Month: December 2004

On Sleep

I definitely count myself among one of the sleep-deprived. The sad thing is that I know not sleeping enough ultimately lowers my productivity, I can’t help it — I enjoy staying up late with a caffeine buzz.

Anyway, this is an interesting look at sleep and the effects of sleep deprivation with some pretty radical suggestions (get rid of the alarm clock? Doesn’t he mean get rid of the alarm clocks — I’ve got three).

I’m skeptical of some of the claims the author throws around — the claim, for example, that sleep deprivation costs upwards of $150 billion sounds like those factoids about the costs of obesity or some other pet concern.

But I do like his ultimate proposal — run a 28 hour day — and some of the suggestions for getting sleep deprived habits back on schedule. Interesting stuff to ponder, at least until provigil or some other drug comes along to make sleep unnecessary (after dying, sleeping has to be the second most pointless physiological reality).

Source:

Good sleep, good learning, good life. Piotr Wozniak, 2000.

UN’s Global Fund Agrees to New Round of Projects for 2005

Members of the United Nation’s Global Fund met this month and agreed to a new round of funding for projects to fight AIDS, malaria and tuberculosis in 2005.

The Global Fund was started in 2002 by the United Nations, but funding has been a major problem. Kofi Annan originally hoped that developed countries would contribute up to $7 billion annually to help the fund fight the three diseases. So far, though, only $3 billion total has been committed to the Global Fund by donor nations.

This year the United States threatened to withhold approval for projects after other developed nations had failed to give significant money to the fund (the United States is the single largest donor to the fund). The United States also expressed concerns over how grants were disbursed.

In the end, the United States joined the unanimous decision by the Fund’s members to move forward, but scaled back its donations from $546 million in 2004 to just $200 million in 2005.

Source:

Focus on deadly Africa diseases. Will Ross, BBC, November 17, 2004.

Deadly disease fight ‘underfunded’. The BBC, November 17, 2004.

Global fund to fight deadly diseases. Associated Press, November 18, 2004.

US Suggests AIDS Fund Delay Grants. Mark Lacey, The New York Times, November 17, 2004.

EU Commission Sets Poor Corruption Example

The European Union Commission demonstrated this month that developing nations hardly have a monopoly on official corruption that rises to the top of political systems.

At the November 19 meeting of the EU Commission President José Manuel Barroso shamefully threatened UK Independence Party’s Nigel Farage with “legal consequences” for daring to reveal the shady past of EU Commission Vice-President Jacques Barrot.

Barrot, it turned out, received a suspended prison sentence for his role in a political fund raising scandal in France. Barrot was later given amnesty by the president of France. Under French law, the media there was barred from mentioning the conviction or suspended prison sentence.

The resulting furor at that revelation forced Barroso to back off his threat of “legal consequences” but that it was made at all in response to a corruption accusation is yet more fuel for the fire of well-founded Euro-skeptics.

Moreover, the revelation about Barrot’s past apparently wasn’t enough to force his resignation. Barroso, in fact, has taken to telling European newspapers that he has 100 percent confidence in the convicted criminal, Barrot.

Is this the EU or Zimbabwe? I’m sure developing nations can’t wait to hear Europeans lecture them about corruption after such a blatant failure to deal with official corruption in their own corner of the world.

The EU should be ashamed of itself.

Source:

New furore shakes EU Commission. The BBC, November 22, 2004.

Barrot given reprieve by European Parliament Socialists. EU Observer, November 23, 2004.

Euro team are liars and crooks, says Ukip. Ambrose Evans-Pritchard, Daily Telegraph, November 19, 2004.

More than 170 Million Indian Children Receive Polio Vaccination

In what was billed as a major effort to eradicate polio from India, more than 170 million children under five were vaccinated against polio over a three day period earlier this month. Simultaneously, another 80 million children in 24 African nations were also vaccinated.

The goal is to eradicate polio from India by the end of 2005.

So far this year, India has reported 85 cases of polio, the lowest number ever since polio statistics have been recorded. In 1994, when efforts to eradicate polio from India began in earnest, there were 4,791 cases reported.

Deepak Kapoor, chairman of Rotary International in India which has played an important role in polio eradication in India and other parts of the world, told New Kerala,

If polio can be completely wiped off by next year, it would be a great victory, not just for India, but for the international community as a whole. It would induce a renewed confidence in our efforts against other diseases such as malaria and AIDS.

