine. By infusing it with fun and excitement, you can transform it into an enjoyable experience for your child. One way to do this is by experimenting with colorful and appealing presentations of food. Use vibrant fruits and vegetables to create visually enticing dishes. Arrange food in creative shapes or patterns that capture your child’s imagination. This not only makes the meal visually appealing but also stimulates their interest in trying new foods. Another way to make mealtime fun is by involving your child in age-appropriate cooking activities. Let them participate in simple tasks like washing vegetables, mixing ingredients, or decorating plates. This not only gives them a sense of accomplishment but also helps them develop basic culinary skills. By being involved in the preparation process, they will feel a sense of ownership and pride in the meal, making them more likely to enjoy eating it. Encourage your child to try new foods and flavors, even if it’s just a small portion. Celebrate their adventurous spirit and provide positive reinforcement for their willingness to explore different tastes. Consider introducing a “food adventure” game where they can try a new food each week and rate it on a fun chart. This can create excitement and curiosity around trying new things. Additionally, make mealtime a time for family bonding and conversation. Set aside distractions like screens and create a relaxed and pleasant atmosphere at the dining table. Engage in light-hearted conversations, share stories, and encourage your child to talk about their day. Creating a positive and enjoyable social environment during meals can make them more memorable and enjoyable for your child. Set a routine Setting a routine for mealtime can have numerous benefits for children. By establishing regular meal and snack times, you provide them with a sense of structure and predictability. This controls their hunger and forestalls unreasonable eating over the course of the day . When children know when to expect their meals, they are less likely to become overly hungry or rely on unhealthy snacks to satisfy their hunger. It’s important to avoid using food as a reward or punishment in order to maintain a healthy relationship with eating. Using food as a reward can create an association between certain foods and positive emotions, leading to potential overeating or emotional eating habits later in life. Similarly, using food as a punishment may create negative associations with eating or contribute to disordered eating patterns. Instead, focus on fostering a positive association with nourishing foods and the pleasure of shared meals. Emphasize the importance of eating a variety of foods for nourishment and enjoyment. In addition to regular meal and snack times, consider incorporating other routines into mealtime. For example, establish a routine of setting the table together or involving your child in meal preparation. This not only teaches them important life skills but also creates a sense of ownership and involvement in the mealtime process. Additionally, make mealtime a screen-free zone to promote mindful eating and encourage meaningful conversations with your child. Consistency is key when establishing a mealtime routine. However, it’s important to remain flexible and adapt to your child’s changing needs. As they grow, their appetite and dietary preferences may change, so be open to making adjustments while still maintaining a sense of structure. Setting a routine for mealtime provides children with a sense of structure and expectation. Regular meal and snack times help regulate appetite and prevent excessive snacking. Avoid using food as a reward or punishment and instead focus on fostering a positive relationship with nourishing foods and shared meals. Incorporate other routines into mealtime, such as setting the table together or involving your child in meal preparation. By establishing a consistent mealtime routine, you promote healthy eating habits and create a positive and enjoyable environment for your child. Limit processed foods and sugary drinks Limiting the intake of processed foods and sugary drinks is essential for promoting a healthy diet and overall well-being. While occasional indulgences are acceptable, regular consumption of these items can have negative effects on health. Processed foods often lack essential nutrients and are high in unhealthy fats, sodium, and added sugars. Sugary drinks, on the other hand, provide empty calories and contribute to weight gain, tooth decay, and an increased risk of chronic diseases like diabetes and heart disease. One effective way to reduce the consumption of sugary drinks is by encouraging water as the primary beverage. Water, which has no added sugars or calories and is necessary for staying hydrated. Make water easily accessible and appealing by keeping a pitcher of cold water in the refrigerator or adding slices of fruits like lemon or cucumber for a refreshing twist. Teach your child about the importance of staying hydrated and make it a habit to offer water with meals and throughout the day. When it comes to snacks, it’s important to provide healthier alternatives to processed and sugary options. Instead of packaged snacks, offer homemade options like fruit popsicles made from pureed fruits or yogurt parfaits with fresh berries and a drizzle of honey. These alternatives not only provide essential nutrients but also satisfy cravings for something sweet. In addition to limiting processed foods and sugary drinks, focus on promoting a diet rich in whole foods. Urge your kid to eat various natural products, vegetables, entire grains, lean proteins, and solid fats. Involve them in grocery shopping and meal planning to teach them about making nutritious choices. It’s important to lead by example and create a supportive environment at home. Stock your pantry and refrigerator with wholesome foods and limit the presence of processed snacks and sugary beverages. Instead of completely restricting treats, teach your child about moderation and balance. Allow them to enjoy occasional treats during special occasions or as a small part of a balanced diet. Limiting the consumption of processed foods and sugary drinks is crucial for maintaining a healthy diet. Encourage water as the primary beverage and provide healthier alternatives to sugary snacks. Promote a diet rich in whole foods and teach your child about moderation and balance when it comes to treats. By making these changes, you can help your child develop healthy eating habits that will benefit them throughout their lives. Be patient and persistent When it comes to introducing healthy eating habits to children, patience and persistence are essential. It’s common for children to resist new foods or show reluctance to try unfamiliar flavors and textures. However, it’s important not to be discouraged and to approach the process with a positive mindset. One effective strategy is to offer a variety of food options. Presenting a diverse range of fruits, vegetables, whole grains, and lean proteins increases the chances of finding something that appeals to your child’s taste buds. Remember that taste preferences can change over time, so it’s worth reintroducing rejected foods at a later time. What they may have disliked before could become a new favorite in the future. Encourage your child to take small bites and explore different flavors and textures. This allows them to gradually become accustomed to new foods without feeling overwhelmed. Offer positive reinforcement and praise for their willingness to try new things, even if they only take a small taste. This helps create a positive association with the experience of trying new foods and encourages them to continue exploring. It’s important to understand that developing a taste for certain foods may take time and repeated exposure. Research suggests that it can take up to 10-15 exposures before a child develops a preference for a new food. So, perseverance is key. Be patient and continue to offer a variety of healthy options, even if they are initially rejected. Over time, your child may become more open to trying and enjoying different foods. Remember to lead by example. Children are more likely to adopt healthy eating habits if they see their parents and caregivers practicing them consistently. Be a positive role model by choosing nutritious foods and demonstrating a willingness to try new things yourself. Nurturing healthy eating habits in children is a journey that requires a balanced approach. By setting a positive example, creating a supportive food environment, teaching nutrition basics, making mealtimes enjoyable, establishing routines, limiting processed foods, and being patient, parents and caregivers can empower their children to make healthy food choices. Remember, the goal is to foster a lifelong relationship with nutritious foods, promoting their overall well-being and laying the foundation for a healthy future.

https://childbehavior.com.ng/how-do-you-introduce-healthy-eating-habits-to-kids/

Family

en

Drafting Process Constitution writing entails several distinct steps, beginning with agreement on ground rules and formats and ending with ratification. The stages outlined here summarize current practice around the globe. Step 1: In times of crisis or profound change, when the existing constitution may not provide sufficient guidance, the process opens with deliberations about the appropriate format for subsequent discussions. The breadth of participation at this stage and the issues considered vary from place to place. Often these conversations take place in the context of round tables, meetings between the leaders of the incumbent government and the most important opposition groups. The parties to these decisions sometimes agree explicitly to accept subsequent modifications in the arrangements they craft, subject to criteria determined by the negotiators. In other instances, departures from agreements are totally ad hoc, and in still others the parties all respect the procedural decisions taken at this stage. Step 2: In one-third of constitution writing exercises completed during the period 1975-2003, the preparation of an interim constitution or a set of immutable principles/essential features was the second step in the process. Interim documents sometimes reinstate an earlier constitution, selectively amended, to serve as a basis for coordination during the transition period. Immutable principles/essential features are terms with which the final draft must comply in order to secure ratification. At this stage the negotiators almost always come from the ranks of a country’s major political organizations. This step is usually absent in settings where the existing constitution enjoys wide acceptance and sets out procedures for amendment or replacement. Step 3: Development of the initial text, the basis for preparation of the final draft, comes next. The handling of this stage varies widely and may involve a prior period of public consultation. In a little over half of all of the cases in this study, the development of a first draft rested with an appointed commission whose members were selected by the executive, the members of a round table, a legislature, or some other authority, such as a transitional legislature in tandem with a national conference. In about a quarter of all cases studied here, a sub-committee of the main deliberative body developed the first text. In eight percent of cases, an elected chamber wrote the initial text itself, in working groups that reported to a plenary. There are also instances in which political parties prepare and submit their own texts. The groups that have responsibility for the first daft are usually small and their deliberations are rarely open to public view, although they may report regularly to the press and to constituents. Step 4: In most countries an elected or indirectly elected assembly has primary responsibility for debating, amending, and adopting the draft. The figure below displays the breakdown by type of forum across the sample of 194 constitutions studied in this project. The duration of these discussions ranges from just over an hour to several months. Informal mediators sometimes play an important role at this stage in fostering compromise. Public hearings or a period for written comment may precede the final stages of deliberation. A : Constituent Assembly B: National Conference C: Round Table D. Legislature E. Commission appointed by Legislature F. Executive, Committee appointed by Executive G. Peace Negotiations/Decolonization H. Appointed Transitional Legislature I. Party Central Committee Step 5: Ratification is the final step in the constitution writing process. About half of the 194 countries in our initial study required a national referendum for ratification. This option was most common when the main deliberative body was appointed or indirectly elected. Countries varied in the length of time set aside for civic education and campaigning prior to the vote. Most of the remaining countries in this study located responsibility for ratification in the assembly that developed the final draft.

