At this point, many epidemiologists do not believe that SARS-CoV-2 made the jump from animal to human in the infamous Wuhan wet-market. Since a lot of people caught it from the market back in January much of the media decided that the Chinese proclivities for wild animals were to blame for the pandemic. This helped perpetuate a racist narrative. Many are even calling for a ban on wet markets.

There is a growing body of evidence that points to a different origin story for Covid-19. We now know that none of the animals tested at the Wuhan seafood market tested positive and about a third of the initial set of reported cases in people in Wuhan from early December 2019 had no connection to the seafood market, including the first reported case. And we also now know, thanks to the leak of an official Chinese report to the South China Morning Post that the actual first known case of Covid-19 in Hubei was detected in mid-November, weeks before the cluster of cases connected to the Wuhan seafood market were reported.

…

The scientists conclude that SARS-CoV-2 evolved from natural selection and not genetic engineering in a lab, and they say that this natural selection occurred through two possible scenarios. One is that it evolved into its highly pathogenic form within humans. In this case, a less pathogenic form of the virus would have jumped from an animal to a human host and then would have evolved into its current form through an “extended period” of “undetected human-to-human transmission”. Under this scenario, there is no reason to believe that the Wuhan seafood market had anything to do with the evolution of the disease, even if it is quite possible that an infected person at the market could have transmitted it to others.

New research suggests industrial livestock, not wet markets, might be origin of Covid-19

Farm animals can be an excellent incubator for virtual diseases that are evolving to make a jump to humans.

The overwhelming majority of farmed animals are kept in dark, unsanitary, overcrowded factory farms, which stresses their immune systems. Worse, they’re bred primarily for rapid growth and maximum output, not robustness, and their genetic similarity makes them especially likely to transmit disease to one another. Animal after animal, they are churned through the system, often on the same dirty floors, the same stagnant trucks, and the same slaughter lines. This system puts everyone’s health at risk.

Reducing pandemic risk begins with ending factory farming

But even if the first human was infected at the Wuhan market it’s still easy to point a finger at factory farming.

It’s true, in other words, that an expanding human population pushing into previously undisturbed ecosystems has contributed to the increasing number of zoonoses – human infections of animal origin – in recent decades. That has been documented for Ebola and HIV, for example. But behind that shift has been another, in the way food is produced. Modern models of agribusiness are contributing to the emergence of zoonoses.

Is factory farming to blame for coronavirus?

If you’re not doing it already, it’s time to start growing your own food!

Related:

• ABC Says Homemade Sanitizers Don’t Work For Coronavirus – We Disagree, So Here’s a Recipe
• Sold Out – How To Get Vitamin C (Recipe/DIY)
• Does Elderberry Increase Risk Of Death With CoVID-19?
• Coronavirus – Your Guide to the CoVID-19 Pandemic

Isoxaflutole is a herbicide that’s manufactured and sold by BASF, the second-largest chemical producer in the world, under the name brand name Alite 27. It’s currently used on corn plants in 33 states, and the EPA has recently registered the use of the chemical on soybeans in 25 different states. This registration is the Environmental Protection Agency’s assurance that Isoxaflutole does what the label says it does and should not pose an unreasonable hazard to your health. Isoxaflutole is classified by the EPA as a probable human carcinogen, and it is phytotoxic to non-target aquatic and terrestrial plants and moderately toxic to freshwater fish.

Recommended: How To Heal Your Gut 

The EPA requested public comment on the proposed registration decision and cited that feedback as a key factor in the organization’s decision to move forward with the registration. All fifty-four comments left during the public review period were positive, a show of overwhelmingly support for the use of Isoxaflutole on soybeans.

Alexandra Dapolito Dunn, EPA Assistant Administrator for the Office of Chemical Safety and Pollution Prevention, says, 

We’ve heard from farmers across the country about the importance of having new means available to combat economically-damaging weeds…We listened and believe this action balances the need to provide growers with the products necessary to continue to provide Americans with a safe and abundant food supply while ensuring our country’s endangered species are protected.”

EPA.gov

The comments reviewed by the EPA did not include feedback from environmental groups and journalists. The EPA circumvented a critical part of the usual chemical approval process, opening the herbicide registration for public comment without notifying the Federal Register. The Federal Register notifies the press and environmental groups of significant rule changes and without this notice, the opponents of Isoxaflutole were unable to register their comments.

Nathan Donley is a senior scientist at the Center for Biological Diversity, a national, nonprofit conservation organization. He stated,

The press release caught everyone off guard. We were just waiting for the EPA to open the comment period, and we never saw it.”

