Open Thread Friday 1-31-2020

When we are young, healthy and full of energy the concept of limiting or budgeting our activities is silly concept. Get hit with an chronic illness, acute illness with long recovery or time passes and the aging body is not as spry as it once was the spoon theory starts to make sense.

[video:https://youtu.be/O1B_c4UMub0?t=37]

A more complex graphic of matching spoons to activities.

The spoon theory concept can also be used to monitor changes is physical and mental stamina. In pain control one might not notice a lessening of actual pain experienced in a day, but by watching spoons could notice doing more activity for the same amount of pain.

So if I miss answering the comments today, as I did last week - the spoon limit was hit early in the day. I need to sit at the keyboard to think, compose and write sometimes it just is not going to happen.

Another organ has been scientifically proven to have the ability to heal itself. Lungs damaged by smoking can heal – study

The study found nine out of every 10 lung cells in current smokers had mutations, including those that can cause cancer.

But in ex-smokers, many of those damaged cells had been replaced by healthy ones akin to those seen in people who had never smoked.

Up to 40% of the total lung cells in ex-smokers were healthy, four times more than in their still-smoking counterparts.

Campbell said the damaged cells had not been able to “magically repair themselves”.

“Rather they are replaced by healthy cells that have escaped the damage from cigarette smoke.”

Preventing damage to lungs is more than avoiding smoke.
Cleaning products as bad for lungs as smoking 20 cigarettes a day, scientists warn

Lung function decline in women working as cleaners or regularly using cleaning products at home was comparable to smoking 20 cigarettes a day over 10 to 20 years.

The scientists who carried out the study advised that such products should be avoided and can normally be replaced with simple microfibre cloths and water.

"While the short-term effects of cleaning chemicals on asthma are becoming increasingly well documented, we lack knowledge of the long-term impact," said Professor Cecile Svanes, a medic at the University of Bergen and the senior author of the study.

Breathing exercises from spiritual training, historical medical practices and martial art practices are being taken up be modern medicine. This article describes six techniques.

As early as the first millennium B.C., both the Tao religion of China and Hinduism placed importance on a “vital principle” that flows through the body, a kind of energy or internal breath, and viewed respiration as one of its manifestations. The Chinese call this energy qi, and Hindus call it prana (one of the key concepts of yoga).

A little later, in the West, the Greek term pneuma and the Hebrew term rûah referred both to the breath and to the divine presence. In Latin languages, spiritus is at the root of both “spirit” and “respiration.”

Recommendations for how to modulate breathing and influence health and mind appeared centuries ago as well. Pranayama (“breath retention”) yoga was the first doctrine to build a theory around respiratory control, holding that controlled breathing was a way to increase longevity.

In more modern times, German psychiatrist Johannes Heinrich Schultz developed “autogenic training” in the 1920s as a method of relaxation. The approach is based partly on slow and deep breathing and is probably still the best-known breathing technique for relaxation in the West today. The contemporary forms of mindfulness meditation also emphasize breathing-based exercises.


Continuing the Journey into Chinese Medicine

China's Real-time update on coronavirus outbreak

China’s virus response has been ‘breathtaking’
ByPepe Escobar

Apart from crisis management, the speed of the Chinese scientific response has been breathtaking – and obviously not fully appreciated in an environment of Total Information War. Compare the Chinese performance with the American CDC, arguably the top infectious disease research agency in the world, with an $11 billion annual budget and 11,000 employees.

During the Ebola epidemic in West Africa in 2014 – considered a maximum urgency, and facing a virus with a 90% fatality rate – the CDC took no less than two months from getting the first patient sample to identifying the complete genomic sequence. The Chinese did it in a few days.

During the swine flu in the US in 2009 – 55 million infected Americans, 11,000 killed – the CDC took over a month and a half to come up with identification kits.

The Chinese took only one week from the first patient sample to complete, vital identification and sequencing of coronavirus. Right away, they went for publication and deposit in the genomics library for immediate access by the whole planet. Based on this sequence, Chinese biotech companies produced validated essays within a week – also a first.

My local hospital consider themselves prepared from the article in the local paper today.