https://pcwcr.princeton.edu/drafting/index.html

Politics

en

Janet noticed a rash in her private area. It was painful and had appeared out of nowhere. She was changing into her clothes when she noticed it. She was really worried about it because she did not know what it was. So, she called her friend, Sarah, to see if she could help her understand what this rash was. But Sarah was not sure too, so Janet decided to go into the hospital to see her doctor. Oral cancers are cancers affecting any part of the mouth, including the lips, tongue, cheeks, the floor of the mouth, sinuses, pharynx, and the palates. It often starts as the “common” oral sores, and then the sores persist and expand, and begin to cause complications. These cancers form the sixth commonest group of cancers globally, with devastating consequences and resultant poor post-treatment quality of life. Unfortunately, as with several known cancers, the cause of oral cancers is unknown, but there are common lifestyle habits of ours that are risk factors of this kind of cancer. They include: Tobacco, smoking and chewing This long-known enemy yet accommodated by many remains a major risk factor for oral cancer. Tobacco smoking and chewing are addictive habits caused by the addictive ingredient, nicotine. However, tobacco contains other harmful substances collectively called carcinogens, which slowly turns the normal tissue and cells in the mouth to cancerous ones. Alcohol drinkers are up to six times more likely to get oral cancers. Alcohol consumption and smoking cigarette doubles this risk. Alcohol contains and is broken down to several harmful substances that could damage the tissues and cells of the mouth over time. Poor diet and nutrition We are indeed what we eat. The age-long advice to take lots of fruits and vegetables remains valid. While certain foods are protective against oral cancer, such as vitamin A, the consumption of processed meat, high-sodium can foods, salted meat and food rich in bad fat are risk factors for oral cancer. The effects of changing from the healthy traditional African diet to less healthy Western options continue to ravage the health of our communities like a plague. The plague leaves in its trail undesired health implications, including oral cancer. Viruses also play a major role in the development of oral cancer. Some of the common viruses that play a role in the development of oral cancers include Epstein-Barr virus, human papillomavirus and herpes simplex virus. The Human Papillomavirus is transmitted through oral sex, and is also the main cause of cancer of the cervix in women. Diseases that suppress one’s immune system increase their risk of oral cancers. Examples of this include HIV/AIDs and kidney failure. These diseases make other risk factors more potent, making the mouth more vulnerable to cancer-causing substances. As with several other cancers, oral cancers risk increases if there is a family history of it. In this situation, there is a genetic defect that causes normal tissue and cells in the mouth to transform into cancerous tissues. Oral cancers are cancers affecting any part of the mouth. They often start as oral sores, then progress to more severe symptoms. If caught early, oral cancer is treatable; however, many patients report when it is already too advanced to treat. Therefore, to lower your risk of this deadly cancer, watch out for these risk factors and avoid them.

https://cuticahealth.com/oral-cancer-be-mindful-of-these-risk-factors

Health

en

[ al-guh-rith-uhm ] - Computers. an ordered set of instructions recursively applied to transform data input into processed data output, such as a mathematical solution, search engine result, descriptive statistics, or predictive text suggestions. / ˈælɡəˌrɪðəm / - logic maths a recursive procedure whereby an infinite sequence of terms can be generated / ăl′gə-rĭth′əm / - A finite set of unambiguous instructions performed in a prescribed sequence to achieve a goal, especially a mathematical rule or procedure used to compute a desired result. Algorithms are the basis for most computer programming. - A set of instructions for solving a problem, especially on a computer. An algorithm for finding your total grocery bill, for example, would direct you to add up the costs of individual items to find the total. - ˌalgoˈrithmically, adverb - ˌalgoˈrithmic, adjective Other Words From - al·go·rith·mic [al-g, uh, -, rith, -mik], adjective Word History and Origins Word History and Origins Since she posted her tutorial on Kapwing’s YouTube channel, a number of other YouTubers have also made tutorials using the same copy-and-pasted algorithm. The researchers trained their algorithm on already-parsed datasets collected by NASA’s retired, planet-hunting Kepler mission. These updates are real — Google announced a core algorithm update on May 4, after all — but you don’t need to worry. Rather than relying on semiconductor physics and silicon-fabrication technology, though, we need to turn to innovations in software, algorithms, and hardware, says a group of leading experts. Whenever Google updates her algorithm, there will be traffic losses and gains. “Today we will learn the algorithm for receiving presents,” the instructor tells her students. Based on these results, the research group produced an emotion recognition algorithm. The biggest challenge for the Amiigo before its 2015 launch is perfecting the training portion of the algorithm. The gnomes were slightly lewd-looking, and they were the product of a generative algorithm that varied each one. Then the CAD people added an algorithm that would take the sensor data and generate random variations on the same basis. Evolutionary algorithm used to produce a minimum-materials/maximum-strength chassis. More about Algorithm What is an algorithm? An algorithm is a set of instructions or rules that can be followed to solve a problem. Algorithms are most commonly used in mathematics and computing, and they can often be very complex or have many steps or sets of instructions. For example, your teacher asks you to add 537 and 162. You might solve the problem by lining up 162 under 537 and adding the columns of numbers together. You add the 7 and 2 in the ones column to get 9, Next, you add the numbers in the tens column (3 and 6) to get 9. Finally, you add 5 and 1 in the hundreds column and get 6. Your answer, then, is 699. You have followed an addition algorithm to find the solution. In computing, a computer coder will create a set of instructions (the algorithm) that a computer or artificial intelligence will use to solve a problem or will consult in order to achieve a goal. Let’s say you spend the day watching Star Wars videos on YouTube. With each video you watch, the website will recommend other videos it thinks you will like. How does it know what you like? It runs an algorithm that finds videos that are similar to the ones you’ve already watched. If Darth Vader shows up in a video of a car commercial, YouTube will likely recommend it to you to watch because Vader was in a lot of the Star Wars videos you’ve already watched. Why is algorithm important? The first records of the term algorithm come from around 1690. It is a variation of the older word algorism, which ultimately comes from the name of the ninth-century mathematician Muhammad ibn Musa al-Khwarizmi. Actual algorithms have been used in math since ancient times. The Euclidean algorithm, for example, was thought up by the Greek mathematician Euclid around 300 b.c.e. Just by using the internet, you have very likely run into an algorithm—or at least the results of one. Search engines use algorithms to figure out what order to put search results in, websites use them to determine which ads to show you, and social media websites use them to decide which of your friends’ posts you are most likely to want to see. Many websites keep the specifics of how their algorithm works a secret. They do this in order to prevent users from exploiting or abusing the algorithm to guarantee it selects their content over everyone else’s. For example, if a user knew that YouTube’s recommendation algorithm prioritizes videos that are exactly four minutes long, they could create hundreds of four-minute videos to trick the algorithm into showing their videos to the majority of YouTube users. Did you know … ? Many algorithms used on websites are designed to adjust themselves and learn the best ways to accomplish problems. Because of this, algorithms will often behave in ways their designers never expected. An algorithm can even change itself to the point that even the original creator has no idea how it works anymore. What are real-life examples of algorithm? This video gives a simplified explanation of how computing algorithms work: <iframe loading="lazy" title="YouTube video player" src="https://www.youtube.com/embed/6hfOvs8pY1k" width="560" height="315" frameborder="0" allowfullscreen="allowfullscreen"></iframe> Many people have become familiar (and annoyed) with algorithms, thanks to their increasingly common use in computing. honestly i have no idea what i've done but twitter's algorithm is 100% convinced i'm a farmer — CarolineJMolloy (@carolinejmolloy) August 26, 2020 What other words are related to algorithm? Is the following a correct use of algorithm? Rather than follow a set of instructions, the website instead uses an algorithm that randomly selects which advertisements to show users.

http://dictionary.reference.com/browse/algorithm

Programming

en

Museum-goers are to be transported back more than 3,500 years in a sniff after researchers identified and recreated the scent of balms used in the mummification of an ancient Egyptian noblewoman. While mummification may conjure up scenes of bandages and jars, the process was a fragrant affair in which the body and organs were embalmed to preserve them for the afterlife. However, with a dearth of texts from ancient Egypt revealing the exact ingredients used, scientists have been using modern analyses to unpick the substances involved. Now researchers studying residues of balms used in the mummification of a noblewoman called Senetnay have not only revealed that many of their ingredients came from outside Egypt but also reproduced their perfume. “Senetnay’s mummification balm stands out as one of the most intricate and complex balms from that era,” said Barbara Huber, the first author of the research from the Max Planck Institute of Geoanthropology. Writing in the journal Scientific Reports, the team say Senetnay lived around 1450BC and was a wet nurse to Pharaoh Amenhotep II. Senetnay’s canopic jars – vessels in which the deceased’s mummified organs were stored – were discovered in a tomb in the Valley of the Kings in 1900 by Howard Carter, the British archeologist who would later become famous for his role in discovering the tomb of Tutankhamun. Huber and colleagues analysed six samples of residues of the mummification balms from inside two jars that that had once contained Senetnay’s lungs and liver, as indicated by hieroglyphic inscriptions. The team found the balms contained a complex mix of ingredients, including fats and oils, beeswax, bitumen, resins from trees of the pine family, a substance called coumarin that has a vanilla-like scent, and benzoic acid, which can be found in many plant sources including cinnamon and cloves. Many of the ingredients, they note, would have had to be imported to Egypt. “For instance, certain resins, like the larch tree resin, likely came from the northern Mediterranean and central Europe,” said Huber. “One other substance was narrowed down to either a resin called dammar – exclusive to south-east Asian tropical forests – or Pistacia tree resin. In case it was dammar, this would highlight the extensive trade networks of the Egyptians during the mid-second millennium BCE, bringing in ingredients from afar.” But not all of the ingredients identified were present in both of the jars, a finding that might suggest the balms were organ-specific, although the team noted it could also be that they were originally the same but were poorly mixed or had degraded differently. The researchers said few mummies had received the elaborated treatment Senetnay was given, which, with the non-local provenance of many of the ingredients, supported the view that she had a high social standing – a situation already indicated by the site of her burial and her title, Ornament of the King. Huber added that, working with a perfumer, the team had recreated the balms’ scent, which would be used in an exhibition at the Moesgaard Museum in Denmark this autumn. The smell of the balm has been labelled “the scent of the eternity”. Dr William Tullett, an expert in sensory history at the University of York, who was not involved in the work, said recreating smells from history was crucial to understanding the relationship between the past and the present. “To our noses, the warm, resinous, pine-like odours of larch might be more reminiscent of cleaning products and the sulphurous scent of bitumen might put us in mind of asphalt. But for Egyptians, these smells clearly had a host of other meanings related to spirituality and social status,” he said. “It’s those revealing comparisons between the here and now of smell that make recreations so interesting.”

https://amp.theguardian.com/science/2023/aug/31/scent-of-eternity-scientists-recreate-balms-used-in-ancient-egyptian-mummy

