health

Sanlu milk: "You’ll find treasure in your kidneys!"

Sophie Team Observers — Fri, 26 Sep 2008 14:59:29 +0200

Web users are not letting Sanlu off lightly. They continue to chide the leading Chinese dairy producer at the heart of the powdered-milk scandal, and this time with humour.

Sanlu has been accused of marketing powdered babies' milk cut with melamine to boost the product's protein levels. The state-run company has been forced to recall 10,000 tonnes of products, but its milk, along with that of around 20 other Chinese manufacturers, has already killed four babies and poisoned 53,000 others.

Fronterra, a New Zealand company that partly owns Sanlu, placed the blame directly on the company's management. They say that Sanlu was first told about the problem in December 2007, which tests confirmed in June 2008. Yet the company didn't manage to notify the Chinese authorities, or their Kiwi partners, until August 2.

It may offer little consolation to the public, but to bring down the company further, Web users are taking great care in parodying the brand's ad.

Translated from Chinese by our Observer Lily Eclimont.

Cannabis: the best cure for a headache?

Sophie Team Observers — Fri, 19 Sep 2008 12:57:34 +0200

Posted on Flickr by "Marylanders 4 Safe Access", an association that defends therapeutic cannabis use in Maryland.

Cannabis is already used as a pain-reliever in several countries, but only for people undergoing treatment for serious illnesses. Now, a British researcher has proved that the drug is also an efficient solution for chronic pain like arthritis. The news has reignited the debate over whether to legalise cannabis for therapeutic means.

Cannabis as a curative solution is tolerated in various American states, in Canada and in Australia. In 2003 Holland was the first country to authorise marijuana-based medicines. This "medical cannabis", sold on prescription, alleviates the side effects of chemotherapy - for example, it creates an appetite. But for the first time, it's been proved in a study published in the Pain review that cannabis can also be used to ease chronic pain, or long-term pain which doesn't react to usual treatment.

Tainted milk scandal – web users investigate

Sophie Team Observers — Wed, 17 Sep 2008 17:51:12 +0200

The Chinese blogosphere is panicking over the tainted milk scandal that has already killed three babies and hospitalised more than 6,000 others. Web users are sceptical about the official government line - that it's the fault of the milk farmers, and not the manufacturing companies.

According to an investigation launched by the authorities last week, 22 companies were marketing milk powder that was contaminated with a toxic chemical called melamine, which had been added to make the products seem richer in protein.

The Zonaeuropa blog reports that police from the Hebei region, where the scandal was exposed, arrested two farmers suspected of providing contaminated milk to dairy companies.

The farmers arrested by the police. Photo posted on China.com.

One of the suspected farms. Photo posted on China.com.

The netizens then found a message from a paediatrician specialised in urinary conditions on the country's official quality control site. The doctor had made a link between babies' milk and a kidney disease that one of his patients died from. The response to his message was simply "contact the health department".

The warning message posted on 31 July by the urologist, on this blog.

The web users went on to question why the authorities were so slow to recall the dangerous products - the decision wasn't made until 12 September. Some Kiwi officials (one of the Chinese companies in trouble is partly owned by a New Zealand firm) even said that the authorities knew for weeks but didn't do anything about it until the New Zealanders intervened.

Another blogger, quoted by Global Voices, talks of a censor that he claims to have been victim to. William Long says that he himself was asked to delete evidence about the subject, that in particular put Sanlu - the first company affected by the scandal - to blame.

There's also talk of internet censorship on the China Smack blog. They published a letter, allegedly sent by Teller, the company that manages Sanlu's press relations. The letter advises the milk company to pay China's best search engine, Baidu, to delete web pages that make any reference to the scandal. Teller says that the document is false, and Baidu says there was no agreement of this kind made with Sanlu. But the denials don't stop the rumours from spreading on the web.

"Fight Club" for kids

Sophie Team Observers — Fri, 12 Sep 2008 11:19:48 +0200

With moves like "ground-and-pound" and "lay-and-pray", Mixed Martial Arts is considered the most brutal form of contact sport after street fighting. So why are children as young as six getting involved?

MMA is a refined version of "ultimate fighting", the short-lived full-contact sport that emerged in the early nineties and was once labelled "human cock fighting" by John McCain. Too violent for the public, ultimate fighting was reworked with a few strict rules and re-entered the sporting arena as "Mixed Martial Arts". Since it began, three people have died from MMA related injuries, and organised competitions are illegal in 49 states. However, the sport's popularity continues to grow, and it's now on a par with wrestling and boxing in terms of TV viewing numbers.

In the past few years increasing numbers of classes for children have sprung up around the US. In states where it's legal, such as Missouri, competitions are staged - like the one in this video.

