Budget for daycare

We know that the first few years of a child's life are the most formative. It is during this period that a child learns about their family history and how to not only appreciate but practice their unique cultural diversity. Where both parents are working this responsibility is often delegated to the grandparents- a job which they are most willing and able to fulfill- after all each grandparent does contribute 25% to the genetic pool of their grandchildren.
Although some Canadians may look at the recent budgeting by the federal government of billions for universal day care as a political tactic to buy votes, others may view it as another form of cultural genocide not unlike I might add that experienced by the aboriginals with the boarding schools. The only difference is that here the government would be targeting a younger population group - the preschooler.
With the ethnic diversity of the Canadian population it would be virtually impossible for a "teacher " to address all the cultural needs of a group of children from different ethnic backgrounds unless of course each supervisor received the diverse training or you recruited several supervisors for each group. Then of course there is the problem of physical abuse. In some of our existing private and public daycare centers, hidden cameras have already been placed to monitor the alleged physical violence of the supervisors.
I am no politician but would it not be more practical- indeed more humane and probably more cost effective- for governments to reduce the tax burden for working parents so that both are not required to work to balance their budgets and would be available to fulfil one of their obligations of parenthood?

Aboriginal summit

Paul Martin,provincial premiers and several aboriginal chiefs are currently meeting in an attempt to resolve the health, social, economical, and other problems of our native population.
Lets review how our governmental agencies have handled this in the past.
- First through wars, Royal charters (like the Hudson's Bay Co, later the railways, churches and other notables), and the many Indian treaties (some of which still have not been honored to this day ) our natives were placed on isolated reservations.
-Then came the literally kidnapping of thousands of native children and placing them in boarding schools were they were stripped of using their language and promoting their culture-cultural genocide
-Followed with promotion of the 3 big "D's":
1. Diseases like TB and smallpox (Some historians suggested that small pox may have been deliberately introduced with blankets)
2. Drink specifically alcohol
3. Diabetes- through promotion of sugar drinks).
Comment. I can still vividly recall my internship year at the St. Boniface General Hospital in the 1960's where I saw many Eskimo and Indian Children with their primary teeth appearing as rotten stumps, and with pus exuding from their ears canals. Even today it is not unusual to see vans full of children appearing at private dental offices to have removal of their entire set of primary teeth because of such tooth decay. Modern industries have also been devastating -hydro dams, lake pollution with mercury and other toxic chemicals,exploitation of Indian Reserve land to make golf courses etc.
Our government cannot use the excuse that they were not aware of the problems. Our former prime minister was at one time also the minister of Indian Affairs. Maybe we should not be surprised with the state of affairs of our native population if internationally similar problems exist and remain unsolved in many areas. For example by keeping the Palestian people in isolated communities, similar to what we have done with our Indians on reserves, the problem there has remained unsolved for over 30 years.

Action not more rhetoric (summits) is needed to solve the Canadian Aboriginal problem
Footnote: It would be unfortunate if the Canadian aboriginal waiting for a long overdue solution began using the same suicide bombing tactics used by Palestians. With our city "street gangs" such a scenario may indeed be possible. Lets hope not.

Hyperlipidemia and anemia

Both of the above clinical conditions are diagnosed by blood tests.
In hyperlipidemia the lipids in the blood-usually the LDL fraction commonly called the bad cholesterol- is elevated while in iron deficient anemia its the hemoglobin which shows lower than normal values. Are these really diseases or are they just defense mechanisms used by the body in its attempt to restore homeostasis?
We know that it is not the cholesterol but rather the peroxidized cholesterol which damages the arterial wall in the pathogenesis of atherosclerosis. These lipids are peroxized by free radicals present either in the food we eat or in our body tissues.
The fundamental question which pathologists should be asking is why do the lipids have to do this job for other defence mechanisms of the body- in this case the glutathione peroxidase and superoxide dysmutase enzyme systems. Indeed we may be doing more harm to our patients by lowering their blood cholesterol. It seems to me that what our bodies are really telling us is :

" You have too many free radicals circulating in your blood and tissues and your specific enzyme defence mechanisms are overwhelmed so you now have to use an alternate neutralizing mechanism called anti-oxidant nutrient supplementation, specifically anti-oxidant vitamins- like C, E and beta carotene or minerals like selenium and zinc. Additionally I will have your liver produce more cholesterol which can be used as a donor of electrons to these hungry free radicals. Did you know that uric acid is another natural anti-oxidant nutrient which plays a similar role in the body. I suggest that you use drugs which lower blood cholesterol levels cautiously and only after careful assessment- since you may be interfering with one of your body's homeostatic mechanism"

What about iron deficiency anemia? As I mentioned in my blog for Parkinson's disease iron is an ideal source for electron donors for the voracious appetite of these free radicals. A person with anemia may be depleting his body's ability to supply the free radicals, or alternatively your body may be reasoning that if I keep the level of iron low in vital tissues like the brain that maybe there will be less tissue damage. So with anemia your body might be telling you:

"If I am sacrificing your body's store of this mineral to donate electrons to those hungry free radicals to make them stable molecules again, I wont have enough iron to form the hemoglobulin molecule of the red blood cell and you will become anemic. Don't you think you should find out why your has so many free radicals ? Maybe its not overproduction but rather that your pathway to neutralize these radicals with enzymes has become inefficient. Please use caution in giving me more iron as supplements you may only mask the problem.
Alternatively your body may be rationalizing as it does with in the case of temperature except in a negative way.
" Remember when elevated body temperature (pyrexia ) was considered a disease. Now we know it is one of the body's mechanism to achieve homeostasis whether it is locally for an area of infection like a wound or systemically where the core or body temperature can rise several degrees in an attempt to kill or stop the growth by an invading micro-organism"
It might be rewarding for us to listen to our body's more often. They are talking to us all the time if we only took time to listen.

