A second dog tested positive for coronavirus in China. Dogs have not shown symptoms of the disease. The Hong Kong government is urging people to stop kissing their pets and also to not abandon them either.

Update: PLEASE DO NOT GIVE AWAY YOUR DOG BECAUSE OF THIS ARTICLE! That is not the intentional suggestion of this article. The best advice one can probably get from this article is that you may not want to be overly affectionate with other people’s dogs right now if you are immunocompromised or you stay with someone who is. But, it’s very important to note that there is no indication the dog can transmit the virus to humans.

In February an elderly 17-year-old Pomeranian tested “weak positive” for the virus. The dog was quarantined until deemed to be free of coronavirus, then the owner took the dog home. The dog died two days later. It is extremely unlikely that the dog died from the virus but we’re told the dog’s owner wasn’t willing to allow an autopsy to determine the cause of death.

Last week a German shepherd in Hong Kong was sent for quarantine after their owner was confirmed as being infected. The dog “repeatedly tested positive” for the COVID-19 virus.

The Hong Kong animal-welfare authority stressed that there is currently no evidence that pets can be a source of the virus or that they can get sick from it. “Under no circumstances should [owners] abandon their pets,” it said.

The American Veterinary Medical Association (AVMA) said that infectious disease experts and multiple international and domestic human and animal health organizations, all agree there is no evidence at this point to indicate that pets become ill with Covid-19 or that they spread it to other animals, including people.

Market Watch

Related:

• Does Elderberry Increase Risk Of Death With CoVID-19?
• Coronavirus – Your Guide to the CoVID-19 Pandemic

There are a few articles circulating around the natural-health blogosphere that warn of potential increased risk when consuming Elderberry to avoid or lessen the severity of the coronavirus.

…elderberry also enhances cytokine response, which may not be so good when one of the complications of pandemic influenza is cytokine storm.

Vancouver Sun – 2010

This concern comes from a 2001 study that concluded:

Sambucol Elderberry Extract and its formulations activate the healthy immune system by increasing inflammatory cytokine production.

NCBI – 2001

But a 2016 study showed Elderberry can inhibit cytokines in people who have a health issue where cytokines were not helpful to the overall situation. 

A natural preparation “Inflaminat” based on black elder berries (Sambucus nigra L.), violet tricolor herb (Viola tricolor L.) and calendula flowers (Calendula officinalis L.) possessing anti-cytokine activity was developed using the designed algorithm. 

Science Direct – 2016

Furthermore, cytokine storms are a consequence of severe infections. A cytokine storm will happen when someone is severely ill with any influenza or any Coronavirus. At this point, when someone is dealing with a cytokine storm, the person should be hooked up to a ventilator.

Conclusion – Is Elderberry Safe with Coronavirus?

Elderberry, as a preventative tonic, without any added sugars, is perfectly safe to consume if someone is trying to avoid or lessen the severity of a virus, including coronavirus. Elderberry seems to suppress viruses and may reduce inflammation. Also, check out other supplements to defend against coronavirus.

Microplastics have been found in every single species of sea turtle, and a new study published in Current Biology suggests that smell could be an explanation for that. Plastics in the water become host to multiple organisms, including plankton. Plankton emit large amounts of dimethyl sulfide, which is an organic compound that a number of marine animals rely on to find food. Sea turtles use their keen sense of smell to locate this compound, and that may be leading the turtles to consume more plastics.

Related: How to Detox From Plastics and Other Endocrine Disruptors

According to Matthew Savoca, a postdoctoral research fellow at Stanford University’s Hopkins Marine Station and one of the study’s authors…

I’ve heard numerous times that animals just eat plastic because they don’t know any better…What this type of research shows is that there are really complex evolutionary mechanisms that govern how animals are finding food.”

CNN

Scientists previously hypothesized that sea turtles consumed plastics because floating bags resembled jellyfish, but that theory doesn’t account for their consumption of other plastics. These plastics block the turtles’ intestinal tract, negatively impacting digestion, and potentially causing the turtle to go into septic shock.

Recommended: Does Elderberry Increase Risk Of Death With CoVID-19?

Microplastics are a threat to nearly all sea turtle populations, which are listed on the International Union for Conservation of Nature’s red list – all but one species of sea turtles are listed as vulnerable, endangered, or critically endangered.

Sources:

• Sea Turtles Think Plastic Smells Like Food
• Odors from marine plastic debris elicit foraging behavior in sea turtles
• Sea Turtles
• Depressing Image Shows Dead Baby Sea Turtle Found with 104 Pieces of Plastic in Its Belly

The coronavirus has shed light on a Chinese monopoly on U.S. medical supplies and prescription drugs. China sells the United States an estimated 97% of all antibiotics used and 80% of the active pharmaceutical ingredients needed to produce drugs.

If China shuts the door on exports of medicines and the ingredients to make them, within a couple of months our pharmacies would be empty. Our healthcare system would cease to function. That’s how dependent we are.”

