Currently viewing the category: "toxins"

Trash Mouth

By On · Add Comment · In American Dental Association, cigarette smoking, oral cancer, periodontal disease, smokeless tobacco, toxins
You know what I’ve never understood? The appeal of smokeless tobacco to anybody not sitting in a baseball dugout. Chaw, dip, spits, grizz–nasty stuff. So if you’re a spitter, here’s a post for ya: The American Dental Association wants everyone to know that smokeless tobacco contains at least 28 cancer causing toxins, and they are in the best position to see what it can do to your trap.Here’s a list of oral health problems associated with chewing the chaw:

  • Increased risk of oral cancer
  • Increased risk of periodontal (gum) disease, possibly causing tooth loss and tooth sensitivity (awesome pictures here).
  • Difficulty healing after a dental procedure.
  • Limited treatment options for dental care, such as a dental implant.
  • Staining of the teeth and tongue, as well as bad breath.
  • Reduced ability to taste and smell.
Like I said, I never did get the chewing tobacco thing. I remember tutoring organic chemistry for the Student Learning Center at UC Berkeley, when sitting one day with a Cal football player trying to explain to him the alkene reactions, I couldn’t help but being distracted by his repeatedly spitting into a Styrofoam cup. I kept thinking…“That’s gross, dude.” And I was a cigarette smoker…ha ha ha…Imagine a smoker thinking your habit is disgusting? Smokeless tobacco is definitely on the bottom of the cesspool when it comes to the hierarchy of poisoning yourself (along with methamphetamine use, or sniffing paint).
If you currently use smokeless tobacco, then…yuck! Hey it’s your health, your life, and your choice…but well, shoot, maybe you’d be interested in needle sharing, or unprotected sex with a $10 hooker. Same thing, dude.

Household Items Poison Pets

By On · Add Comment · In chocolate, drugs, household pets, over-the-counter medications, poisons, Ritalin, toxins

Listen up pet lovers: Be super-careful with your drugs, as they top the list of toxins poisoning household pets.  From dropped pills to medication packets lying around, domestic animals can be sickened by ingesting human drugs.  One ASPCA hotline reports that it received approximately 40,000 calls last year for animals poisoned by human medication–that’s in one city alone!  Dang!

Pet owners do not always know what their pets have gotten into–they just see the animals exhibiting symptoms, like lethargy, vomiting, seizures or refusing food.

The top toxins sending pets to veterinary ERs are over-the-counter meds, antidepressants, and…Ritalin!!!  Ha ha ha ha…no kidding.  Guess little Johnny ain’t paying attention the way he’s supposed to on the dope.  Just try watching your dog fer chrissakes.  Here are the top ten poisons taking out household pets:

  1. Human medication
  2. Pesticides
  3. Rodenticides
  4. People food
  5. Veterinary medications
  6. Chocolate
  7. Household toxins (cleaners)
  8. Plants
  9. Herbicides
  10. Outdoor toxins (like antifreeze and fertilizers)

So clean up your garage, put the Easter candy up high, and please…please…keep your kid’s Ritalin off the floor.

Unsafe Drinking Water Found in Schools

By On · Add Comment · In drinking water, Environmental Protection Agency (EPA), National Resources Defense Council (NRDC), Safe Drinking Water Act, schools, toxins, water safety, water treatment

This just in: Thousands of schools across the country have been found to have unsafe drinking water. Contaminants have surfaced at both public and private schools in all 50 states–cities and small towns alike–including lead, pesticides and dozens of other toxins.

The federal government has failed to monitor water safety violations despite them multiplying over the last decade. The contamination is most prevalent at schools with their own water supply–wells, that is–which represent 8 to 11 percent of the nation’s schools. Approximately 20% of schools with water wells has violated the Safe Drinking Water Act over the last ten years, according to data from the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA).

The number of schools with violations is only a fraction of the country’s 132,500 schools, but it causes concerns since children drink more water per pound of body weight than adults do. Part of the problem is that the monitoring of drinking water in schools is spread too thin among a number of local, state and federal agencies. Finding a solution, experts and children’s advocates say, would require a costly new national strategy for monitoring water in schools.

Some of the findings from the EPA data include:

• Water in about 100 school districts and 2,250 schools breached federal safety standards.

• Those schools and districts racked up more than 5,550 separate violations. In 2008, the EPA recorded 577 violations, up from 59 in 1998 — an increase that officials attribute mainly to tougher rules.