Religion

en

Artificial intelligence is the tech catchphrase of the moment, but it may soon share headline space alongside another wild new computing field: organoid intelligence (OI), aka biocomputers. Computers, simply put, are running out of space—at least, computers as most people know them. Silicon-based chips have long been the standard for everyday usage, but most experts agree that electronics makers are quickly approaching the physical limit in both the size of transistors, as well as how many can fit on a surface. Merging organic matter with electronics is a promising new avenue for advancing beyond these constraints, including organoid intelligence. [Related: Microsoft changes Bing chatbot restrictions after much AI-generated weirdness.] Scientists across a variety of disciplines and institutions recently published an early roadmap towards realizing this technology utilizing “brain organoids” in the research journal, Frontiers in Science. The phrase “brain organoids” may conjure images of noggins floating inside glass jars, but the reality is (for now) a lot less eerie. Organoids aren’t whole brains, but instead small, lab-grown stem cell cultures possessing several similarities to brain structures, including neurons and other cells enabling rudimentary cognitive functions such as memory and learning. Brain organoids’ three-dimensional design boosts their cell density over 1,000-times larger than their flat cell culture counterpoints, thus allowing for exponentially more neuron connections and learning capabilities—an important distinction given the trajectory for existing computers. “While silicon-based computers are certainly better with numbers, brains are better at learning,” said Thomas Hartung, one of the paper’s co-authors and a professor of microbiology at John Hopkins University, in a statement. Hartung offers AlphaGo, the AI that bested the world’s top Go player in 2017, as an example of a computationally superior program. “[It] was trained on data from 160,000 games. A person would have to play five hours a day for more than 175 years to experience these many games.” But AlphaGo’s impressive statistical capabilities come with a hefty cost—the amount of energy required to train it equaled about as much as it takes to keep an active adult human alive for about 10 years. A human brain, by comparison, is far more efficient, with around 100 billion neurons across 1015 connection points—“an enormous power difference compared to our current technology,” argues Hartung. Factor in the brain’s ability to store the equivalent of around 2,500TB of information, and it’s easy to see how biocomputers usher in a new era of technological innovation. [Related: Just because an AI can hold a conversation does not make it smart.] There are serious ethical hurdles ahead of researchers, however. Today’s earliest brain organoids are small and simple cell cultures of just 50,000 or so neurons. To scale them up to computer-strength levels, scientists need to grow them to house 10 million neurons, according to Hartung. More neurons means more complex brain functions, edging researchers further into the murky realm of what is and isn’t “consciousness.” As Live Science explains, brain organoids have been around since 2013, primarily as a way to help study diseases like Parkinson’s and Alzheimer’s. Since then, these cell clumps have even been taught to play Pong, but they remain far from “self-aware.” The new paper’s authors, however, concede that as they develop more complex organoids, questions will arise as to what constitutes awareness, feeling, and thought—considerations that even the most advanced computers can’t answer. At least, not at the moment.

https://www.popsci.com/technology/brain-organoid-biocomputer

Education

en

Around the world, people are under attack for who they are. Living as a lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender or intersex (LGBTI) person can be life-threatening in a number of countries across the globe. For those who do not live with a daily immediate risk to their life, discrimination on the basis of one’s sexual orientation, gender identity and/or expression and sex characteristics, can have a devastating effect on physical, mental and emotional well-being for those forced to endure it. Discrimination and violence against LGBTI people can come in many forms, from name-calling, bullying, harassment, and gender-based violence, to being denied a job or appropriate healthcare. Protests to uphold the rights of LGBTI people also face suppression across the globe. The range of unequal treatment faced is extensive and damaging and could be based on: - your sexual orientation (who you’re attracted to) - gender identity (how you self-identify, irrespective of the sex assigned at birth) - gender expression (how you express your gender, for example through your clothing, hair or mannerisms), - sex characteristics (for example, your genitals, chromosomes, reproductive organs, or hormone levels.) Amnesty International campaigns to protect and uphold the rights of LGBTI people globally, including their right to life, freedom and safety. What does it mean to be LGBTI? The term LGBTI refers to a broad category of people, including those who identify as lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender or intersex, although we recognize that there are many terms around the world that are used by people to define their sexual orientation or gender identity. The terminology used can vary widely depending on historical, cultural and societal contexts. It is well established in international human rights law that states must take steps to safeguard the rights of LGBTI people. Gender identity vs sexual orientation Gender identity refers to each person’s deeply felt internal and individual sense of gender, which may or may not correspond with the sex assigned at birth. An individual’s gender identity may be that of a man, woman, or outside the binary categories of man and woman; it may also be more than one gender, fluid across genders or no gender at all. Sexual orientation refers to a person’s capacity for profound emotional, affectionate and sexual attraction to, and intimate and sexual relations with other people. People experience sexual and romantic attraction differently. You can be attracted to people of a different gender, or the same gender as you. Some people are asexual, meaning they experience little to no sexual attraction. Transgender (or trans) people have a gender identity that is different from typical expectations of the gender they were assigned at birth. Some trans people might decide to get legal gender recognition or undergo gender affirmative interventions to help them feel more confident or comfortable living as their true gender. Being transgender has nothing to do with a person’s sexual orientation. You can be a trans man and be gay – or be a trans woman and be lesbian. Not all transgender people identify as male or female. Some identify as more than one gender or no gender at all and might use terms like non-binary, agender, genderqueer or gender fluid to describe their gender identity. What is gender affirmation? Some trans people decide to affirm their gender identity, which is the process of living your life as the gender you identify with. There is no single gender-affirming process. Some people may adopt new pronouns, change their name, apply for legal gender recognition, and/or undergo gender-affirming surgery or hormone therapy. What is gender recognition? Gender recognition, in theory, allows trans people to align their legally recognized gender with that of their own gender identity. For some trans people, having their gender legally recognized is an essential step towards being able to live freely, authentically and openly. Unfortunately, even in countries where it is possible to affirm one’s gender identity legally, the process is often dehumanizing, long and expensive. In some countries, trans people need medical proof before they can get their gender identity legally recognized. This can be an invasive process and also reinforces the misinformed view that being trans is an illness. Unfortunately, despite the World Health Organization updating their guidelines to no longer recognize being transgender as a ‘disorder’, this attitude, is still prevalent in many societies around the world. Requiring transgender people to undergo unnecessary medical treatments to obtain legal gender recognition violates their right to the highest attainable standard of health, which is protected under international human rights law, including by the UN Covenant on Economic, Social and Cultural Rights. For transgender people, official identity documents reflecting their gender identity are vitally important for the enjoyment of their human rights. They are not only crucial when travelling but also for everyday life. States must ensure that transgender people can obtain legal recognition of their gender through a quick, accessible and transparent procedure in accordance with the individual’s own sense of their gender identity while preserving their right to privacy. What does it mean to be non-binary? Non-binary people have a gender identity that exists outside the categories of male and female. It is an umbrella term for various gender identities that lie outside of the gender binary. While some non-binary people may identify as trans, others may not. Some non-binary people may use gender-neutral pronouns, such as they/them. Others may use a combination of gendered and gender-neutral pronouns, such as they/he or she/they. It is important to always respect people’s pronouns. If you aren’t sure what words to use to describe them, find polite ways to ask them. What does intersex mean? There is an assumption that everyone’s physical, hormonal and chromosomal characteristics fit neatly into either male or female. But that is not always the case, an estimated 1.7% of children in the world are born every year with variations of sex characteristics. These variations are diverse; for instance, some children have genitalia outside the standard norms of male and female bodies, others have female reproductive organs but have XY (male) chromosomes, or male reproductive organs and XX (female) chromosomes. These characteristics might be present at birth or become more apparent during or after puberty. Many people with intersex variations are forced to undergo invasive, non-emergency and irreversible “normalizing” surgeries, often when they are children, and therefore cannot consent, but sometimes this can happen later in life. Many people Amnesty International has spoken to that have gone through such surgeries reported lasting negative impacts on their physical and mental health, sexual lives, psychological well-being and gender identity. When performed without informed consent or adequate information, these surgeries violate people’s right to physical bodily integrity and may have long-term consequences on their right to health and their sexual and reproductive rights, particularly since they can severely impede people’s fertility. Case Study: The impact of Covid-19 on trans people in Asia Transgender people – who were already subject to deep-rooted and persistent structural inequalities and discrimination – found their pre-existing marginalization exacerbated by the Covid-19 pandemic and related public health measures and suffered disproportionately. The report examined the ever-present barriers to access to healthcare, employment, education, housing, essential goods and services, and social support that were experienced against a backdrop of lack of legal gender recognition, stigma, discrimination, violence and criminalization. Our report “Pandemic or not, we have the right to live” documents the experiences of transgender people in 15 countries in South, Southeast and East Asia, and the Pacific Islands during the Covid-19 pandemic. Discrimination against LGBTI people We are each protected against discrimination based on our sexual orientation, gender identity and/or expression and sex characteristics under international human rights law. However, in practice, authorities in many countries that have signed international treaties, committing them to protect human rights, continue to implement and introduce legislations that singles out and discriminates against individuals on the basis of their sexual orientation or gender identity and expression. There are 64 countries around the world which have laws that criminalize homosexuality, many of which can be traced back to European colonization. In some countries, such as Brunei, Iran, Mauritania, Saudi Arabia, Yemen, Uganda and in the northern states in Nigeria, people can be sentenced to the death penalty if they engage in consensual same-sex sexual acts. Discrimination goes beyond being criminally prosecuted for being an LGBTI person and can include limited access to healthcare, difficulty in securing employment, bullying or harassment in the workplace and much more. LGBTI identity and intersectionality Intersectionality is a term coined by black, feminist legal academic, Professor Kimberlé Crenshaw, and was first publicly explained in her 1989 essay ‘Demarginalizing the Intersection of Race and Sex.’ The term ‘intersectionality’ was originally used to describe the multiple forms of inequality and discrimination black women face in the USA but has now become an international marker for defining ways that different forms of oppression and discrimination intersect with each other. Many countries of the Global South may have their own knowledge and experiences of addressing intersecting oppression. Feminist academic Nivedita Menon gives the example of India – stating that there has been a long history of engaging with multiple, intersecting identities that can be traced back to the anti-imperialist struggle, without any reference to Crenshaw’s work. For example, an LGBTI person may experience discrimination because of their gender identity or sexual orientation, and oppression because of their race, class, caste, religion, ethnicity, (dis)ability, or age. In order to fight back against systems that oppress LGBTI people, we need to deconstruct all systems of oppression, including racism, imperialism, ableism, sexism, xenophobia, ageism or classism. Pride as a Protest What is Pride? While Pride is often perceived as a celebration it originally began as a riot against police brutality at the Stonewall Inn in New York City. On 28 June 1969, the Stonewall Inn was raided by the police, as it had been on many occasions before, due to laws which required a ‘man’ or a ‘woman’ to be wearing clothing items which ‘matched’ their gender on their state-issued ID. As the LGBTI community in the Stonewall Inn, primarily led by trans women of colour, fought back, police brutality increased amid six days of riots which was a galvanizing force for LGBTI activism in the USA. In many states around the world, Pride is still centrally and most importantly a protest which highlights, commemorates, and fights for the rights of LGBTI people. Pride is marked differently in countries across the world. Many communities organize parades, marches and concerts that bring LGBTI people, allies, and the public together. But in other places, pride is actively shut down by governments and law enforcement agencies, leading to security risks for those participating. While Pride has increasingly become one of the most visible modes of celebrating queer joy and resistance, LGBTI activism, protest and ways of coming together as a community have always existed across the world in different iterations. There are also several places in the world where Pride as a concept may not resonate with local LGBTI people, and they prefer to celebrate their identities in subtler, more locally relevant ways. Case Study: Harassment of LGBTI activists in Poland The atmosphere of hostility towards LGBTI people in Poland is getting progressively worse. Those who advocate for LGBTI rights face an immediate and hostile response from the state apparatus. Our report documents the stories of those who uphold LGBTI rights and the repression they face for their peaceful actions. Amnesty International research highlights examples of how Polish authorities not only fail to adequately protect LGBTI activists but have also targeted LGBTI people. People have faced prosecution just for writing in chalk or hanging a rainbow flag. What is Amnesty doing to promote LGBTI rights? Amnesty is committed to ending discrimination against LGBTI people around the world. We learn from the lived experiences of LGBTI people and make recommendations to governments and other influential leaders on how to improve laws. For example, our research on the rights of intersex people was one of the first of its kind from a human rights perspective and strongly influenced new laws in Denmark, Finland, Greece and Norway. Amnesty also helps activists around the world by producing resources on various issues that affect LGBTI people. This work takes many forms, from an advocacy toolkit for activists countering discrimination in Sub-Saharan Africa to the Body Politics series aimed at increasing awareness around the criminalization of sexuality and reproduction. There is still a lot of work to do and we endeavour to continue to push for the fulfilment of all the rights of LGBTI people, in close collaboration with partners, LGBTI groups and activists across the globe.