AP News

Sources:

• EPA sidesteps normal public process to approve BASF’s cancer-linked pesticide – St. Louis Post-Dispatch
• Isoxaflutole | New Active Ingredient Review – MN Department of Agriculture
• Public Participation for Isoxaflutole: New Use on Herbicide Resistant Soybeans – Regulations.gov

Under the relative peace and privacy afforded to animals during the CoVID-19 lockdown, panadas are finally “screwing to save their own species,” and Sea Turtles are also benefitting from the pandemic.

Odisha’s Rushikulya rookery, a coastal beach in India, is where the endangered Olive Ridley sea turtle lay their eggs.

At least 50% of the world’s population of Olive Ridley turtles come to the state’s coasts for nesting, according to the Odisha Wildlife Organisation.

Related:

• ABC Says Homemade Sanitizers Don’t Work For Coronavirus – We Disagree, So Here’s a Recipe
• Sold Out – How To Get Vitamin C (Recipe/DIY)
• Does Elderberry Increase Risk Of Death With CoVID-19?
• Coronavirus – Your Guide to the CoVID-19 Pandemic

This event happens once a year and is typically a tourist attraction, but India is under a stay-at-home order. Every year, the Forest Department creates hatcheries along the Indian coast. Authorities aren’t having to work as hard to protect the hatcheries from human intervention. Last year a cyclone severely damaged the hatcheries and the sea turtles were unable to reproduce at normal levels.

According to the Forest Department, over 70,000 Olive Ridleys arrived to take part in the unusual event of day-time mass nesting. Normally, throngs of people — tourists and locals — generally show up to watch the sea turtles and authorities have to deploy considerable resources to keep them away from the habitat.

Business insider

While locals have been forbidden from gathering on the shoreline since last weekend because of the partial shutdown, 97 critically endangered hawksbill sea turtles have hatched on a deserted beach in Brazil.

According to Brazil’s Tamar conservation project, which protects sea turtles, hawksbills lay their eggs along the country’s north-eastern coast and are considered a critically endangered species.

They can grow up to 110cm in length, weigh 85kg and owe their Portuguese name, which translates as “comb turtles”, to the fact that their shells were once widely used to make combs and frames for glasses.

The Gaurdian

Boris Johnson is reportedly responding to coronavirus treatment and remains clinically stable after four nights in St. Thomas Hospital in London. Johnson was admitted to the hospital with a cough and high fever on Sunday, 10 days after testing positive for the virus. Johnson was given oxygen and later sent to intensive care. Foreign Secretary Dominic Raab has spoken out saying he is confident Johnson will make a full recovery. Additionally he said: 

But we’ve got very clear directions, very clear instructions from the prime minister, and we’re focused with total unity and total resolve on implementing them so that when he’s back, I hope in very short order, we will have made the progress that he would expect and that the country would expect.”

Foreign Secretary Dominic Raab

The UK has yet to flatten the curve with a record 938 deaths in one day, based on the latest numbers from the department of health. These numbers put the UK death toll at more than 7,000. 

Johnson banned public gatherings of more than 2 people as well as closed all non-essential retail on March 23rd in an effort to flatten the curve. Lockdown review occurs every 21 days, however health minister Edward Argar commented saying that cases have to peak before changes are made. The London mayor spoke out saying he expects the peak in cases is still a week away. London has plans to build temporary hospitals if necessary. 

Boris Johnson isn’t Laughing Anymore

In the beginning of the outbreak, like Trump, Boris Johnson did not seem to take the threat seriously. He quipped that while everyone should wash their hands he would not stop him shaking hands with people he met.

I can tell you I am shaking hands continuously. I was at a hospital the other night where I think there were actually a few coronavirus patients and I shook hands with everybody.

Johnson’s War With Coronavirus Is No Joke Anymore

Johnson also said, on a call with ventilator manufacturers, that their task should be code-named “Operation Last Gasp.”

Related:

• ABC Says Homemade Sanitizers Don’t Work For Coronavirus – We Disagree, So Here’s a Recipe
• Sold Out – How To Get Vitamin C (Recipe/DIY)
• Does Elderberry Increase Risk Of Death With CoVID-19?
• Coronavirus – Your Guide to the CoVID-19 Pandemic

Sources:

• Coronavirus: Boris Johnson responding to treatment in intensive care – BBC News

Turns out, Pandas prefer privacy when they’re doing it just like most of us humans!

The coronavirus has been good for Pandas. A pair in Hong Kong felt they finally got enough privacy to get it on.

Keepers at Hong Kong’s Ocean Park have reportedly been trying to get pandas Ying Ying and Le Le to mate naturally. It had been a decade-long failed effort until CoVID-19 shut down the zoo. Since January, staff say they have noticed changes in the panda’s behavior.

“Since late March, Ying Ying began spending more time playing in the water, while Le Le has been leaving scent-markings around his habitat and searching the area for Ying Ying’s scent,” reads a statement from the zoo.

Following this foreplay, Ocean Park proudly announced that the two pandas had succeeded in natural mating on Monday morning.