At St. Charles Health System, the four-hospital system is prepared in case anyone comes or calls in with concerns of having contracted the coronavirus, Gudmundsson said.

The hospital wants residents to know that they have weekly conversations with the CDC, the state and county health officials, and all are in alignment on prevention and treatment.

“We feel very prepared,” Gudmundsson said. “Hopefully the virus wear themselves out and eventually go away.”

But if someone is concerned and contacts a medical professional, they will be asked a series of questions, she said. Anyone walking into a clinic or the hospital ER will be asked if they have a fever and lower respiratory symptoms like a cough or trouble breathing, she said.

If they answer yes to any of these questions, they’ll be asked to wear a mask. In addition, if they have traveled to China in the past 14 days, or have been in contact with a person under investigation for the virus in the past 14 days, additional precautions will be taken. The person will be placed in airborne isolation, and CDC will be contacted for further recommendations and potential testing.

“There’s no treatment for this,” Gudmundsson said. “It’s like the flu. It’s a virus. There are no antiviral medications that we’ve been recommended to prescribe by the CDC.”

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Comments

that Pepe Escobar mentioned is taking a toll
on our national mental health as well.
Head ache indeed.
Thanks for the links SoE.
Will be taking the qi awareness with me today.

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studentofearth's picture

@QMS A source that is reliable becomes targeted for a takeover of ownership or management. The lag time before being noticed creates a new group of Zombie Believers staying with their favorite news source. Then sources with a history of Zombie Believers sneak a few truth tellers into their mix. Not enough to loose their Zombies, but add a few new followers. Then their company can have money funneled into to change the content. The cycle continues.

It is understandable why people check out of current events and into a bubble of their beliefs. I am getting dizzy.

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Still yourself, deep water can absorb many disturbances with minimal reaction.
--When the opening appears release yourself.

mimi's picture

that has nothing to do with the themes of your Open Thread?

I am so sad that the only people who speak a little truth to power, are always only comedians. Imagine they were serious ...

John Bolton Is Committed To Getting His Story Out, Even If It Takes Down President Trump
[video:https://youtu.be/o21Bs-EolBc]

I want the book NOW.

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@mimi
leak a little sensational bs to the slip stream media wolves
then make the public anxious for the upcoming release date
personally have no clue why anyone would want to see inside
the mind of that clown, but hey - HairyKissinger sold copy too!

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mimi's picture

@QMS
under all those layers of moustachios is the REAL one. Think about those, who missed out on the these books, they would have known better, if they had studied moustaches in depth.

The darn thing all those books from folks over there at your side of the pond, stare at me over here in bookstores as well.

You have to go into Museum's bookstores to catch a book from those ... folks, whose names one can and should not mention. Beware it"s dangerous. Better sneak in to the museum without being caught be surveillance cameras.

Not the best time of the year to get something friendly and nice out of me, QMS.

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@mimi
in the gathering gloom
Who's to say which is real
and which is an illusion?
Moody Blues

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lotlizard's picture

@mimi  
when he still had the chance — he coulda explained, “Hey, all these industrialists were begging me to give him a job, so I gave him a job, okay? But the guy’s nuts. He’s nuts! Listen to that guy and Germany will be in World War Six Great War Number Two! Not gonna happen . . ."

. . . Europe and all humanity would have been spared a lot of trouble.

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mimi's picture

@lotlizard

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studentofearth's picture

@mimi without losing your head. Too many non-humorous truth tellers have had tragic repercussions. Julian Assange, Martin Luther King, Chelsea Manning, Glenn Greenwald, environmental activists, the over 300 human rights activists killed in 2019, and the list continues to grow.

Please continue to contribute any thought or info in the Open Thread. It is an opportunity for for whats is on our minds for the day. I simply stay within a theme in my writing so it is easier to compose and finish.

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Still yourself, deep water can absorb many disturbances with minimal reaction.
--When the opening appears release yourself.

ggersh's picture

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I never knew that the term "Never Again" only pertained to
those born Jewish

"Antisemite used to be someone who didn't like Jews
now it's someone who Jews don't like"

Heard from Margaret Kimberley

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studentofearth's picture

@ggersh Any reported abuse may be censored. Ha Ha, no agenda to see here.