https://www.amnesty.org/en/what-we-do/discrimination/lgbti-rights/

Politics

en

Article body copy Dan Esposito, a chemical engineer at Columbia University in New York, places his newly assembled energy-generating apparatus under a halogen lamp. Filled with salt water, the device looks like a glass cooking pot with a black lid adorned with four small solar panels. He connects the panels’ wiring to electrodes submerged in the water and flips on the lamp. Almost immediately, little bubbles begin to form and float up around the electrodes, as if the water around them is boiling. Esposito’s device is no kitchen gadget, but a solar-powered tool to extract hydrogen from water. The glass pot is just a water container, but the buoyant black lid is a prototype hydrogen fuel rig. The actual device, which will be thousands of times the size of the prototype, could one day float on the ocean’s surface, converting solar energy into an electrical current that breaks water into oxygen and hydrogen. While still in its early stages, this technology may be the solution to the long-standing challenge of creating a reliable and affordable source of hydrogen gas. “So far, we only did it in lab settings,” says Esposito. “But it is a conceptual prototype.” Unlike carbon-based fossil fuels, which generate carbon dioxide as a byproduct, hydrogen gas is a zero-emission fuel. When it burns, all that’s left behind is water. According to the US Department of Energy, a hydrogen fuel cell combined with an electric motor is two to three times more efficient than a gasoline engine. But efficiently extracting hydrogen from naturally occurring compounds like methane or water has been a technological holy grail. Scientists have been trying to crack hydrogen from water for more than a century. A Scientific American article from 1868 mentions water electrolysis, along with wind power and other ideas, as fossil fuel alternatives. But electrolysis, in which an electrical current is passed through water, itself requires energy, and existing technology fails to extract the hydrogen at an economical cost. Plus, the separated atoms of hydrogen and oxygen will recombine if allowed—often violently. In the 20th century, scientists developed electrolysis devices for seawater that could separate hydrogen from water using fine membranes. But these contraptions were prone to clogging and biofouling. “Magnesium and calcium ions precipitate and clog the pores of the membranes, and the microbes and other life forms attach to them,” Esposito explains. “You can purify them, but it adds cost.” To solve this problem, Esposito and his team have created a first of its kind membrane-free hydrogen rig. In their design, the reactive sides of the electrodes, which do the actual work of making hydrogen and oxygen, face away from each other. As the electrical charge is applied and the water breakdown reaction occurs, hydrogen forms at the negative electrode, while oxygen congregates at the positive one, with both gasses naturally separated from each other. This arrangement keeps the hydrogen and oxygen gasses far enough apart to prevent them from recombining into water molecules. Instead, the molecules float up along the vertical electrodes, forming bigger bubbles as they rise. At the top, the hydrogen is collected into a container while the oxygen is vented into the atmosphere—possibly adding a whiff of fresh air to Esposito’s basement lab. Esposito says commercial seawater hydrogen production is still far on the horizon, but once the technology matures, the floating rigs would function somewhat similarly to oil rigs, without the fear of polluting spills. If operating close to shore, the hydrogen could be brought to land in pipes. If the rig is in the deep sea, the gas would have to be pumped into tankers. Another possibility, Esposito says, is to use blimps or air balloons to deliver the gas, capitalizing on hydrogen’s natural buoyancy. If we wanted to use offshore hydrogen production to replace all the oil used in the world today, the floating rigs would have to cover only a tiny fraction of the world’s ocean—about 162,000 square kilometers, Esposito says. That’s slightly smaller than Florida, and bigger than New York State—or about 0.032 percent of our globe’s surface. “That’s all you need to power the planet with seawater and sun,” Esposito says.

https://www.hakaimagazine.com/news/turning-water-into-fuel/

Religion

en

The word Sniper was derived from a term used by British soldiers stationed in India in the 1770s. The troops would hunt the Snipe, a small and nimble bird considered extremely challenging to shoot. So, those who were successful in hunting the bird were nicknamed, Snipers. Although several armies had special marksmen, it was only during WW1 when the German Army exploited the proficiencies of the Sniper by equipping their sharpshooters with scoped rifles. Soon after discovering the German scopes, the British Army started setting up specialized sniper schools. However, after basic sniping training, the British Sniper saw intermittent action with little skills development. It was only in 2000 when interest was renewed in sniping and the Bn Commanders were compelled to deploy snipers in the field. They are now an established part of a Bnâs Order of Battle. Basic sniper training has not evolved much since WW2 although the sniperâs weapons and optics have. Training is conducted over a minimum six-week period at the Bn level. The training is based on a WW1 technique the instructors were first trained as snipers who would then train their snipers. During the last week of training, called Badge test week, all snipers have to pass a basic skills test. The basic training focuses on Seven Basic Sniper Skills that all sniper students are assessed on: This consists of developing a comprehensive understanding of the sniperâs goal and tasks, intimately knowing the weapon system, interpreting wind and range calculations, and much more. Unfortunately, instructors give too much attention to History and not the expertise of the job. Snipers are individually assessed on a written test that requires coming up with solutions for range and wind problems. Map Reading and Air Photography Snipers should be able to create a plan of action and navigate around an operational area, so they need to learn how to navigate, how to pin-point features from a map, and interpret and accurately grid and scale air photographs. The sniper student is placed in an unknown location where he has to find his position from an aerial photo. Following this, the sniper has to identify and solve six problems on the aerial image and six problems on the map. Then at night, the student has to navigate over a distance of 8km carrying a weight of 40lbs and his weapon in 1hr 30 mins. Learning methods of concealment allow snipers to remain undetected so as to have an advantage before engaging with the enemy. Snipers are taught to become experts in camouflage. Several tests are conducted repetitively, which include the sniper being concealed for 20 minutes at a range of 150 â 300m from two trained observers. Snipers need to stay hidden after firing a blank round at the observers. Being able to survey and recall every detail is a key skill in sniping. Snipers are trained to develop their acute attention to detail that allows them to locate any presence of a target or any perceived threat and accurately relay this information back to their Bn. Snipers are tested to locate 10 military objects between 5 â 300m in 30 minutes using 7x42mm British GS binoculars and a Leupold 12-40 variable with mil-dot reticule spotting scope. After identifying them, they have to illustrate and describe the objects on a panoramic sketch completed within 10 minutes. Points are scored on different factors such as accuracy, neatness, and correct perspective. The art of stalking, mobility, route selection, and determining the best firing position are critical components of the sniperâs training. While remaining undetected, a sniper needs to plan and execute the most effective route to the best firing position, take out the target and then withdraw. Snipers have to traverse unnoticed over a distance of up to 2 km to locate a two-man op who are partially concealed. Then the sniper has to move to within 150-300m from this target, fire two blank rounds and remain unseen while extricating from the firing position. Snipers are training in several techniques to judge distance correctly so they can set up for an accurate shot. Without a scope or binoculars, the Sniper has to correctly evaluate 8 out of 10 unknown distances and be within 15% of the correct range to pass. Conventional and unconventional fire positions are also included in sniper training tests to increase the chance of a kill with the first round. The Armyâs first criteria for a sniper is to get a first-round kill at a man-sized target from a distance of 300m and 900m. Snipers begin at the 900m range and work down to 300m. The challenging aspect is having to stay in conventional kneeling and sitting positions on which snipers are scored. The reason these positions are emphasized is because the prone position doesnât work for taking the shot. Another part of the shoot test is completed at night using the CWS, Common Weapon Sight, 4x magnification. The maximum range of a night shoot is 300m because of the ambient light affecting the scope quality. As an aside, when using the Simrad on the .338, itâs possible to achieve hits at 600m with no ambient light. Sniper students are assessed individually to ensure each trainee is competent and proficient under extreme conditions and worst-case scenarios including operating alone after losing a partner. To qualify as a sniper, 75% mastery must be achieved to pass every skill and discipline required. Re-tests are permitted but if students fail one part, they fail the entire test. Another two weeks of re-training are required before attempting to take the test for the final time. After the basic sniper course is completed, continuation training starts where snipers learn to work in pairs and operate effectively in special warfare operations. Snipers never stop developing their skills and they need to master a range of expertise in communications, First Aid, and operational procedures. Snipers train hard and they train for war.