Unfortunately, eradicating polio in Africa might prove a bigger challenge. Planned vaccinations in Ivory Coast, for example, had to be canceled due to the unstable political and military situation in that country.

Sources:

India starts ‘final’ anti-polio push. Ania Lichtarowicz, The BBC, November 21, 2004.

India inches closer to eradicating polio. New Kerala, November 21, 2004.

UN giving kids in India polio shots. United Press International, November 21, 2004.

World Bank Report Finds Mixed Results in Meeting Millennium Development Goals

The World Bank reported this month that many developing countries are falling further behind in efforts to meet the Millennium Development Goals of drastically cutting the death rate of children and pregnant women. On the other hand, many countries are on target to meet goals of cutting poverty in half.

On under-five mortality, for example,

60 percent of the people in the Middle East and North Africa are in countries on track to reach the goal for under-five mortality, 39 percent in Latin America and the Caribbean, 28 percent in Europe and Central Asia, 17 percent in East Asia and Pacific, 10 percent in South Asia, and 0 percent in Sub-Saharan Africa.

A similar situation holds for efforts to reduce maternal mortality,

84 percent of the people in the Middle East and North Africa are in countries on track to reach the goal for maternal mortality, 69 percent in East Asia and Pacific, 19 percent in Europe and Central Asia, 3 percent in Sub-Saharan Africa, 2 percent in Latin America and the Caribbean, and 0 percent in Sub-Saharan Africa.

When it comes to poverty and malnutrition, however, the situation is a bit better despite recent economic problems,

Some good news: 80 percent of the world’s people live in a country that is on track to hit the malnutrition target.

Sources:

Many Countries Falling Behind In Race To Improve Health And Reduce Deaths By 2015. Press Release, World Bank, November 10, 2004.

The millennium development goals for health – rising to the challenges. (PDF) World Bank, 2004.

About that Impending Bird Influenza Pandemic

Saw this item at Boing! Boing!,

World Health Organization’s bird flu warning: 100 million deaths

Matt Vine sez: Since yesterday, the rest of the world has been buzzing with news of the World Health Organization’s warnings of a impending flu pandemic that could kill up to 100 million. These warnings are suspiciously missing from American news sites – we get things like “Godzilla honored with ‘Walk of Fame’ star” from CNN’s front page.” Link

posted by Mark Frauenfelder at 08:47:00 AM

Of coures if you actually bother to read any of the articles that Boing! Boing! links to you, you learn that the impending epidemic is not so impending.

In fact, there is no evidence that the bird flue can be spread from human to human, which would be necessary before it could become a pandemic. There are apparently two cases of bird flu where researchers haven’t yet figured out how the individuals contracted the disease, but otherwise all cases of the bird flu have been transmitted directly from birds to human beings. It is telling that unlike the SARS outbreak, so far there appear to be no cases of infections among health care workers who have treated victims.

So why is the WHO going around saying that there’s this impending pandemic? Well, the short version is that it isn’t. The long version is that its Pacific regional director made the claims about the bird flu pandemic, and the rest of WHO appears to be scratching its head about where he came up with these claims.

For example, here’s the New York Times’ coverage,

Dr. Shigeru Omi, the W.H.O.’s regional director for Asia and the Pacific, said that if a pandemic should strike – an outcome he termed “very, very likely” – governments should be prepared to close schools, office buildings and factories to slow the rate of new infections. They also should work out emergency staffing to prevent a breakdown in basic public services like electricity and transportation, he said.

. . .

W.H.O. officials in Geneva said later that they had not received an advance copy of Dr. Omi’s remarks and did not know the basis for his estimates and why he believed a pandemic was so likely.

. . .

In sounding the alarm about avian influenza, “W.H.O. is trying to raise concern because we’re concerned, but W.H.O. is not trying to scare the planet,” Dick Thompson, a spokesman for the agency, said in a telephone interview.

“No one knows how many are likely to die in the next human influenza pandemic,” or even when it will occur, said Dr. Klaus Stöhr, the agency’s top influenza expert. “The numbers are all over the place.”

The same thing happened with SARS, you might remember, where there were a few individuals who claimed SARS was going to turn into a pandemic.

Obviously such a pandemic is always possible should a virus like the bird flu mutate into a highly communicable form, but a pandemic is far from impending.

Source:

W.H.O. Official Says Deadly Pandemic Is Likely if the Asian Bird Flu Spreads Among People. Keith Bradsher and Lawrence K. Altman, The New York Times, November 30, 2004.