• California, which has the most schools of any state, also recorded the most violations with 612, followed by Ohio (451), Maine (417), Connecticut (318) and Indiana (289).

• Nearly half the violators in California were repeat offenders. One elementary school in Tulare County, in the farm country of the Central Valley, broke safe-water laws 20 times.

• The most frequently cited contaminant was coliform bacteria, followed by lead and copper, arsenic and nitrates.

It seems to me that this problem is only the tip of the iceberg. I point out in my book, The Six Keys to Optimal Health, that the nation’s public water system is a shambles. According to a 2003 National Resources Defense Council (NRDC) study, many community water systems (CWS) had the following problems:

  • polluted water source
  • outdated treatment processes
  • poor maintenance of water treatment and storage systems

It’s high time investigative journalists, like the ones at the Associated Press breaking this story, start reporting this mess with our nation’s water system. Water is the elixir of life–no living thing can survive without it–so it stands to reason that a faulty public water system is essential to our health and safety. Children in Minnesota and Seattle have already gotten sick from drinking contaminated water at their schools. At what point will the entire system come unglued and start causing a real public health hazard? I don’t know, but it’s one of those rare times I endorse the government stepping in, providing funds for the upkeep of this vast system, monitor all source water and its transportation, and shut down schools or any other building violating the Safe Drinking Water Act.

*If you would like to know more about your local drinking water, check here: http://www.epa.gov/safewater/dwinfo/index.html

Gastroenteritis–My Bout With Stomach Flu

By On · Add Comment · In cramping, cramps, gastroenteritis, medications, Motrin, spasms, stomach flu, toxins, viral, virus

Well, 2008 has started with a bang! Just not the one I’d been hoping for. As I was shaking off the blow of a serious tooth infection, and a subsequent root canal, I got nailed with the stomach flu–gastroenteritis to be exact–and I’m only just starting to feel my old raucous self today.

Gastroenteritis is often called the stomach flu, although it’s nothing like the regular flu–no fever, no body aches or pains, none of that stuff. What is was, however, was a lot of stomach ache–cramping, crippling spasms that had me boweled over in pain for about 48 hours. Many things can cause gastroenteritis–bacteria, viruses, toxins, medications, some other things. I think mine was probably viral, but it could have also been from taking Motrin; I was taking 2,400 mg a day for the toothache I was enjoying.

Either way, I stopped taking the meds on Friday, immediately following my first hit of flu. I also stopped drinking coffee and pretty much eating all together. If, in spite of my haze, I am remembering all the details correctly, I think I couldn’t even stomach water; I was helpless. But did it ever make me find religion. Please Oh Mighty Isis. Make it stop, please. Nicky be good boy. Nicky be good boy…

Once again I have to say, being sick is a part of life. You can get depressed about it (it’s easy, really), or you can just see it as a time to take care of yourself–rest, relax, catch up on paperwork, and even on those missed episodes of Real Housewives of Orange County (right PB?). There’s no such thing as 100% health, 100% of the time; and living in that illusion is the quickest way to frustration and/or depression. We all get sick. Bless it, use it to your advantage, and rest up. There’s plenty of life to be lived tomorrow.

Start With the Basics – Health First

By On · Add Comment · In bodywork, Centers of Disease Control, exercising, health, health care system, health practices, health theory, magic bullet, medical doctors, mentally balanced, nutritious foods, rest, toxins

Our health care system is in a shambles – so says the director of the Centers of Disease Control, Dr. Julie Gerberding. Her solution: start from the ground up – train medical doctors in health theory and practice, and not just the treatment of diseases.

Bravo! I’ve been pushing this agenda for the last seven years. In fact, my upcoming book – The Six Keys To Optimal Health – runs precisely on that premise. It makes no sense to me to neglect basic health practices and hope that, in the future, a magic bullet will be waiting to save us. That’s a big fat fantasy. Dream on.

If you are not eating wholesome nutritious foods, not exercising regularly, not getting sufficient rest, not working out the stress and tension of your body with regular bodywork, not keeping mentally balanced, and regularly ingesting toxins – like prescription and over the counter medications, recreational drugs and cigarette smoke – then you’re flirtin’ with disaster. And…guess what? It’s going to continue to tax an already overloaded and overpriced medical system. Michael Moore can make 5,000 films and presidential candidates can campaign on the Universal Health Care platform till kingdom come – if the people of this country don’t start with the basics, then it ain’t gonna get any better – just worse. Nuff said.

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