http://www.snipercountry.com/articles/britishsnipertraining.asp

Politics

en

When the Roman Empire was at its height, the emperor's reach stretched from the rain-sodden hills of northern England to the parched deserts of Saudi Arabia. But when did it start to go wrong? Why did Rome fall? The answer, it turns out, is not straightforward. Some argue the sacking of Rome in A.D. 410 by the Visigoths is as good a marker as any for the end, while others say it wasn't until the Middle Ages that the empire's tenure was finally concluded. Largely speaking, it depends on which ancient Rome we're talking about. In A.D. 395 the Roman Empire was split in two, ever after separately administered as the Western Roman Empire with Rome as its capital and the Byzantine, Eastern Roman Empire with Constantinople (modern-day Istanbul) as its capital, according to HistoryHit, an online-only history channel. "We tend to think of the Byzantines as this separate people and state from the Romans, but they called themselves "Romanoi" and saw themselves as citizens of a Roman government," said Kristina Sessa, associate professor of history at The Ohio State University. The fates of these two jurisdictions inevitably diverged. The Western Roman Empire fragmented as various provinces suffered economic and political disrepair within decades of the split. The Eastern Roman Empire was meanwhile comparatively prosperous for several centuries. "You need to distinguish these different regional trajectories," Sessa told Live Science. Related: Deformed 'alien' skulls offer clues about life during the Roman Empire's collapse The West crumbled because of a creeping and steady loss of centralized control, sometimes due to incursions by non-Roman tribes and occasionally instigated by traitors from within the Roman establishment. It's hard to mark the precise moment when Rome lost control over a given territory, because unlike the decolonization of imperial empires in the 20th century, it was rare to make or sign documents and declarations of independence. There were however, landmark battles — between A.D. 460 and A.D. 480, the Visigoths had managed to take substantial parts of what is now France. But still, the decline of Western Rome was a fairly gradual, nebulous process wherein colonies, one by one, were no longer realistically under the sway of an emperor in Rome. Instead, autonomous local leaders were increasingly in charge. "In some cases, these were Roman usurpers," who used coups to take power, said Sessa. In other cases, these autonomous regions were headed by so-called barbarian regimes. But the barbarians — such as the Franks, Saxons and Vandals — weren't simply raiders from foreign lands chipping away at a weaker Rome. That's selling those groups short. "That map with all the arrows of invaders coming into the empire from beyond and taking it over, which commonly appears in textbooks, is flat out wrong," said Sessa. Many of the barbarians were coalitions of soldiers that had been working with and for the Roman Empires for several generations. Sign up for the Live Science daily newsletter now Get the world’s most fascinating discoveries delivered straight to your inbox. "They had been living and working inside the Roman Empire, on behalf of the Roman Empire, for decades if not centuries," said Sessa. That gave the barbarians the opportunity to learn Roman tactics and expertise, which they then applied against the empire, resulting in a series of withering military defeats for the Romans. "The Roman frontier wasn't a border in the modern sense of the nation state. It was simply a region of diminishing Roman influence where people moved freely around," she said. In that context, it's easy to see how the frontier could shrink over time. "Without a central state, taxes were no longer regularly collected in most areas of the West, which obviously impacted the military," explained Sessa. Dwindling tax revenue made it increasingly tough for Rome to muster enough legions to reclaim lands the barbarians had taken. While the Roman Empire in Western Europe was going to hell in a handbasket, the Eastern Romans carried on. "The East, by comparison, remained consolidated and focused around the city of Constantinople," said Sessa. Its demise, however, was very much at the hands of an outside invading force. "It was over the course of the seventh and eighth centuries that the Eastern Empire began to undergo a similar political fragmentation, though in this case we are talking about external armies and regimes; the Persians, the Slavs and the Arabs," she added. It wasn't until 1453, when the Ottomans sacked Constantinople, that we can truly say the Roman Empire ended. Originally published on Live Science. Benjamin is a freelance science journalist with nearly a decade of experience, based in Australia. His writing has featured in Live Science, Scientific American, Discover Magazine, Associated Press, USA Today, Wired, Engadget, Chemical & Engineering News, among others. Benjamin has a bachelor's degree in biology from Imperial College, London, and a master's degree in science journalism from New York University along with an advanced certificate in science, health and environmental reporting.

https://www.livescience.com/why-did-rome-fall.html

Culture

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Calling all chocolate lovers and industry insiders! Have you ever wondered about the current cost of cocoa in Ghana? Well, look no further because we’re diving into the nitty-gritty details of this essential ingredient. From fluctuating prices to market trends, we’re breaking down how much a bag of cocoa is going for right now. So grab your favorite sweet treat and join us as we uncover the delicious world of cocoa pricing in Ghana. Introduction: Explanation of the importance of cocoa in Ghana’s economy and the significance of understanding its current cost Introduction: Explanation of the Importance of Cocoa in Ghana’s Economy and the Significance of Understanding its Current Cost Cocoa has long been a vital part of Ghana’s economy, playing a significant role in shaping the country’s history and development. It is estimated that cocoa accounts for about 8% of Ghana’s Gross Domestic Product (GDP) and employs over 800,000 farmers across the country. The importance of cocoa to Ghana cannot be overstated, as it is not only a major source of income but also provides livelihoods for many rural communities. Historically, cocoa was first introduced to Ghana by Tetteh Quarshie in 1879, and since then, it has become one of the country’s main export commodities. In fact, cocoa has been referred to as ‘the golden crop’ due to its economic significance. Today, Ghana is recognized as one of the top producers and exporters of cocoa in the world, with an average production rate of around 900 thousand metric tons per year. The significance of understanding the current cost of cocoa in Ghana cannot be overlooked. For starters, the price fluctuations can have a direct impact on both farmers and consumers. With over 70% of cocoa farming done by small-scale farmers who are heavily dependent on this crop for their livelihoods, any changes in prices can greatly affect their incomes. Similarly, consumers may experience fluctuations in prices for chocolate products if there are changes in the cost of cocoa. Moreover, knowing the current cost helps stakeholders make informed decisions about investments and policies related to cocoa production and trade. This includes government agencies responsible for regulating pricing policies and providing support to farmers through subsidies or other incentives. Additionally, understanding how much a bag costs currently enables us to assess how sustainable cocoa production is in Ghana. With increasing pressure from climate change and environmental degradation affecting crop yields worldwide, it is crucial to monitor how much it costs to produce each bag to ensure the industry’s sustainability. Cocoa is an integral part of Ghana’s economy and understanding its current cost is essential for various reasons. From its significant contribution to the country’s GDP to providing livelihoods for thousands of farmers and influencing pricing policies, it is clear that cocoa plays a vital role in Ghana’s economic landscape. Therefore, keeping track of the current cost of cocoa is crucial in ensuring a sustainable future for both the industry and the people involved in its production. Historical Context: Brief overview of cocoa production and pricing in Ghana over the years Cocoa has been a vital part of Ghana’s economy for over a century. The country is the second-largest producer of cocoa in the world, accounting for approximately 20% of global production. Cocoa production and pricing have played a significant role in shaping Ghana’s economic history, with several changes occurring over the years. The cultivation of cocoa in Ghana can be traced back to the late 19th century when it was introduced by Tetteh Quarshie, a Ghanaian farmer. Initially, cocoa was grown on small family farms and used as a means of trade. However, with the expansion of European demand for chocolate during World War I, cocoa production became a profitable venture. In the early 1920s, cocoa prices skyrocketed due to high demand and limited supply. This led to an influx of farmers into the industry, resulting in increased production and significant profits for Ghanaian farmers. By 1928, Ghana had become the leading exporter of cocoa beans globally. However, this boom did not last long as prices began to decline in the 1930s due to overproduction and competition from other countries such as Nigeria and Brazil. This led to a severe economic crisis in Ghana as many farmers struggled to make ends meet. To address this issue, the government established the Cocoa Marketing Board (CMB) in 1947. The CMB was responsible for regulating cocoa production and prices through its monopoly on export sales. This move stabilized prices and provided security for farmers by ensuring that they received fair payment for their produce. In subsequent decades, global events such as wars and political instability continued to affect cocoa prices in Ghana. For instance, during World War II, there was an increase in demand for cocoa by Allied forces which drove up prices again. However, after independence from British colonial rule in 1957, political instability resulted in fluctuating prices once more. In recent years, efforts have been made by the government and international organizations to improve cocoa production and pricing in Ghana. In 2011, the Ghana Cocoa Board (COCOBOD) was established to replace the CMB, with a focus on sustainable cocoa production and fair prices for farmers. Currently, one bag of cocoa in Ghana is sold for an average of $400-$450. This price is subject to change depending on global demand and supply, as well as local factors such as weather conditions and government policies. Cocoa production and pricing have played a significant role in shaping Ghana’s economic history. Despite challenges faced over the years, efforts are continuously being made to ensure that cocoa remains a vital part of Ghana’s economy while providing fair compensation for farmers. Factors Affecting Cocoa Prices: Discussion on the various factors that impact the cost of cocoa, such as global demand, weather conditions, and government policies Cocoa is a vital crop for many countries, especially in West Africa where it is the main source of income for millions of farmers. Ghana, being the second-largest producer of cocoa in the world, heavily relies on this commodity for its economy. However, the price of cocoa has been fluctuating over recent years, causing concerns among cocoa farmers and other stakeholders in the industry. There are several factors that affect cocoa prices globally, including global demand, weather conditions, and government policies. Understanding these factors can help shed light on why cocoa prices have been volatile and provide insights into future price trends. One of the primary drivers of cocoa prices is global demand. Cocoa is used to produce chocolate, which is a popular and highly consumed product worldwide. The higher the demand for chocolate, the more pressure there will be on cocoa supply to meet this demand. Therefore, when there is a surge in global demand for chocolate or other products containing cocoa, it leads to an increase in cocoa prices as producers try to keep up with consumer demands. Weather conditions also play a crucial role in determining cocoa prices. Cocoa trees require specific environmental conditions to thrive and produce high-quality beans. Extreme weather events such as droughts or floods can significantly impact the production of cocoa and lead to lower yields. This decrease in supply causes an upward pressure on prices as buyers compete for limited quantities. Additionally, pests and diseases can also affect weather conditions’ impact on cocoa prices by damaging crops and reducing output further. For example, the outbreak of fungal diseases like black pod disease has caused significant losses for Ghanaian farmers over recent years. Another critical factor affecting cocoa prices is government policies both locally and internationally. Government interventions such as subsidies or taxes can directly influence production costs and ultimately impact market prices. For instance, if a government decides to incentivize farmers by providing subsidies on farming inputs like fertilizers or pesticides, it can lead to higher production levels which may result in downward pressure on prices. On the other hand, if there are export restrictions or taxes imposed by governments, it can limit the supply of cocoa and push prices up. Cocoa prices are heavily influenced by various factors such as global demand, weather conditions, and government policies. As a result, these factors must be carefully monitored to understand current market trends and predict future price movements accurately. This knowledge is crucial for cocoa farmers in Ghana and other producing countries to make informed decisions about their crops’ production and pricing strategies. Current Market Situation: Analysis of the current state of cocoa prices in Ghana, including recent fluctuations and trends The cocoa industry in Ghana has long been a vital component of the country’s economy, with cocoa beans being one of its top export products. As such, the fluctuation and trends in cocoa prices have a significant impact on the overall economic situation in Ghana. Currently, Ghana is one of the leading producers of cocoa beans globally, accounting for approximately 20% of the world’s total production. However, despite this high production rate, recent years have seen fluctuations in cocoa prices that have left farmers struggling to make ends meet. One of the main factors affecting cocoa prices in Ghana is global demand. The demand for chocolate and other cocoa-based products is heavily influenced by consumer preferences and economic conditions in major importing countries such as the United States and Europe. In recent years, there has been an increase in demand for dark chocolate, which uses a higher percentage of cocoa compared to milk chocolate. This shift in consumer preference has led to an increase in global demand for cocoa from Ghana. However, while demand has increased, there have also been several challenges faced by Ghanaian cocoa farmers that have impacted supply and subsequently affected prices. One such challenge is climate change, which has led to unpredictable weather patterns and reduced crop yields. This has resulted in a decrease in supply and thus contributed to price fluctuations. In addition to climate change, another factor contributing to price fluctuations is currency exchange rates. Cocoa is traded globally using US dollars as the standard currency. Therefore any changes or instability in exchange rates between currencies can greatly impact the final price paid to farmers by local buyers. Additionally, political instability and government policies can also affect cocoa prices significantly. For instance, during elections or times of civil unrests, there tends to be a decrease in exports due to disruption of transportation routes or even outright bans on exports imposed by governments seeking to stabilize local food supplies. Despite these challenges and fluctuations, it should be noted that there have been some positive developments within Ghana’s cocoa sector. The government has implemented policies to support farmers and increase production, such as the Cocoa Board’s initiatives to distribute high-yield seedlings and provide training for farmers. While cocoa prices in Ghana have experienced fluctuations and challenges in recent years, there is still potential for growth and stability in the industry. It is crucial for all stakeholders to work together towards sustainable solutions that can ensure fair compensation for farmers and a stable supply of cocoa for global demand. Challenges Faced by Cocoa