Gibson, Law Enforcement Today, Feb, 2020

It’s not the first time the issue has come up. Rosemary Gibson is the co-author of China Rx: Exposing the Risks of America’s Dependence on China for Medicine. He has been sounding the alarm on national media for some time.

We can’t make penicillin anymore. The last penicillin plant in the United States closed in 2004.”

Gibson, NBC News Sept, 2019

Medicines can be used as a weapon of war against the United States. China Rx: Exposing the Risks of America’s Dependence on China for Medicine. Supplies can be withheld. Medicines can be made with lethal contaminants or sold without any real medicine in them, rendering them ineffective.”

Gibson, Politico, Dec 2019

The FDA says it is better monitoring the drug supply for potential shortages, including 20 products that may be at risk due to the current pandemic, which is raising concerns about our convoluted pharmaceutical supply chain.

Coronavirus highlights a growing vulnerability: Not only are many medications used in the United States manufactured overseas but critical ingredients — and the chemicals used to make them — also are overwhelmingly made in China. As much as 90 percent of drugs sold in Americans are generic. Most of the generic drugs produced outside of China use ingredients that come from China.  The supply chain is so complicated and obscure that it’s difficult to predict where critical shortages could emerge.

Related: Coronavirus – Your Guide to the Covid-19 Pandemic

Pressure-treated wood is rot and insect resistant. It’s typically used for decks, mailbox posts, light posts, playgrounds, utility polls, picnic tables, home building foundations, and much more. Pressure-treating wood saturates wood under pressure with a chemical preservative. Wood that is pressure-treated can last many years when in contact with concrete and dirt where other wood would begin to rot. (image credit)

If you’re like me, you’ve wished you could use reclaimed pressure treated lumber for a garden bed to grow food in. I had heard that pressure-treated lumber was too toxic to be near food but there were two discarded utility poles in my neighborhood that I wanted to use in my urban farm. So I did some research, and I found out that I definitely do not want to use those utility poles! But I also found out that pressure-treated wood produced more recently is probably perfectly safe to use.

Until the early 2000s, pressure-treated wood was typically treated with chromated copper arsenate (CCA), which is an extremely toxic chemical. Arsenic is easily absorbed into the body but it does not exit the body nearly as easily. Those utility poles I wanted were made this way. You shouldn’t even touch utility poles.

If pressure-treated wood has a greenish tint to it, as utility poles often do, then it has been pressure-treated with CCA. Utility poles are still usually treated with CCA.

Recommended: How To Heal Your Gut 

In 2002, after growing concern due to studies and questions raised about CCA toxicity, the EPA pushed lumber manufacturers to find a non-arsenic based formula to treat lumber. In late 2003, CCA manufacturers voluntarily ended the use of CCA in residential wood products. Manufacturers switched to using copper and chromium-based chemical preservatives. The two main types of treatment for residential construction today are copper quat (ACQ) and copper azole (CA).

ACQ is said to have very little relative risk. Research was done to determine how much of the chemical a person could conceivably touch and then put in their mouth. Results showed that ACQ-treated wood is non-toxic to skin as well as any normal oral exposure. Other studies have shown that copper can leach from the wood but we need more research on this to know if it has a toxic effect on the environment. ACQ wood has problems with corrosion so be careful to choose screws and other metal fasteners, wisely.

Copper azole treatments contain copper, boric acid, and tebuconazole (type B does not contain boric acid). CA is a water-based preservative that can be cleaned and painted.

Copper Azole and Alkaline copper quaternary treatments both contain a fungicide. The copper deters insects and the fungicide prevents soil rotting the lumber.  

Is ACQ and CA Pressure Treated Lumber Safe?

Safer, for sure. Manufacturers are confident, of course, that these treatments pose no health or environmental problems. I think that the risks with CA and ACQ pressure-treated wood are minimal. Research is ongoing. What I can say is that I would much rather eat food from my own garden grown with ACQ or CA pressure-treated wood over anything I’d get in the grocery store. But I really like to use reclaimed wood. In fact, most of the wood I use is reclaimed, and I’m guessing at least half of the treated lumber I get is more than 20 years old.

If you want to grow the healthiest, best organic food possible it’s probably not a good idea to use any kind of pressure-treated lumber.

If you just found out that your raised garden bed was made with arsenic-treated wood, if rebuilding is not an option, know that plants will not absorb arsenic when they have enough phosphorous.

Sources:

• Pressure Treated Lumber WHAT SAFETY SHOULD BE TELLING YOU before use! – Terry Penney
• Pressure Treated Wood Safety Tips – The Spruce Crafts
• Toxicity Concerns about Raised Bed Construction Materials – Iowa State University
• Using Pressure Treated Wood For Raised Gardens… Is It Safe For Growing Food? – The Natural Handyman

Google, Microsoft, and Amazon have long touted the need to reduce the use of fossil fuels. These tech companies, along with their bought-and-paid-for neo-liberal politicians, led many of us to believe that big tech’s AI is the hero we need to save us from climate disaster.