Parkinson's Disease

PD is characterized by a loss of neurons (brain cells) in the substantia nigra located in the mid brain. These neurons produce the neurotransmitter dopamine. Symptoms of PD usually only appear after the loss of dopamine exceeds 80%. The production of ROTS-Reactive Oxygen Toxic Species are the major causes of death of neurons- indeed also for most of our other degenerative diseases like heart disease,cancer, diabetes, dementia etc. These species are called free radicals. Because they lack an electron in their outer rings they take away or steal electrons from macromolecules like DNA, RNA, proteins and lipids. Although in the process they have become stable, they have produced damage to the electron donor molecules, e.g for DNA- resulting in mutations; for proteins- autoimmunity and so on.
The brain is an ideal organ for such oxidation reactions.
1. It is the organ in the body with the largest amount of polyunsaturated lipids an excellent substrate for lipid peroxidation recognized easily diagnosed by our kitchen staff as rancidity
2. It receives 20% of the blood circulation for an organ just the size of your 2 clenched fists and weighing only about 2 pounds
3. The brain also houses large amounts of iron an ideal source for donor electrons needed to initiate and catalyze the oxidative stress reaction.
ROTS are generated in one of 2 ways: intrinsically by normal metabolism or extrinsically by ingestion of alcohol,various drugs and other neurotoxins. Let us review some of the extrinsic causes.
Scientific literature has discussed the mechanism for the designer drug MPTP and why young adults can get the symptoms A drug review of such young adults showing the tremor,rigidity and other features of PD might prove interesting. I want to relate my family experience.My dad was a gardener by occupation. One wet summer season he had to dust the entire potato crop by hand- over 20 acres I cant recall which insecticide he used but I remember he did not use a mask. Within a few years he developed the symptoms of PD. A few years ago using the same duster, but spraying a potato crop on a much smaller scale , I began noticing involuntary twitching of my thumbs. As a medical doctor I had heard of the use of Eldepryl for PD and began taking it . I was surprised to notice that within a few days my twitching stopped. It has not returned and fortunately I don't have any Parkinson's symptoms- yet. Incidently the neurologist had put my dad on artane even though levodopa and I believe also bromocriptine was available at the time.

Preservation with ransom money

If we were to analyze and compare the recent sponsorship scandal to the Canadian Government's handling of the ongoing health care crisis we would find some striking similarities.
In the former case the government has allocated annually billions of dollars (the sponsorship is only the tip of this iceberg) to support their strategy of how to retain Quebec in confederation, while in the case of preserving health care they have budgeted over 40 billion over the next 10 years also in their ongoing attempt to preserve the 5 pillars of our health care delivery system.
It would also appear that our senior government seems to be using this "ransom money " to treat symptoms rather than causes of these two national crisis problems.
Unless they make this shift in their strategy, they will not only continue to empty the public coffers but in the end could even loose both these battles.

Immortality

Man is the longest living mammal on earth
In the Book of Genesis Chapter 6 verse 3 we read "And God said: My spirit shall not always dwell in man, since he is of flesh; yet the number of his days shall be one hundred and twenty years"
Gerontologists who are scientists that study the causes and effects of aging and the means of controlling this biological process, accept the theologian's estimate of 120 for the maximum life span. One significant difference between the 2 groups relates to achieving immortality.
For theologians with their cathedrals, pyramids, mosques, synagogues, temples or other places of worship the solution is simple. They just convince their followers with the compromise that you must first die in order to achieve "afterlife everlasting" or immortality
To some gerontologists, the requirement of death on earth is too high a price to pay. Some have even become skeptical of this theological guarantee. So in their houses of worship called laboratories rather than preach they feel the solution lies in experiments designed to extend maximum life span. There is
another group out there called longevists who experiment on themselves by taking dubious potions, like free radical scavengers and other nutritional supplements, or by becoming involved in life extension programs like calorie restriction, body temperature lowering devices, and in some cases even yielding to the most Draconian measure of suspended animation by having their entire bodies preserved in liquid nitrogen a process called cryogenics-a procedure which must be done while you are still alive. I am told that some commercial cyrogenic labs offer specials for those who only want to preserve their heads- a bargain which might appeal to the Nobel laureate's and other geniuses especially if their bodies were crippled with arthritis, diabetes, heart disease or other chronic diseases. Such individuals feel that in the future we will have developed procedures to thaw such frozen bodies and bring them back to life- like we now do with human sperm, ova and more recently with early human embryos.
At the present time the closest procedure man has developed for achieving immortality on earth is by procreation- some family trees going back for many centuries. For procreation you don't need theological guarantees from preachers and their elaborate institutions, gerontologists with their sophisticated laboratories, shiny equipment, and shelves of anti-aging drugs and nutrients. All you need is just doing "what comes naturally "

Iris scan for airport security

The Government of Canada is circulating to the public a letter entitled CANPASS- Air membership. One can proceed through airport security by inserting a membership card into a slot, and provide an iris scan. To get this membership card, you register, have a photograph taken with a digital camera of your iris and of course pay a non-refundable CAN$50 annual processing fee.
At the airport you insert your card into a slot, provide an iris scan and go through security unless of course you are randomly selected for inspection.
If iridology has any scientific basis, then this "iris recognition biometric technology " may not be a reliable test for security like fingerprints and/or DNA analysis.