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Still yourself, deep water can absorb many disturbances with minimal reaction.
--When the opening appears release yourself.

Chest Fever
The Band

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Not Henry Kissinger's picture

During the Ebola epidemic in West Africa in 2014 – considered a maximum urgency, and facing a virus with a 90% fatality rate – the CDC took no less than two months from getting the first patient sample to identifying the complete genomic sequence. The Chinese did it in a few days.

makes one wonder whether they already knew the sequence and the danger. (i.e., this isn't a 'naturally occuring' virus.)

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The current working assumption appears to be that our Shroedinger's Cat system is still alive. But what if we all suspect it's not, and the real problem is we just can't bring ourselves to open the box?

Not Henry Kissinger's picture

@Not Henry Kissinger

Study suggesting earlier human transmission fuels public anger

TOKYO/HONG KONG -- The deadly new coronavirus from Wuhan was spreading from person to person as early as mid-December, weeks before China officially confirmed such transmission, government-funded Chinese researchers report in a top American medical journal.

The paper in the New England Journal of Medicine analyzes data on the first 425 confirmed cases in the central Chinese city of Wuhan, where the outbreak originated.

"On the basis of this information, there is evidence that human-to-human transmission has occurred among close contacts since the middle of December 2019," it reads. The paper notes that seven health care workers contracted the virus between Jan. 1 and Jan. 11 -- significant evidence of human-to-human transmission.

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The current working assumption appears to be that our Shroedinger's Cat system is still alive. But what if we all suspect it's not, and the real problem is we just can't bring ourselves to open the box?

@Not Henry Kissinger
thank you in Chinese?
https://www.thoughtco.com/how-to-pronounce-thank-you-2279496
neither do I
but this happened today

aid2692991-v4-728px-Say-Thank-You-in-Chinese-Step-5-Version-4.jpg
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studentofearth's picture

@Not Henry Kissinger Who and how released will probably stayed classified beyond our lifetimes. At this point dealing with the spread of infection and treating those infected should probably be the first priority. Seen more discussion on economic and political repercussions than on the lives of individuals and impact on communities.

I am concerned about our country's ability to respond with the cost of health services creating a reluctance to seek help and lack of sick leave encouraging individuals to keep working while sick. We are in the middle of flu and pneumonia season and could have misidentified infections late December and beginning of January related to international travel. My local hospital spokesman seems confident about the care that can be provided. But the hospital has started having doctors sign agreements restricting their ability to criticize care at the facility.

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Still yourself, deep water can absorb many disturbances with minimal reaction.
--When the opening appears release yourself.

mimi's picture

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studentofearth's picture

@gjohnsit Can not get average citizens to speak out so they can stay in the shadows.

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Still yourself, deep water can absorb many disturbances with minimal reaction.
--When the opening appears release yourself.

mimi's picture

[video:https://youtu.be/oFCHgWAGCyc]
France's Anti-Neoliberal Protesters Get Their Second Wind.

The strikers protesting President Macron's pension reform are expanding their target to the whole neoliberal system. They're gathering their forces for a new wave of opposition, says Le Monde Diplomatique's Renaud Lambert.

I think it's worth listening to.

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Dawn's Meta's picture

@mimi and accurate. The reaction to police violence is two directions: fear (don't bring kids to a march where police commit acts of random violence); and rising anger and more groups joining the marches.

One thing I see is that unions are much stronger and have proportionately more members. However, the sole business sectors such as nurses who almost always have their own office and will expect to drive to your home; osteopaths and other adjunct medical; stone masons; builders; various trades in construction; bakers; meat purveyors; hairdressers; anyone in a private soley-owned business has no union. This needs to be fixed.

Right now these are the people who are isolated; pay the most during strikes (can't take the train to work, must fuel up and use the car); their clients have difficulty getting to them.

It does create a backlash, quiet but solid against the strikers.

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A society grows great when old men plant trees in whose shade they know they shall never sit. Allegedly Greek, but more possibly fairly modern quote.

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