Times have changed. Shareholders want more. The Wall Street Journal and Gizmodo have reported that these three companies are deeply invested with the fossil fuel industry, attempting “to help them squeeze as much oil and gas out of the ground as possible,” and they’re using artificial intelligence to do that.

Remember when Google got too big and too pragmatic for that silly “Don’t be evil” phrase for their code of conduct?

In 2018, the oil and gas industries spent an estimated $1.75 billion on AI — a sum that is projected to balloon to $4 billion by 2025. To get their piece of that pie, big tech companies are developing AI for oil companies, even as they publicly celebrate their sustainable initiatives.

Adam Cole, Vox

Vox asks you to join the Open Sourced Reporting Network to help us report on the real consequences of data, privacy, algorithms, and AI.

The health, food, and education systems in the United States are failing young people. According to a new study from JAMA Pediatrics, an estimated 18 percent of adolescents aged 12 to 18 are prediabetic, while 24 percent of young adults aged 19-34 were estimated to be prediabetic. Young people with obesity were more likely to be prediabetic. That’s not great news for Americans, as the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development predicts that 47% of the United States population will be obese by 2030.

A Big Bundle

Diabetes is a serious yet manageable health condition that costs the United States healthcare system an estimated 327 billion dollars in the year 2017. According to Dr. Linda J. Andes, a mathematical statistician with the Centers for Disease Control (CDC) and one of the lead authors of this study,

The average medical expenditures for people with diagnosed diabetes were about $16,752 per year. After adjusting for age group and sex, average medical expenditures among people with diagnosed diabetes were about 2.3 times higher than expenditures for people without diabetes…”

This study should be greeted with a call for greater education and awareness. Dr, Andes continues…

We hope that this research expands the pool of available research on prediabetes in adolescents and young adults.  Monitoring the number of young adults and adolescents with prediabetes and varying levels of glucose tolerance can help determine the future risk of type 2 diabetes in youth. We also hope that this news sounds an alarm for young people, parents and clinicians – and that those who may be at risk or living with prediabetes are encouraged to take the necessary steps needed to prevent or delay progression to type 2 diabetes.

Recommended: How To Heal Your Gut 

Pushing Backwards

Instead, this news will likely be greeted with a chorus of “get your ass off the couch and eat better.” Unfortunately, that outdated and patronizing advice ignores the difficulties faced by young people today. Food that isn’t sprayed with large amounts of agricultural chemicals, chosen for its shelf life rather than taste, and processed in a way that kills the little nutrition not bred out of it comes at a premium. If you want good quality, tasty food, you’re going to have to pay for it.

There’s also the issue of nutrition education. Nutrition science is always evolving as science is better able to measure more and more variables in food. But that still doesn’t mean consumers will be getting all of that info. Coca-Cola finances in-house research institutes like the “Beverage Institute for Health and Wellness,” designed to promote the hydration benefits of their products while conveniently ignoring the health damage caused by sugary drinks. Nutrition and dietetics conferences are frequently sponsored by corporations with a vested interest in the least healthy option, like McDonald’s, Hershey’s, and Kraft Foods. This year’s Food and Nutrition Conference Expo’s sponsors included PepsiCo, Big G Cereals (the manufacturer of Lucky Charms, Cinnamon Toast Crunch, and Cocoa Puffs), and SPLENDA^® Sweeteners. This is not to say all studies have been bought, but it is difficult, sometimes confusing, and incredibly time-consuming to sift through all the noise and find truly helpful health information.

Related: Holistic Guide to Healing the Endocrine System and Balancing Our Hormones

This doesn’t even touch on the issue of the weight fluctuations that can occur with prescription medication, especially antidepressants and mood stabilizers. Even if you have the education needed to chose well and can afford quality food, you’re still at a massive disadvantage. Studies have found that the offspring of generations of mice fed a poor, low-fiber diet lose a high percentage of gut bacteria diversity, and they are unable to get it back. Though human studies haven’t been conducted, it’s not a stretch to think the same phenomenon is happening in people. At the end of all of this, the most basic act of care-taking we can perform (eating) can feel like yet another part-time job. No wonder more Americans are dying sooner.

The Bad Snowball

It’s highly likely that some of those prediabetic twelve-year-olds who have been diagnosed with prediabetes are being raised by some of those 34-year-olds with the same condition, or its next evolution stage, diabetes. The percentages of young people diagnosed with prediabetes are lower than the nearly 34 percent of Americans adults with prediabetes. Children and young adults may catch up sooner than expected, especially if the American way of life, eating, and addressing health continues the path it is currently on.

Sources:

• Prevalence of Prediabetes – CDC.gov
• Prevalence of Prediabetes Among Adolescents and Young Adults in the United States, 2005-2016 – JAMA Pediatric
• Your poor diet might hurt your grandchildren’s guts – Science Mag
• I Went to the Nutritionists’ Annual Confab. It Was Catered by McDonald’s. – Mother Jones
• How Coca-Cola Disguised Its Influence on Science about Sugar and Health – Union of Concerned Scientists
• The U.S. is the most obese nation in the world, just ahead of Mexico – MarketWatch