https://smsposition.com/2024/09/14/caf-bans-ghanas-baba-yara-stadium-and-cape-coast-stadium-for-international-matches/The

Sports

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A suddenly cold climate about 5,500 years ago coincided with the advent of ancient Chinese civilization, implying some relationship between the two events, Chinese scientists said Monday. About 5,500 years ago, a global climate change occurred and the average temperature dropped by two to three degrees centigrade due to solar activity and the orbit of the earth, geologist Liu Dongsheng told Xinhua. Liu, an academician of the Chinese Academy of Sciences, said the glaciers in the western part of China advanced forward during that period and the development of ancient soil of the Loess Plateau in northwest China stopped, while the cold resistant spruce prospered in regions such as today's Beijing. More and more archaeological discoveries seem to indicate there was also a social change in China during that time. The poor and the rich were differentiated in human society, and people were divided into different social strata. Archaeologists have found ancient settlement centers and tombs of aristocrats in the relics of that period. Weapons became popular funeral objects, which means that wars were common at that time. And then castles appeared. All of these are deemed as signs of emerging civilization, said archaeologists. Wu Wenxiang, a scholar with the Urban Environment Department of Peking University, explained that the sudden change of climate caused a sharp decrease of food and intensified the conflict between population and resources. As a result, the ancient Chinese migrated from outer areas to the center regions, from high land to low altitude places which were more comfortable to live in, said Wu. During the process of scrambling for resources, the concept of private property appeared, and people's praying for favorable weather led to the development of religion, Wu said. But the overall environment was still suitable for human development. The climate played an important role in human social development, but it was not a determinative factor, said Wu. Scientists have found that the climate change did not always push forward the development of civilization, but sometimes caused disasters. The climate became remarkably cold again about 4,000 years ago, which many foreign scholars believe is the main reason of the collapse of the ancient civilizations in Egypt, Indus and the Mesopotamian. China has many legends about floods during that period. Chinese archaeologist Yu Weichao attributed the decline of the Liangzhu and Longshan cultures on the lower reaches of the Yangtze and Yellow rivers to serious floods about 4,000 years ago. "The floods turned the lower reaches of the Yangtze and Yellow rivers, especially the Yangtze delta, into boundless water. Most of the facilities of the formerly prosperous Longshan and Liangzhu cultures were suddenly destroyed when their farmland was inundated," said Yu. He added that production stopped, along with the development of civilization. Wu Wenxiang said that when the Longshan and Liangzhu cultures were declining, the Xia Culture was rising in central China during the climate change, initiating China's first dynasty, Xia (about 2070-1600 BC). More studies are needed to explain why, Wu added. The relationship between climate change and the evolution of civilization has drawn the attention of many scientists, who presume that the fluctuation of climate is favorable for the survival of the fittest. Chinese archaeologists and scientists have begun a project to find the origin of ancient Chinese civilization. They listed environmental change and civilization development as an important research subject. (Xinhua News Agency February 11, 2003)

http://www.china.org.cn/english/2003/Feb/55500.htm

Culture

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History of Marches and Mass Actions Parades, pickets, demonstrations, marches, rallies, protests. No matter what they are called, perhaps the single most powerful, peaceful way to bring about social change is for people to stand together publicly on behalf of an important cause. For many women, a mass action like NOW’s 2004 March for Women’s Lives is an unprecedented opportunity to speak out and do grassroots organizing, a celebration of strength and unity, and a defining moment in their lives. “Many women I talk with say they got hooked on being an activist the moment they stepped off a bus and into a crowd of hundreds of thousands of other feminists,” said former NOW President Patricia Ireland. The history of mass political actions organized by U.S. women dates back to the turn of the century. As early as 1903, labor reformer Mary Harris “Mother” Jones organized children working in factories to parade in front of city hall in Kensington, Pennsylvania, with their maimed fingers and hands held high in the air. Although the movement for women’s right to vote began in the latter half of the 19th century, evolving out of women’s activism in and frustration with the abolition (anti-slavery) movement, the first mass demonstrations for suffrage weren’t held until 1911. They were organized by suffragist leader Alice Paul, who had been impressed by the tactics of the British suffrage movement while she was traveling in England. A suffrage parade in 1913 on the eve of President Wilson’s inauguration was marred by violence, but also increased the integration of the movement. Members of the Black sorority Delta Sigma Theta marched as a delegation, while Black journalist and anti-lynching activist Ida B. Wells marched side-by-side with white women from Illinois. In 1916 and 1917 suffragists picketed the White House, with one silent picket leading to the arrest of 218 women from 26 states. The women were jailed and force-fed at the Occoquan workhouse, a prison in Virginia, and their mistreatment led to public outrage and helped with the campaign. The 19th amendment guaranteeing women the right to vote passed Congress in 1919 and was ratified in 1920. During those early years, and throughout the 20th century, women of color were leaders of mass actions on behalf of many causes. In 1914 and 1915, Black leftist Lucy Parsons led mass demonstrations of homeless and unemployed people in San Francisco and Chicago. In 1917, Black women in white dresses were prominent in the front lines of a 15,000-person march in New York protesting lynchings and racial discrimination. In the latter part of that century, Latinas like Delores Huerta, who co-founded the United Farm Workers Union with Cesar Chavez, organized and marched on behalf of improved working conditions. With a single carefully-planned act of protest, refusing to give up her seat on a bus, NAACP activist Rosa Parks gave new vigor to the civil rights movement in the early 1960s. Black women were among the protesters arrested during a May 1963 civil rights march on Birmingham, Alabama, and were key organizers across the country for the 1963 civil rights March on Washington that featured Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr.’s “I Have A Dream” speech. Many young women joined in Vietnam era student marches and protests that drew record crowds to Washington in 1969 and 1971. But something was missing for women in the radical student movement and many of the other movements of the 1960s. “Many of our earliest activists were women who felt squeezed out of leadership in these movements, and were drawn to possibilities for them in the women’s movement,” says Ireland. And the possibilities were endless, with the energetic new movement using creativity, daring and sometimes both the costumes and techniques of the suffragists. In perhaps the first picket ever by NOW members, activists in August 1967 dressed in vintage clothing to protest the old-fashioned policies of The New York Times, which then segregated help-wanted ads by gender. In December of the same year, NOW held its first national day of demonstrations in five cities, targeting the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission for issuing guidelines approving of the ads. In September 1968, New York NOW members and other women’s liberation activists picketed the Miss America pageant in Atlantic City, New Jersey, and though no bras were actually burned that day (some were thrown into a trash can), this is the event from which the myth of the bra burners evolved. On August 26, 1970, on the 50th anniversary of women’s suffrage, NOW activists organized a “Women’s Strike for Equality.” Approximately 50,000 women marched in New York and another 100,000 women participated in demonstrations and rallies in 90 cities, 42 states. In 1973, NOW activists organized “Take Back the Night” marches and vigils around the country, which protested sexual assault and other violence against women, and those events continue to this day on many campuses and in many communities. Marches on behalf of the Equal Rights Amendment began in May 1976, when NOW brought 16,000 supporters to Springfield, Illinois, to urge ratification by the Illinois legislature, many of them arriving from the East Coast on the ERA Freedom Train. In August 1977, 4,000 women and men marched down Pennsylvania Avenue to demand that President Carter take a more active role in efforts to ratify the ERA. Days later, activists donned jogging shoes for the first of what became five annual ERA walk-a-thons that together raised over $1.7 million for the ratification campaign. The next year NOW organized over 100,000 people to march on Washington in 95-degree heat, in a sea of purple, gold and white banners (reflecting the suffragist colors), to press for an extension of the time limit on ratifying the ERA. Having won the extension, NOW activists organized a record 90,000 people to march on Chicago, again urging Illinois’ ratification, in the 1980 Mother’s Day March for ERA. After the defeat of the ERA in 1982, NOW did not organize another major march on women’s rights until the East Coast/West Coast March for Women’s Equality/Women’s Lives in March 1986, when over 120,000 women and men demonstrated in Washington, D.C., and the following weekend in driving rain in Los Angeles, against the impending threat to abortion rights. During the interim, NOW was a major organizer of the 1983 March for Peace, Justice and Equality — the March for the Dream, a celebration of the 20th anniversary of the 1963 Martin Luther King march, as we have been for each of the subsequent anniversary marches in 1988, 1993 and 2003. The threat to reproductive rights again became palpable in 1989, with Missouri’s anti-abortion laws pending before the Supreme Court, and the Bush administration siding with abortion foes, explicitly urging reversal of Roe v. Wade. NOW’s April 1989 March for Women’s Lives drew crowds that had not been seen in Washington since the Vietnam protests of 1969 and 1971. After organizing a recording-breaking crowd of 600,000 in April, we followed up with a rally of 350,000 that fall — the November, 1989 “Mobilize for Women’s Lives” at the Lincoln memorial — then broke our own record by bringing 750,000 abortion rights supporters for a massive April 1992 March for Women’s Lives as another threatening case, Casey v. Planned Parenthood, was pending in the Supreme Court. These mass marches forced the issue of abortion rights into the forefront of political debate going into the 1992 elections and provided strong, new networks of activists and contributors. Lesbian and gay rights marches on Washington in 1979, 1987 and 1993 and in New York in 1994, each drew crowds from hundreds of thousands to over 1 million, and reflected the growing power of that movement. The largest to date was the Millennium March in 2000. In 1995, more than 200,000 people gathered in Washington, D.C., on April 9 for the Rally for Women’s Lives, the first and largest mass action to stop violence against women. Organized by NOW and endorsed by a record 702 national and local groups, the rally coincided with NOW Foundation’s Young Feminist Conference, brought in many new activists, especially young activists from more than 200 college campuses. 1995’s Million Man March in Washington, which focused on African American men, was followed in 1997 by a Million Woman March, in which African American women filled the streets of Philadelphia with demands of justice and equality. NOW marched again on April 14, 1996, when over 30,000 women and men gathered in San Francisco to Fight the Radical Right. The march, organized by NOW, united activists from a range of causes and organizations to actively support affirmative action; economic justice; abortion rights and reproductive freedom; civil rights for people of color; lesbian, gay and bisexual rights and efforts to end violence against women. Over 140 countries around the world participated in the October 2000 World March of Women, demanding an end to poverty and violence, and NOW was the U.S. organizer of the march in Washington, D.C. Over 20,000 women and men came from across the country, including many who joined us from other countries, and NOW Foundation organized the Women’s International Symposium on Health (WISH) Conference to coincide with the World March. In 2001, after the elevation of George W. Bush by the Supreme Court decision in Bush v. Gore, NOW organized a “Zap Action for Women’s Lives,” which brought 30,000 marchers to the Capitol for a rally and march to draw attention to Bush’s threat to women’s reproductive rights and to focus public attention on the danger of Bush stacking the federal courts. The April 25, 2004, March for Women’s Lives drew a record 1.15 million people to Washington, D.C., to protect and advance access to a full range of reproductive health care options, including abortion, birth control and emergency contraception. The such march that was not organized solely by NOW, this massive event was coordinated by an unprecedented coalition of women’s rights and social justice groups — led initially by six core groups: NOW, Black Women’s Health Imperative, Feminist Majority, NARAL, National Latina Institute for Reproductive Health, and Planned Parenthood, with the ACLU joining the leadership in the final months. Activists came from all parts of the country, angered by the anti-woman policies imposed by President Bush, making the 2004 March for Women’s Lives was the largest protest in U.S. history. Marches build and rejuvenate the various movements for women’s rights by sending a message to those in power, and by forever changing the lives of participants. “When women work to mobilize and fund a group of local participants for a big event like our March for Women’s Lives, they are often transformed from enthusiastic but inexperienced activists into community leaders,” said Ireland. “I’ve seen it happen over and over again. We count on it. The other transformation I have seen hits everyone from the most seasoned pioneer activist to the college sophomore. Standing side by side with a sea of kindred spirits, each of us finds renewed strength to wage the struggle for women’s equality.”