Shanghai.ist

Recommended:

• ABC Says Homemade Sanitizers Don’t Work For Coronavirus – We Disagree, So Here’s a Recipe
• Sold Out – How To Get Vitamin C (Recipe/DIY)
• Does Elderberry Increase Risk Of Death With CoVID-19?
• Coronavirus – Your Guide to the CoVID-19 Pandemic

A recent study done by the University of Bath shows that exercising before eating breakfast can have a significant positive impact on overall health. The study was conducted over a period of 6 weeks with 30 men classified as overweight or obese. During the study, researchers examined a group who ate breakfast before exercising, a group that ate breakfast after exercising, and the control group who made no changes. 

The results of the study showed that while eating breakfast before or after working out did not make significant differences in terms of weight loss, those who ate breakfast after working out increased their body’s ability to respond to insulin. Additionally, those who ate breakfast after workout burned more fat and saw general improvements in their overall health.  

We found that the men in the study who exercised before breakfast burned double the amount of fat than the group who exercised after. Importantly, whilst this didn’t have any effect on weight loss, it did dramatically improve their overall health.”

-Dr Javier T. Gonzalez, Department for Health, University of Bath

Subjects not in the control group ate a breakfast of cornflake cereal in skimmed milk with wholemeal toast, sunflower spread, and strawberry jam. The group who ate breakfast first, ate breakfast and then allowed for a 90-minute “rest and digestion” period and then exercised by cycling on stationary bikes for 60 minutes, the group who ate breakfast after working out participated in the same exercise and then immediately ate breakfast. 

Related: Detox Cheap and Easy Without Fasting – Recipes Included

Breath samples and blood samples were collected at the 25-30 minute mark, and again at the 55-60 minute mark, to determine which fuels were being used to power the cyclist. The results of the data collected show that moderate-intensity exercising before eating breakfast can help regulate insulin, regulate blood sugar, as well as burn more fat. Both those who ate breakfast before and after working out lost weight at the same rate, however, the group who ate breakfast before working out saw no changes in their body’s response to insulin.

The group who exercised before breakfast increased their ability to respond to insulin, which is all the more remarkable given that both exercise groups lost a similar amount of weight, and both gained a similar amount of fitness. The only difference was the timing of the food intake.”

Can Excercising Before Breakfast Dramatically Improve Your Health?

The co-author of the study has noted that it is not recommended that you participate in high-intensity workouts on an empty stomach. The long term effects as well as rather or not this benefits women, in the same way, have yet to be studied. 

Recommended: Homemade Vegan Nut Milk Recipes

Sources:

• Can Exercising Before Breakfast Dramatically Improve Your Health? -Scientific American
• Lipid Metabolism Links Nutrient-Exercise Timing to Insulin Sensitivity in Men Classified as Overweight or Obese -Academic.oup

A recent study done by the UK has linked certain antibiotics, taken during pregnancy, to a higher risk of birth defects. The study shows that women given antibiotics in the macrolide class, compared to those given penicillin, were 55% more likely to give birth to babies with major birth defects. Antibiotics in the macrolide class include erythromycin, clarithromycin, and azithromycin. These antibiotics are most often given to women who are allergic to penicillin, to treat bacterial infections. 

Recommended: How to Eliminate IBS, IBD, Leaky Gut 

Macrolides are frequently prescribed in pregnancy, and our findings suggest it would be better to avoid macrolides during pregnancy if alternative antibiotics can be used”

-Study leader Heng Fan of University College London.

The study was conducted on 104,605 children born as early as 1990, up to 2016 whose mothers took penicillin or macrolides while pregnant. Additionally, the study consisted of two negative control groups of mothers who were prescribed macrolides or penicillin before pregnancy and 53,000 children who were siblings of children in the study.

Along with birth defects, researchers also looked for connections between antibiotics and cerebral palsy, epilepsy, attention deficit hyperactivity disorder (ADHD) and autism but found no links.”

Common antibiotics tied to miscarriages may also lead to birth defects

A total of 186 children born throughout the study, whose mothers took macrolides, had major birth defects, (28 out of every 1000 babies) The birth defects documented included defects to the brain and nervous system, heart, lungs, digestive tract, urinary tract, or genitals. The majority of the women in the study were given penicillin and among these women 1,666 babies were born with major birth defects, 18 per 1,000 babies. 

It should be noted that this study does not examine the overall health of each mother before or during pregnancy. Additionally, the study does not draw attention to the changes in prenatal care from 1990 to 2016 and it is unclear rather more birth defects occurred earlier in the study or later.

Related: How to Detoxify From Antibiotics and Other Chemical Antimicrobials

Sources:

• Common Antibiotics tied to miscarriages may also lead to birth defects-Reuters
• Associations between macrolide antibiotics prescribing during pregnancy and adverse child outcomes in the UK: population based cohort study -BMJ