Posted by "pankrasekid" 18 November 2007.

The letter from the "invisible man"

Ségolène Team Observers — Thu, 11 Sep 2008 18:02:50 +0200

Last Thursday, various French newsrooms and ministerial cabinets received an email signed by a certain Didier L. The author, physically disabled by a genetic illness, lost his job four years ago and today finds himself destitute. Here is the seemingly banal story of an "invisible man" who refuses to give up.

Forty-years-old, Didier L suffers from a hereditary illness of the blood. An artistic director, he's been looking for work since the company he worked for was liquidated in 2004. He sent his "Letter to France" to various MPs and journalists, right up to the French President, Nicolas Sarkozy.

You can send Didier a question directly onto his profile page. He prefers to remain anonymous.

An anti-AIDS ringtone on your mobile

Ségolène Team Observers — Wed, 20 Aug 2008 10:49:24 +0200

As part of its campaign to fight against Aids, a charity has launched "condom!", a mobile phone ringtone designed to encourage condom use. It's simply hilarious. Check it out and download it onto your mobile.

Launched by the BBC World Service Trust, the campaign aims to make condoms "more socially acceptable" in India, a country where between 2 and 3.6 million people are HIV positive.

A damning video for a Brooklyn hospital

Sophie Team Observers — Wed, 02 Jul 2008 13:11:07 +0200

This CCTV video, taken in the psychiatric ward of a Brooklyn hospital on 19 June, has caused outrage in the US. The footage shows a woman collapsed on the floor while staff apparently choose to ignore her. When help is finally called after an hour, the woman is already dead.

Jamaican-born Esmin Elizabeth Green was admitted to Kings County Hospital after suffering a nervous breakdown. The 49-year-old social worker was administered tranquilizers and had been sitting in the waiting room for 24 hours when she fell to the ground at 5:30 am. None of the patients nearby reacted. A security guard approached her, but then walked away. Almost an hour later, medical personnel came to her assistance. But they were too late.

The medical report that logged Green's death shows that staff reported that she was "sitting quietly in [the] waiting room" until 6:20 am when they noticed she had passed away and immediately tried to help her. Unfortunately for them, the CCTV footage proves quite the opposite. The video was released by the New York Civil Liberty Union, who had filed a case against the hospital for filthy conditions and the abuse of sedatives about a year earlier. The lawsuit would likely have been left at the bottom of a pile, but might be taken more seriously now.

Japan’s young smokers find a way around wrinkle-scanners

Sophie Team Observers — Mon, 30 Jun 2008 18:03:13 +0200

You can get pretty much anything through a vending machine in Japan these days - even bread. But for products that come with an age restriction, the authorities are having a hard time thinking up new ways to prevent under-agers from getting their hands on them. Blogger "Pink Tentacle" has written about the discovery by a Japanese reporter that you can trick newly introduced age-verifying scanners on cigarette vending machines by holding up a picture of somebody older.

The wrinkle-scanning machines have barely come off the production line but are already proven failures in deterring under-20s (the legal age) from lighting up. With Japan counting one of the highest smoking rates in the world, it seems like a lame attempt at tackling the problem. Our Observer in the country wonders whether the Japanese government's 50% share in the tobacco industry has anything to do with it.

Mobile phone health risks: "I trust specialists more than big firms"

Sophie Team Observers — Tue, 17 Jun 2008 09:28:52 +0200

Cooking popcorn with mobile phone waves (a faked video posted on YouTube).

French scientist David Servan-Schreiber led a group of 19 cancer specialists in speaking out about mobile phone-related health risks - particularly for children - and calling for increased awareness of the dangers. We asked our Observers, including one of the doctors who signed the agreement, whether they think that mobile phones really are deadly.

The text, which was published in the French press on Sunday, recommends using handsfree sets and restricting their use by children under 12 to emergency cases. It also suggests that sending text messages is better than making calls.

Traumatised veterans sent back to Iraq

Sophie Team Observers — Tue, 03 Jun 2008 16:53:25 +0200

A virtual world resembling Iraq has been created for US army veterans suffering from post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD). But is revisiting the sights and sounds of the scenes that caused the trauma a good idea?

Virtual Iraq is one of three virtual-reality programmes that have been created to help ex-servicemen and women with mental traumas caused by terrifying events during war. Adapted from Full Spectrum Warrior, the Institute for Creative Technologies designed virtual-reality programme looks and feels like a "sandpit" video game - meaning that the user controls where the person goes and what they do. The only difference, is that the soldier cannot fire his weapon. Currently being tested by the US Department of Defense, the virtual therapy is hoped to help the estimated 20% of Iraq and Afghanistan veterans who suffer from PTSD, by revisiting and therefore overcoming their terrifying experiences.