https://now.org/about/history/history-of-marches-and-mass-actions/

Politics

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Is Tithing Still Valid Today? Tithing, the giving of “a tenth” of one’s income to God, is a Bible practice that originated from the Old Testament of the Bible with the Patriarch Abraham. It was first mentioned in Genesis 14: 18-20. Here, Abraham for the first time, paid tithe to Melchizedek described as “the King of Salem and Priest of the Most High God” who brought him bread and wine and blessed him after his victory over a group of kings. Tithe paying as part of religious practice has being controversial in Christendom with some denominations dismissing it as an Old Testament law that has no place in the New Testament. However, there are many Christians who believe it as part of the New Testament worship. Before we proceed to establish whether tithing remains valid in the New Testament or not, let us first examine both its background and its various types as was practised back in the Old Testament. As already mentioned, tithing originated under a grace dispensation. In other words, it did not come to Father Abraham as a law when he gave one tenth of his spoils of war to Melchizedek: For this Melchisedec, king of Salem, priest of the most high God, who met Abraham returning from the slaughter of the kings, and blessed him. To whom also Abraham gave a tenth part of all; first being by interpretation King of righteousness, and after that also King of Salem, which is, King of peace. It is common knowledge with those familiar with the scripture that the law came by Moses. Therefore, the commandment to give “one tenth” as issued by God through Moses was a later development that came with specifications as to how it was to be observed. Under the law, the Israelites were commanded to give a tenth of their crops and livestock to the Levites, who were the priests and assistants in the Tabernacle and later in the Temple. But there were several different types of tithes commanded to be given. The first type of tithe was known as the “Levitical (priestly) tithe” or the “sacred tithe” (Num. 18:21-24). It was given to the Levites, who were the tribe of Israel responsible for the maintenance and service of the Tabernacle (and later the Temple). This tithe was used to support the priests and Levites, who did not have an inheritance in the land like the other tribes of Israel. The second was the “festival tithe” (Deut. 14: 22-27) which was set aside for the purpose of supporting the celebrations and festivals held at the Temple in Jerusalem. This tithe was to be used to buy food and drinks for the celebration, and to support the poor and disadvantaged who came to the festivals. In other words, it was set aside for the good of man, a kind of a social feasting or vacation with a religious purpose such as a camp meeting of today. The third type of tithe was known as the “poor tithe” or the “widow’s tithe” (Deut. 14: 28-29) and was set aside every three years to support the poor and disadvantaged in the community. It was for the benefit of the Levites, strangers, the poor and the widow. This tithe was a kind of community project that everyone was expected to participate in. Summarily put, the Levitical or sacred tithe was for the honour of God as it was consecrated for the furthering of the work of the ministry and therefore valid for all believers. The festival tithe was for the good of man i.e. for man’s social benefit while that of the poor or widow was designed for the good a man’s neighbour. These tithes were prescribed under the Mosaic Law that governed the Israelites. As earlier stated, the concept of tithing is still practised by some religious communities today, but some have rejected it as an Old Testament practice that is no longer valid in the New Testament. Their position is hinged on the argument that a demand for tithing is not clearly stated in the New Testament. The truth however is that tithing is as valid in the New Testament as it was back in the Old for a number of reasons. The first is that tithing predated the Mosaic Law. It began not as an injunction, but as an act of faith and worship. This was why Abraham, moved by personal revelation of what he needed to do when he met Melchizedek, gave him the tithe of all that he had. Abraham, through his action, recognized Melchizedek’s priesthood which would later become a type of the priesthood of Christ. Here lies the difference between law and grace i.e. tithing under the law and tithing as part of worship under grace. When Jacob (the grandson of Abraham) fled from his brother Esau, he rested at a place he later named Bethel where he slept and had a dream of angels descending and ascending into heaven and the voice of God spoke to him saying, I am the Lord God of Abraham thy father, and the God of Isaac: the land whereon thou liest, to thee will I give it, and to thy seed (Gen. 28:14). Jacob in turn made a vow to God, “of all that thou shalt give me I will surely give the tenth unto thee” (v.22). We never saw where Jacob fulfilled that vow personally but his descendants who later inherited the land of promise, did give tithe under the Mosaic law. Now, after the dispensation of law, we are now back to the grace era under which Abraham paid tithe to Melchizedek and the scriptures well establish the fact that the priesthood of Melchizedek continues in Christ. In Psalms 120:4 and Hebrews 7:17, we read, Thou art a priest for ever after the order of Melchizedek. This makes the giving of tithe valid as it was when Abraham gave it as an act of worship. Today, the change from the Aaronic (Levitical) priesthood to what is now the Melchizedek (Messianic) priesthood, does not invalidate tithing. Before the era of Mosaic Law came into being, Abraham paid tithe to the Priest-King Melchizedek; then under the Mosaic law, Israelites paid prescribed tithes for religious and charitable causes (priests, Levites, widows and the poor) and in the New Testament, another grace dispensation, the believer is expected as a matter of faith and worship following the footsteps of Abraham, to give tithes and offerings for the benefit of ministers of the Gospel of Jesus Christ and the work of the ministry. Apostle Paul said, If we have sown unto you spiritual things, is it a great thing if we shall reap your carnal things? Do ye not know that they which minister about holy things live of the things of the temple? and they which wait at the altar are partakers with the altar? Even so hath the Lord ordained that they which preach the gospel should live of the gospel (1Cor. 9:11,13,14). For the scripture saith, thou shalt not muzzle the ox that treadeth out the corn. And, The is worthy of his reward (1Tim. 5:18). One may question if the above scriptures expressly speak about tithes? Maybe not, but hear what the Lord Jesus himself said in respect of tithing in the New Testament: Woe to you, scribes and Pharisees, hypocrites! For you tithe mint and dill and cumin, and have neglected the weightier matters of the law: justice and mercy and faithfulness. These you ought to have done, without neglecting the others (Matthew 23:23). It is clear from this scripture that Jesus did not denounce tithing but rather he endorsed it even with minor commodities such as “mint, dill and cumin”. But he did not fail to point out what he called, “the weightier matters of the law “justice”, “mercy” and “faith” which the Pharisees were neglecting while meticulously paying their tithes. We should note that Jesus pointedly said “These you ought to have done” i.e. they ought to pay their tithes! but without ignoring justice, mercy and faith. Now if the New Testament believer is required to pay tithe then the question will be what kind of tithe will that be? Is it the Levitical (priestly) tithe, the tithe of feasts or the tithe for the poor or widows? Or will it be a combination of the three, prescribed under the Mosaic Law? The answer is simple. Since we are no longer under the Mosaic Law, we should simply do what Abraham the Father of faith did. He gave tithe to Melchizedek the Priest and King of Salem after his victory over a group of kings. Therefore, we too should give our tithes and offerings and all, to Christ our High Priest and King of peace and righteousness who has given us the bread of life (His body) and wine (his blood) which he shed for us, and for the victory we have gotten over sin, Satan and his coalition of demons.

https://calvarymessage.com/2023/01/07/is-tithing-still-valid-today/

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Homeostasis-Definition, Objectives, Examples, Importance, and Levels of Homeostasis What is Homeostasis? In Biology, protection of the internal environment from the harms of the fluctuation in the external environment is called homeostasis. Homeostasis In Anatomy In anatomy, homeostasis is important because it ensures that the body’s cells and tissues have the conditions they need to function properly. For example, homeostasis maintains a constant body temperature, blood sugar level, and water balance. These are all essential for cell survival and function. Homeostasis In Physiology In physiology, homeostasis is important because it allows the body to function properly. Without homeostasis, the body would not be able to maintain a constant temperature, blood pressure, blood sugar level, and other important bodily functions. Objectives Of Homeostasis The objectives of homeostasis are to: - Maintain a stable internal environment within the body, despite changes in the external environment. - Ensure that the body’s cells have the conditions they need to function properly. - Prevent the body from becoming too damaged by changes in the environment. - Allow the body to adapt to changes in the environment over time. Homeostasis at Organism Level The organismic level of homeostasis is the maintenance of a stable internal environment within the body of organism, despite changes in the external environment. This level of homeostasis is achieved through the coordinated activity of many different organ systems, including the nervous system, endocrine system, respiratory system, cardiovascular system, digestive system, and urinary system. The three main components of the internal environment are water, solutes, and temperature. These components are controlled by three processes: Osmoregulation is the maintenance of water and salt balance in the body. This is done by balancing the intake and output of water and solutes. The kidneys play a major role in osmoregulation, as they filter water and solutes from the blood and excrete them in urine. Excretion is the elimination of waste products from the body. This includes nitrogenous wastes, such as urea and creatinine, as well as other waste products, such as salt and water. The kidneys are also responsible for excretion. Thermoregulation is the maintenance of internal body temperature within a tolerable range. This is done by balancing the heat production and heat loss of the body. The hypothalamus is involved in thermoregulation. Homeostasis at Cellular Level The cellular level of homeostasis is the maintenance of a stable internal environment within the cells, despite changes in the extracellular environment. This level of homeostasis is achieved through the coordinated activity of many different cellular processes, such as: - Osmosis-movement of water across a semipermeable membrane. - Diffusion-movement of molecules from an area of high concentration to an area of low concentration. - Active transport-movement of molecules against a concentration gradient, requiring energy. - Exocytosis-The release of molecules from the cell. - Endocytosis-The uptake of molecules into the cell. Homeostasis Feedback Mechanism Feedback mechanism is a process in which a system responds to changes in its environment by adjusting its output. In the context of homeostasis, feedback mechanisms are used to maintain a stable internal environment. Positive Feedback in Homeostasis Positive feedback is a type of feedback mechanism in which the output of a system increases the input to that system. This can lead to a runaway effect, in which the output of the system continues to increase until it reaches a limit. Positive feedback is often used in processes that need to be amplified, such as childbirth. Examples of Positive Feedback In Homeostasis Here are few examples of Examples of Positive Feedback In Homeostasis: When a blood vessel is damaged, platelets release chemicals that trigger the clotting cascade. The clotting cascade forms a clot, which helps to stop the bleeding. The formation of the clot is an example of positive feedback because it amplifies the initial change in the system (the damage to the blood vessel). When a muscle contracts, it releases calcium ions. These calcium ions bind to receptors on the muscle fibers, which causes the fibers to contract even more. This is an example of positive feedback because it amplifies the initial change in the system (the contraction of the muscle). Negative Feedback in Homeostasis Negative feedback is a type of feedback mechanism in which the output of a system decreases the input to that system. This helps to keep the system in equilibrium. Negative feedback is the most common type of feedback mechanism in homeostasis. Examples Of Negative Feedback In Homeostasis Here are few examples of Examples of Negative Feedback in Homeostasis: When the body’s temperature rises, the hypothalamus triggers mechanisms to cool the body down. These mechanisms include sweating and vasodilation (the widening of blood vessels). The sweating and vasodilation help to lower the body’s temperature, which brings it back to its set point. This is an example of negative feedback because the body is trying to return the temperature to its set point. Blood sugar regulation When blood sugar levels rise, the pancreas releases insulin. Insulin helps to move glucose into cells, which lowers blood sugar levels. The release of insulin helps to bring blood sugar levels back to their set point. This is an example of negative feedback. Importance of Homeostasis The purpose of homeostasis is to maintain a stable internal environment within the body, despite changes in the external environment. This is essential for survival, as even small changes in the body’s environment can have a significant impact on its function. Homeostatic Imbalance can cause different diseases in humans. Here are some of the important purposes of homeostasis: - Homeostasis is important in Maintaining a constant body temperature. Homeostasis helps to regulate body temperature by sweating when it gets too hot and shivering when it gets too cold. - Homeostasis is also important in Maintaining a constant blood sugar level. Homeostasis helps to regulate blood sugar levels by releasing hormones such as insulin and glucagon. - Homeostasis helps in Maintaining a constant blood pH. Homeostasis helps to regulate blood pH by the kidneys and lungs. - Homeostasis is involved in maintaining constant water balance. Homeostasis helps to regulate water balance by the kidneys and sweat glands. - Homeostasis also helps in Maintaining a constant salt balance. Homeostasis helps to regulate salt balance by the kidneys and sweat glands. Examples of Homeostasis Here are some examples of homeostasis: - Temperature regulation - Blood sugar regulation - Water balance - Electrolyte balance - pH balance - Blood pressure regulation Frequently Asked Question – FAQs Maintenance of Temperature in the animal body Maintenance of Blood Glucose Level Water and salt balance in animal body Homeostasis is important to maintain the internal environment despite the changes that are happening in the internal and external environment. It helps to maintain optimal conditions for enzyme action. Homeostasis is maintained through a series of control mechanisms being controlled at cellular, tissue, and organ level. Homeostasis helps to maintain body temperature, water, and salt balance and prevents the accumulation of waste materials. If it is not maintained properly, it can cause an increase in body temperature which may disrupt enzyme functioning. Similarly, an imbalance of salt and water can lead to fatal diseases. Sweating is an example of homeostasis because it helps the body maintain a stable internal temperature. When our body temperature rises, sweating helps to cool us down by evaporating from the skin. This process absorbs heat from the body, which helps to lower the temperature. Leave a Reply

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Whether a person is 12 or 102, receiving a COVID-19 vaccination should be on everyone’s priority to-do list, as in, it needs to be done today. A primary reason to be vaccinated is because of the COVID-19 variants. The Delta variant is particularly a matter of concern. Everyone needs to be vaccinated against the SARS-CoV-2, which causes COVID-19 to slow the spread of Delta and other currently unidentified variants. Based on the devastation Delta caused in India, health experts in the United States are concerned it will soon be the dominant COVID-19 strain as it is spreading quickly in unvaccinated and under-vaccinated communities. There is good news. People who have had both doses of Moderna or Pfizer-BioNTech vaccine are not likely to get sick with Delta. However, for those who have had the single-dose Johnson & Johnson vaccine, less is known about its effectiveness against the COVID-19 variants. [Update] On July 2, Johnson & Johnson released a report indicating the vaccine works well against the delta variant. Further boosting their assertion, they announced the immune response lasts at least eight months, according to lab data. Children Under 12 Must Be Protected From COVID-19 and Variants Millions of children — ages 11 and under — are at great risk of contracting the Delta variant. They must be protected by every person they come in contact with. Experts are concerned about how the new variants, especially Delta, will affect these little ones. While infection remains low with the initial strain of COVID-19 among younger people, there is still a risk. How great a risk is unknown. But, there are simple ways to protect children: - Make sure they are not around others who are not completely vaccinated. - Insist they continue to wear masks when away from home. - Find playgroups for socialization where all those 12 and older are vaccinated. - Create a social network of fully vaccinated individuals. New moms can help their infants by becoming vaccinated and sharing the COVID-19 antibodies even while breastfeeding. Vaccination Appointments Easier to Obtain When the coronavirus shots were first made available, people were forced to wait to be vaccinated, and that was after spending hours, if not days, trying to get an appointment. Now, most places do not require appointments, even if they recommend them. Finding a location is simple: call 211 for local COVID-19 vaccination sites or check with neighborhood community centers, churches, and schools to see if they are holding a vaccination event. One barrier to obtaining COVID-19 vaccinations is transportation. Consider gathering a few friends, family, or neighbors to carpool. COVID-19 Vaccination Offers Freedom Freedom is an excellent reason for all eligible Americans to be vaccinated. When the entire country is vaccinated, people can travel free from concern. Additionally, children can safely attend daycare, preschool, K-12, and beyond without the stress associated with the unknown. Moreover, masks can be placed in the rubbish bin. Opinion by Cathy Milne-Ware Edited by DiMarkco Chandler CNN: What parents need to know about children and the Delta variant; by Virginia Langmaid Scientific American: How Dangerous Is the Delta Variant, and Will It Cause a COVID Surge in the U.S.? By Tayna Lewis CDC: Benefits of Getting a COVID-19 Vaccine NBC: Johnson & Johnson one-dose vaccine works well against delta variant; by Jane Weaver Featured and Top Image Courtesy of Phil Murphy’s Flickr Page – Creative Commons License Inset Image Courtesy of Gilbert Mercier’s Flickr Page – Creative Commons License 6 thoughts on “There Are More Reasons to Be Vaccinated Against COVID-19 Than Not [Update]” Hi there! This post couldn’t be written any better! Reading through this post reminds me of my previous room mate! He always kept talking about this. I will forward this article to him. Pretty sure he will have a good read. Thank you for sharing! Very nice post. I just stumbled upon your weblog and wanted to say that I’ve truly enjoyed surfing around your blog posts. After all I will be subscribing to your feed and I hope you write again very soon! Do you have a spam problem on this site; I also am a blogger, and I was wondering your situation; many of us have created some nice methods and we are looking to swap solutions with others, please shoot me an email if interested. What’s up friends, good piece of writing and nice urging commented here, I am genuinely enjoying by these. Comments are closed.

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